A day in the life.....

martin.j.carey

Hi Guys,

Was looking for some advice from people currently working in web design.
I am currently studying a Masters in Interactive Media and was hoping to work as a Web Designer next year.

What is a web designers typical day/week like? What are opportunities like today in Ireland?

What technical skills are most important ? Is there a clear difference between the roles of designers and developers or do employers expect you to be capable of doing both?

Any advice is much appreciated thanks

oeb

martin.j.carey wrote: »

Hi Guys,

Was looking for some advice from people currently working in web design.
I am currently studying a Masters in Interactive Media and was hoping to work as a Web Designer next year.

What is a web designers typical day/week like? What are opportunities like today in Ireland?

What technical skills are most important ? Is there a clear difference between the roles of designers and developers or do employers expect you to be capable of doing both?

Any advice is much appreciated thanks

Hi Martin.

I am a developer (I can't design worth a crap), I work in a company with two designers and two developers. In all of the places I have worked you were either a designer OR a developer, but pure designers often had to do a little bit of other work too (such as minor print stuff like business cards or logo design).

Typically over the course of any day I will be doing at least some bit of work on two or three different websites. One of them is normally in full development, and the other two will be at the stage where all the content management systems / catalogs / carts / whatever are written and functioning and just dealing with last minute changes either on the request of the client or one of the designers.

To work solely as a designer these days I think you need a broader skillset than just being able to draw up a pretty site in photoshop, I would think that if you had a nice rounded base (photoshop, xhtml+css, javascript, flash) you would be much more employable. It would also help if you had some tallent when it comes to designing for print, especially if you work for yourself or in a smaller studio. It is very very regular for a web designer / developer to be asked 'Do you know anyone who can do me up new business cards to go with my new site?' and there is no reason to pass that cash on to someone else.

I think there are currently plenty of opertunities in Ireland (if you are talented enough), but in my experience, a portfolio is 100 times more important than and degree in this industry (I did not even pass my leaving cert, and I am consistantly hired over people who do have degrees). So if at all possible get as much of your work as possible out there in the real world. Even if it is just a personal site, and small sites for some relatives who might own a business or something.

p

Search the forum archives, there's tons of posts & excellent advice here about career.

In short, if you wanna get a foothold in teh industry learn your XHTML & CSS really wel and be able to take any photoshop design and code it into decent code that that validates and uses web standards.

That's the easiest way to get in the door as a 'junior designer' or 'html coder' and work your way up, but you might need to let your pride take the back seat for a year or two because you'll be earning your stripes and not doing a lot of designing in work.

martin.j.carey

thanks a mill guys,
Had a look through some of the threads and found some great advice.
Cheers