18 Helpful Time Management Tips for Designers

Some people claim that 24 hours is not enough for them to finish all their tasks for the day. Indeed, most of us are running after time trying to befriend it. Time is very vital for us. Time management is said to be the most important element of professionalism which includes balancing and managing both professional and personal life well. Ironically, time management is also the biggest problems of graphic designers. Freelance designers have various projects that come just anytime, so you need to be good at time management. Since you are working on your own, you have to handle everything on your own. This is vital in order to finish all your projects before your client’s deadline. Every task requires a lot of time especially that you have to work on it always with the best of your ability.

Reasons Why you Can Keep Both your Day Job and Freelancing

Some people choose to work for multiple types of job and they have mastered the art of multi-tasking. They could be working for a day job and also do freelance at the same time. If you come to think of it, it is quite hard, isn’t it? But for some, it is already their way of living and losing the other makes them feel incomplete. There are actually advantages that one can get from keeping both jobs. We will take a look these advantages today.

Benefits Freelancers Can Get from Having Self-Confidence

When you are into business or you are occupied working, you need self-confidence since you will harvest many advantages if you are confident. Self-confidence is an important thing for everyone. It is related to one’s self-assuredness in his own decisions and actions. When a person is confident, he believes in his self and also ends up giving value to himself which can also lead to self-care. But being confident isn’t merely about one’s self but it can also affect those people that surrounds a confident person.

Independently place video and audio in Adobe Premiere Pro CS5

To drag the video and audio portions of a clip to specific tracks, drag the clip from the Source Monitor or Project panel into the Timeline. When the video portion of the clip lies above the desired video track, press-and-hold Shift, then drag downward past the bar separating video and audio tracks. When the audio portion of the clip lies above the desired audio track, release the mouse, and release Shift.

Give OpenGL rendering more memory to work - Adobe After Effects CS5

Increase the texture memory used for OpenGL rendering to 80% of the installed video RAM (VRAM) on your video card. The default of 200 MB is quite small for modern video cards; values in the 400-800 MB range are appropriate for modern cards with 512-1GB of VRAM. Choose After Effects (PC: Edit)>Preferences>Previews, click OpenGL Information, and enter a new value for Texture Memory.

Anchoring Graphics Between Paragraphs in InDesign

To add a graphic separator between paragraphs (such as ornamental
dots), anchor the graphic as the first character in the second paragraph, select it, choose Object > Anchored Object > Options, and choose the Above Line option.

In CS5.5 and later you can use the Anchored Object Control (the little blue square that appears on an object when it is selected) to anchor an object and set the options. To anchor an object, simply drag the blue square to the point in the text where you want the anchor to be located. To anchor an object and open the options dialog box at the same time, hold Option/Alt as you drag and release the blue square.

Select layers without using the Layers panel

Select layers without using the Layers panel (CS2/CS3/CS4/CS5)

Panels have their purpose, but they can also obstruct the view of your Photoshop canvas. Oftentimes, though, you don't actually need to show a panel in order to use it. You can select normal layers, for example, without ever touching the Layers panel.

As you probably know, layers enable you to organize and selectively manipulate content. But, before you can edit an item in a multilayered document, you must first select its layer.

To select an item's layer:
  • Select the Move tool in the Tools panel.
  • Click the Auto Select Layer check box on the tool options bar.
  • Click on the area you want to edit to automatically select its layer.

Alternately, you can skip the step that switches you to the Move tool, and simply [command][control]-click ([Ctrl]-right-click in Windows) on the object. Then, choose its layer from the resulting context menu.

Shortcuts for scrolling in Excel's print preview

Excel's Print Preview is helpful for checking the layout of a document before you print, but scrolling through it can be annoying. Depending on the length of the document, you may find it easier to navigate the Print Preview window using shortcut keys. You probably know that you can use the [Page Up], [Page Down], and the direction arrows to move around the current page when a document is zoomed in. However, you can also hold down the [Ctrl] key while using the direction arrows to jump to the edge of the document that corresponds to the direction arrow. Holding down [Ctrl] while using [Page Up] and [Page Down] lets you horizontally scroll in increments. When the worksheet preview is zoomed out, [Ctrl][Left Arrow] and [Ctrl][Up Arrow] cause the preview to jump to the first page of the document, while [Ctrl][Right Arrow] and [Ctrl][Down Arrow] move you to the last page.

Learning InDesign

Basic Tips for Learning InDesign
  • Based-On Master Pages are a terrific time saver; learn them and save tons of time when you have to change your master pages.
  • Careful set up and use of both Paragraph and Character styles saves time and creates a consistent look—especially with multiple users.
  • Use the Book feature to link long documents. Break the files into logical sections or chapters; avoid building one long (and large) file.
  • In most cases, place native Adobe Illustrator files rather than pasting them. This creates a link to the original file and makes for easier management and updating.
  • Adjust your Color Settings and set all your Adobe programs to the same settings. If you don’t know how, ask your printer or, at very least, use the appropriate Prepress Defaults.
  • Create Swatches before applying colors. This makes for easy changes to colors later on. Use the Color palette only to create tints of true spot-color swatches.
  • If you are having trouble printing your files to older printers or RIPs, adjust your Transparency Flattener (Print>Advanced). Always use the High Resolution setting for high-end output devices (unless the printer supplies custom settings).
  • Test a sample file with your printer for correct separations. Make sure the sample is representative of your final layout and do this BEFORE your deadline is looming.
  • Turn on the Layout>Layout Adjustment option before applying new master pages, especially if you are not using Master Text Frames for flowing text.
  • Learn to use your Layers for multi-language or complex documents. If using any transparency features, put your text on the top layer whenever possible.