graphic design or web design

[aintnothang]

I was thinking about getting in to these. anyone got any experience and can tell me about it.

[d_stilgar]

Well, my brother got a degree in communications, but mostly studied programming within that degree. He now has a job at a web company.

Both web designers and graphic designers are a dime a dozen. There are tons of people that know what they are doing and do it well. My brother taught himself HTML in middle school, in the 1990s. He's taught himself a lot over the years and I think that made a big difference. In the end your portfolio and experience are going to be what make you stand out and get a job.

It's hard to say one over the other. Choose what you love best. That said, the computer industry and internet based jobs aren't going anywhere and will continue to be in demand. Traditional graphic design is a shrinking business and is getting harder and harder to get into. Everything is moving to computers and everything is moving to the web. Choose the one that you like best. Choose the one that you hunger for no matter how much you do it. If you don't hunger for either of those then choose something else altogether. You will be a lot happier even if you don't make much money (and you won't in graphic design or web design).

[dr.walrus]

That's a hell of a broad question ;)! I'll ask you a few questions to narrow it down:

- Do you have any web design skills in HTML and CSS?
- Do you have any experience in Photoshop and Illustrator (or similar packages)?
- Are you interested in setting up your own business or getting a job within the industry in general?

[knowledgegranted]

Here's a few places to help.

http://tutsplus.com/

Go to the Photoshop and Net ones specifically. Do tutorials from there, literally anything. You won't understand anything at first but just copy+ paste the code from examples and read the tutorials. After a while you will start to learn it.

I pretty much use this approach for everything now. It's like if I were to move to Germany not knowing any German, after about 3 months I would probably be able to hold conversation well.

[aintnothang]

I'm not fully settled on web/graphic. Just not sure what to really get into.

[aintnothang]

I do like design oriented careers.

[knowledgegranted]

Well what types of mediums of art do you like best?