anybody study know or is a grafic designer ?????????????? | Page 2 | GTAMotorcycle.com

anybody study know or is a grafic designer ??????????????

Freestyle72 said:
Not to insult anybody in graphics design, but the reason the market is so saturated with them and the fact that the pay is so little is because even a kid can do that kind of stuff. You need to diversify your skillset if you want to get paid anything to do that kind of work. I've seen 13 year old kids who can photoshop as well as any seasoned artist. In fact when I was 16 I got paid to make a website with my graphics design skills that I had grown from just playing around in photoshop and dabbling in that stuff outside of school. It's too easy for anyone to do. Right now graphics design is more of a supplement to marketing, or web design, communications roles etc...
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What you did as a 16yo isn't what a professional graphic designer does. Every geeky 16 yearold these days can make a website and use photoshop. That doesn't make one a graphic designer.

Also, there's a difference between self-taught Joe Designer who sits at home making crappy business cards and an educated one working for an ad agency or printing house etc etc. There's also a huge difference between someone who only knows the technical aspects of using various 'design software' and a person who has the creative eye and talent necessary to make nice designs.
 
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stormcat said:
LMAO! You do realize Photoshop isn't "graphic design," correct? It's an image manipulation tool and that is it. There are other products in the CS package, but you probably only got PSD Lite with your digi camera, so you think that's all there is to it. I've seen you wannabe designers using Microsoft Word before. I've seen you use Corel Draw. I've seen you use low res bitmap images you've stolen off the Internet with no understanding of copyright laws. The same people who can't understand colour processes and whine about the printed colour being 'off' from your monitor, have never heard of a printers bleed before — little less know how to apply one — and complain about the white line around your graphic, and caterwaul about the jagged image quality on your crappy images. No clue. No clue whatsoever. And it seems that very few true, educated designers know the first thing about prepping files for print, how to create a simple dieline, or even how to set simple tabs and style sheets.
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I am well aware that photoshop is not "graphic design" For me its the least used tool in CS5, indesign and illustrator are what I use most of the suite.

Corel used to be a big name, while Adobe was packaging free versions of photoshop with scanners, though now I would not touch the program. We still have corel for old files, but whenever an old corel job comes up, me re do the job and set it properly in CS.

There is a problem with many designers not understanding bleeds, pantone colours and the like, but those are the cheap ones who are not very good and in the end, you get what you pay for. .
 
wonderings said:
There is a problem with many designers not understanding bleeds, pantone colours and the like, but those are the cheap ones who are not very good and in the end, you get what you pay for. .
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Exactly. And you'll get to pay the pre-press dude a royal amount to fix those errors.
 
stormcat said:
Oh, suck it up. You got called out on the whole Photoshop IS graphic design statement. And don't put words in my mouth, either. Being a real graphic designer is a lot of work, it's stressful, mentally exhausting and the hours and continued education we put into our careers is seldom appreciated or understood. It's no wonder so many graphic designers are alcoholics. No, I'm not kidding.
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Please point out where I said Photoshop is graphics design? It's a tool graphics designers use. My point was the same tools are easily accessed and used by kids just as effectively as the people coming out George brown and the like trying to work their way to the top. And like I said at the end of the post graphics design is more of a supplement to things like marketing and web design.



mmmnaked said:
What you did as a 16yo isn't what a professional graphic designer does. Every geeky 16 yearold these days can make a website and use photoshop. That doesn't make one a graphic designer.

Also, there's a difference between self-taught Joe Designer who sits at home making crappy business cards and an educated one working for an ad agency or printing house etc etc. There's also a huge difference between someone who only knows the technical aspects of using various 'design software' and a person who has the creative eye and talent necessary to make nice designs.
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Point is Kids at home and Joe Designer do get jobs, and sometimes that all that is needed for the job. You don't call in the worlds greatest diagnostic medical expert when your kid gets the sniffles. And really the point I was trying to make is I got that work without even tring being a kid 16 and client was happy with the work. And I didn't really do it for the money I did because I enjoy art but can easily recognize that doing that for a living isn't necessarily attractive to me especially when the competition is thousands of people trying to get their foot in the door.
 
I understand what you're saying, I'm just pointing out that you can't lump all 'graphic designers' into the same category as the photoshop-proficient 16 year-old.

There are higher end jobs for higher end designers. They're just hard to find and the competition is fierce.
 
My friend, who is a production artist/designer, makes well over $70,000. So if you have the talent and experience, it pays pretty decent. He's been in the field for 15 years.
 
No offense to your friend, but if I was working in a professional field for 15 years and only making $70k I'd probably find another career.
 
mmmnaked said:
No offense to your friend, but if I was working in a professional field for 15 years and only making $70k I'd probably find another career.
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Imagine going from $45/h to $24/h I'd be outta there in a hurry too.
$24/h on a 8 hr day works out to like what? $49K annually?

But you know the saying. If you like what you do, you never work a day.
 
$24/hr to many people these days would be a blessing.

But anyway, I think that people here are agreeing without realizing it: there are MANY people out there who can play around with Photoshop/whatever and pretend to be graphic designers. And to some clients who don't have a discerning eye, it's good enough. Hence, why clients won't pay what they once did. So yes, the market is saturated with "graphic designers", and whether they know what they're doing or not isn't necessarily the point. It's all about what the client is willing to pay for.
 
Freestyle72 said:
Most 15 year professionals make 70K or more easily.
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Really?
I will use electrical as an example since its what I know. Many electricians in ontario make around $30 an hour. Some more, some less. ($25 an hour is a min, wouldnt except it as anything more than a starting rate if you have a ticket.)

Cant imagine plumbers, HVAC, let alone drywallers etc. make much more than that.
 
What's the general definition of a professional? And is it profession-specific?
 
Freestyle72 said:
Not to insult anybody in graphics design, but the reason the market is so saturated with them and the fact that the pay is so little is because even a kid can do that kind of stuff.
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And that is precisely what is wrong with the industry.
Everyone thinks that they can do all their own design. I've been in the field for over 20 years, and with the onslaught of home PCs, the quality of work has dropped incredibly. Every week we get stuff supplied to us in Publisher, Word or Xcel. It's absolutely pathetic how lousy this kind of stuff is - if a company I hired to do some work on my place gave me a quote on something so poorly designed chances are I wouldn't use them. If they don't have pride in their image, they won't take care in their work.

Just 'cause you've got a PC and some freebie or pirated software, you're not a graphic designer any more than I am a serious carpenter because I have a jig saw, sand paper and a tape measure.
 
As for the money drop in the graphics field, it's very real and far reaching.
In KW alone, 2 major printing shops closed, and the newspaper laid off half their art staff.
My employer just hired a new person, and had a stack of resumes over 1.5 inches thick in less than a week.

I had a look at several different locations looking for "graphic designers" -- what they want is completely over the top for basement grade wages. You need to be proficient in general graphic design, variable data, web design (including full flash, fireworks and javascript), photo retouching, and IT service capable. The overall wage offered -- $15-17 / hour. From about 4 places I applied at.
 
mmmnaked said:
No offense to your friend, but if I was working in a professional field for 15 years and only making $70k I'd probably find another career.
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No offense to you, but I don't care what someone does or how long they've been doing it, making over $70,000/year in this economy is pretty good. And it's not like he's an art director or creative director - he's just your basic production artist/graphic designer.
 
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