by renegadeZERO
A Guide To Starting In The Design Industry
3:05 pm in Resources & Tuts by renegadeZERO
This post actually started life as ‘’what advice would you give to people wanting to start out in graphic design/digital artwork?’’ – A question in the interviews we will be bringing you soon. It soon became apparent I couldn’t stop talking and this one question ended up as a brief start up guide to getting into design. We decided to create a separate post for this and thought it would be a nice introduction to the tutorials and resources we will be bringing your shortly.
Introduction
When starting out, no matter what it is it’s best to have a plan. Getting an idea of what areas of design you would like to cover (although this will most likely change) is the best way forward. It’s best to have an idea of where to start rather than following a blind path. Once you have an idea of the kind of work you want to do, it’s a case of building your skills in these areas and putting together a portfolio.
The method below follows the hobbyist to potential career path, but many points could be applied to whichever way you decide to start. Depending on your starting knowledge and natural talent your route may differ from someone else’s but the main points here should be transferable.
Ideally it is best to have some formal training. A college course in Graphic Design will probably cover the basics and then when you go on to University you can start to specialise in a given area. Marketing, web design, motion, corporate identity/branding and so on. If there is no way you can do any training then I have devised the following guide to help you on your way. Note the word guide, it is in no way a bible but I hope it helps.
Equipment and software
I would suggest getting hold of the relevant software Photoshop and Illustrator if possible and semi decent computer. There are free alternatives to Photoshop and Illustrator such as The Gimp and Inkscape but after many years of using Adobe products I found these to be cumbersome and not as flexible. But for a starting point they should give you a taste of what you can do and considering you already have a computer (your most probably reading this on a computer) the software is free.
Once you have the software play with it, there are many resources and tutorials available online, they are your friends. There is the possibility of falling into other people bad habits but to me the end result is all that matters. Speed and knowledge will come in time, and experiment on your own where possible. Set yourself little tasks like designing a web banner, and see if you can do it unaided and you’ll get an idea of what you need to improve and what your good at as well as timescales involved. For the moment I wouldn’t bother with graphic tablets and that kind of thing, maybe a get a cheap scanner but the need for anything else at this early stage shouldn’t be an issue. Take it one step at a time.
Building your portfolio
One you are fairly familiar with your software do as much free work as possible to build up your portfolio and knowledge. Try stick to things that interested you, as there is nothing worse than starting on a project you don’t believe in when you’re not getting paid for it. You won’t finish it and it will be a waste of time. From then hopefully some paid work will come your way and you’ll have a portfolio to showcase. deviantArt will crop up quite a bit during the course of this article, sign up asap. It’s free and you’ll probably want as much inspiration as possible, and the tutorials on there will help with projects such as designing business cards and anything else you can think of. People can post on the forums there for both paid and unpaid work. For the time being focus on unpaid work. It’s a good way of building up your portfolio when you have run out of friends and family you can do things for. Plus the variety of work people need on there is pretty diverse giving you a chance to cover numerous aspects of design. Don’t try too much too soon, and make sure you have one thing down before moving onto something else. It’s better to be great at one thing than crap at 3 things right? The other point I would like to make here is by doing actual work for actual people rather than just messing around ‘making stuff up’ is that you can get testimonials from the people you have done work for, you will learn what it is like to deal with clients (not always great) and how to handle them. This experience is invaluable. Believe me when I say that just because you are doing a job for someone for free, that they will get down on their hands and knees and kiss your dirty sneakers. They won’t. Some can be damn annoying, demanding and turn a great project into a chore, but stick with it. Some people I have dealt with in the past, usually the worst of those type of clients, are my best clients today. Plus with doing actual work for actual people you may pick up a few freebies and favours along the way. And it’s really cool to see people buying a CD you designed at a gig you got into for free.
Marketing
At this point set up a website, hopefully you’ll have a bit of web design knowledge by then if that’s a skill you want to add. If not see if you can do a trade. Places like deviantArt are great for meeting people, and there may be a web coder who can turn your idea into a fully functioning website. They may do this free of charge (they may be starting out like you) or be able to do a website in exchange for you doing some artwork for them.
You could do the website after learning a bit of web design as a personal project whilst getting to know your software as mentioned earlier. It just depends on your free time and what directions you want to head in.
Ok so by now you will hopefully have a website, portfolio and small amount of paid work. Don’t quit your day job yet though! Market yourself; get yourself on facebook, twitter, myspace and any other social sites you can think of. Enter competitions to get your skills seen, join places like deviantArt where you can pick up inspiration, tips and feedback on your work.
Keep learning and be inspired
Constantly hone your skills. Even the world’s greatest web designers are constantly learning new things. Such is the advance of technology and practices in the design world. Seek inspiration whenever wherever you are. Notice logos on shops, signs on the street, notices on public transport and music, game and DVD artwork. Hopefully before long you will be able to spot mistakes other people have made, what fonts they have used etc and learn from them. Be inspired by the good and learn from the bad.
Those really crappy spam emails you get? The junk you get through your door. Look at them, from a design perspective anyway. You don’t want to read it, it looks like spam. Ask yourself why? I have on occasion found myself reading spam, not interested in the product or service itself, but because it is well designed. Not very common but it does happen from time to time!
Upgrading
When you have enough money buy the best software and equipment. By best I don’t mean the BEST, but the best for you. Do you need Adobe Creative Suite CS4 or will just Ps and Ai do? Do you need the latest Mac AND iMac or will a standard laptop do? Many arguments to be had there, but we’ll leave that one for another time.
Now is the time to think about the extra stuff you may need such as a graphics tablet. With any software/equipment read reviews and give it a go before buying it. Most software comes with a free trial. By this point your no longer a beginner and will probably know what to buy and what to avoid. You’ll probably have a few favourite artists and know what they use (although this doesn’t mean it’s right for you) and have some friends in the industry that can recommend stuff to you. As I said before, get what you need not what you want.
Freelance?
At this point you will probably want to take things to the next level. There’s two possibilities really. Work for a company or freelance. Each has it’s pros and cons. Working for a company means more security and less stress, but freelance gives you more freedom and possibly more money. To get a job within a company, especially with no formal training whilst not impossible is extremely difficult. It’s hard enough with a degree and strong portfolio. Most require a minimum amount of experience too. Like I said at the beginning getting as much training as possible would benefit you a lot.
Summary
Last but not least you need to live and breathe art and design. Unfortunately this is something that can be taught. If you’re reading this, then chances are you either love it or merely like it. When I look at a blank canvas I get excited. I have a white screen burnt into my brain, and whenever I have finished a project I pull that image up and see what has come out of the nothingness. Sometimes, just sometimes, I even surprise myself.
There are many further points I could make about planning, dealing with clients and so on but maybe we will do a part two to this further down the line. I will hope to be bringing more articles like this soon, so I hope you found some points in there that can help you along and good luck!
We will be posting two more parts to the ‘Getting Started’ guide – A round up of the best free programmes, resources and tutorials on the web as well as our recommended software and equipment. Look out for those soon.
