TEN QUESTIONS THAT REALTE TO WHAT YOU MAY OR MAY NOT NEED TO KNOW, TO BE A SUCESFULL GRAPHIC DESIGNER IN THE 21ST CENTRY.

Hello

I am James Mclearie / 20 year old / student at London

College of Communication / working towards a FDA in

Design for graphic communication.

This project requires me to research and communicate,

in the form of a designed and printed 12 page publication,

what a graphic designer needs to learn and be able to

do to successfully function in the 21st century.

After writing out hundreds of possible questions to ask

practicing designers I settled on ten that I found to be

the most informative and interesting which you can see

over rest of the pages, I hope you agree.

I believe this is a very difficult question to answer, no

one can predict the future, so mainly when people think

of an answer to this question it is based on opinions

personal experiences and taste. So in order to answer

the question on the brief I chose to ask questions to

people I think would give me the most current and

interesting answers. I started by asking my peers and

there thoughts, this was a great place to start as there

answers where different and interesting, we are also the

future of the deign industry so by asking them you can

start to see common trends in opinions that will come

into play over the next ten years. I went on to ask a variety

of established and successful designers there thoughts

on the question. The designers I chose come from a

variety of places some I emailed some I spoke to over

the phone and others through internet forums, beacuse

of using these different methods of communication I

managed to get different types of answers.

0 Forum

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LCC students

Åsa ElmehedVilja AchtéLaura Carless

Designers

Si HawkesworthFold deaign.

Marek Bereza

Andrew FriendStudio Good one

Graphic design Forum thread adress:

http://www.graphicdesignforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=58446

Studios

http://www.studiogoodone.com/about

http://www.folddesign.co.uk/

http://www.mrkbrz.com/

When did your interest in design start?

Students

At sixth form I studied photography and loved it, but

always knew that I didn’t want to be just a photographer,

during my time studying I found myself starting to input my

photographs into a magazine layout or a poster. I think is

when I first started to think about design as a career. I still

do photography as a hobby, and still like to include it in my

design work when I can. Laura Carless

At sixth form I studied photography and loved it, but

always knew that I didn’t want to be just a photographer,

during my time studying I found myself starting to input my

photographs into a magazine layout or a poster. I think is

when I first started to think about design as a career. I still

do photography as a hobby, and still like to include it in my

design work when I can. Åsa Elmehed

I was about 14. Around then I started to understand what

design is. Vilja Achté

Designers

Officially, just before I went to university to study it,

unofficially, (i.e. when I started designing things), when I

was very young.

Probably early teens, hard to pinpoint exactly...

I began working as a web designer almost at the inception

of the web, and an interest in design started from there.

Forum

I honestly don’t remember

In hindsight, childhood.

About the age of 8. I just called it learning about nature

though.

As a child I loved arts and crafts. So I think I always had a

knack for it.

Elementary School-ish. Hated arts and craft but love

putting ideas out and was fairly interested in computers.

Sometime real early, before five years old for sure.

Probably when I started playing with Play-Doh and

Plastercine and all that good stuff as a kid. Creativity is

creativity, whatever the medium.

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2Do you think a Graphic designer needs a degree from art school to be a successful creative?

Students

No I don’t. I think you can learn a lot by yourself if you spend a large amount of time on it. In the end I think it’s mostly about your portfolio and what’s in it that will make you successful or not.

This is definitely untrue, you can do whatever you want if you put your mind to it, this way it would be tougher and you would need to dedicate your whole life to working upwards but it can be done. I would like to say I could have gone out after college and made it into the design world but my skills and attitude just weren’t mature enough at the time.

Not necessarily if you have a very good portfolio already.

Designers

No. It’s what you have in your portfolio that counts. That’s what people care about.

It is certainly helpful to have studied in a creative discipline, though art school is not always necessary, (architecture school is particularly good....!), a good critical understanding and skill-set that you can get while studying and being surrounded by other like minded young creative’s is certainly a good thing!

No, but a training as a result of a degree course can help. I think a good designer needs: // some innate ability to appreciate and execute design (a lot can be taught, but perhaps not all) // a wide interest in things that can inspire them/draw ideas from. // This can be other arts, literature, history, biology, anything that stimulate // and makes you interested in the world around you // an ability to critique both your own and others work // an ethical consideration of the impact of your practice // If a degree can give you some or all of these things then I think it’s a great course, but I think a good creative needs input from wider sources

Forum

A designer needs to be trained. Whether that is a GOOD college course, an internship or apprenticeship with a design mentor, or going to a good trade school, some di-rection is needed. That direction should not only include theory, it should include production practices as well. It doesn’t help to design a logo if you don’t know how to make a sign, and it doesn’t help to create a website if you don’t know how to implement privacy and security.

I don’t think “needs” is the right word. However, a de-signer will certainly benefit from a degree in the sense that it will open doors and provide a structured, well-rounded foundation.

Depends on the def of ‘successful’. I tend to think of success as being happy working hard at something that makes you happy. So the short answer is, nope.

“Needs” – No “Should have” – Yes I think it’s important to be trained in Graphic Design but I know some good designers, mostly web for some reason that have done it all on their own.

No. But to design anything you must have basic grasp of logical analysis and the ability to communicate a design to be successful in the visual arts. And that takes a cer-tain amount of training - however that training is acquired doesn’t really matter.

3Do you think social media such as facebook/twitter etc is having an effect on the design industry? (in design itself or the ways designers communicate?).

Designers

Definitely, these websites have become such a massive platform for advertising and they encompass whole audiences in one place, they are the perfect opportunity for designers if they need to communicate with that audience, whether this be through an advert on the site or merely having some sort of connection to the sites.

Yes, different ways of communication create different kinds of design. I believe it effects both the design itself and the ways designers communicate.

Stiudents

I don’t think it’s affecting design. It might be helping peo-ple to keep track of what other people are doing.

facebook and twitter are certainly having an impact, though in many cases I think that they offer an easy solu-tion / lazy option, many twitter based projects can be pretty uninteresting I don’t know if they will leave a last-ing impact.

I’m sure it helps to advertise what you do and to make contacts and to collaborate. I admit that I’m very slow in the uptake, but that’s as much about the time it takes to participate in it as anything else.

Forum

Yes, but it’s sort of indirect. So many people are using various social media (like this forum, for example) that it’s hard to argue against it having an influence on the way we communicate. As for it affecting design directly, prob-ably not so much.

Design follows culture much more than it creates it. Of course gigantic communication revolutions will have dra-matic effects on design.

Sure. Any new media forms have an effect. We adapt, learn to market and design for those new platforms and carry on. It’s also changed people’s ability to have com-panies hear them, ie: Gap logo phenomenona.

4 What is the worst decision you think you have made in your creative careear?

students

As I haven’t really had that much of a career within the creative field yet I can’t really come up with any. Must probably say something silly like choosing the wrong typeface when designing some project at Uni.

It’s hard to pick. I often have that feeling that I have perhaps chosen the wrong topic to work with, but at the end of the day it’s what you make of it, and I think that a good designer should have the skills to make any subject interesting. I would like to have done my foundation year somewhere different, the college I went to wasn’t very good and the course was uninspiring and full of people who had no real passion for the art & design industry.

Mixing up fine art and graphic design.

Designers

Taking on a job I wasn’t sure I wanted to do. I do it quite often, but usually for the moolah

I try not to dwell on the negatives!

Not taking enough chances. It’s too easy to stay in your comfort zone.You need to test yourself and make mistakes. I’m still learning

Forum

That’s hard to say. I’m not one for spending a lot of time pondering water that’s already passed under the bridge.

Starting my ‘classical’ graphic design training in 1980, three years prior to the market introduction to the Mac. That was three years of skill training that almost vanished into obsolescence overnight. (Dark days)

Not focusing more on Web... Having knaowledge in both can really help.

Using sex as a means to please certain clients.

Abandoning print and going web-only. Print is my pas-sion. I miss the smell of fresh ink on paper, I miss the sound of the press, I miss cmyk, I miss typography, I’ll stop now, otherwise, I’ll grab my setting stick, go to bed and sulk.

What do you think the best decision was?

Students

Going to university in the capital of England. The people I’ve met here are so interesting and the city is rife with inspiration and culture.

Moving to London.

Going to LCC

5Forum

To place a high priority on finding a job which allowed me to balance personal life with professional life.

Finishing my degree and taking on those projects that seemed like a waste of time. Ie: pro bono jobs for charities when I started out. Those projects got me in the door to my first design firm

At the end of my degree I got offered a Stage (internship) at a company close to my place. Great company, they were hiring so I worked my ass off and landed myself the position, I’m still here.

Using sex as a means to please certain clients.

Designers

It’s good to make decisions, better than just sitting there in indecision. Gong to the Royal college of Art, fantastic environment and the freedom to explore my own agenda, whilst being in the company of a wealth of incredibly talented other designers and artists.

Stop doing web design as a primary creative area and move into print. It’s what I’ve always loved, I just didn’t realise it.

When designing / creating which do you hold most important, the client, the intended audience, yourself and why?

Students

When designing/creating which do you hold most impor-tant, the client, the intended audience, yourself and why?

All of them are important but it depends on what I’m designing. If it’s a uni project I put myself in the front (if its not a project based on client and audience then of course they are very important). But when I work with freelance projects the clients are the most important as they are my employers.a

The client. Focusing on the intended audience gives a good perspective but the client is who you’re working for.

6 Forum

The intended audience. The trick is convincing the client it isn’t them.

The client. It’s the client’s project, the client’s money and it’s the client who will pay me. Even so, the whole time I’m working with the client, I’m telling the client that what-ever it is he or she has hired me to do must be aimed directly at the target audience.

Depends. Sometimes the battle is to design. Other times, it’s to sell design. I prefer the former to the latter

The intended audience and then the client. However, at the end of the day the client wins, b/c they are the ones paying me.

Intended audience always. Usually the client supersedes all of that because he’s got the $$$ but sometimes you get the rare client that agrees with you that the person seeing the work is more important them himself.

Myself. Because it’s to my design/creative ability that I measure me. Design/create like there’s nobody else, pe-riod. Just you, and you alone. That’s really what’s impor-

Designers

Audience, obviously, in order to do a good job.

All these things count, but you have to be true to yourself and try and do things that you are happy with both from the creative output and who and what you are doing it for. If you have issues about the exploitation of people - and you should - then doing work for big, exploitativeorganisations should make you think twice. I know it’s hard when you need to make money to pay the rent - and sometime you have to do what you must to put food on the table, but you also have to stake out some ethical and moral guidelines for yourself. I think using your art to dopositive things is a good starting point and trying to mini-mise.

What do you think is the most important attribute a designer can have?

Designers being creative.

Confidence and the ability to look forward rather than back.

Curiosity.

Students

Freedom to explore, guts to take risks. Sense of humour

Being inquisitive. An interest in lots of things will inform your workand open up ideas and opportunities for work

“FREEDOM TO EXPLORE,

GUTS TO TAKE RISKS”.

7Forum

Common Sense.

Patience. And creativity.

Sounds like a no-brainer, but I’d have to say some ba-sic, natural design talent.

Humility.

Patience and the ability to stay calm in stressful situa-tions.

Patience Patience Patience! If you have zero patience you’re in for some rough times... Minor corrections coming back, stupid clients, changes over and over....and over....

The ability to live life as an individual. It is that rare qual-ity which generates creativity.Don’t live life by committee.

Skill. (followed closely by Attitude, Patience and Imagi-nation)

8 What do you think is the most important non-creative skill a designer should have?

Students

Having a huge interest for design as a subject and its different pathways.

You need to be able to see the world from another person’s eyes, to understand how they think and beahave, otherwise designing for them will be a waste of time.

You need to be able to see the world from another person’s eyes, to understand how they think and behave, otherwise designing for them will be a waste of time.

Designers

Time management? Or maybe that’s just me.

Organisation and time management! It’s no fun staying up all night working!

Reading books. Read novels, read non-fiction. Read, read, read. Itinforms you about ideas, about history, culture, politics... and I don’tmean the net. Read books made with paper. The net’s not the same.

The other thing is hard work. You have to graft at any-thing you want to dowell. Unless you have a brain like Leonardo di vinci, you have to graft todo well. He probably worked his arse off as well but it helped to be a

Forum

Time management

Intelligence coupled with curiosity.

BPH (basic personal hygiene)

Tactfulness. It’s important to be able to tell someone their idea is not in the best interest of the production, without them telling you to jump off a cliff and firing you.

Communication. If you can make the client understand why you’re doing what you’re doing, i.e. Place the logo in the middle instead of in the bottom right corner then you can gain an edge. If you create a piece and don’t communicate at all with the client and he doesn’t like it, he’ll shoot you down. With good communication skills it’s possible to turn his vote.

mmm surely all ‘skills’ are creative? I ride a motorcycle, play guitar and cook rather well ... I would consider all three as ‘creative’?

Is the term “Its not what you know its who you know” especially relevant to the design industry?

9 Designers

I think they go hand in hand. If you’re good at what you do, you will meet the right people who will help you on your way.

To a certain degree, though I think it is up to you to put yourself in the right place at the right time in order to create and design your own opportunities.

It’s important, of course. But if you don’t know your craft people willeventually get sick of doing you a favour. If you work had, do goodwork, treat people with respect, people will get to know you as someone they will want to work with.

Students

I think it’s relevant in all industries but I’m not so sure it’s all correct. If you have a great and strong portfolio you will get a job (if you’re a nice person as well of course). But to know the right people will probably make it easier for you, even though your portfolio is not that strong.

I often wonder about this, I’d like to think it isn’t true but I think there’s a lot of truth in it, knowing people in industry is always a good thing and I think in design it’s useful, if not crucial to your career.

I’m afraid so.

Forum

Makes the world go round. Network, network, network.

It’s important, but no more so than in most fields, and pos-sibly a bit less. Social skills, salesmanship, charisma, etc., are all important, but unlike many fields, the quality of a designer’s work speaks loudly enough to be easily heard.

Not as much as most people believe, or want to believe.

It’s relevant to all industry. It always helps to know the right people.

I would say yes, it’s very important, especially when start-ing out.

‘Who you know’ may open a door or two, and that’s all. ‘What you know’ can open many more so long as you market yourself correctly.

What does the word integ-rity mean to you whether creative or otherawise.

10 Designers

It means not cutting corners in thinking of the best solution.

If a design detail is nagging at you because it’s not quite

your best in terms of giving the

I would take it to mean an honesty or lack of pretence be-

hind my work.

Its key issue for me - you can’t be divorced from the wider

world just because you think you are

a ‘creative’. What you do and how you treat people - your

colleagues,

clients, consumers - matters. Anyone who says it doesn’t is

the type of person I neither want to work for or with.

Students

For me it means that you should design with respect for other people. Not use wrong symbols or language that could make people upset. And also not stealing other designer’s ideas as you don’t want anyone to steal yours.

Integrity to me means to have a sense of who you are. As a designer you need to be open to new ideas but you can’t forget your values, I think at this point you risk losing a grip of your true self.

Forum

Adherence to moral and ethical principles.

Honesty, ethics, and consistency.

Faithful to a system or set of standards. It’s more socially practical than professionally practical, in many cases. Eth-ics are simply applied rules of moral behaviour. Morality is a set of values that’s socially shared and yet rapidly altered to better suit reality, and just as often, class or individual opportunity.”Business ethics has about the same ring of truth to it as the phrase, ‘Monopoly Money’”

Everything.

Honesty and Transparency in everything you do.

It means I won the lottery and am doing this for shit and giggles.