I’m telling myself each time when I’m starting a project, “Make a mockup!“. Still, there are simple projects, and you want to make them fast without entering a normal design process. Like to use a good template and just change the logo. But when a logo is added, I often see the template would need some color change, etc., etc.
Each time I wasn’t making a draft design before starting to implement, it turned out to be much longer, than in projects where I prepared a draft and approved it with a client, before implementation. So I’m telling myself again, “Create a draft before implementing it!” And you should do this too. Otherwise, you’ll find yourself struggling without a concept, continuously editing CSS, images, and HTML without a clue about what are you doing and what’s the goal.
So do yourself a favor, make a design mock-up before implementation, even for simplest one. The project will go much faster and better.
I’m not telling it’s not possible to redesign on a live site, it just takes more work and a longer time.
As my Art School teacher said once: “I could draw a face starting from any detail, but you’ll do better if you start from a general head shape deepening into details later on“. This is true. I already could do it starting from a detail. But it’s still faster and better to start from a general design draft. You can organize fonts, colors, and elements as needed beforehand. You can then approve it with a client avoiding most future misunderstandings and discussions. And most importantly, you’ll know your implementation aims and means. You’ll have a list of colors to use on pages, you’ll not be required to try several fonts for a site, and you’ll have everything already planned.
It’s enough to make a homepage design mockup, and if there are important pages, you could add them too to a draft. Other pages gonna be ok, you’ll have a mainframe for them.
So sorry about this post, but I had to remind to myself after falling into this trap again. It was a success after all, anyway 🙂