Brought my son to this place and was genuinely floored when I saw this. I can’t imagine taking so little care with something and then saying, “Yeah, looks good. Send it off to the printer. Make it 25 feet long.”

What makes it even better is that this wasn’t an isolated incident. The entire place was absolutely littered with stuff like this, along with some truly spectacular examples of AI-slop artwork.

I am experimenting with both minimalist and brutalist styles, and I would appreciate some criticisms, opinions and thoughts.

Made with Photoshop and Illustrator, and with stock images from Google/Pinterest/Yandex.

Cheers!

Edit: No AI was used in the creation of these designs. None of the stock images are also AI generated. Felt like clarifying that.

EDIT: There is zero AI and I'm still a beginner designer thats self-teaching.
Please don't be so quick to judge things as AI. The mockup was free and was downloaded a year or so ago: Chocolate Bar Packaging Free Mockup

Hello guys! I have a personal project that I would love any advice for in order to improve. This one took me quite a long time and unfortunately, I feel like I stumbled across this solution rather than carefully crafting it. I was married to certain concepts that I simply couldn't execute and was too stubborn to give up. Your thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

Objective:

To create two luxury chocolate bar packaging designs that are based on the video game: "Final Fantasy 7." The packaging should resemble something you would find being sold in the real world but also in the world of FF7. In real life, you would find this chocolate bar sold in official merchandise shops that mostly gamers would seek out and you would purchase it with the feeling that it's something that would actually be sold in the world of the game.

Background:

I decided on "SHINRA CONFECTIONARY CO." as the company name and based it on "Shinra Electric Power Company" (or Shinra Inc.) from the game. Shinra Inc. is a megacorporation that paved the way for futuristic technology through innovation by any means necessary and takes pride in themselves and their achievements. It only stands to reason that the kind of packaging that they would design would be one of quality, luxury, and something that doesn't compromise on their self-image.

I made sure to keep these things in mind along with the target audience(s) when considering what style and feeling I wanted to go for.

Audience:

This was the hardest part since there are two target audiences that I was designing for:

1. The real audience in our world.
2. The fake audience in a fictional world with a different culture, society, issues, etc...

I eventually settled with these traits for both audiences but with contextual changes made for the fictional audience:

• Age: 18-45 years old
• Gender: Male/Female
• Education: High School Diploma or above
• Income Level: Middle/Upper Class
• Married: N/A
• Interests: Video games, premium chocolate, merchandise, collectables

Design:

Balancing Minimalism with eye-catching visual elements that any gamer/Shinra Inc. fan would instantly recognize was my aim for this design. Minimalism for the quiet, yet confident feeling of a high-quality product. Then eye-catching elements to make consumers give the packaging a double take as they walk by and know exactly what the design is referencing.

I left the company name in a straightforward, yet classy serif typeface at the top of the design to give the impression that the brand speaks for itself and doesn't need to stand out to make a statement. Shinra Inc.'s pride and confidence shines through by allowing their designs to do the talking.

In my research, I noticed a lot of premium chocolate bars utilized large shapes to chunk important info and also give the subtle impression that those same elements are "seals of quality" from the company producing them. It also helped with brand continuity and instant recognizability. These were my intentions for the diamonds in the middle of each design.

The illustrations and colors were chosen to reflect the flavors of each chocolate bar and the in-game material that they reference. After all, I want the real audience to feel like the person behind the design actually did the research and appreciates/respects the game. I also assumed that the gamers who bought this merchandise would also keep and possibly display the packaging as a keepsake of the time they spent going to the shop to find this official product commemorating their beloved game.

I’m rebranding Markolé, a platform for entrepreneurs building their first brand. The original identity was deliberately understated, leaving room for customers’ brands. I felt ours needed more character.

The references were Bauhaus and mid-century design: condensed typography, strong colour blocks, paper textures and overlapping panels. The oversized numbers double as windows into the photos.

I’d appreciate feedback on the hierarchy and readability. Does the visual system hold together across these screens? Where does it start feeling too busy?

Meaning, when you want to work on your own brand or personal project. Ever get that feeling where you think you've done a great job but then never get satisfied with it, in a sense you're always micro analyzing your design and reworking it till exhausting or delaying it for another day.

Dealing with client work on the other hand seems easier in a sense there are deadlines and milestones to reach. Can anyone relate?

BLACK AND WHITE ARACHNIDS!

I wanted to exercise my artistic skills to the use and create album covers inspired by original ones so i hope you enjoyed these xd

I did not want to put the scorpion set aflame so fire ants should be the best alternative

I was thinking of using these for my portfolio, let me know if you guys have feedback I'm serious in building a small career for album designs

I'm a beginner designer eager to refine my skills and master visual concepts. Here is one of my recent designs! I would love your honest, constructive feedback to help me grow. What key areas, design principles, or technical concepts should I focus on developing to take this layout to the next level?

I've made a previous thread about my current freelancing situation here, but I'll paraphrase below:

• Designer since 2018, with in-house, agency, and freelance experience across print and digital for both local and international clients.
• Unexpectedly made redundant from a fully remote, in-house role in May.
• Moved to a rural location to be with my girlfriend who had a stage 2 Lymphoma diagnosis in the same week as my redundancy (insane, I know).
• Local in-person jobs are non-existent due to location, and I don't drive.
• Attempting to make freelancing work for the first time.
• I have a one day a week retainer, who are doing well as a company. Corporate work and the people are lovely. It's been more than one day a week until recently, but it's calmed down to 'just' that recently.
• My retainer pays enough a month to 'just' about cover all of my outgoings, permitting I'm frugal. I've currently got a runway of about 7~ months.

With the above info at hand, I'm wondering how to best utilise my time (ideally 9am-5pm, Monday to Thursday) to take my existing skills (or learn other skills) to bring in more income, and scale within reason to pad out my existing situation.

I'm finding that each Sunday since 'accidentally' going freelance, my 'Sunday scaries' (as much as I hate that term) are more about how daunting a mostly 'empty' week is, and wondering where the money and work will be coming from.

I want to overhaul my offline portfolio document, portfolio website, LinkedIn etc and commit to learning the business of design and adding an air of maturity to things, rather than simply being a 'creative for hire'. In a perfect world I'd land another corporate retainer or two to increase things.

So, for those of you freelancing, how do you cope with anxieties on your Sundays? How are you filling quieter/emptier periods such as days, weeks, or months? Any general advice at all?

Thanks so much to the community as always.

Yesterday I posted some of my favorite "killed" book covers, and someone asked to see them side by side with the final covers. Here are most of them!

One thing you learn in this business is that there are many, many reasons why a cover, even a good one, isn't the right fit for a book. But sometimes they do just get it wrong.

Sharing my first work as a beginner graphic designer.

I’m still learning and figuring things out, so I’d really appreciate any feedback or constructive criticism on this design.

I'd love to hear from designers who are currently working in the sports design industry.

How's the competition out there? What do you think the current market is lacking? And is there still room for newcomers to break into the industry?

Would you rather choose all capital words with comma or just the first word is capital?

Hi all, my friend recently switched to linux and is looking for alternatives to some of Adobe's products, we have found photopea works well in place of photoshop and we also found vectorpea but he says is is very primitive and not feature complete when compared to Illustrator. Does anyone have any better options?

thanks

I'm trying to design a poster for a club I'm in, but it looks odd. I don't have much experience in graphic design, so I would love feedback on how I could improve it.

Did this for a uni assignment exploring streetwear as a form of self-expression and resistance to conformity. Had to be positioned in an existing publication, I chose Sneeze Magazine. Shot, styled and designed the whole thing myself, bold colour, graffiti backdrops, some fisheye shots thrown in to push the exaggeration further.

Recently graduated in May, trying to secure my first full time position, have applied 115+ applications thus far, (been applying for about a month), have received one interview thus far, not sure what else to do? Are there avenues I'm not considering? I could try cold emailing agencies, but it feels like a waste tbh. Idk, would love to hear how you guys are handling it!

My cofounder and I are working on the branding for our new app called Rejoin. It is a social app for aviation professionals.

We are trying to settle a design debate and need some honesty. I’ve attached a mockup showing both concepts and how they would look as app icons.

Option A: Uppercase R, with overlapping flight paths to represent intersection.

Option B: A lowercase r and a paper airplane combined.

Which logo/icon looks better?

Does Option A look too much like an Rx symbol?

Does option B look aviation related?

How do you think each logo could improve?
Thank you for your criticism.

Im searching for advice and to see what people think of this (Im new to Graphic Design so...)

Hi everyone, I'm a beginner graphic designer and I work for a local hockey team. The thing I've been finding hardest is finding inspiration for my designs and flyers.
For example, I've been tasked to promote the local hockey team to get people to call and join it, I know what to write on the flyer etc. but I don't have a precise workflow, know where to start the design from and basically no idea how to actually build the flyer itself.
Do you guys have any tips? Where can I find inspiration for these types of promotional, sports flyers?

I have been doing graphic design since 2022 and have recently been getting into tech product design. The following are some of my concept renders where I am trying to create a premium and luxurious look for my tech products. I will mostly be asking for critiques on the composition, lighting, typography, product placement, and polish of the concepts.