Ryan Robinson: Being thrown in at the digital deep end
INTRODUCTION
Ryan is a 26 year old designer from Hampshire, currently based in London. He graduated from Portsmouth University in 2016 with a BA in Graphic Design. Since graduating, he has been enlisted as a digital designer, working on both UI and UX design across desktop and mobile platforms at Amigo Partnership. Clients have included Rolls Royce, McLaren, Tomorrowland, Frijj, O2 and Laurent Perrier.
Ryan describes himself as: “A designer, with a love for bold expressive type and record sleeves. I get told that I wear my heart on my sleeve. I'll take that.”
This interview took place over video call in July 2020.
So how are you finding everything post-pandemic? I’m guessing you’re working remotely?
Yeah, I’m working remotely. It’s weird, but I kind of like it. I like not having to deal with idiots. Whether I'm commuting or just dealing with people day to day. It’s quite nice. I miss the interaction though, like I'm sure you guys do. I like bouncing ideas off of people and just having that kind of set up at work where I’m like “Right, I’m here, I’m gonna do my job” and then I go at the end of the day. So transitioning from that to home was quite hard.
How have your projects been affected at the studio? Is it ‘business as usual’?
We won a job recently for a massive client, and we had some pretty crazy ideas that were supposed to be coming out for Halloween or later in the year, and they were meant to be having a whole rebrand too and overnight they just went “Nope, we’re putting it on hold” which is pretty wild considering they spent all that money on it. So we’ve just come in to try and rescue some of their credibility. So that’ll be interesting to see. I’m doing TV ads which is not something I thought i’d ever be doing, but yeah!
Premier League © Ryan Robinson
It sounds like you’re doing a lot of work you never thought you’d be doing!?
You know what it’s like at Portsmouth [Uni], it’s like “Print, print, print! Look at all these jobs that are available, isn’t print amazing” but then actually when you come out of uni you’re like “damn, yeah I miss the letterpress, I miss screen printing!”.
So did you feel confident graduating into a less print-oriented role?
At the time I got hired, my boss put it quite well, he said “Well, if you know how to use typography in print, you should have no problem doing it digitally” which definitely gave me some confidence going into it, but having been in the industry now for a while, I think it takes a whole different skillset to design online.
I think a lot of grads come out of uni with very print-focused portfolios and are overwhelmed by how many job roles require digital skills. Do you have any advice for grads in that situation?
I think if you know how to use typography, layout and grids, and have a consideration for how a user will read your book for example, then you’ll definitely have an advantage in the digital world, because UX is a massive part of that. I still use so many of those principles from print now, no matter what I’m designing.
So I think if you’re print focused, then there shouldn’t really be a reason why you can’t go into digital. Naturally, if you’re new to anything, the more you do it, the more tips and tricks you pick up. Especially with digital design, there’s so many helpful guides out there and UI examples.
I feel like if people want to know how to get into it, then definitely just try and do as much stuff in your free time as you can. There’s so many tutorials for kinetic typography and stuff like that on YouTube that you can easily pick up. There’s some free tools too like Figma and Sketch which are great for UI, because it’s almost like a prototyping tool and a UI tool. And then obviously you can record it and put it in your portfolio and it looks dead real.
“I think if you know how to use typography, layout and grids, and have a consideration for how a user will read your book for example, then you’ll definitely have an advantage in the digital world, because UX is a massive part of that.”
So in your job when you were given these new projects that you had little experience with, did they help you with that? Or did you almost train yourself?
So at first I kinda shit myself, and then I was like “No, OK, I can do this!”. But the other main designer at the time was the year above me at Portsmouth, so he helped me out a lot and we tag teamed on a lot of stuff. Definitely one thing I learnt that I always do now, is if I find any blog or inspiration site I just bookmark it, so I've got this whole folder just called “Graphic Design Shit” with every resource in it. You know when you’re designing, you come back to stuff, because all of these sites generally work the same, they just look a bit different. So if you can get a few examples and then apply that to your work, it saves you a lot of time.
Tell us about your side project - Yeah Yeah Cool (YYC), where did that come from?
I’ve had YYC for almost four years now. I think I bought the domain about three years ago and put it up as a blog site. Every time I did something I thought was cool or relatively OK then I'd just wang it on there. Then I was like “actually, you know what, let me take this a little bit more seriously” and the end goal for me, is for it to be a small studio, running design projects through. But obviously at the moment, it’s myself and just freelance bits I get or personal projects.
I just wanted to get YYC out there, because some of my friends knew about it and were pushing me behind the scenes going “do it, just do it” and I definitely talk myself out of ideas too often.
YYC Desert © Ryan Robinson for Yeah Yeah Cool
Especially on Instagram, I believe that if you just keep putting your work out there, you will gain traction.
I think a lot of people mistake that for “Oh, I’ve got to post something to get likes”, which is never good, and it can make you really disheartened, if you feel you did a really nice bit of work...and it only gets 10 likes. And yet, an absolutely shocking piece of work, will get thousands of likes. So I just put whatever I want up there now and I'm not too precious over it. The main goal is to grow it, so any project I do now is attributed to YYC.
It’s been quite nice to see different people following it, because obviously some people from my main account followed, but now a lot of those followers are totally new, which is cool, so I am putting more effort into it. But as we were saying before this, if you’ve had a long day at work, the last thing you want to do when you get home is more design...even if it’s going to be a lot cooler than the work you were doing in the day, it’s just thought of it. I’ve definitely been feeling that over the last few weeks. But I’ve got a few good things coming up so I should get back on it. But hopefully...Yeah Yeah Cool will take off!
You’re so right. We’ve always said that if you keep doing something whilst no one's watching, eventually people will come, as long as you're doing it for the right reasons.
At what point would you say it clicked that you no longer cared about what you posted on social media?
As I said before, I see people more and more now, just posting videos of them like fucking around in the studio, with a Wacom tablet, or spray paints, so I’m thinking “why should I be precious about what I’m posting on my Instagram feed?” Your profile doesn't have to be polished, or have all these mosaics and shit going on. I think there’s a misconception that your feed has to be styled and I just don’t agree with that. So I was like “fuck it” I’m going to create a new account.
[Instagram] Stories are quite good as well in that sense, because you can just post ‘disposable’ content up there, the really raw stuff and not worry about it too much. And again, I think the design studios I like more, that come across less polished, have a feed that’s totally random. And I kinda like that! If anything, it’s more annoying when people post all these small cuts of images. I’m like “wow, a zoomed in leaf” I couldn't care less.
“[Instagram] Stories are quite good as well in that sense, because you can just post ‘disposable’ content up there, the really raw stuff and not worry about it too much.”
Are you still working on your hip hop politics project from uni? That was so great, it was everywhere when we were at uni! It definitely inspired me a lot in first year.
Wow that’s mad. Thank you. In my third year I worked so much harder, I partied so much harder and I played so much more FIFA. I think I just did everything in excess! But yeah I really had no idea what I wanted to do for it and my tutor sat me down and said “Just do it on what you like” and I was thinking “I can’t just do it on what I like, how would that work”. But as it turned out, you just need the angle for it.
I definitely want to revisit it, because everybody at the time was saying “Yeah you should get this published” but I still can’t help but look at it and spot the things I want to change and fix the bits that still aren’t quite right in my eyes.
But with what’s going on at the moment (Black Lives Matter) I thought it would be cool to make it a collaboration and bring in a range of artists to explore the issues around police brutality in America.
Hip Hop Politics © Ryan Robinson
Well one thing we like to do at the end of each of these interviews, is get our guests to make themselves accountable for something! So you’ve spoken about this project now, you’ve put it out there and it has to come to fruition!
Oh god! What have you made me do! There’s so much I want to do with it, but it just needs planning. Planning properly.
Dom: I’m the same. I need a project mapped out, planned out, done properly. I care so much about the content but what I’ve started to learn now - especially with The Arena - the most important thing is just to start! I tell myself all the time that I can’t start on X because I haven’t done Y, and actually you just have to get on with it, otherwise there will always be an excuse not to!
I agree. I think that’s why I put off a lot of stuff. It’s all foreign to me. For instance, with these t-shirts, my main thought is “Ah fuck, I’ve never dealt with suppliers before though” or this or this, but I need to tell myself “Just ring, stop being an arsehole”.
We all have those sorts of thoughts, for sure, whether it’s cost or logistics, something will always get in the way. But you’d never know that from socials! People seem to achieve these huge things with such ease and confidence.
You’ve hit the nail on the head there. It’s kind of a FOMO. You see someone doing something and you’re like “Ugh I wish I knew how they were doing that” instead of actually asking to see how they’re doing that!
It’s 100% just about switching the question and flipping the mentality.
But going back to one of your first points, when you’re applying for a job in UI, even if you don’t have any experience, I think enthusiasm and a willingness to learn can take you a long way. People are willing to give you a chance as a junior.
Although, one thing I've found that really boils my piss, is when you apply somewhere and they just don’t get back to you. I think that’s so rude. I can’t put a number on how many applications I’ve sent since I left uni, but I can count on one hand how many responses I've had.
For me, all it takes is a templated, blanket email, just to let you know you haven’t got the job, and that’s immediately so much better than nothing!
“I can’t put a number on how many applications I’ve sent since I left uni, but I can count on one hand how many responses I’ve had. ”
That’s so true. Because when you get nothing back there's still an element of hope! And this is one of the main issues we want to tackle in the industry. I can see it from the other perspective though, obviously studios are overwhelmed with applications, but it’s soul destroying, and it means you never learn and develop.
Something I've also noticed is there’s no graphic design podcasts, that are from people like us. Young, in industry. It’s all mid-to-late 30s or 40s, but we’re in the thick of it. So that’s something I'd love to do or be a part of.
Recommended reading
Visible Signs by David Crow & BRICK magazine
Recommended listening
Creative Boom Podcast & Private View(s) Podcast
Recommended follow
Follow Ryan!
Instagram: @yeahyeahcool_
Website: www.yeahyeahcool.com
If you’d like to reach out to Ryan, DM him on Instagram or drop him an email to: ryan7robinson@hotmail.co.uk
