Graphic Designer Job Description: What Is A Graphic Designer

What is a graphic designer?

What is the graphic designer job description?

What’s the difference between a senior graphic designer job description, and a junior graphic designer job description?

Questions we see a lot, and we would like answers. Let’s take a look at a graphic artist description or graphic designer description.

The graphic designer’s job is to bring a lot of kinds of communication to life. They’ll give their client a design that will get their message across and achieve a high visual impact.

The role actually requires a business sense, as well as creative flair. They tend to work on a variety of products, from packaging, websites, magazines, and books, as well as corporate identities, exhibitions and computer games.

Nowadays, most of their work is done on a computer, with specialized software packages. They have to work closely with other colleagues who are involved in the project, such as photographers, copywriters, as well as sales staff. And, they often work directly with clients.

They tend to work Monday through Friday, but extra hours, especially when they need to meet project deadlines, are common. And, part-time work may also be possible. The work is commonly done in a design studio and includes sitting at a computer for prolonged periods of time.

A graphic designer makes a combination of art and technology in order to communicate an idea through images, web screens, and printed pages. To achieve both decorative and artistic effects, they use a variety of design elements. They’re behind the development of the overall layout and the production design for anything from a business card to a corporate report.

They’re in charge of choosing types, fonts, sizes, colors etc., and decide how the text and images go together on a screen, along with the writers who both choose the words, and decide whether they are to be put into lists, paragraphs or tables.

The graphic designer job commonly involves some of these things:

• Meeting with the art director or clients, to determine the project’s scope
• Advising their clients on strategies to reach a specific audience
• Determining the design’s message
• Making images that will convey the message, or identify a product
• Developing graphics, as well as images for logos, product illustrations and websites
• Making designs, either by hand, or with the software packages mentioned above
• Selecting images, colors, text style and layout
• Presenting the design to the art director or clients
• Incorporating recommended changes into the final design
• Reviewing the designs for errors before publishing or printing

Graphic design is nowadays an important part in the marketing and sales of products. Therefore, the designers are also referred to as communication designers, and they work closely with people in advertising. And, designers often specialize in a specific category, or type of client. For example, some make posters and print media, while others make credits for motion pictures.

They must keep up with the latest computer graphics and design software, on their own, as well as through software training programs. And they need to be able to create a design that’s both interesting to consumers and clients, and artistically interesting. They use either hand sketching or a computer program to make a rough illustration of a design idea.

They must communicate with the customers, clients, as well as with other designers, to make sure that the design they create will accurately reflect the message, and express the information effectively. Most of them will use a graphic design software, and they need to be able to think of a new approach to communicate an idea to the consumers. Their goal is to develop a unique design that will convey a recognizable meaning on behalf of their clients.

A graphic designer works on projects with other designers and marketers, as well as business analysts, programmers and writers. They need to collaborate in order to make a successful end product. And, some individuals who have a background in graphic design will often teach in design schools, universities and colleges.

Education

A bachelor’s degree in either graphic design or a field that is related, is commonly required. However, if you have a bachelor’s degree in another field, you may pursue technical training in order to meet most of the hiring qualifications.

There are plenty of programs that will give you the opportunity to build a professional portfolio, which means collecting some of the finest examples of their designs, be it from a classroom project, internship, or any other experience.

You can use these examples to demonstrate your skills when you’re applying for a job or bidding on a project, as a good portfolio is often the deciding factor.

If you’re interested in a graphic design program, you should take basic design and art courses if available. Many bachelor’s degree programs will require you to complete a year of basic courses before being admitted to a formal degree program. Some will even require you to submit sketches and other examples of your skills and abilities.

Important qualities

Analytical skills. A graphic designer must have the ability to look at what they’ve done from a consumers’ view point, and examine how the end consumer will perceive the design, to make sure that the desired message is conveyed.

Artistic ability. A graphic designer needs to be able to create an artistically interesting design that will appeal to consumers and clients. They’ll make a rough illustration, often by a computer program or by hand sketching.

Creativity. They should be able to find a new approach of communicating their idea to consumers. The unique designs they develop should convey the message on behalf of their client.

Time management. Graphic designers will often need to work on multiple projects at the same time, where each has a different deadline.

A graphic design input will be necessary for a variety of products, such as:

• Packaging
• Websites
• Corporate identity
• Books and magazines
• Computer games
• Advertising
• Exhibitions and displays

Their tasks will commonly include:

• Taking a brief about the requirements
• Making an estimate about the time required, and costs
• Coming up with a design concept as per the client’s needs
• Presenting options for the design treatments
• Creating a final design within the deadline and budget
• Making changes according to the client’s requirements
• Proofreading, and finalizing the design

A graphic design will either need to meet with their client directly, or if working in an agency, they may take briefs from the account manager who is responsible for the client contact. They also need to work with their other colleagues, and may take part in formal presentations if they’d like to pitch their ideas to a potential client.

Do they need to have the ability to draw? Nowadays we have a lot of computer based-tools and the drawing abilities aren’t that important. You don’t have to be a great artist, but you need to have a good sense of design and be able to make a basic sketch or drawing.

The sketches and drawings need to be able to convey the ideas to either your boss, or a client. If you’re uncomfortable with your drawing skills, find some tutorials, and spend time practicing.

What’s the difference between a graphic designer and an illustrator?

Both of them do design-type work. However, a graphic designer will work on the design structures and elements, and provide a visual message or brand for a company that wants to sell a product, or service.

An illustrator, on the other hand, will do commercial work for someone like a comic book house, or a publishing house and advertising agency. They do a lot more drawing, illustrations and company logos or graphic novels.

A graphic design degree requires a concentration in website design, product design and publication design. An illustration student will have some kind of graphic design training, but the majority of their coursework is focused on art history, drawing and painting. And, the illustrator commonly won’t have the graphic designer’s advanced knowledge.

If drawing and illustrating concepts is something you like, illustration is a good fit. However, if you want to do detail-type work, as well as code and make websites, a graphic design is a bit better.

What is it like to be a graphic designer?

The job isn’t as glorified as many think, and it’s actually a stressful, cutting edge job, where you have to face challenges on a daily basis. The industry evolves faster than any other industry, technically and creatively, and you have to stay on top of trends continuously, as well as stay creative and learn new software.

A huge part of the job is being attentive to the clients’ needs, and being intuitive, as well as being able to see through what they’re saying. To be a good designer, it takes more than just an artistic ability, as you’ll also need to have great communication skills in order to understand your client’s expectations and criticisms, and manage them.

If you want to set yourself above many other designers, you will need to develop client-related skills, and make the entire design process about them, and their products. Keeping your ego out of your work is also a key point here.

Designing for print, versus designing for the web

When you’re designing for the web, you have a lot of new variables, as well as opportunities and limitations that aren’t there in print design. With print, you usually know exactly how the content is displayed and you have a fixed layout, but web design requires that you are aware that users can be viewing your content on a variety of devices.

This often means designing for a fluid experience, where your design needs to change, and react to changes such as a different screen size, which is a design challenge by itself.

Furthermore, you have higher technical constraints when designing for the web, as you should know what you can, and can’t do with the current technologies.

For example, a lot of the standard typographical tools aren’t available, or at least easily accessible, and a lot of foundries won’t license their typeface for online use, meaning that web typography is nothing more than in its infancy.

Additionally, constraints such as bandwidth will require that you consider file size, which often restricts your design opportunities for the sake of a better user experience.

However, when designing for the web, you’ve got some interactive elements that you won’t find with print design. They will both offer plenty of new possibilities, and create more work for the designer.

For example, you can add animations and transformations to elements on the page, but you also have to worry about user experience as well. With print, on the other hand, there’s very little user interaction. But, on the web, this is a very big concern.

Ending thoughts on the graphic designer job description

Let’s go over the graphic designer job description again. A graphic designer will use either their hand, or a computer software, to create a visual concept that communicates an idea that will inform, inspire or captivate the consumer.

They should develop the layout, as well as the production design for anything from brochures, advertisements, magazines as well as corporate reports.

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