How To Pursue A Career In Graphic Designing?

Having a creative outlook towards life is something that is in the human genes. Since time immemorial, humans have always tried to do all that they can in an effort to beautify their surroundings. Over the years, the world of art was inhabited by that of technology and in the midst of it all, the science of graphic designing was born. The last couple of decades saw a tremendous change in which ideas were communicated in this field. This created a new surge of employment opportunities in the world of graphic design. A career that was earlier unknown to most people now became a source of employment for thousands of people.

Amidst all the hue and cry surrounding this field, more and more professionals started requiring the services of a graphic designer. This included architects, industrial designers, landscape architects and interior designers.

The collaboration of all these people with graphic designers resulted in the creation of new design environments in public arts, museums and exhibitions. As a society and a nation, all of this is indeed a welcome change. Read on to know how you can make a career in graphic designing and the scope of growth there.

Job Description

These people are responsible for designing layouts and illustrations to convey a message as desired by the client. They make use of a number of digital illustrations and photo editing software and tools to accomplish the same. The designing of logos, badges and emblems is also the responsibility of these people.

Graphic designers use either images or texts (or a combination of both) in order to achieve the desired artistic or decorative effects in their work. The design of websites, graphic tee shirts, bags and other merchandise is the responsibility of such people.

Educational Background

A bachelor's degree in graphic design is the most desirable qualification for a career in this field. However, for those who have completed their bachelor's degree in some other discipline and who wish to become a graphic designer, the best career path would be to obtain a postgraduate diploma in this regard.

There are 350 colleges across the lengths and breaths of the country that are accredited by the National Association of Schools of Art and Design and most of them offer such postgraduate diploma courses to interested candidates.

Skill Set Required

Once a task is assigned to a graphic designer, they must be able to analyse it from the client's point of view and understand what is expected out of them. For this, good interpersonal and communication skills along with a natural analytical ability is needed. One should be creative and have the knack to express an idea in an artistic manner.

In today's world, in order to succeed as a graphic designer, one needs to have fair computer operational skills as well. In fact, it will be fair to say that computer operational skills are as important for a graphic designer as is their artistic ability.

Also, no matter how much work you put in, in this field you cannot expect all your work to be an instant hit amongst your clients. Thus, patience is an essential skill for an individual to succeed here.

Experience

Since the basic educational qualifications that are required in this job are pretty nominal, a lot of people end up choosing this as the career of their dreams. This creates a lot of competition and makes it difficult for an individual to get their first job.

In such a situation, the best way out would be to start off as an intern. This will give you the required experience that is necessary for bagging a job while giving you an opportunity to sharpen the skills that you had picked up in the classroom.

Type Of Jobs

Graphic designers need a combination of tools in order to function to the best of their abilities. This includes drafting tables, appropriate stationary and computers fitted with appropriate software. Although some graphic designers choose to work independently and freelance for a number of clients or firms, most of the graphic designers actually work as a part of larger teams.

Public relations, advertising, printing and publishing are the sectors that require the exclusive services of trained graphic designers. These days, there are a number of digital marketing firms that hire qualified graphic designers. Other than that, there are a number of specialised design firms that hire such professionals. Needless to say, almost all the careers in this field are those in the private sector.

Work Condition

Although this is a creative field, jobs in this field do not involve too much physical labour. It involves minimal or no travel. The icing on the cake here is the fact that most graphic designers do not have to work in shifts or during weekends. This is a very creatively satisfying job with a very high scope of career growth.

However, since the software that are used in graphic designing are improving every day, it is important for graphic designers to keep themselves updated with the changing times if they are passionate about growing in this career.

On a positive note, if one is well versed with any one particular graphic designing or photo editing software, with a little bit of hard work and patience it will be easy for them to master newer software.

Salary

This is a creative field and like every other creative field, the amount of salary that you make here is directly proportional to the quality of work that you produce. For a fresher, the average starting salary is something about Rs 2 lakh per annum. However, if a graphic designer is able to produce work of exceptional quality, in less than a year they can make as much as Rs 6 lakhs per annum.