What are the Careers like in Web Design?

S.M.B.

Pretty much. They work with an IA to create mock ups and design assets across all our sites (we're not a web design agency). Together they also oversee any UX work that has to be done.

Same with all the London agencies I worked at. There was always a bigger divide between the designers and those developing the sites. They were always just straight up designers.

Placebo

smash wrote: »

What do they do then? Mock up layouts?

Why is that so hard to believe ? http://ebow.ie/ have a couple of sole designers too and separate developers.

smash

S.M.B. wrote: »

Pretty much. They work with an IA to create mock ups and design assets across all our sites (we're not a web design agency). Together they also oversee any UX work that has to be done.

Same with all the London agencies I worked at. There was always a bigger divide between the designers and those developing the sites. They were always just straight up designers.

So they're graphic designers, not web designers... Because essentially they just design graphics, not websites.

Placebo wrote: »

Why is that so hard to believe ? http://ebow.ie/ have a couple of sole designers too and separate developers.

I know who ebow are. And I find it hard to believe because every web designer I know, can code. Otherwise they're just graphic designers and work for print, I don't see any good reason for a web design company to have a designer that can't code.

Pixelcraft

I can code front end, but when I'm working in agencies I never do the front end - the knowledge is still beneficial so I'm not designing something that's impossible to develop.

The last thing an agency would want is to pull their designers and get them coding, unless they've only one project on!

If you think graphic design for print is the same as digital and the only difference is knowing how to code you're really, really mistaken

BostonB

The terminology is used interchangeably like designer, developer, web, graphic, UI etc. When it really isn't all the same by definition, or for that matter in the real world. Sometime you might be doing overlapping roles. So I wouldn't get too wrapped up in the titles.

The only way to define a role or a persons experience is to see what they have done or do on a daily basis. Also the roles change over the years. what I did as a web designer/developer 10yrs ago wouldn't count for very much these days. The industry has moved on. You need to look and see what skillsets jobs are asking for. Thats really what defines the roles.

Goodshape

smash wrote: »

And I find it hard to believe because every web designer I know, can code.

And that's fantastic for you but I'm honestly finding it hard to believe your unwillingness to grasp that that simply isn't the only option.

A code/designer is great for so many things --- but it's not the only option.

smash

No it's not the only option, but by not learning then your limiting yourself a lot. I know a lot of graphic designers out of business or who have been made redundant. Then again, they all work in print, but still, I've never met a web designer who doesn't code. It doesn't make sense to me that someone would be offered a position like that, and I've never seen one advertised either. But I guess it happens.

Pixelcraft wrote: »

If you think graphic design for print is the same as digital and the only difference is knowing how to code you're really, really mistaken

As a general rule I find that web designers can design for print. Print designers can't design for web. they don't have the discipline or understanding of how it's going to be coded.

Pixelcraft

smash wrote: »

As a general rule I find that web designers can design for print. Print designers can't design for web. they don't have the discipline or understanding of how it's going to be coded.

What I'm saying is that there's more to web/interaction design than knowing how to code up your designs. You need to think about the UX, design systems etc.

Also you're wrong about web designers knowing how to design for print - there's many technicalities that would be an expensive mistake on press if you didn't understand the process of production.

smash

Pixelcraft wrote: »

What I'm saying is that there's more to web/interaction design than knowing how to code up your designs. You need to think about the UX, design systems etc.

And as I said earlier. I've been doing it for 12 years now.

Pixelcraft wrote: »

Also you're wrong about web designers knowing how to design for print - there's many technicalities that would be an expensive mistake on press if you didn't understand the process of production.

From this, I'm talking about layouts and knowledge of the applications like illustrator, indesign etc. I'm not talking about colour spaces or advanced printing techniques. The bottom line of what I'm saying is that a web designer can take a blank canvas that doesn't need many rules applied and design something on it that could be printed. A print designer finds it very difficult to take a blank canvas and created a design within constraints of what the final product should be.

strandroad

smash wrote: »

No it's not the only option, but by not learning then your limiting yourself a lot. I know a lot of graphic designers out of business or who have been made redundant. Then again, they all work in print, but still, I've never met a web designer who doesn't code. It doesn't make sense to me that someone would be offered a position like that, and I've never seen one advertised either. But I guess it happens.

Depends on the size of the team, simples. The bigger the team and projects, the more specialized roles you have. Where it's really specialised you will have dedicated folks for screenflows/wireframes and completely different folks for graphics and mockups, and the coding hasn't even started.

DipStick McSwindler

This post has been deleted.

cormee

Placebo wrote: »

Why is that so hard to believe ? http://ebow.ie/ have a couple of sole designers too and separate developers.

Webfactory.ie too

BarackPyjama

Most of the best web designers I know don't code. Personally the thought of a designer coding scares me. I know some designers know front end code but not many are good at it. It's a technical skill.

cormee

feeney92 wrote: »

so to summarize lads....what do i need to do/learn/get qualified at to succeed in the buisness that i wish to go into??

I think everyone agrees you need to be able to design. Beyond that it all gets a bit Greece/IMF'y

Giblet

Cork24 wrote: »

Safari doesn't support HTML 5 video..

Android supports flash still but has moved into html5 as I said it will take ablest 2 years

There is no such thing as a move to HTML5, you can use it today. You mean unsupported DOM API elements, which provide fallbacks. Video provides a method to fall back by adding content before the closing tag which. Others which don't just need to be detected using proper detection methods. And can be worked around, shivved or just allowed to degrade.

Other new HTML5 properties such as data attributes are supported by most browsers (Incl IE6). IE8 and older cannot render some html5 elements with styling without using JavaScript, which is why some of the semantic tags shouldn't be used if you care about supporting older browsers (sans javascript anyway). Using aria compliant role attributes do the same job semantically anyway (for the purpose of readers which need semantic layouts to be effective).

As regards to the argument of the skillset of a designer vs a front end developer. My 2c would be that while you have good designers, it would be rare to find one who could write optimised context driven JavaScript for example. jQuery plugins won't solve everything, especially for low powered devices. (I had jQuery XHR kill a Blackberry Curve recently as to make the entire page lock up for 30 seconds, and I had to hard reset a Galaxy Tab 10.1 due to some dodgy CSS3 Animation script). I've yet to meet one who could roll their own solution to a problem. Anyone who is involved with programming for a living would probably find this horrifying.

Also ebow.ie should remove the HTML5 boilerplate styles they left in there lol. ( I know that pink ::selection style anywhere :P)

red_ice

Really am sorry to pull this conversation back so I can say my own two cent...

cormee wrote: »

they take a lot of pride in the quality of their work.

You have to. If you don't take pride in your work it reflects badly on you. Anyone who sits back on a design and doesnt look at how it can be better aesthetically every time a new addition to the design is put forward and not see the positive/negative affects really shouldn't be in the industry. Im sorry if I'm stepping on toes, but I've seen alot of my peers think their work is amazing when its simply not up to par!

I simply will not talk about their work to them... change the subject, i cant say anything nice. Likewise with my own work, I dont show it to anyone but my client, not even my family or girlfriend. When they like it, ill show it to people to look at and crit, and its a select few people who i know will tell me straight. The last two signed off designs I have produced and started coding I scrapped because a day or so into the build I got other inspirations that made for a better website, which took less time to design and would be more ergonomic to code, I've shown them to the client and they have opted for the new design. That design is free of charge because I simply cannot bring myself to work on something which isnt of a certain standard, even if the last one was too! Very foolish of me, but I put that down to morals.

cormee wrote: »

Then there's the other type - someone who knows enough html to patch a page together, and produce a design that looks like it's had every available Photoshop filter applied by Homer's makeup gun.

Yes. Words cannot express how true this is.

cormee wrote: »

The first type of designer can make a pretty good living because there is a shortage of people with these skills, the second type will struggle to make a living before they finally realise, five years later, they aren't web designers.

I disagree. Sadly, I see it as the reverse, only not as extreme. Most of our market don't understand the benefits of valid code and a good foundation in building websites. They just want it to look good(which most dont). Its the typical irish "it'l do" attitude.

I have recently taken on 3 websites from 3 separate clients all of which went with the same company who are well established. I told them my rate, they agreed to it. I was giving them an update on the cost of their site and they freaked out. They told me that the last company they went with charged them 400 euro for a design, website, cms and an eCommerce package. Again, this is an established company, who i've seen many a site with their footer on it. I simply asked them why they didn't go back to them for their website update, to which the matter resolved itself very quickly and humorously!

The market is FAAAAR too diluted with chancers offering cheap websites with the "it'l do" mentality. If you're going to do something, put your heart and soul into it.

smash wrote:

I find this thread amusing because

1: There are not a lot of web design jobs out there.
2: There are literally thousands of shít web designers out there.
3: Companies don't pay what they used to.
4: We're coming into the top of another dot com bubble which will burst because.
5: Taking a short course or learning in your spare time does not make you a web designer.
6: web design involves a lot of languages, applications and discipline.

1: Business has NEVER been better right now for me.
2: Yep. Doesnt matter tho, they soon get caught out, see my reply above.
3: Companies are paying me what they have to, end of.
4: I only have my current work situation as a basis for comparison and its allllll good right now.
5: You should never stop learning in this industry. ever.
6: Languages are all more or less the same.

p

feeney92 wrote: »

so to summarize lads....what do i need to do/learn/get qualified at to succeed in the buisness that i wish to go into??

To summarize, there's plenty of work in the web business for people who are good at what they do. Be that visual design, front-end coding, or server-side coding, it's a healthy market that's growing.

It's not something you're going to learn in a few months and be employable, but it you learn what you can, figure out what it is that you like the best, work hard at it and always keep an open mind to new ideas and other skills you'll do fine. If you can do some course in a relevant field such as visual communications, computer science (depending on which area you decide to go towards) that will certainly help you along the way.

Stephenius

So how long would it take to become qualified enough in HTML (4 & 5),
CSS (etc), Javascript (etc), PHP and mySQL to get a freelance paid job?
[All learning from home -- say an average of 25 hours per week]
[Presume the person has the ability for technical aspects at least]

And what would be the best way to acquire the first one or two jobs?
[a site which would require PHP]