Don't Fear Web Design
As more and more businesses—big and small—find the Web to be a valuable medium for creating an engaging branding experience, more and more designers are learning Web design. But for many this is still a seemingly daunting task. Fear not timid print expert; you know more than you think.
"If you have a talent for print work, you are already half way there to becoming a web designer," says Gregg Greenwood, former senior Web designer/programmer for Sony Music Entertainment and who currently teaches Web Design at the School of Visual Arts (SVA).
Greenwood started out as a photographer, then became a programmer, and then a designer. His foray into Web design began while he worked as a photographer and designer for a snowboarding magazine. He was able to combine the programming skills he learned in high school with his design experience to create a simple Web site for the magazine.
"Creating layouts for Web sites is a practice most graphic designers can get their head around: color, balance, shape, style, type, hierarchy of information, readability—all the same principles of print design apply."
Greenwood, whose client list includes names such as Bruce Springsteen, Aerosmith, and the photographer David Lachapelle, says, "current graphic designers are likely skilled with the form; it's the understanding of function that needs to be developed [through practice]."
At SVA, says Greenwood, students undergo practice, critique, and reproduction training that enables them to develop and design work using HTML, CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) and Flash.
Even software vendors have re-engineered and repackaged their applications to allow easy and simultaneous content publication across any medium.
"About five years ago people would design content for print and then when finished they would start designing content for the Web," says Tricia Gellman-Holmes, Group Manager of Product Marketing for Creative Professional Products at Adobe. "What we see now is that people want to create content that can be used for whatever the final output may be."
And through dynamic publishing, says Gellman-Holmes, designers can deliver customized content via any medium to end users for a richer brand experience.
But is it even realistic to be an expert Web designers and print designer?
"Absolutely, says Greenwood. "In my mind there are no barriers to learning both of these skills."
And if you are a designer looking to take the next step up the ladder to Art or Creative Director, Web design knowledge is a must.
"At Sony, Art Directors who make an effort at building pages or creating Flash movies produce the most interesting designs for the Web. Those who shun exposure to the medium are left to create flat, non intuitive designs that require more of the production process to bring them to life," says Greenwood.
Hello Steve
A very positive post. I have tried it by myself geting into web but i could not continue without proper training.
Can you please advise. Where and how to start.
I am an Indian currently making a living in Saudi Arabia as an in-house designer for print.
Kind regards
Unnikrishna
Hello Unnikrishna!
Yes. Definitely easier said than done. That's for sure.
The best, and perhaps the only way, to learn Web design is to practice. But you need an actual project that provides a manegeable goal. You are an in-house designer. Does your company have a Web site? If not, suggest that you build a simple one. If so, then maybe suggest a simple monthly e-newsletter that you could design.
Like Gregg says above, learn HTML, CSS, and Flash. Where to find this information? Check out the sites in internet.com's Web developer channel at http://www.internet.com/sections/webdev.html. There should be enough material to get you started.
Good luck!
Hi Steve
Thank you for your reply. That's my goal for 2006 hopefully.
Have a great New Year and Merry X-mas too.
Doing web design isn't the 'problem' or 'difficulty' in itself. I would say that when you begin 'tinkering' with web design it eats up the time you have for other projects since it's more than just 'design' elements (such as layout, color, etc.) but also has scripting elements that you *must* support if you want good client relations after the site has reached a public build. //
I realized that my favorite part of building a website was the design itself and that I was spending more time making code be accessible to the majority of clients and doing server-side support instead of doing what I loved. That's why an independent print designer should stay a print designer if you actually want to spend more time *designing* stuff instead of technical support. Every once in a while you'll get good web projects where all you do is design the UI elements and have a staff do the support but they are rare as a contractor.//
>>That's why an independent print designer should stay a print designer if you actually want to spend more time *designing* stuff instead of technical support.<<
Actually I would encourage a person who felt this way to bypass print design as well.
Why? Because there is only so much *design* involved in print design before a person must bother themselves with *support issues* like pre-press and printing.
HOW to get that edgy design to a point where it can be printed for the amount of funds present in the client's printing budget requires that a print designer bother themselves to learn about printing technology -- offset AND digital -- and educate themselves as to the potential traps and pitfalls that can arise as the result of certain decisions made at the design phase.
It's no wonder that most junior designers come up with these elaborate design solutions that could never be printed. Experienced designers factor the technology into their head while coming up with designs and have certain issues worked out long before they sell those designs to their clients.
In other words, same *support issues*, different technology.
How many print designers actually enjoy endless rounds of proofing or late night press runs? And what exactly do those -- or any other details specific to printing technology -- have to do with actual design?
.chris{}
Chris, I don't think you see my point. The support issues relevant to print design are relevant to a print designer. Just like an actual web developer probably enjoys troubleshooting code I can say that I like prepress and already know how to solve those problems. Learning web design isn't just doing the interactive design itself it comes with a whole host of problems that detract from, say, my chosen specialty.
I wouldn't even say that you're halfway there. The hypothetical Creatives that were cited in the article probably have the luxury of creating content and then passing it off to the interactive staff and QA for troubleshooting. I would say that some freelancers do not have this luxury of just dropping their bread and butter (print design) and becoming high paid tech support for something they just got into on the side.
I apologize for not having the time to articulate this clearly, I'm sure I repeated myself by accident, but I hope you get the gist of it.
**Chris, I don't think you see my point. The support issues relevant to print design are relevant to a print designer. Just like an actual web developer probably enjoys troubleshooting code I can say that I like prepress and already know how to solve those problems. Learning web design isn't just doing the interactive design itself it comes with a whole host of problems that detract from, say, my chosen specialty.**
Well I think printing issues are relevant to print designers and web issues are relevant to web designers only in the sense that the understanding of those issues is paramount to creating an effective design in those media.
Whether a print designer ENJOYS troubleshooting printing/prepress issues or a web designers enjoys troubleshooting code issues is secondary to the fact that both designers will do so anyway because the understand that it's part of their responsibility in creating an effective design.
Now talk to any printer and their tell you tales of irresponsible print designers who have NO CLUE about printing and prepress issues and routinely send RGB, 72dpi files to be printed. To them, it's someone else's problem to learn how to effectively produce a printed piece. Their job is over the moment the client approves the hot design that was put together in Photoshop or Quark.
It's no different with web designers who employ the same attitude and leave similar messes for their programmers to clean up. Rather than spending their time on the heavy lifting of a site and creating code, based on interactive behaviors defined by the designer and their overall vision, the programmer must make up for the fact that the designer declared his/her job over at the moment the client signed off on the design comps composed in Photoshop or Illustrator.
Very nice post Steve! I got very encouraged after reading your article. I started studying designing web sites last January and I'm already a little lazy studying and designing stuff just for practice, but after reading this post I became encouraged again because I realized that I need to try and do my best practicing because if my chance come its gona help me alot.