Profesional web deseigner path

There are really two career paths here that you have to consider, especially as the competition is fierce, and the market for web design is changing drastically.

Their are essentially two different routes you can go in the beginning.

1.) The designer.
The designer is an artist. A typography and graphic specialist. He designs for usability, and knows what goes where and why. This route is the most expensive route, because you have to get some foundation in design practices, workflows, color theory, etc., from somewhere. When you look at what goes into a web site designed from the bottom up, it really is daunting. And this can be the trickiest part to master.

He creates web sites from scratch in Photoshop or some other graphic manipulator, but avoids code because it bores him, and makes his nose bleed.

If you're going to compete on a global level get ready to bid pennies for the most part, because you'll be competing with some of the best talent on the planet, who also happen to live in third world countries. I wouldn't say that is a hinderance across the board, but it is a difficult market to compete in.

Locally, if you really know your stuff, and focus on learning clean, elegant, modern design, you can clean up. Literally. There are guys in my area charging thousands of dollars for what amounts to late 90's static design. Locally, and I mean this, focus on what the world's greatest designers are doing, and try to emulate it.

Here is one of the best web sites you'll find for inspiration. I go here often and try to find something I can recreate without ripping off: www.thebestdesigns.com.

You may need some college, though don't depend on college to give you a foundation in modern web design. You may not even need the degree. I will hire seniors in high school if they know there stuff. Period. But you'll need to get a foundation in design aesthetics.

You could pick these up from books as well. Look for books with the following subject matter:
Graphic Design Basics
Color theory
TYPOGRAPHY (more important than graphic work)
Usability (Also more important than the graphic work, and ties in heavily with readability and usability)


The second track is that of the Developer:

2.) The Developer
Her job is a lot different than the designer. She knows the nuts and bolts of code, semantics and markup, and validation (she's a code nazi). She takes the elements of the design, i.e. the artwork possibly created by a designer, slices it up and creates a functioning web site according to the vision of the client.

Again, school isn't going to be a good place to learn the foundations of good programming. As a matter of fact if you go to Tutorials - Online Training - lynda.com you'll find that you have access to gargantuan amounts of online training at a very, very reasonable price. (www.lynda.com also has some spectacular course for the designer, as well.)

My preference is that of the developer, because I've gotten lazy in my later years. I have become much more left brained and prefer it, because it takes the pressure off me having to come up with perfect design. I much rather hire some of the world's finest designers, have them create the design, and assemble the elements and functionality the client desires.

I almost always integrate the designs in to Wordpress, because it gives me an added selling point of being able to tell the customer that he/she has a small learning curve, but will be able to man their own site, without having to pay the developer on red scent.

I know there are some on this forum who suggest you can do both (I can do both, but I don't) but I don't recommend it, especially when you're first starting out. Debugging the code alone can take a long time to master, if you're studies are spread too thin.

Whatever track you choose, make sure you surround yourself with a talented outsource list to handle the aspects of the site don't want to manage.

Finally, it comes down to who you are as a person. Are you meticulous? Organized? Like solving problems and coming up with new solutions? Can you see yourself looking at numbers, tags, hard code, and markup all day long? (I can do that all day long and never get bored ).

Or, are you right brained? Are you an artist? Do you like the idea getting awards, getting featured on websites like www.thebestdesigns.com?

A fantastic web designer who really focuses on learning the elements of clean, usable design, will make a name for him or herself rather quickly. While the developer more often than not will have a seat in the nosebleeds of the Webby awards.

I hope this helps. PM me if you need clarification on anything.

God bless,
Beau

P.S.
I have been a graphic designer, programmer, usability specialist, and art director for about 15 years.