Graphic Design

In the Helvetica documentary, there is a interesting point of view about the relationship between computers and graphic design, that computers do not enable better design, but can dramatically speed up the design process. The judgement is ultimately subjective and leaves plenty of areas for disagreement, but there is no doubt that computers completely revolutionized graphic design.

Inside the Publishing Revolution: The Adobe Story is a partial but insightful elucidation of the digital revolution in graphic design. With the launch of Illustrator, Photoshop, and InDesign, Adobe is the de facto standard that students must learn in design schools. At a low price, Adobe dramatically democratized graphic design in that everyone may experiment with creativity without a steep learning curve. Software takes care of complexities like color, selections, and layers. Designers can focus on bringing vision to life.

Apple is the platform of choice for graphic design. The astonishing popularity of Apple devices tells something beyond fierce disagreement between different design cultures. Designers with radically opposite views agree on Apple equipment. That's quite a achievement. With the introduction of mobile gadgets and Retina Display, Apple really beats Microsoft in terms of complementarity between creative design tools.

There is a reason to believe that the digital revolution has still more to offer for graphic design, that ebooks failed and required a complete technological re-imagination. Digital content is a exciting and innovative field to work in, but due to immature technology, currently suffers subpar output both in quality and quantity. It's a magical experience to explore the human skeleton in dynamic 3D, to compute how quantum electrons work, and to analyze huge volume of real-world data. Technology that makes presentation of digital content pleasing and fluent is all required to bring these magical experiences to a wide audience.

The story of digital publishing is yet to be completed.