Wherein I am exotic and menial

The Design Observer has an article about being designers and their role as "Exotic Menials". Laughed out loud when I followed a link to this. Not that it's particularly funny in any way, but it hits a little too close to home at the moment.

In my employment as a freelance designer I haven't had much experience. A couple of jobs for tiny companies, most of which I doubt are still around today. And yet for some strange reason even the tiniest of these seemed fascinated with the idea of Branding. Whenever the CEO of Small Generic Company Very Pte Ltd whispered to me in hushed tones about how branding would bring him business beyond his wildest dreams I had to resist the urge to roll my eyes and risk losing a job. The word still makes me vaguely quesy these days, although my days as a freelancer are over. Perhaps because I was never a design student I never developed the conceit that branding was controllable, at least through design means.

Consistent design does not constitute branding.

Good design does not constitute branding.

A logo does not constitute branding.

Which is not to say these things are not part of the whole package, but they're just the surface of things. Designers who claim they'll help you brand your company are just saying they'll help you come up with consistent designs, which is like having the painters come over. A dilapidated house will still look ugly no matter how nice the paint-job is.

Of course, the poo-poo-ers are bound to shake their heads and accuse me of being a dinosaur still living in a world of production values, but I still say the best way to brand is to have good service and better products. Whilst the measure of a designer should be the ability to make sucky products look good, I'd like to see the successful designer who can take up campaigns like the Americans Against Islam Society and still come up smelling good.

My point is that the primary point of design should be to add value, not to create it (unless you're trying to sell design).

Guess I'm no exotic. But for a menial I still possess some display value.

Today, as I was tracing a logo to touch it up, the entire office gathered behind me to look (having the cubicle beside the pantry makes for high-volume site traffic). They made guesses as to what I was doing, politely not rousing me from my state of intense concentration with their questions and making token comments like "What the hell, sia..." and "Wah, what is that huh..." whilst I added vector points using Photoshop's pen tool (intensely concentration required not to roll eyes). I explained to them that I was tracing a logo in vector form as the original was too low in resolution, and people nodded in agreement, muttering generic technical terms that I think were directed at me for some kind of approval.

They dispersed when, after a couple of clicks, no exciting bright lights flashed on the screen announcing a message in bright red Courier font saying GRAPHIC COMPLETED, COMPUTER SUCCESSFULLY HACKED or YOU NOW HAVE COMPLETE ACCESS TO THE SYSTEM.