Design Edu Today

Shannon Crabill, Email Developer at T. Rowe Price, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the design of emails for a global investment management firm. Shannon goes in-depth on the need to research and understand the purpose and goal of sending emails to inform the visual design. Shannon also shares tips for designing calls to action with the body of an email, and she reveals the struggles to code emails for all the different email clients.

Jay Fanelli, co-founder of Cotton Bureau, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the skills necessary to be a contemporary designer such as designing micro interactions, and design systems (not style guides). Jay also discusses the specifics on the need to produce high fidelity prototypes before getting too far along in the visual design process. Finally, the conversation goes into what a designer’s portfolio should like, what it shouldn’t, and how non visual design choices can say more about the portfolio than the work itself.

Chris Hallahan, User Experience Designer and Design Educator at Kent State University, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the nuts and bolts of teaching responsive web design in a single class including different strategies for teaching HTML and CSS, User Experience, and Visual Design. We also touch on how that class fits into a larger curriculum and what an idea set of courses or program would look like.

Gary Rozanc reflects on what he has learned from hosting the Design Edu Today podcast on its two-year anniversary by revealing his top five takeaways. Gary also discusses the upcoming hiatus so he can redesign the show's website.

Lucas Roe, User Experience Designer at Fastspot, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss what the hiring process looks like for web and user experience designers, what should be in a student’s portfolio if they want to get a job as an interactive designer, and how User Experience Design is different from Graphic Design and Interactive Design and requires different training.

Meagan Petri Digital Art Director at Planit joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the pitfalls of responsive web design, from site performance to digital typography. Meagan also shares her thoughts on HTML and CSS, and how the web is a different medium and needs a different skillset from print design. The conversation ends with a discussion of information architecture, wireframes and other user experience disciplines.

Meagan Petri Digital Art Director at the Baltimore firm Planit joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the details of the design workflow at a large agency. Meagan covers tools for design through team communication. She also discusses the importance of working in teams including working with project managers and developers, not just fellow designers. Finally, Meagan discusses the importance of email design, and taking great notes along with version control.

Tsilli Pines Digital Creative Director, and Mark Hoffmann Director of Interactive Technology at FINE joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the pitfalls of responsive web design including how visual designers anticipate breakpoints and work alongside developers. Tsilli and Mark also discuss how the web is a different medium and needs a different skillset from print design. Finally we chat about how hard it is for educators to find the right balance of HTML and CSS for interactive designers.

Tsilli Pines, Digital Creative Director at FINE joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the in-depth details of the digital design workflow at FINE. Tsilli starts from the very beginning of the process, the initial client meeting. She then goes into specifics on file naming conventions and version control. Tsilli ends the conversation discussing creating prototypes. Her colleague Mark Hoffmann Director of Interactive Technology at FINE also joins the conversation to talk about the design and front-end developer relationship.

Dana Pavlichko, Designer at Happy Cog, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the ins and outs of content strategy from the graphic design perspective. This includes where content strategy fits into the overall design process, how it identifies the voice of the client, and how that voice should be driving the visual design. We also briefly discuss ways to safely get students into better drawing habits.