Your developers don’t understand your designs.

Why does it exist?

The gap between designers and developers often stems from their distinct roles, objectives, and tools they use. Traditionally, designers are primarily concerned with the look and feel of a website or application. They work with design tools like Adobe Photoshop or Sketch, focusing on colors, typography, layout, and other visual aspects. The end product of their work is usually a static design mockup.

On the other hand, developers are tasked with turning these static designs into functioning, interactive digital products. They work with programming languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, focusing on functionality, performance, and browser compatibility. The end product of their work is a working website or application.

This segregation of roles can often lead to a lack of understanding and communication. Designers might create designs without considering the technical challenges involved in implementing them. Developers, focused on code, might overlook the importance of faithfully reproducing design elements, subtly altering them during implementation.

An illustrative example of this gap can be seen in the world of responsive design. A designer might create a beautiful website layout for a desktop screen without considering how the design should adapt to smaller mobile screens. When the developer receives this design, they’re left to make assumptions about how to adapt the design for different screen sizes, leading to a final product that might not match the designer’s intent.

Another common example is the use of custom fonts and high-resolution images. Designers, aiming for visual perfection, might incorporate unique, custom fonts or high-resolution images in their designs, overlooking the impact of these elements on website performance. Developers, mindful of website loading times, might opt for web-safe fonts or compress the images, altering the original design.