OH HEY THERE! This post was pretty reliant on images that no longer exist… so it’s probably broken by now. Why am I leaving it up? My SEO tools tell me it brings a lot of juice to my website. Sorry about that.
I’ve got no issue with jobs – they give you cold hard cash and teach you to stop making stupid mistakes. Experience is more important than regular education and money is more important than creative freedom. I’ll be writing a post about this in the near future, but for now I thought I’d share some of my previous job “tests”.
Junior Designer Role
Company: Your portfolio has captured our attention! We’d like to invite you to complete a small design task,is this ok with you?
Me: Sure thing, send it over!
Company: As discussed *attached are 3 rubbish tasks with a 48-hour deadline*
Task 1 was the easiest: Make a 1200×628 banner image promoting beach destinations for families, using the colour palette attached, flat design and the copy “Save up to 35% on your next trip“. I sent them this image along with my decision not to tackle tasks 2 and 3:
Freelance App Icon Design
Client: We need an app icon for an idea we’ve had, can you help?
Me: Sure! Can you give me some more details? I’ll get started ASAP.
Client: Well it’s an app for women of all different shapes and sizes to be themselves and be free without judgement. We’re only willing to pay $10 because it’s quite a small job.
This client was definitely not leading anywhere helpful for me, and I was slightly tipsy on a train at the time so I sent them over a few designs for fun:
Client: Sorry but I think those look like boobs to me? Maybe I am missing something. Also we can’t afford an Apple license to make our app, do you have one we can borrow?
Me: I don’t see it, but if you can give me some pointers I’m happy to adjust them. I don’t think Apple licenses work that way, though.
Client: Oh okay we’ll just make it for Android then. Ummm more different colours I guess? Although not as bright as that pink and blue. Maybe make the icons round as I think square ones feel a bit too simple.
I got the last e-mail in the morning and decided to meet their demands:
Client: Fuck off you sad pervert.
