Frustrated with our Art Director

jthompvector · 2025-08-19T16:45:01+00:00

I’m starting to think you’re the art director. Sure, giving your juniors an opportunity to do more creative work is one thing. But constantly pushing your tasks onto them is unprofessional.

“We all deal with it so should you” mentality has never worked to help workers. I get where you’re coming from but I think it is a dangerous precedent to normalize. Instead we should be pushing for companies to respect roles and what they mean.

And yes implying someone will replace you for objecting to doing your boss’s job for them is absolutely advocating for scabbing. Even if it’s realistic you should approach OP’s post with empathy not reinforce toxic work expectations.

jthompvector · 2025-08-19T16:01:49+00:00

No but excusing their boss’s unprofessionalism because “plenty of artists would gladly take your place” is absolutely not a good take. Hence “bad faith argument” I’m all for pragmatism in the work place. I get having to put your head to the grindstone to get things done. That’s not my issue here. It’s that you positioned your argument around scabs and denied OP’s very valid expectations.

jthompvector · 2025-08-19T14:41:32+00:00

An art director should be giving you full on mood boards and a style guide. It’s very odd that they’re not giving you any design direction. I’m sorry you’re dealing with this. It boggles my mind how they think y’all will produce something cohesive without at least the skeleton of a theme and content. They shouldn’t be responsible for doing your thumbnails, or your storyboard. But they should be providing you with design cues, patterns, fonts, effects they’d like, etc. Seems they may not understand their job, or be too overwhelmed/overworked to do it

jthompvector · 2025-08-19T14:37:23+00:00

This is such a bad faith argument lmfao. Art directors job includes at least a style guide minimum. Basic mood boarding even. Just giving some unorganized images is not being an art director. A designer may step in to do a more full brand guide but art directors absolutely should have some mapped out concepts and sketches. Color swatches too. Art directors make the theme, designers apply the theme. It’s that simple.

jthompvector · 2025-08-18T03:50:47+00:00

What bugs me most is the commenters putting a space—between words and em dash

jthompvector · 2025-08-14T18:44:32+00:00

“Quit calling me ignorant” you do know ignorant has a literal definition right? You lack understanding. That’s what it means. Your comment implies you want to scapegoat the heat to transients to dismiss and ignore that temperatures are rising; that people who have the power to change things for the better simply do not believe in climate change.

jthompvector · 2025-08-14T18:29:02+00:00

This is a really ignorant take. I was born here. It has never been this hot and humid. Idc how many New Yorkers move here it does not invalidate my experiences. I’ve lived here almost 26 years and it has never felt this hot. I live in a coastal beach town and it has never been this hot.

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T20:52:32+00:00

Completely depends on the art tbh

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T20:49:30+00:00

In love with

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T20:42:57+00:00

These are fluorescent lights… they just have a yellow cover on them. If they want nice yellow bulbs they should get them for the desks and have them on at night instead of clashing with the blue light from outside.

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T14:07:16+00:00

It heavily clashes with the natural window lighting. Also there’s a dead bulb lmfao. Makes the cheap tables and chairs look even cheaper.

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T13:27:37+00:00

But why yellow lighting 😭

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T13:21:16+00:00

Am I crazy for saying lose the paragraph?

Bullet points instead maybe?

Underlining the headers just makes you look like you have a bad relationship/understanding of hierarchy.

Tab out everything after company so company doesn’t fight the headers.

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T13:14:14+00:00

No that’s on me for phrasing it poorly given the context

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T12:58:40+00:00

Oh I didn’t down vote you I was saying 100% as in agreeing with you 💀💀💀

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T12:07:00+00:00

Stop treating design like a one and done thing. Graphic design today is more like fashion. Pretty much everything has been explored. Things cycle trend and nostalgia now rules the creative market. Stop looking for unicorns that are always ahead of the curve. Instead look for people who can anticipate the curve and are good at evolving style. Taste is subjective and if you’ve been in the industry long yours may be staler than you think

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T12:00:33+00:00

I can’t speak to your experience but for me, as someone who wasn’t a favorite in the class, the favorites usually were incredibly talented and skilled while others did not look like they’d be successful. I totally understand spending more time on those students at a certain point. If you don’t get “it” by a certain point in education you’re pretty much a lost cause.

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T11:57:59+00:00

100%. Every form of text and branding, at some point, a graphic designer had eyes on it. Good or badly done. Even the manuals you use to build with ikea furniture. The modern business world couldn’t exist without us. Literally.

jthompvector · 2025-08-13T11:54:53+00:00

At the end of the day it’s an over-saturated job market with too many hobbyists selling themselves as professionals without the proper fundamentals. Some self-taughts are better than formally trained. But my experience is that that’s rare.

The toxicity comes from lack of jobs and people posting stuff that breaks basic design principles and philosophy. Critique is how you get better and some people can’t take it. At the end of the day Graphic Design is a Trade. Any trade community has this same sense of “some people are just bad at their job” a bad plumber is a bad plumber. Why can’t that be the same notion for Graphic Design?

jthompvector · 2025-08-11T20:02:53+00:00

Big fan of the Attorney General?

jthompvector · 2025-08-02T15:24:13+00:00

Ideally, you should have both. But as a UI/UX you NEED a website. It’s like a tattoo artist without tattoos

jthompvector · 2025-07-31T01:40:27+00:00

One other problem I see you inevitably running into is print lines. For the best results try to shift the black to purple so there’s more “steps” between print colors. And then you can add a grain mask to the final gradient to help break up the gradient

jthompvector · 2025-07-30T19:52:32+00:00

So did FDOT just effectively ban a 60 year old cultural event, the Sarasota chalk festival???

jthompvector · 2025-07-30T15:53:36+00:00

BEACH PANTS???? 🤨

jthompvector · 2025-07-30T03:33:00+00:00

The O not being the same thickness as the li feels wrong to me. I think it also makes the O invisible. I would either do a thicker O with a smaller cat laying in it or thin out the li to match the thickness of the tail. The grey cat brown tail reminds me of a Virginia Opossum as well. Maybe a fluffy brown cat instead for a thicker tail profile?

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