: If you have any aspirations for being a successful freelancer or starting your own business, I'd personally use the opportunity to "audition" graphic designers for future work. There's no better

@Nimeshi995

If you have any aspirations for being a successful freelancer or starting your own business, I'd personally use the opportunity to "audition" graphic designers for future work. There's no better resource to have around than a good designer you can call on a moment's notice.

Disclaimer--I was a designer prior to being a developer (am now UI developer) The main difference for me between crowd sourcing and using a pro is that there's a level of communication that's lost in crowd sourcing. Its the reason that canned templates just don't make a GREAT website--they weren't purpose built. Sure, you can modify based on the theme given...but then, what are you paying for, really? Also, maybe this won't happen with your personal site, but there's a tremendous amount of flux in design and the web process--no matter how bulletproof your requirements documents or wireframes are, things change....often, they change a LOT. Now what? Can you reliably count on the low-ball offer at 99 designs to quickly and cost-effectively change to fit your needs? Did they properly layer and design for elements such as navigation and content? That alone could cost you hours worth of extra work in the cutup phase. If they give you poorly formatted html and CSS, you could REALLY be in for extra work.

Great design STARTS with a designer. I take mine to all my client planning meetings because they help shape the wireframes that lead to the final requirements. Who knows better than them what "works" with design? And, let's face it, clients don't care how great your code is--they care how easy it is to work with. Code only matters to a client when it doesn't work....

Good luck.

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