TIL comparing my mood board to the final photos saved me 6 hours last week

I used to just sketch out ideas and hope they worked in the final design. Then I started making a side by side comparison - mood board on one side, final photos on the other - for a restaurant menu project. It caught 3 color mismatches and a font issue before I even opened Indesign. Has anyone else tried this kind of pre-check before sending to print?

2 comments

2 Comments

taylor_barnes595d ago

Honestly I think the real hidden win here is that it forces you to catch stuff like color theory and contrast issues that you'd never notice on a screen by itself. I've had projects where the mood board had this soft pastel vibe but the final print came out looking like a totally different palette because of lighting or paper texture. Ngl doing a side by side before you even start laying things out is a game changer for spotting those weird optical illusions too like when a font looks clean in a sample but next to the board it's all wrong. Most designers skip this step and just cross fingers at the printer which is wild to me for how much time it saves. Tbh I'd argue it's more valuable than a lot of the tech shortcuts people push these days.

riley5955d ago

@taylor_barnes59 I see your point but I actually disagree a bit here. Spending too much time matching a mood board can box you in before you let the real materials do their work. I've had projects where the final print looked better than the mood board because the paper and ink added a depth I couldn't plan for.