I too came from a Fine Art background, which I studied until I felt I wasn’t actually learning anything new from my tutors. Unfortunately I was on my degree course by this time. I knew I had to do something, but I didn’t know what. I spoke to some lovely people on a course in Communication Media who let me move over to their course. While not specifically a design course, it was always design led, and I found the initial restrictions of design over art quite limiting. I wrote quite an impassioned thesis on the difference between the two in the end, but as I left the course I realised I shouldn’t have fought the change as much as I did, and that’s when things started to go a little better for me! With the benefit of a little perspective I hope to revisit that very subject soon. I moved through the course still wrestling with design vs art and was let out into the wild world of work.

I have had my ups and downs working for varying levels of studios with some fairly unlucky moments all round, mainly the feeling of somehow being a bit of an imposter given my previous background, but I’m determined to keep on keeping on. Currently my situation is quite stifling as my company has started outsourcing design work for some reason unknown to me, so for the time being I really am a pixel pusher. On the 2 days I don’t work I am working hard to get my freelancing off the ground, so far with moderate success, one website created and another in the pipeline. I feel I have grown immensely as a designer, and my goal is to freelance properly as I believe this offers the greatest opportunity for learning and provides the right environment to nurture creative development.

pam,

Everything can be a learning experience if you open your eyes.

I couldn’t agree more, and thanks for sharing your own path to becoming a graphic designer. I hope everything’s going great for you.

You asked what led us to where we are today – for me it’s been a long and very windy path that began with music. I was a music (piano performance) major in university, then was a singer in a band full-time for five years (out of St. Louis, MO). And that’s actually where I began playing around with design, by making posters and flyers for the band. Gradually I started taking on small projects for other people and companies, and kept learning loads about design and client relationships with each new project. I realized I found true love, at the juncture of creativity and organization: graphic design. By the time the band parted ways I had a small portfolio, enough to land an assistant graphic design position at an art museum and go from there.

I’ve had my own design studio for several years now, and I love that I still learn more with each project, like you mentioned. I’ve also benefited from years of traveling and living overseas, teaching English and living in Asia and now London, and I feel very fortunate to have all of these experiences. In my opinion, everything can be a learning experience if you open your eyes.

So though I don’t have a traditional formal education in design, I believe there’s something to be said for self-taught designers who have been through it all and started at the very, very bottom! Hopefully we can all be grateful for our experiences and not take anything for granted.

in my two years, i’ve also learned that taste of designs of the clients are also dictated by their culture. which i think, these things can’t be taught in schools but by experience.

someday i’m gonna go study in an exclusive design school. :)
anyway, i like your post. very true. :)

That’s a blog post I’ll look forward to (religious logos), and thanks for the random fact. I can’t imagine the king lived too long!

Neil,

Great question RE: keeping a ‘design by committee’ discussion on track. In those previous situations I’ve found myself in, I wished I had asked more questions at the outset. For instance, “Who is ultimately responsible for making the decisions?” — the last thing you want is for continual disagreement.

Good luck with your project, and remember, keep contributions positive, and welcome everyone’s thoughts, no matter how irrelevant you (or others) think they might be. The more involvement there is at the beginning, the faster you can reach an effective outcome.

Oh, and Tjeerd (the plant) brought up an interesting thought (Belbin Team). I’ve no experience there, so can’t offer advice.

Mariano, Jonny,

Glad you liked the post, thanks. Mariano, it seems that through the tough times you found your true calling, which is fantastic. Very sorry to learn of your dad’s death.

PG,

Drawing for Disney, eh? I remember a Disney rep calling into one of my college classes to set us an assignment. Looking back, it was probably a spec contest, and it didn’t really interest me enough to remember the outcome… I’ve gone off on a tangent, sorry. It’s great that you haven’t looked back. Long may it continue.

Rick,

So you’re a computing teacher? Were your students playing up when you posted your comment (you wished you had counted to ten)? I used to teach English (for a very short time) but thankfully my students were great. I can imagine how much an unruly student would disrupt the flow, given that I was no saint in my teenage years.

Are you training for a marathon?! 36k is impressive.

But my entry to design is actually interesting. I spent my childhood taking the battery covers off things to see how they worked, but in school I knew people who were amazing artists and good with bubble letters. :)

Anyway, in 4th year of my 5 years completing my 3 year computer degree, I applied for a job as a volunteer to format people’s resumes. They asked me to do a basic layout of a poster as a test for the interview, and I was hired as a “graphic artist”. I did a few resumes, but also my first b&w posters and newspaper ads :) The work i did there was awesome. I was working elsewhere for $10/h for 10 hours a week, but I was spending 20h per week in the graphics office. Even slept on the couch once to get a job done. It was some of the most fulfilling work I ever did. The next year they asked me to be one of two webmasters (I was basically a technical lead and didn’t to much design but I organized the team) so no more posters for me :(

Then about 7 years ago I took a 12 week university course in graphic design and it was all by hand and we actually made things… no real computer design outside of typing everything up. So, my only training is 12 weeks of graphic design. And thats where I am now. Teaching computers and writing blogs. And running 36 K in the past week.

I guess you can say I’ve been into art since day one. I took drawing and cartooning classes at an early age, and wanted to head towards the fine art career path. Actually, one of my first desires was to draw for Disney. It wasn’t until high school when I progressively moved towards architectural design then eventually to graphic design by senior year.

A lot of my art during my last year in high school was heavily influenced by the minimalistic and “graphic” styling of Mondrian and architectural drawings (this was back when Photoshop and the likes were in their infancy so all this was done by hand of course). It was because of this that a teacher of mine suggested graphic design would probably suit me very well. Thus, I looked into it and haven’t looked back since then.