5 ms·

Just to belabor your well made point, here is an example of a final PSD I received from a 'professional agency': (from psdgrade.com) https://cloudup.com/c5RmHN

Just to belabor your well made point, here is an example of a final PSD I received from a 'professional agency': (from psdgrade.com) https://cloudup.com/c5RmHN8t1QZ https://cloudup.com/c5RmHN8t1QZ https://cloudup.com/cmpmBEYg93c https://cloudup.com/cmpmBEYg93c Thats 27 different font sizes for ONE PAGE of a site. I bet most of this was done through scaling layers to 'fit' into spaces. There were also 42 layers named some verson of <shape>-n.

grey-area 13y ago
Would you normally expect a psd to contain exactly specified type sizes? I don't use psd comps myself, but I'd treat them as more sketches and guidelines as to actual style and placement, rather than some sort of specification document, because it's a different medium and text handling in ps is pretty basic - it's really not suited to extensive text layout.
- wonderyak 13y ago
  Yes, since there is an implicit agreement beforehand that the PSD should be converted to HTML/CSS. For example, if I missed a border on an element or margin spacing between text areas this would be something I would be expected to fix. The designer would most likely point this out. Many designers I've worked with get very upset if you change anything in this regard without some sort of discussion. The point you bring up about text handling is true as well, which is another reason that PS is not a great way to design for the web. AI might be a little better, but not by much.
  - grey-area 13y ago
    Yes, since there is an implicit agreement beforehand that the PSD should be converted to HTML/CSS. I see why it'd be a pain for you, but feel like this process of handing over a supposedly pixel-perfect design is inherently broken - without collaboration the design will be dead as handed over - it should be changing constantly as you encounter difficulties, first in translation to templates, then in putting in content. Specifying text sizes in a PSD is insane! It doesn't even have styles so I see why the designer hadn't bothered. I think I'd honestly prefer to receive a hand-drawn image with scribbles for the different text sizes.
    - wonderyak 13y ago
      Oh, the process (as normally done for the past decade) is completely broken. Thats one of the reasons that the groupthink behind "PSD to HTML is Dead" is important in spite of how hyperbolic the statement is. There is always an adjustment period throughout development, however just a simple understanding of the medium would eliminate all but the toughest of these problems. For as long as I've done this I have mostly worked with designers that started in print, have zero to very little experience in working with the web and do not care to learn. It is not just the designers who hold blame here though as the instituions which employ them do not require anything more than they've done their whole careers. Combine that with the fact that a lot of these designers are expected to design for both print and screen, it creates a situation where you cannot expect someone to know all of the nuances of both mediums. When this happens, things like declared text sizing is important in the PSD because thats how they set up their print files too. Everything is implicit.
  - johnjlocke 13y ago
    So developers actually have to know quite a bit of Photoshop in order to translate designs into authentic representations of a mockup.
- IgorPartola 13y ago
  To pile onto wonderyak's point, I am a developer, not a designer. I wish I was also a designer, but due to where my talents and experience lies, I cannot do both well at this point. The problem is that I cannot tell what is and what is not important in a design that is handed to me. I have had conversations with designers where I inadvertently change a margin on a callout box by +/- 10% and the designer notices and explains that they arrived at the exact margin by a long research process, and by the way it matches all other places where the margin is exactly 40 pixels and not 36, etc. There are changes that are not consequential and there are changes that completely undermine the message the designer was trying to send. This is not an ego trip. This is a professional telling me that they've thought through the problem and I trust they know much more about the problem domain than I do. Ideally, I try not to change the design if possible. However, unless the designer is very good, it does require lots of tweaking here and there, which introduces delays and compromises the vision for the finished product. If a designer has long since walked away, it can become a huge problem.
  - grey-area 13y ago
    As a designer and a developer (I often do both), I think I see where you're coming from, however I feel this is more a sign of a breakdown in the relationship between the developer and designer than a shortcoming of the tools. Design isn't so scary - I think a lot more developers should try to pick up a little, just as designers should know at least a little about the final medium for their work, and in an ideal workplace there should be at least a handover with plenty of chance for feedback on things like text styles, not just throwing something (PSDs in this case) over the wall from designer to developer. I would never accept a photoshop comp as a developer or send one as a designer and expect it to be reproduced exactly, because it's in the wrong medium, and it's a terrible way to specify things like text sizes or column widths except as a general indication. There has to be some give and take (and a lot of feedback) in a process going from something static and done without grids like a sketch (e.g. a psd or pencil sketch) to a final website, so what you describe in your feedback from the designer is a normal process I think and to be welcomed, it's inevitable in the translation to HTML. The design will change as it has content added and goes into templates, adaptations will have to be made, and the design must be flexible enough to deal with that, and your designer should be around to help with it - if they're not they're not doing their job properly. I guess what I'm trying to say is that dealing with change is part of the job in design, and your designer should gracefully do so, in which case it is no problem if they gave you a vague psd - it should be vague at the early stage before implementation, because there will be changes, and additionally, html is just not a medium which allows us to specify layouts which are exactly the same in all conditions - browsers, text sizes, fonts, scripts, proxy servers mangling images, user stylesheets all affect layouts, so you have to accept that not all users will see content at exactly the same sizes or with the same fonts or even the images as you intended them (if they're on a mobile network, a proxy might have downsampled the images).

grey-area 13y ago

Would you normally expect a psd to contain exactly specified type sizes? I don't use psd comps myself, but I'd treat them as more sketches and guidelines as to actual style and placement, rather than some sort of specification document, because it's a different medium and text handling in ps is pretty basic - it's really not suited to extensive text layout.

wonderyak 13y ago
Yes, since there is an implicit agreement beforehand that the PSD should be converted to HTML/CSS. For example, if I missed a border on an element or margin spacing between text areas this would be something I would be expected to fix. The designer would most likely point this out. Many designers I've worked with get very upset if you change anything in this regard without some sort of discussion. The point you bring up about text handling is true as well, which is another reason that PS is not a great way to design for the web. AI might be a little better, but not by much.
- grey-area 13y ago
  Yes, since there is an implicit agreement beforehand that the PSD should be converted to HTML/CSS. I see why it'd be a pain for you, but feel like this process of handing over a supposedly pixel-perfect design is inherently broken - without collaboration the design will be dead as handed over - it should be changing constantly as you encounter difficulties, first in translation to templates, then in putting in content. Specifying text sizes in a PSD is insane! It doesn't even have styles so I see why the designer hadn't bothered. I think I'd honestly prefer to receive a hand-drawn image with scribbles for the different text sizes.
  - wonderyak 13y ago
    Oh, the process (as normally done for the past decade) is completely broken. Thats one of the reasons that the groupthink behind "PSD to HTML is Dead" is important in spite of how hyperbolic the statement is. There is always an adjustment period throughout development, however just a simple understanding of the medium would eliminate all but the toughest of these problems. For as long as I've done this I have mostly worked with designers that started in print, have zero to very little experience in working with the web and do not care to learn. It is not just the designers who hold blame here though as the instituions which employ them do not require anything more than they've done their whole careers. Combine that with the fact that a lot of these designers are expected to design for both print and screen, it creates a situation where you cannot expect someone to know all of the nuances of both mediums. When this happens, things like declared text sizing is important in the PSD because thats how they set up their print files too. Everything is implicit.
- johnjlocke 13y ago
  So developers actually have to know quite a bit of Photoshop in order to translate designs into authentic representations of a mockup.
IgorPartola 13y ago
To pile onto wonderyak's point, I am a developer, not a designer. I wish I was also a designer, but due to where my talents and experience lies, I cannot do both well at this point. The problem is that I cannot tell what is and what is not important in a design that is handed to me. I have had conversations with designers where I inadvertently change a margin on a callout box by +/- 10% and the designer notices and explains that they arrived at the exact margin by a long research process, and by the way it matches all other places where the margin is exactly 40 pixels and not 36, etc. There are changes that are not consequential and there are changes that completely undermine the message the designer was trying to send. This is not an ego trip. This is a professional telling me that they've thought through the problem and I trust they know much more about the problem domain than I do. Ideally, I try not to change the design if possible. However, unless the designer is very good, it does require lots of tweaking here and there, which introduces delays and compromises the vision for the finished product. If a designer has long since walked away, it can become a huge problem.
- grey-area 13y ago
  As a designer and a developer (I often do both), I think I see where you're coming from, however I feel this is more a sign of a breakdown in the relationship between the developer and designer than a shortcoming of the tools. Design isn't so scary - I think a lot more developers should try to pick up a little, just as designers should know at least a little about the final medium for their work, and in an ideal workplace there should be at least a handover with plenty of chance for feedback on things like text styles, not just throwing something (PSDs in this case) over the wall from designer to developer. I would never accept a photoshop comp as a developer or send one as a designer and expect it to be reproduced exactly, because it's in the wrong medium, and it's a terrible way to specify things like text sizes or column widths except as a general indication. There has to be some give and take (and a lot of feedback) in a process going from something static and done without grids like a sketch (e.g. a psd or pencil sketch) to a final website, so what you describe in your feedback from the designer is a normal process I think and to be welcomed, it's inevitable in the translation to HTML. The design will change as it has content added and goes into templates, adaptations will have to be made, and the design must be flexible enough to deal with that, and your designer should be around to help with it - if they're not they're not doing their job properly. I guess what I'm trying to say is that dealing with change is part of the job in design, and your designer should gracefully do so, in which case it is no problem if they gave you a vague psd - it should be vague at the early stage before implementation, because there will be changes, and additionally, html is just not a medium which allows us to specify layouts which are exactly the same in all conditions - browsers, text sizes, fonts, scripts, proxy servers mangling images, user stylesheets all affect layouts, so you have to accept that not all users will see content at exactly the same sizes or with the same fonts or even the images as you intended them (if they're on a mobile network, a proxy might have downsampled the images).