Creating A Future With a Career in Graphic Design
A career in graphic design… how will you ever make a living? Don’t listen to them, you can create a solid future with a career in graphic design, keep reading.
What is Graphic Design?
From an outsiders perspective, Graphic design is creating and manipulating art digitally or maybe even physically. Really, graphic design is so much more than that…
Graphic design is visual communication. Graphic design is the back bone for your brand, your marketing, and your messaging as it relates to your audience. From Hollywood to Tokyo, graphic designers have found a home helping with special effects, costume design, and much more. Outside of movies graphic design is used to create video games, bring architecture to life, and even giving form to new products. To truly understand the field of graphic design, let’s look a little closer.
Graphic Design Degree?
A graphic design degree is perfect for anyone who wants to start their career in animation, marketing management, web design, app design, or just pure blooded graphic design as it applies to print and packaging. The courses are geared towards the things that you’ll really need and be proud to take part in with hands-on training throughout the course as well! Usually a Bachelor’s degree takes about 4 years, and once you’ve gotten your legs under you in the field you can always go back for a 5-6 year Masters degree as well. An education in graphic design is not about perfecting your illustration skills or mastering computer programs — though you should be practicing that. A degree in graphic design is really about mastering the ability to solve problems that real business have. If you want to lend your brilliance to top notch gaming, animation, or movie directors, you’ve got to be a real solution provider. This degree opens the door to handling the communication channels of Fortune 500 companies from brand development all the way down to manipulated image url design.
Is It Too Late?
You may wonder if it’s too late to worry about a graphic design degree. Maybe you took a sabbatical after high school to work, or you think it might be an over populated field with no supply demand balance. In truth the interest means more than your age, because this is a career of passion and attention. No matter how old you are this is a career that you can get into and still do something worthwhile. Thankfully for everyone else, there is always going to be a shortage of graphic designers. Everything from our cell phones and T.V. to our cars and refrigerators all use at least some sort of graphic design. With that being said, if you think it’s a tank of fish filled to the brim you may want to zoom out your vision a bit. In fact, the field of
Graphic design is more closely comparable to the universe, constantly expanding with opportunity. The few career options we’ve discussed so far are actually just the first few planets from the sun here in the milky way. When looking at it in that light, imagine all the places that a career in graphic design could take you. Even more imagine all the places you could take the world of graphic design. New more convenient designs for every day technology, software, or even architecturally. You could be the head designer for the next big game and create a standard in game design entirely if that is what you decide to do with your degree, your professors will have given you the skill set to make that happen. The next great cell phone or interface designer could be reading this right now.
A career in graphic design gives all of the “well that could be better”s a home. It’s a field to make things better beyond just the idea of what could be different. Have you ever thought that a logo could be better? Be the one to pitch the upgrade. Did a certain movie leave you wanting more visually? Be the one to transcend the sequel. Careers in graphic design can help make the next trend or help shape current trends. Maybe you’re worried that it would be too expensive and not worth the time and getting so far in debt. Fortunately, a degree in graphic design on average costs only about $34,000 with an earning potential of $45k to start and up to $150k for art directors. The great thing about design is you can decide where you take this career.
Post Graduation Fears Debunked
Often times people are afraid to go into graphic design because they fear graduating into a dead field meaning they have no way to work. This isn’t actually true. As we previously discussed, the field of graphic design is vast and there are a lot of aspects of the profession. Most people just see the immediate “graphic designer ” job title and zero in on that one idea. The best part of graduating with a degree in graphic design is that you can do with it exactly what you want to do with it. People have started their own design companies, others have become Art Directors with other companies, some have done a mixture of both. The only thing holding you back once you get your graphic design degree is your own mindset. The sky’s the limit and the world is yours to create.
What To Do Now
Now that we’ve seen just how great the world of graphic design really is, why wait? Get started on pursuing your career today!
Find a school near you or compare some of the more highly acclaimed schools. The road to starting your degree is much like the road to your career, only your mindset can stop you. Finding the right school for you could be as easy as your next google search. When you’re ready to work on your resume — check out this post on how to get your graphic design resume in top shape if you’re applying for design jobs.
