[stephenr]

The argument is that having a dedicated design stage before converting to templates/app/etc is still valid. Just because that button in the PSD is a rasterized gradient, doesn't mean the resulting page will have an image - but it does mean the developers writing the HTML CSS and JS have a solid design to work from, that the client has already approved.

Do you somehow think that because the PSD to HTML process starts with a PSD file that the output is necessarily going to be a) fixed dimensions and b) lots of images? If so, I have some news for you...

[pawelk]

Converting PSDs to HTML/CSS has been my job for the past ten years. The "PSD that client has already approved" is part of the problem, because what's been approved is a picture of the website which may be very close to reality under some circumstances, but not necessarily what's going to be rendered on an ancient corporate workstation with IE7 which, by coincidence, is what the client uses to test the website.

Now the workflow slowly evolves and Photoshop mock-ups are still part of it, but what the client accepts is the visual style, mood, UX, content strategy etc. The design team provides style guides, graphical assets, some key components. The UX team may provide a clickable prototype or just sketches of individual pages. Front-end devs build HTML/CSS components, then individual page templates which are usually integrated with server-side logic and filled with content. Everyone can be involved at any stage so it's not a typical waterfall process, rather combining the expertise of different professionals to deliver the best product.