Career Fields/Specializations
Graphic Designer Career
Graphic designers generate the visual presentation and design of goods, including anything from websites to detergent boxes, album covers to dog food cans. The work is usually done on a project basis. You must be able to work under extreme time constraints and very defined financial and design limits to produce quality material.
Graphic designers also must be creative and able to communicate their ideas in writing, visually, and verbally. Because consumer tastes can change quickly, you need to be well read, open to new ideas and influences, and quick to react to changing trends.
- Problem-solving skills, paying attention to detail, and the ability to work independently and under pressure are important traits.
- It is essential to keep up-to-date with the new software technologies that develop everyday. Some important ones to master are QuarkXpress, Adobe InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat, Dreamweaver, and Flash.
- Career opportunities include those in advertising, television and film, publishing and private businesses.
Web Designer Career
Web Design is a large and growing industry that combines the fields of graphic design, computer programming, multimedia, and writing. With the dramatic growth of the Internet and exciting technological advances in the design field, web graphic designers have many opportunities. Today, every business, large or small, needs a strong web presence in order to thrive and this means a large web design base within the graphic design industry.
Main skill sets that are required include HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP, Flash and Photoshop. It is important to have a good grasp of graphic design, layout and text editing. The best web-designers know more than just the technical skills, they also know what a good looking page is supposed to look like.
Desktop Publisher Career
Using computer software, desktop publishers format and combine text, numerical data, photographs, charts, and other visual graphic elements to produce publication-ready material.
Desktop Publishing Specialists create such documents as reports, brochures, instruction manuals, magazines, books, tickets, cards, newsletters, advertisements, and forms. In some companies, graphic designers may supervise these workers, while other DTP Specialists apply their knowledge of graphic art to complete the job unsupervised.
Most desktop publishing career opportunities are in printing and publishing industries. However, other desktop publishers print or publish materials in-house or in-plant for business services firms, government agencies, hospitals, or universities, typically in a reproduction or publications department that operates within the organization. The essential skills include QuarkXPress, Adobe InDesign, PageMaker, FreeHand, Illustrator and Photoshop.
Advertising Design Career
Advertising designers create visual and print ideas for advertising and marketing campaigns. They tackle how to best convey their message to consumers and stimulate demand for their products. In order to do this, a range or factors should be considered, to determine the most appropriate and effective design for the given advertisement. Advertising designers need to use various combinations of print, electronic, and film media to create designs that visually solve communication problems.
Professionals in the field of advertising design combine design, writing, strategic planning and branding to develop integrated multimedia marketing campaigns. Knowing how to use programs such as Adobe InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, PageMaker, and Quark are also an important part of the skill sets required for the industry.
Marketing Design Manager Career
Marketing Managers are responsible for conducting and evaluating market research for a product or service. As a marketing manager, you will be in charge of designing, writing, and overseeing the production of printed promotional materials including catalogs, brochures, flyers, and program and media guides. You will also often be in charge of developing advertising campaigns for various media and designing layouts and preparing copies.
In addition to experience in marketing, the necessary skills for marketing managers include experience with design, print and web production and a strong knowledge of design applications and tools - Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign to name a few. Marketing Managers can get into the fields of advertising, television, film and print media.
Product Packaging Designer Career
Packaging design is the discipline of creating the container, graphics and visible outer presence of a consumer product. This container may range from a simple bottle and label to an elaborate box or system of boxes and inner packaging.
The discipline of package design focuses on producing a container that will get noticed. By skillfully teaming colorful graphics, a unique shape, or any other eye-arresting method, the package designer is a key player in any company's marketing effort.
Packaging designers need the ability to develop marketable ideas and translate design concepts into three-dimensional packages of all shapes and sizes. They must also be in tune with today's market and knowledgeable about competitive strategies to communicate the essence of a consumer brand, product, or service over a wide variety of mediums.
As a packaging designer, you need to be able to combine the knowledge of a structural engineer with the esthetic sense of a graphic designer. You also need to have knowledge of computer-aided design software (CAD) in addition to QuarkXPress, Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign.
Print Designer Career
In the world of print,
graphic designers that specialize in print use their creativity and computer skills to layout advertisements, promotional brochures, newspapers, magazines and other print materials that artfully bring together text, photos, and illustrations to create the kind of visual impact desired by clients.
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