How to become a graphics designer

Recently, questions like "how to become a graphic designer?" and "how much does a graphic designer get?" gained some popularity. It seems that a lot of people want to get trained in graphic design, whether for personal goals and projects, or to start a career in this field.

 

Whatever the reason, however, there are key requirements that anyone who wants to become a graphic designer should know about. If you are one of these people looking to start a career in graphic design, great! You've come to the right place!

At the very beginning of this guide, we will talk about the profession (specialty) of graphic design. We will tell you general information about graphic design, the skills required, where to learn these skills, and much more. After that, we will go into more detail about each of them. Finally, near the end of the guide, we'll talk about the main reasons for choosing this profession and of course, salary is one of them.

 

Introduction

So let's start this tutorial by describing graphic design from a professional point of view. While you may already know the most basic information about this profession, this part will be a great reminder for you of the basic criteria for becoming a graphic designer.

 

First and foremost, a graphic designer is a creative profession. As the name suggests, graphic designers are dedicated to creating creative and compelling designs. This design can usually be a site layout, poster, interface, and so on. As you can imagine, this profession includes a whole range of different tasks - and they most often depend on the specifics of the company in which the designer works.

 

If you want to learn how to become a graphic designer, then you must understand that you have two options for this: either you work for a company or as a freelancer. This is the main feature of the profession - you can choose whether you want to work in a team or alone. Depending on the option you choose, some of the requirements may differ significantly - but we will talk about this in more detail a little later.

 

Whether you work alone or for a company, one factor remains the same - people who want to take graphic design training need to pay attention to their communication skills. It doesn't matter what type of work you do, you will always need to communicate with the client, find compromises and listen carefully to wishes.

 

So now we have a general direction. Let's move on and try to answer the question about the basic requirements for getting a job as a designer .

 

How to Become a Graphic Designer?

Most likely, you understand this yourself, but there are many different requirements for the full development of this profession. We will not talk about each of them (it would take a very long time) - instead, we will talk about the aspects of graphic design that will be most important for getting this position.

 

In this guide, we will cover three such aspects - education, motivation and experience. Let's start with education.

 

Education

Education is very important (yes ...) - graphic design is no exception. Even though employers these days have become more flexible in hiring employees, proper education is still one of the most important requirements when trying to get a graphic design job. But even for this, there are two ways.

 

First, you may have a traditional education . This is the most common type of education for a graphic designer - you go to college, university, take graphic design lessons to help you learn how to become a graphic designer, and voila! - you are a certified graphic designer. But you should understand that everything here is not as simple as it seems.

 

One of the most important aspects of your training will be your portfolio. Throughout your years of studying graphic design, you must spend a lot of time (and this implies a LOT of time) adding projects to your portfolio. It can be said that this is the most important part of your resume - if you aspire to become a graphic designer, then in the first interview your skills will be assessed only by your portfolio. You need to take this into account!

 

Moreover, if you are in college or university and want to learn how to become a graphic designer, then you should participate in seminars, competitions, additional lectures (and the like) as much as possible. That way, you can not only work on your graphic design skills, but also get a chance to get noticed. In addition to this, these events (especially the ones that give you any certifications) can be a great addition to your resume - if a potential employer sees that you have been an active participant in any graphic design events, then for him it is will be a positive signal. But, again, we'll talk about the motivational part a little later.

 

Another alternative to education is teaching and learning on your own. This is still a common phenomenon among people who want to learn how to become a graphic designer, especially for freelance work.

 

One of the best things about this type of training is the ability to plan your time and even start taking orders in between. Even if you decide to study graphic design (the answer to the question of where to study it) through online courses , then most of them have a very flexible training schedule, so they allow you to take graphic design training at a convenient time for you.

 

Even though things used to be very different, today's employers are more flexible in terms of hiring employees. If previously traditional education (university diploma) was a mandatory attribute, now everything has changed. Your character and personality will be just as important as your skills and portfolio - don't forget that !

 

Motivation

Motivation is a kind of subjective thing to analyze, it is still important for every beginner.

 

If you start looking for information on how to become a graphic designer, you will soon find that there are a huge number of articles devoted to motivation - and this does not just mean a desire to do something. A motivated graphic designer is one who continually develops and improves his marketing and creative thinking. It's pretty hard to do - very often you will find yourself in a situation where you like the design, but it just doesn't “sell”. This is why motivation is important - you should easily abandon ineffective designs and move on to other more creative ideas. The same applies to learning, when you will have to constantly learn new graphic design lessons despite the difficulties.

 

Your motivation will be visible during the interview as well. If your potential employer is an industry veteran, then he will immediately understand why you are interested in how to become a graphic designer.

 

However, motivation doesn't end with just the interview. Even after getting a job, you will need to show yourself (and your motivation) to employers. Whether it's simple, initial assignments or adjustments, the company will monitor your work, and if you manage to show “fake” motivation in the interview, then during the work, well ... it will be a very difficult time for you.

 

So, to summarize - if you want to become a graphic designer, then you must understand that motivation is not limited to " wanting to do something ." Motivation means working on that “ something ” with a focus on results.

 

Experience

Finally, let's talk about experience. Often this topic becomes very painful among those who are interested in how to become a graphic designer, but they have no experience with it. Or at least it was before.

 

Given that “experience” is often associated with “work experience”, this is not always the case. You can be an accomplished graphic designer simply through your personal experience. The above seminars, courses, projects, graphic design lessons. These can all be experiences.

 

For example, there are a lot of jobs right now that require an entry-level graphic designer. Of course, this is not your dream job and the salary may not be what you would like (compared to others). However, she can be the perfect source of experience for you - you will have the opportunity to start small and gradually build on it and improve your skills.

 

Finally, you shouldn't forget that freelancing is also considered a highly rewarding experience. Of course, your skills should be represented in every freelance job, but employers often treat reputable freelancers very well. While not everyone will want to start a career in a regular job after freelancing, this can be an option for you too.

 

So now you know the main aspects of how to become a graphic designer. Let's move on to the reasons for this.

 

Why Become a Graphic Designer?

There are several important reasons for this. The very first of these is creativity in the work of a graphic designer. A graphic designer must be creative - this can be a real calling for people who want to see their designs published (printed, etc.) on any product.'

 

Since graphic design is a profession where you can study and work right from home, you can use your time more effectively. If office and teamwork are not for you, then it's okay! The more you learn how to become a graphic designer, the more opportunities open up for you. Working as a freelancer is common in this industry. However, this may require earning yourself a reputation for less profitable orders - and this can be much more difficult than in a single company.

 

Finally, a graphic designer's salary can be something that attracts many people. Glassdoor.com claims the average graphic designer salary is $ 48,560 per year, or $ 4050 per month. Note that these are salary figures for international companies - in addition, freelance earnings can vary greatly. Although it will still be above the average for the labor market!

 

Conclusion

By this point, you should not only know the basics of how to become a graphic designer, but also where to learn it and have a complete understanding of the profession as a whole. We hope you found this guide helpful and that you are now ready to start your journey into the world of graphic design. Good luck on your way to your dream!