I’m beginning to question the way I set up projects. I’ve had three clients, one with 30+ graphics, recently request I put everything I’ve done into an MS Office program. This request usually comes after I’ve put a couple weeks (hours and hours) into the project, and have sent them proofs along the way. This baffles me. I’m not sure where to put it in my brain, because asking the client up front, “Do you want me to do this in Word?” seems both traitorous and unprofessional as a graphic artist. Yet it keeps happening. Has anyone else experienced this? Am I crazy? Is graphic art moving away from both graphics and art?

A thought is that it’s that ever-lurking Bad Economy. They hire an artist to design a page they intend to use long-term, but don’t want to pay to have it changed down the road. It makes sense from that angle. I guess I’d just like to know that up front, before I format an InDesign spread for print or a 30-slide Illustrator presentation. The process for creating a Word document or Power Point presentation is completely different than it is for laying out standard graphics, and I just have never thought to ask about that from the beginning.