CAN I SEE THAT FLUSH RIGHT? | Perich Advertising + Design

CAN I SEE THAT FLUSH RIGHT?

By Ernie Perich

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I started out in 1980. When keylining, typesetting, galleys, the waxer, letraset type, rubylith, parapaque, x-acto blades and rapidograph pens were the tools of the trade. Art direction was a craft. Like a carpenter, you built things with your hands, and the result of your blood, sweat and toil was small but very intricate. Countless hours were spent getting artwork ready to print. The work was hard but fun as hell. The creative person had the power. Clients had to trust you. Sometimes all they approved and bought off on was a sketch or a marker comp. Watching a press sheet come off was like Christmas morning, and you were Santa. You delivered your gift to your client.

Life was good. Now, thanks to Mr. Jobs and Mrs. Epson, the surprise is gone. The magic is lost. The big unveiling is but an anticlimax. Writers and art directors meet. Headlines are scribbled or word-processed. Comp photos are found online (photos that some clients see as cheap and finished and adequate, without a moment’s consideration given to how much new photography could bring to the idea). Computer layouts, sometimes as detailed as a finished ad, are created, even for an internal review. So from a single hour of thinking and three hours of comping (instead of the other way around) comes a virtually finished looking ad. Sometimes we don’t give great ideas a second thought because we can’t figure out a way to comp them up. Ideas move ahead in an incomplete state. Clients have gotten used to seeing computer comps. Which can empower them to a disturbing degree. “Make that type a point bigger.” “Can you crop that photo closer?” “Can I see it in blue? Yellow? Teal?” “That’s easy, isn’t it?” The hard-working, aiming-to-please agency says yes, yes, yes a thousand times yes. A few clicks of a mouse, a pdf is made, then sent and voila, the client’s version is complete. And, sadly, approved. Which means you’re screwed. Control is lost. The day your client asks for “more leading in that type” or “can it see that flush right?” or “show it to me in five colors before lunch,” you’re toast. Computers and color printers don’t have brains. They can’t think. Faster isn’t always better. At least this chubby, balding 60ish-year old doesn’t think so.

P.S. This and every other rant I’ve ever written was created on a Mac. Thanks, Steve.