What does a web designer do?

Web designers manage the look and feel of websites – be they large corporate sites consisting of hundreds of pages, or sites for small businesses comprising just a few.

Either way, it’s the web designer’s responsibility to make decisions about every visual aspect of the site – its colour scheme, the fonts and text size, the images, the buttons, menus and other navigation – and so on.

For anyone thinking about a career as a web designer, it’s worth considering that use of the internet has continued to grow: it’s now estimated that there are over 182 million sites online. And good design is one of the main factors dictating which will be read, and which will be ignored after just a few seconds. That’s why forward-thinking organisations realise the value of skilled, suitably qualified web designers – making it a career path offering plenty of promise.

Qualities for a web designer

So what qualities do you need to become a web designer? Well a strong interest in all things web and internet is good for starters: Do you have clear ideas about what does and doesn’t work when you visit web sites? Do you take an interest in how sites look? Are you a creative, artistic person? And do you like working with computers, and perhaps learning new software packages? Would you like to learn professional software like Adobe Dreamweaver or Photoshop? And finally, are you the kind of person who pays attention to detail, and who would be good at interpreting someone else’s brief?

If all of this sounds like you, then it’s certainly worth thinking through some of the other factors involved with becoming a web designer.

People skills count

You may have visions of shutting yourself away all day with your computer and your favourite radio station, and ‘creating in your home office’. While that may well be possible for some of the time, it’s also useful to have or develop another set of skills, around successfully working with other people. You’ll need to listen to what’s required (‘take the brief’), ask pertinent questions, and reach a solid understanding of what will make your client happy. And then ensure that your work delivers – or ‘meets the brief’.

Little or large?

Being a web designer may also involve working as part of a team. If you work in a larger design or advertising agency, your team may be led by an account manager who liaises with the client; you may work under a creative director, and alongside copywriters, photographers, other web designers and web developers – those responsible for programming sites and ensuring any special functionality works as it should.

Equally you may work for a much smaller company where you’re in charge of ‘all things web’; in this case you’ll still need to be team-minded, as it’s in smaller organisations where pitching in to help out is often essential. So one day you may be presenting to a client, and another pricing up a new job.

Or you may choose to work for yourself as a freelance web designer. It’s a path many choose, but you will need to find out about the legal requirements of running a small business, and develop general business skills – from marketing and sales to estimating and bookkeeping – as well as honing your website design abilities.

Getting started

So where should you begin? Well learning the recognised software packages is probably a must; developing an understanding of HTML and CSS – the basic building blocks of web pages – is going to come in handy sooner or later; you could learn technologies like Flash, or other coding languages such as PHP – useful for sites needing more functionality; and you could even stretch yourself by learning about popular content management systems like Wordpress, Joomla or Drupal.

The bottom line in web design

The bottom line is that the more skills you can develop, the more employable you’re likely to be. But you really don’t need to know everything before you can start designing great looking websites for your clients.

- See more at: http://www.ukwda.org/careers-advice/becoming-a-web-designer#sthash.BLPVIXTv.dpuf

Pablo Picasso

“Every child is an artist, the problem is staying an artist when you grow up” – Pablo Picasso

Vincent Van Gogh

“If you hear a voice within you say, ‘You cannot paint,’ then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced” – Vincent Van Gogh

Salvador Dali

“Have no fear of perfection, you’ll never reach it” – Salvador Dali

Leo Burnett

“Curiosity about life in all of its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people” – Leo Burnett

Jack London

“You can’t wait for inspiration, you have to go after it with a club” – Jack London

George Bernard Shaw

“Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine, and at last, you create what you will” – George Bernard Shaw

Dr. Seuss

“Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try” – Dr. Seuss

Charles Mingus

“Creativity is more than just being different. Anybody can plan weird; that’s easy. What’s hard is to be as simple as Bach. Making the simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity” – Charles Mingus

Voltaire

“Originality is nothing but judicious imitation” – Voltaire

Donatella Versace

“Creativity comes from a conflict of ideas” – Donatella Versace

Ray Bradbury

“Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can’t try to do things. You simply must do things” – Ray Bradbury

Steve Jobs

“Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, the just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while” – Steve Jobs

Cecil B. DeMille

“Creativity is a drug I cannot live without” – Cecil B. DeMille

George Bernard Shaw

“You see things; and you say, ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were; and I say, ‘Why not’?” – George Bernard Shaw

Albert Einstein

“Creativity is contagious, pass it on” – Albert Einstein