How to become a better designer

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Photo by Devin Avery on Unsplash

Poyi Chen

Every year I take some time to reflect on the topic of self-improvement, specifically on how to improve my craft as a designer.

Know everything about the tools you’re using

Whether you’re using photoshop, sketch, or some wireframe tools during your design process. The more you know about your tools, the faster you can bring your ideas to life. I spend some time every day just to learn new tricks, shortcuts or functionalities I don’t know about. Recently I just picked up Sketch, which I think is a solid replacement for photoshop when it comes to designing interfaces.

Discover new tools

New tools come out very frequently. I keep an eye out for them every day in case they can perform the same task more efficiently than the tools I’m currently using. These new tools (or Startups) usually pop up on Hacker News, Techcrunch, or Designer News. I also keep a curated list of tools on UX Collections

Keep up with the new/current trend

As a designer, it is important to know what the most popular design styles or patterns are currently and which designs are becoming a trend. As an example, when iOS 7 came out the user will be expecting designers to conform to the iOS 7 pattern so this is something to keep in mind…