My design path

Aruffell · 20 Aug 2008 at 22:51

I've decided i want to follow my heart in the design career. I did media at school and college and then went onto a path of sales, but i miss designing websites etc...

I used to just dabble when i was at college but now i want to get into it as a career.

I'm more into design than developing, i'm more of a creative person than someone sitting there writing code, so love photoshop and flash etc... but i'd say i'm only at the basics in flash and intermediate of photoshop, i know the basics of html etc... and i've looked for jobs of junior designers, but there is nothing i can find.

What should i be learning and from where? I've spoke to the OU today and they are sending me a prospectus.

Can anyone guide me?

Thanks,

Andy

darwin · 22 Aug 2008 at 12:32

I don't work in this area but I would say you won't be able to get away from coding if you want to get into web design. At the least you will need excellent knowledge of HTML/XML/DHTML, Javascript and CSS. Some knowledge of scripting languages such as Perl/ASP/PHP would do no harm either. Perhaps people who work as web designers could chime in with their experience.

adamph · 22 Aug 2008 at 12:54

I work as a web designer / developer. Mock up a design of a website in photoshop and when you are happy with it try and convert it to HTML / CSS. If you can get that down you will learn the basic code very quickly and from then on can try other things.

kkbigal · 22 Aug 2008 at 13:05

I think that if you look at a lot of job descriptions for "web developers" these days they usually specifically ask for knowledge of a server-side scripting language as well as HTML/CSS etc, so I don't think you could get away with not learning that side of web development.

You could specialise as a graphic designer though (photoshop/flash etc.), particularly if you have a flair for art and creativity. I'd imagine on project teams, a good designer would be really valuable.

Mickey · 22 Aug 2008 at 13:15

Why does nobody understand the difference between a web designer and a web developer?

darwin · 22 Aug 2008 at 13:29

I think in smaller organizations the distinction between the two roles is not necessarily clear cut as you might expect - i.e. design people are expected to wear the 'coding' hat from time to time

GravyMonster · 22 Aug 2008 at 13:36

darwin said:
I think in smaller organizations the distinction between the two roles is not necessarily clear cut as you might expect - i.e. design people are expected to wear the 'coding' hat from time to time

I wish that was the case in my place. There are 3 print designers (who sometimes do digital stuff), 1 digital designer who can just about write his name in HTML using frontpage, and me who gets lumped with all the development work.

Mickey · 22 Aug 2008 at 21:57

darwin said:
I think in smaller organizations the distinction between the two roles is not necessarily clear cut as you might expect - i.e. design people are expected to wear the 'coding' hat from time to time

Right, so you don't work in the area, I do, but you know more about it than I do? Well I'm certainly learning a lot today, anything else you'd like to tell me about?

simisker · 22 Aug 2008 at 23:20

Mickey said:
Right, so you don't work in the area, I do, but you know more about it than I do? Well I'm certainly learning a lot today, anything else you'd like to tell me about?

No need to be quite so sarky. I do work in the area for a smaller organisation, and I'd certainly agree with what darwin has said. My job title is 'designer', yet I'm often called upon to don the coding hat - and by coding, I mean standards-based front-end development.

Frankly, if my seven years in the industry have taught me anything, it's that there are a hell of a lot of people out there employed as 'web designers' who are more decorators than designers. The mentality seems to be: "Knock up a mockup of the home page in Photoshop full of eye candy; pass to developers; job's a good 'un. Next!". That's not what I'd call designing for the medium. User experience? Sod that, my site's got translucent PNGs...

That's not design.

To get back on topic a little: Aruffell - being a good web designer means knowing the medium, and that means at the very least having an understanding of code's idiosyncracies. If the term 'web designer' means little more to you than "I get to spend loads of time being creative in Photoshop", then you're only ever going to be an average web designer. Unfortunately, I know next to nothing about the average web design degree syllabus, so I can't offer advice on whether they'd be worth your time/money or not. All I will say is that if it's a well-paid job and recognition from the cream of web designers that you're after, you'll need to do more than sit in front of an Adobe product.

philjohn · 22 Aug 2008 at 23:30

Aruffell said:
I've decided i want to follow my heart in the design career. I did media at school and college and then went onto a path of sales, but i miss designing websites etc...

I used to just dabble when i was at college but now i want to get into it as a career.

I'm more into design than developing, i'm more of a creative person than someone sitting there writing code, so love photoshop and flash etc... but i'd say i'm only at the basics in flash and intermediate of photoshop, i know the basics of html etc... and i've looked for jobs of junior designers, but there is nothing i can find.

What should i be learning and from where? I've spoke to the OU today and they are sending me a prospectus.

Can anyone guide me?

Thanks,

Andy

Start off doing contact work to build a portfolio, then if you are good enough try and land a job at one of the big creative agencies.

Mickey · 23 Aug 2008 at 01:01

simisker said:
No need to be quite so sarky. I do work in the area for a smaller organisation, and I'd certainly agree with what darwin has said. My job title is 'designer', yet I'm often called upon to don the coding hat - and by coding, I mean standards-based front-end development.

Frankly, if my seven years in the industry have taught me anything, it's that there are a hell of a lot of people out there employed as 'web designers' who are more decorators than designers. The mentality seems to be: "Knock up a mockup of the home page in Photoshop full of eye candy; pass to developers; job's a good 'un. Next!". That's not what I'd call designing for the medium. User experience? Sod that, my site's got translucent PNGs...

That's not design.

To get back on topic a little: Aruffell - being a good web designer means knowing the medium, and that means at the very least having an understanding of code's idiosyncracies. If the term 'web designer' means little more to you than "I get to spend loads of time being creative in Photoshop", then you're only ever going to be an average web designer. Unfortunately, I know next to nothing about the average web design degree syllabus, so I can't offer advice on whether they'd be worth your time/money or not. All I will say is that if it's a well-paid job and recognition from the cream of web designers that you're after, you'll need to do more than sit in front of an Adobe product.

Most good web designers I know are totally useless if asked to turn their designs into even static sites. The problem with the industry ATM is that non designer/developers don't understand where each job should start and finish. They're very different jobs and 99% of people who try to do both endup doing both badly.

While it's true that there's far more to the design process than just using photoshop, it's not true that to be a good web designer you need to know how to take it past the visuals stage.

Oh and what do you mean by 'coding'? You still didn't explain it. If you mean doing a bit of XHTML/CSS then that is certainly not coding.

Mickey · 23 Aug 2008 at 01:05

philjohn said:
Start off doing contact work to build a portfolio, then if you are good enough try and land a job at one of the big creative agencies.

He'd be much better starting off doing designs for himself/friends/family for free to build up a decent porfolio. He's not going to get any paid work without a decent portfolio to start with.

The most important thing when starting out though is that he should ask anyone and everyone for honest criticism of what he's done. It's the only way anyone ever really gets better, anyone not willing to take onboard constructive criticism should find something else to do really.