Speckyboy Author

Addison Duvall (72 Articles)

Addison Duvall is the author of Food Identities, a blog that explores the crossroads of food, design, art, and culture. She’s written some things, designed other things, and eaten a whole lot of food.
What Happened to the Great Plans For Your Design Career?

What Happened to the Great Plans For Your Design Career?

So your great plans of achieving your design career goals are have been flushed down the drain. What happened? Is there a practical reason?

Doing Away With Bad Design Ideas & Moving on to the Good Ones

Doing Away With Bad Design Ideas & Moving on to the Good Ones

There’s a common saying in the fiction-writing world: kill your darlings. No, this isn’t some morbid encouragement to do bodily harm to your loved ones. Killing your darlings means that…

The Role Design Plays in Your Client’s Sales Funnel

The Role Design Plays in Your Client’s Sales Funnel

We talk about what you’re really supposed to be doing as a designer, and about the role your designs play in your client’s sales funnel.

Finding & Using Your Own Design Voice

Finding & Using Your Own Design Voice

Your design voice – or design style, if you will – is how you choose to relay information to your audience. That sounds simple, but for the uninitiated, it can…

How a Culinary Technique Could Make You a Better Freelancer

How a Culinary Technique Could Make You a Better Freelancer

Incorporating the mise en place idea into your creative process allows you to prepare yourself to power through your work with less stress and fewer headaches.

As a Designer, Is Failure a Necessary Part of Success?

As a Designer, Is Failure a Necessary Part of Success?

From failure to success: how designers can learn from mistakes to improve their work and approach.

Stop Worrying About People Stealing Your Ideas

Stop Worrying About People Stealing Your Ideas

We explore some important reasons why you should stop worrying about anyone potentially stealing your creative design ideas.

Getting Past the Limitations of Your Design Skills

Getting Past the Limitations of Your Design Skills

Have you ever looked through design books or online publications, keeping up to date on what’s happening in the industry, when you happen upon a bunch of work that’s leaps…

Avoiding Design by Committee

Avoiding Design by Committee

Most people have an idea of the perfect solution to their design problem. The downside is that so does everyone else with the same problem.

Taking the Occam Razor Approach to Design

Taking the Occam Razor Approach to Design

We discuss the importance of ditching the unnecessary when developing design concepts, and why it’s so hard to do in the first place.

Presenting Design Ideas is All About Presentation

Presenting Design Ideas is All About Presentation

A good design presentation will encourage clients and colleagues to take your ideas more seriously and assign more value to them.

Those Things You Must Do When Ending a Freelance Design Project

Those Things You Must Do When Ending a Freelance Design Project