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Even if you don't know anything about graphic designing, you're already familiar with it, that's how powerful this career is.
Your day to day lives consist of graphic design.
You see it in the grocery stores, in your house, on the way to the cinema when going to watch your favorite movie.
Graphic design is visual communication so if you were ever shown a message instead of being verbally told you've probably been exposed to graphic design.
Yes, even the messages you get on your phone, that's part of user interface design, which is a part of graphic design.
Is Graphic Design still Relevant?
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| Is graphic design still relevant? (image credit: CHIE Consulting) |
The first question any person might have when choosing a career path is, "Would I be able to achieve anything in this?"
No matter what goal you have in life regarding your career, whether that be financial, emotional or physical, you will always want to first look into if the career path you choose is still relevant in today's times so you can thrive in it.
The graphic design industry is still very relevant as the industry is worth approximately $12 billion with an employment of 156,545 graphic designers (Source: Ibisworld.)
Many people are actually making a full time income from graphic designing and have been given the means to quit their day job and follow their passion.
As times are changing people are choosing visuals over traditional information much more often such as people preferring eBooks over books.
Due to this shift many businesses prioritize good, eye-catching, and visually appealing design for the growth of their business.
Adobe reported that 71% of companies are now creating 10x the number of design assets than they did in previous years which just proves how important graphic designers are in the process.
Why Choose a Graphic design career?
Continuous Learning
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| Graphic designing and gathering experience |
With graphic designing there is always space to move a step forward, it’s a never ending ladder that you climb as you grab more interest and knowledge on the subject.
There are a multitude of techniques you have to learn such as, the Golden Ratio, the rule of thirds, Hierarchy etc. There also many theories of graphic design with the most famous being the color theory.
Graphic design also consists of branding psychology in which you will learn why some colors are more appealing compared to others, what kind of emotions people express when looking at a certain design and basically why people find some items more attractive than others.
You might have experienced this yourself when out to buy something. Many consumers might prefer to buy a product just based on it’s packaging.
Also, it’s pretty exciting as due to advancing graphic design trends there is always something new to learn and pursue and due to technological advancement many graphic designers might have to keep their designs updated so they don’t get caught behind A.I.
Variety of fields
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| Graphic design fields of study |
Graphic designing is a very broad niche with a very diverse workforce due to the number of creative fields you can enter with a graphic designing degree, here are some, just to name a few:
- Graphic designer
- UI/UX designer
- Animator
- Video game designer
- Creative director
- Illustrator
- VFX artist
Basically, all the cool stuff.
Since there are so many different fields of study available to you this means that there is a higher probability of landing a job that resonates with you and one that you like.
You can bounce around from one field to another, if you think animation isn’t for you, it’s not the end of the world you can try illustration. Not even that? Then try tapping into the video game industry, you have tons of opportunities because of your degree choice.
Design will always be in demand
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| Social media graphic design (image credit: 99designs) |
These days businesses are going digital and they are utilizing the power of technology, social media and the worldwide web. So, in the near future, businesses will always need visually appealing designs in order to stay ahead of the competition and improve their brand image.
According to a study conducted by Crazyegg 15 participants were told to search the internet for health advice relevant to them. Afterwards, they were asked of their first impressions of the website and the response stated that of all reasons the website was mistrusted, 94% was design related whereas, only 6% had an issue with the content of the site.
This proves how crucial it is for businesses to incorporate good design in their products/services even 74% of marketers in 2019 reported that 70% of their content contains some form of visuals.
Still not convinced design is widely demanded?
Just look at it in a general sense, every business nowadays needs a flyer, or a business card to get their name out there and make their brand known to their potential customers.
How many times have you come across a brand out of pure coincidence? You must have been exposed to some form of media before actually considering to buy a certain product or service whether that be in the form of a brochure, a business card, a social media ad etc.
Point being, you need good design in order to strengthen brand image and increase brand awareness.
Future Confidence
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| Rise in Social media |
As technology is advancing at a much faster rate, many people are threatened by getting their jobs replaced by artificial intelligence (A.I) or robots.
However, in the graphic designing niche you don't need to worry as automation could probably never replace real graphic designers.
This is because graphic designing isn’t just making a “pretty” looking logo for a business and calling it a day.
Graphic designers evaluate the business’ aims, objectives, goals and target audience in order to design a brand that will resonate with their audience and communicate their message in a visual form.
A fully automated graphic design software might not be able to achieve such a skill as the human mind because of it’s limited creativity and lack of meaning in the A.I generated designs.
As discussed in the above point, graphic designing is here to stay as the demand of such designers is very unlikely to fall in the future, it’s actually expected to increase due to the rise of digital technology.
In a study conducted by Softarefindr the employment of graphic designers for computer-related designs and electronic media fields is forecasted to rise by 35% from 2015 to 2022.
Sky is the Limit
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| Opportunities for graphic designers |
We read that as in the graphic design field you will be continuously learning, this means that you will keep on getting more and more exposed to different mediums and positions which will make you gather experience and as you get more experienced in this field you can move on to more senior positions such as creative director, head designer etc.
There’s no “cap” on your earnings, as a graphic designer you can earn as much as $50,000 or $200,000 per year.
In a report by review42 they analyzed that 67% of small businesses are willing to pay $500 for a logo.
This is just a logo design for a small, probably local, business. Imagine how much you can make for full branding projects of large multinationals!
The industry is also flexible, giving you a number of options on how to offer your services.
It’s not necessary for you to get a job, although it may be ideal when you’re first starting out and just gathering experience.
You have the freedom to start your own agency, become a freelance graphic designer or partner up with a brand.
The Future of Graphic design and Risks
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| A.I technology VS human graphic design |
The graphic design industry is more competitive than ever due to it’s low barriers to entry, anybody can claim himself as a “professional” graphic designer without having any kind of industrial knowledge.
This can be due to the increase in automated graphic design software such as Canva, which provides you with ready-made templates that you can edit and transfer to clients with full rights.
Also, due to the rise in freelance platforms such as Fiverr many people are prompted to list their services for as low as $5 per design. This deteriorates the value of good graphic design, as many designers might be pressured to lower their prices due to so many cheaper alternatives.
Because of high competition, many designers undervalue themselves and list their services for a very low amount.
This obviously is not financially feasible so, graphic designers might have to work multiple complementary jobs such as teaching and/or freelancing.
Technology is rising at a rapid pace and becoming more and more advance. Artificial intelligence has made it possible for designs to be made with just a “press of a button”.
To tackle this, many designers have to work extra hard to stand out and make more original, meaningful designs.
However, despite all these risks, the graphic design industry is still expected to grow because there are a lot of opportunities for graphic designers to achieve a successful future.
Conclusion
Being a graphic designer is great, it’s a field with many options to choose from such as video game designer, video editor, or animator. It’s not very risky as well since you have so many various options you can bounce from one career to another so if one field isn’t working for you, you can try in another till you find one that best resonates with you.
Even though there are certain risks in the industry like high competition, growing A.I etc. graphic design is still a good and secure career amongst many passionate designers.
