I know how to type, have a good grasp of English, know how to spell – but that doesn’t mean I could or would or should try to write the next John Grisham.

Having a pen doesn’t make me a writer. Having a camera doesn’t make me a photographer. Having a computer doesn’t make me a designer…

To be a designer takes talent, knowledge and practice. You need to understand balance, beauty, symmetry, asymmetry, flow, pace, shape, unity and contrast.

Being a great visual story teller requires all those qualities.

It also requires the understanding that that’s what you’re doing – telling a story, as surely as John Grisham is.

When I design an album, I want you, a stranger, to feel like you were there. After all, some of the people who will treasure it haven’t even been born yet.

I want you to feel the emotion of the event, and connection with the people, rather than just admire the venue, the flowers and how well everyone’s dressed.

The layout should be understated, yet bold enough to project star images alongside the support shots. It should show elements of repetition and elements of surprise. It should value white space.

Ironically, the skill of the designer shouldn’t be apparent. It certainly shouldn’t be about the latest photoshop tricks I’ve learned.

One of my favourite industrial designers is Dieter Rams. I love his ten principles of good design, especially this:

“Good design is as little design as possible.”

Less design, but better – because it “concentrates on the essential aspects, and the products are not burdened with non-essentials. Back to purity, back to simplicity”.

Back to simplicity, but not to instant. Apps that lay out your pages automatically are like painting by numbers. They’re fun, but don’t add much value.

Help your photographs speak, and tell their story.

Happy designing!

Best, Heather

PS The illustration is an all-time favourite at trade shows. It’s from one of our display samples, photography by Johannes van Kan.

PPS If you’re looking for design advice, do feel free to email the team, and they’ll pass it on to me.

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And no, this is not a scam.

For those not in the know, I’m based at the Queenberry lab.

They put up with me here as long as I sit quietly in the corner. It’s a bit crowded as Philip Laing is sitting in the same corner.

Anyway, I’m not allowed to speak so I get to listen to what’s going on regarding some of the issues that our printers face.

Now correct me if I’m wrong, but the terms and conditions of most album companies are a bit like the signs you used to see in china shops around New Zealand – “if you break it, you buy it”. In other words, if you send us a crappy file, don’t blame us if we send you a crappy print job.

Where we tend to be different is that we really hate putting crappy prints in beautiful albums, so if we can, we pull the job and get in touch with you to see if between us we can do better.

Here’s the dirty little secret.

Most of the stuff that stops work being printed could be resolved before the files are even sent to us, because the three main problems we see are very simple: pixelated images, soft images, alignment issues.

So, if you don’t listen to anything else I say, and my wife wouldn’t blame you, listen to this.

CHECK YOUR FILES    CHECK YOUR FILES   CHECK YOUR FILES  CHECK YOUR FILES  CHECK. YOUR. FILES.

Honestly, I bet you do check your files, but I mean check them!

Don’t just view the thumbnails in Photojunction. When you export the layouts, open them up in Photoshop. View them as an overall layout, and then zoom in to 100%. You’ll be amazed what you pick up at that level.

Now this is where the saving money bit comes in. We query hundreds of orders each year. Every time we do, and a new file has to be sent, or we have to do some artwork, and reprint something, it costs money. Either you, or us. We’d rather sort things out than send you an album you’re unhappy with, but we hate charging people, and no-one likes paying.

The second way you save money is by saving time. Half an hour spent checking your exported layouts before sending is better than twenty-four hours, a week, even a month of holdups waiting for an album we’ve found issues with. You could have handed it to your clients and banked that final payment.

Finally, there’s album repairs. Maybe the wrong file was sent for printing (eg the wrong version of an image, missing the artwork). Or maybe the date on a title was wrong.

Times are tough, and every dollar counts, so who’s pocket would you prefer it to be in? A dollar saved is a dollar earned.

Yours helpfully, Pete (and Philip).

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