It is very hard to for an aspiring designer to get jobs if you always charge high rates.

And what about building a portfolio? Isn’t this very essential for me?

I never, and I mean never give away free work to coroporate stuff, but when it comes to an indie band and I know their budget is very limited, is it okey then?

If author would answer me on email, it would be awesome!

To me they do pay the bill but they are not always right which is why they come to you for guidance in the first place otherwise they would do it themselves. Sometimes you have to educate the client and prepare them for exactly how much things cost, If you work too cheap you might aswell dig yourself a grave, I can also appreciate that costs are looked at with a horrifying view from a clients position, depending on the work involved you have to educate them that it is an investment in their business, therefore it should not be seen as a direct cost.

A piece in the article talks about sparks of creativity coming in phases is totally true, when the creativity does come around then you do go with the flow and you can work hours and hours more once you get into the zone but there is no way to keep at it consistently. I feel it is the duty of the designer to educate their clients on how designing is not some 1 or 2 hour job that can be done at any time, this is not possible no matter how good you are.

Spacing rules, this I feel should be down to the designer putting down rules for themselves so that they look at spacing as a matter of habit, always giving plenty of whitespace where needed, margins etc.. If you have rules that you keep repeating to yourself as as part of your business ethos and as you design they just become a natural part of incorporating the spacing of sections, type or parts of the design rather than trying to force it in, separating sections is one of my favourite ways to keep spacing in check.

One other thing regarding designs for clothing is customers have a distorted view on how much these things cost right from the start and often expect you to do the whole work from design to handing them the clothing and all for a small price, when you factor in all of the things that are needed to get to that result you can never recoup the cost.

I think you just did the same with all pros who are writing articles in magazines on topics like “how to be designer” and are getting paid for that.