Design Deep Research — Visual Inspiration & Aesthetic Trend Analysis

"Great design doesn't emerge in a vacuum; it stands on the shoulders of extensive visual references."

Core Philosophy

This is an autonomous research and trend analysis skill for graphic and visual designers, not a direct layout generator.

Workflow breakdown:

• Intake: Understand the designer's intent, category, and target aesthetic.
• Harvest: Parallel web harvesting across global and regional design platforms.
• Analyze: Extract recurring visual patterns, color palettes, and typographic structures.
• Cluster: Group references into 3–5 distinct, actionable design directions.
• Synthesize: Emit an interactive, standalone HTML research report with moodboards and reusable prompt seeds.

[!TIP] System Collaboration Guidelines:

• This skill focuses on upstream trend discovery, aesthetic clustering, and visual moodboards.
• If you need to convert an approved visual style into production-ready commercial prompts for e-commerce, product heroes, or marketing posters, hand off to commercial-image-prompt.

Execution Workflow

Phase 0: Requirements Scoping & Planning

Step 1: Intake Parameters

Receive user requirements:

• Text Brief (Required):
  • Design category: Poster, Brand VI, Packaging, Editorial, UI, Illustration, etc.
  • Industry / Sector: Tech, FMCG, Luxury, Culture, Education, Fashion, etc.
  • Vibe & Mood Keywords: Minimalist, Cyberpunk, Neo-Chinese, Warm Organic, Bauhaus, etc.
  • Target Medium: Digital screen, Out-of-home (OOH) physical print, Packaging box, etc.
• Reference Image URLs (Optional): 1–3 visual reference links.

Step 2: Brief Decomposition

If reference images are provided: Extract dominant color schemes, lighting, typography, and texture as an initial "style anchor" for search queries.

Step 3: Create Research Workspace Directory

Create the research workspace:

design-research/[brief-slug]/
├── report.html                      # Final HTML report (Phase 3)
└── references/
    ├── 01-international-inspiration.md  # Behance + Dribbble + Pinterest
    ├── 02-mockup.md                     # Mockup World + Graphic Burger + Yellow Images
    ├── 03-asset-libraries.md            # Freepik + Vecteezy
    ├── 04-image-galleries.md            # Unsplash + Pexels
    ├── 05-regional-platforms.md         # Zcool (站酷) + Huaban (花瓣) + Gutianlu9 (古田路9号)
    └── sources/                         # Verified reference links

Phase 1: Parallel Multi-Platform Reference Mining (Agent Swarm)

Deploy parallel sub-agents across specialized platform tiers:

Strict Reference Standards:

1. Zero Hallucination of URLs: Every recorded image URL and project source link must be an authentic, accessible URL. Never fabricate placeholder links.
2. Failure Handling: If a platform returns no relevant results, explicitly record No matching assets found on [Platform] with attempted keywords and reasons. Never pad with irrelevant fake data.

Phase 1.5: Harvest Review Checkpoint

Summarize harvested references for user confirmation:

• Total references gathered (Target: ≥30 real references across ≥5 platforms).
• Identified preliminary aesthetic clusters.
• Prompt user for approval before running deep aesthetic analysis.

Phase 2: Visual Synthesis & Aesthetic Clustering

2.1 Aesthetic Feature Extraction (7 Dimensions)

Evaluate harvested reference pools across 7 core visual dimensions (see references/analysis-framework.md):

1. Color Palette: Dominant hues, secondary structural colors, accent saturation, emotional temperature.
2. Typography: Typeface classification (Serif, Sans, Display, Geometric Mono), hierarchy, tracking/kerning density.
3. Graphic Language: Vector geometry, textural grain, 3D elements, iconographic style.
4. Lighting & Texture: Specular highlights, matte finishes, film grain, paper embossing, glassmorphism.
5. Composition & Grid: Golden ratio, asymmetric balance, negative space breathing room, visual gravity.
6. Emotional Tone: Mood keywords, psychological associations.
7. Signature Techniques: 3–5 concrete design techniques that define the aesthetic.

2.2 Prompt Derivation (Exploratory Prompt Seeds)

For each clustered design direction, derive an exploratory image prompt:

[Subject/Hero], [Style/Movement], [Color Palette], [Lighting/Texture], [Composition/Viewpoint], [Mood/Atmosphere], --ar [W:H] --style raw

[!TIP] Prompts generated here are intended for aesthetic exploration and moodboard generation. For strict commercial e-commerce assets (white background cutouts, marketing banners with text-safe zones), hand off to commercial-image-prompt.

Phase 3: Interactive HTML Report Generation

Generate a self-contained, responsive HTML report using references/report-template.html:

• Executive Summary: Total references, platform coverage, core design challenge.
• Direction Cards:
  • Distinct style name & one-line aesthetic thesis.
  • Visual feature breakdown grid (Color, Type, Graphics, Lighting, Composition).
  • Curated gallery of verified reference images with working source links.
  • Reusable prompt seed with bracketed parameter placeholders [like this].
• Cross-Direction Trade-Off Matrix: Comparison table highlighting contrast between directions.

Write output to design-research/[brief-slug]/report.html.

Phase 4: Quality Gate