Web Design Blog

I was sitting here waiting for a download to complete, reading blogs and articles when I thought… I’ve forgotten to just play. It brings me back after so many years to a time when I wrote HTML just because I could. I remember the satisfaction I felt when I was able to make some cool pendulum thing in Flash by extending someone else’s pendulum. I also remember the satisfaction of hooking up my first webpage to a database.

So where does this bring me?
As we grow in our careers, client and marketing take over our lives. We’re constantly asking ourselves where is the next lead, what’s our next project. These are important focus areas in our careers. We have to feed ourselves and our families. However this constant pressure to get new work can take some of the joy out of our career. A career is something you enjoy. We have to remember this fact lest we fall into a rut.

In The Middle
Somewhere between meeting client needs and gaining new clients there is a middle ground. It’s the ground we use to grow as web designers/developers. It’s important for everyone to learn something new because you have to stay on top of web design trends. This can put additional pressures on you. Sometimes I’ve thought “How can I possibly stay on top of everything?” You can’t but you can keep up with most of the trends.

Where’s The Fun?
Pressure is the enemy of fun. How do we combat that simple need to perform better than the next guy? How do we move forward? It comes down to remembering when you started. What was fun about web design? Why did you start? For me as I said it was satisfaction. It’s important for us to find that satisfaction again. I’ve found it when completing a client’s website but that’s not the only place to find satisfaction.

Don’t forget to Play
I spent a year getting a teaching credential and during that time I taught kindergardeners through high schoolers. What I remember the most of all that time was if a lesson was fun the kids responded better to it. They remembered it longer. By taking a leaf out of my own teaching background, I’ve found that learning can be fun if we take the pressure out of it. Last year I spent some time in photoshop playing in a simple design contest for no prize and nothing for a website… just for fun. It was on a discussion board for a series of books by one of my favorite authors. It was fun bringing the book’s characters to life. Nobody got work because of it, we just patted each other on the back.

Go Play
We need to take time out each day or once a week or once a month to just play at our craft. No pressure just play. It’s the playing that got many of us started and it’s the play that will make us better. It’s a time to relax because the outcome doesn’t matter. This weekend I got interested in using ffmpeg for video uploads and conversions to flv format with asp.net. I completely forgot my sense of time. After 7 hours of research, trial and error I have a small working upload button that transforms an avi to a flash video file. I don’t have a client for it but I do have satisfaction in doing it. So I did play this weekend after all.

How do you play? Let us know.

Web Out
Des

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