THE DESIGNER by Warren Kramer

It's a late summer night on the Oregon coast on a full-moonlit night. It's so bright, it's almost like day. Huge rock formations along ashimmering beach are so beautiful I just have to stop. Walking along this beach, eyeing the rock formations, the beach, the moon, the starry sky, I'm struck with an incredible thought. This couldn't possibly have just happened!

Let me explain. All my adult life I'vebeen a professional graphic designer. Most people don't understand what that is. They say, You're a cartoonist? No, I design things for print-like this brochure. But this doesn't have any cartoons in it. Did you take these photographs? " No, a commercial photographer did. Well, did you do this lettering? No,that's type set on my computer. Well, did you print it? NO, a printer did! Well, what did you do?

I DESIGNED it! Someone has to decide what size and color it's going to be, what to use for photos or artwork, how to crop them, where to put them on the page, what type style to use and how big, how many columns to use for the body copy, how to fold it, how to make it inviting to read, what kind of paper to use, whether it will self-mail or go in an envelope and how to design the envelope! In short, someone has todecide the best way to communicate in print. It doesn't just happen! Bingo! The same thing people had been doing to me for years, I had been doing to the Great Designer.

A printed piece doesn't just happen without being designed and produced. Whether it's done haphazardly by Joe Printer or thoughtfully by a professional designer, it must be designed and produced or it doesn't exist. In the same way, this beautiful coastline couldn't have just happened without a Designer. Clearly, the universe has design.

Plants are designed to take in carbon dioxide and emit oxygen, animals and humans are designed to breathe oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide. This is design. How could it have design without a Designer? How couldit exist without the Great Designer?