Graphic Design tools before Photoshop | Photoshop 25th Anniversary

I was in school for design in the mid 90s, and we were taught all of this. Then when I got out of school and got my first design job, the place where I worked was switching over to using only macs with photoshop, freehand, and quark. Never had to actually do the manual stuff, but I’m glad i got the foundation of this before switching over to digital. But I’m also really grateful that the job is a lot easier these days!

im 16 and really dont care about graphic design im only watching this for school credit

I still have Letraset and a pristine set of Kohinoor Rapiograph pens in my nostalgia foot locker.... This guy needs some non repo pencils :)

Im a goofy kid, we used wax :)

Very amazing <3

Having computers means that ANYBODY can do this job, not just competent artists!

I got 4 minutes in and I’m ready to break. No, no, no. HELL no. Absolutely not! (But I love this! There are different tools like rapidograph pens and rubber cement and rubylith that I’ve seen, or used once or twice as child in the 90s, but never understood their functions in art work. This is really cool even though it seems like a TON of work.) I got here after starting to spiral about AI art and it’s cool to see what came before and to see other commenters speaking about being able to adapt to workflow changes in the past, like I’m realizing I’ll need to.

great video... Im relatively new to GD and sometimes think of how it was done before... thanks for the demo!

Sir, Which certificate in graphic designing has more value?

Hello, I am a graphic design student in art school in Normandy in France. I am very interested in old practices, and how it was possible to create and lay out text and images without softwares at the time. When I was born, there was already the computer. And I mostly create on screen all the time. Reading the reviews, I see that when Mac arrived, it was like a liberation in this field, an incredible time saver. I think this practice very interesting, by the gesture of the creative hand and by the tiny imperfection which regulates in the pages. If you want, I would like to know what you think about it :
If you have already worked like that, what did you think about the arrival of Mac ?
Did you see any graphical differences with the switch to computer ?
Do you ever come back to this practice ? Something missing ?
Do you think the graphic sensibility is more perceptible with this practice ?
Thank you.

Me working on a cover art

He said Rubyltih and my eye started twitching!

And this istherycal guy is designer .. Look way young them me , and I am the last gen who do the transition from analog/ mechanical to digital... To do that explanation we need put a REAL Old Timer to make all this example. This guy looks like reading a libretto .... finally the digital all way treat to imitate the the old system ...

In Bulgaria, I can clearly recall the 1st yeat students were doing over 90 percent of their work analog. Drawing nude human body, posters with gouache, typefaces drawn by hand, etc. The remaining 3 years digital or as necessary to obtain the desired result. I can definitely say that in many cases the graphic designers who can draw by hand are better because manual techniques develop a specific way of perception. It is not the same to pick up font forge directly or to have previous experience in calligraphy and hand typography and then to use the same program. The second one has at least a huge advantage in sketching the idea.

Loved your video. Brought back memories of doing this for 35 years. It was a labor of love. Frustrating at times with clients. This was called a trade. You were devoted to your craft. Meticulous but it kept people working. Thanks.

As a design student I am happy that I have a background on fine and visual arts. It sets amazing background knowledge for when doing digital graphic visualizations. Thanks for the video!

I remember the word Letraset being used a lot, don't hear that nowadays

Rotring Isograph Pen

thank to all Gods for Photoshop

Isn't he trying to make it look extremly hard while it isn't actualy ?

It was also fun transfering all this art board material into film work, from the line shots on a large camera then building the ad in the stripping dept. where we used rubi lith and orange vinyl with a lot of mylar and start laying down and registering each color and positioning all the text as well. Those were definitely the days of a real job.

Ancient designers were true masters of the thinking.
i'm glad we can use this form of graphic design in our process and as aesthetic

what a nightmare lol

now a kid with a cell are better deigner than this guy.... DG profession is in extintion profession

Thank you, Adobe!

Fascinating to see and remember the industry I trained for in 1977 and worked in along with large format B&W photography for nearly 20 years. It took not only skill but a keen artist eye and ability and cleanliness was paramount to producing high quality work. It took time yes but that was the only way back then. Strangely I miss those days a lot! in the UK it was known as 'Paste Up'

This was super helpful! I'm writing about my father who, in the basement of our house in the 1960s where he created his own newspaper, he did all this. I wasn't able to put all the technical moves into words, but you've helped me do so. Thanks a lot.

amazing

oh my, I can't think of anyone missing this

thank god for photoshop

interesting !

So much talk

My mother did layout and design at Vogue Magazine 1942 to 1945 during WWw under Irving Penn

Today's technology make people think that its much easier, well it is, but they think more like we do it like magic. I think the thinking process is pretty much the same, but we just cut the physical works, and spend more time on learning the software's tools.

My greatest respect to all the graphic designers before Photoshop!

That's why everybody is a "graphic designer" nowadays.

"Gee wouldn't it be swell..." People still actually talk like that. Wow.

Looked more fun than clicking a mouse all day thats for sure.

He seems so Nervous... His Hands were shaking

Ummm, this better CELEBRATING INDESING. xD

I did mechanical design one semester on the high school newspaper. Hated it. Then Pagemaker came out while I was in college. Changed my life. Became a graphic designer. Been working in Photoshop since 1993.

I would be furiously pressing ctrl+alt+z in front of that piece of paper.

If you want to be good at something you have to learn the basics, sadly its a common thing today that learning the basics is not part of the education anymore.
I remember as a kid that we all learned to make newspaper by hand and its only 18+ years or so ago so not that old, computers and Photoshop was definitely around by then but the learning process helped me later in life even though at the time I did not care much for it I thought it was fun but I never imagined myself working with design.
It was also extremely time consuming, we also made posters and other stuff using the old methods of cutting, gluing and writing our own text because we were too cheap to use the pro stuff like this guy did and colour prints were too expensive for us to play around with LOL.

Thanks. I could have never imagine the world of graphic design before I was born. This is gold.

Re-positional wax over rubber cement any day. As a prepress guy, I remember art boards like this coming in with "F.P.O." ("for position only") written over the top of the copied photos too. BTW the reference to "printer" is probably pretty typical of graphic designers back then. Many (I suspect him included) never really visited their printers to see the processes required that led up to mounting the plates on the press. Not even a brief mentioning about camera work, ortho films, opaquing the films, and "stripping"/imposition of the films for proof and plate. Designers who were never curious or familiar with what goes on inside a "printer's" facility were typically a pain in the ass—at least their art boards were. But designers that worked in printing operations or took the time to inquire about the processes were always the better designers as they were less problematic and met the deadlines as well as the budget allocated. And what of graphic designers today? They still need to understand the prepress element as well. Just like back then, they will be better designers if they know how to use their tools to not only make an aesthetic design, but to make it so it is not problematic down the line. Think an architect who knows or doesn't know the building tools or processes. Aside my nit-picking, I enjoyed the video even if it made me a little queazy as I revisited those old, tedious processes.

im glad all you people love doing it on a computer, but this is more fun. And I think the end product of this is able to be great art, whereas the computer is just different and more robotic.

So much appreciation to old school graphic designers.

Amazing...but truly a big Job...cant believe its a tough job...now days graphic designer are just flying....big thank you to all the inventors of computers programs .

Something to do without power

"...I can pick it up, that's the undo feature." lol. I can only imagine that if we ever lose power for weeks due to a solar flare, that these skills would be important again.