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What do I need to do to become a web designer?
merryblue
Posts: 8 Forumite
in Techie Stuff
Hi, I'm looking for a change in career and quite like the idea of becoming a web designer. Can anyone recommend any courses I can take - either classroom or web based? Also what computer should I be looking to buy? PC or Mac? As you can tell I am a complete beginner - but I have a good work ethic and hope I can learn it fast!
Thanks for any replies.
Thanks for any replies.
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Comments
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Honestly your tools are not that important short of a proper computer (ie not a tablet) and an internet connection, thats all you really need.
Well apart from persistance, technical ability/understanding, creative flair, ability to learn etc
I would really avoid any structured course you have a to pay for unless its highly specalised to a certain obscure technology.
There are plenty of free resources avaliable on the internet.
http://www.w3schools.com/ maybe start here, and then find somthing more specific0 -
Hi, I'm looking for a change in career and quite like the idea of becoming a web designer. Can anyone recommend any courses I can take - either classroom or web based? Also what computer should I be looking to buy? PC or Mac? As you can tell I am a complete beginner - but I have a good work ethic and hope I can learn it fast!
Thanks for any replies.
Don't do it. I am a web designer and the marketplace is saturated.
Unfortunately there are alot of college kids who think that the going rate to build a website is circa £30 which puts us actually in the industry under pressure.
If you do decide to go for it then whatever you do, don't give up your day job until you have enough clients to actually make a living.Estate Agent, Web Designer & All Round Geek!0 -
See the link provided by Rob for learning the coding language, xhtml / css etc
Also try
http://www.htmldog.com/guides/htmlbeginner/
or using this Youtube series ... it's vg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwQMnpUsj8I&feature=related
However, 'design' is much more than the coding. Anybody can learn to code (if I can, anybody can) but design is really a flair you have or have not. Some folk can see an idea in a flash, whereas a coder will never see more than the next <html> tag.
.. a bit like architects coming up with weird and wonderful (???) designs which then need an engineer to do the calcs etc to enable them to be built. Anybody can draw pretty pictures, with trees and fancy curved walls .. then leave us structural engineers to sweat over the calculations.
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Agree with comments above. Way too many people wanting to do web design for too few customers, esp simple 3 or 4 page sites. And for clients who wants a fully fledged site, with databases, CMS etc they'll be looking for a pro company with good portfolio, something thats probably 10 years away for someone starting out now.
Can try getting a client base using free lance sites, just remember you'll be up against a load of people from india etc willing to work for 50p an hour0 -
+1 for w3schools
'Web designer' is a nebulous term, but it encompases the look of the site, the ergonomics of it, the functionality of it (or at least helping to specify it, and working with a developer to implement it), the optimisation of the structure and file sizes, the optimisation for search engine interest, the maintenence, sourcing a suitable hosting company, etc. It is a big job to get it right. To make things worse, no end of kids and muppets are bottom-feeders and will exhaust the simple end of the market. If you really want to do it, can you sustain yourself for a couple of years to get some baseline skills and start asking for a living wage?0 -
Macs are better than pc's for any sort of design, but a good spec pc that has more than the system requirements for the software you will be using will be sufficient.
I'd suggest looking for a course on Dreamweaver as it's a wysiwyg editor (which stands for what you see is what you get- it's a program that allows you to generate code for a website by manipulating/creating a layout without using code) which allows you to either switch between using code and a wysiwyg environment, or see them both at the same time, which in my previous experience is great for learning html/coding.
I have also been hearing some good things about Joomla and Drupal, which are both open source content management systems/ platforms (although i haven't used either as I don't design any more) but they both look quite interesting.0 -
Sweeping statement!k0nstantine wrote: »Macs are better than pc's for any sort of design, ...
Drupal and Joomla can make building professional looking websites very easy. Its not quite the same as designing them though, unless you build the templates yourself.0 -
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Sweeping statement!
Well in all my 10 years of working with both, I've never came across a new pc that worked better than a new mac for video editing, graphic design, web building, music editing, movie making or anything else come to think of it that's related to the design field.
The OP is looking into LEARNING, you know, trying to gain new skills, knowledge etc and when someone starts to learn something they normally start at the beginning then work their way up to the complicated stuff.Drupal and Joomla can make building professional looking websites very easy. Its not quite the same as designing them though, unless you build the templates yourself.0 -
Funny enough, I know of 2 people who are coming back to Windows as they seriously dislike the new version of Final Cut Pro.k0nstantine wrote: »Well in all my 10 years of working with both, I've never came across a new pc that worked better than a new mac for video editing, graphic design, web building, music editing, movie making or anything else come to think of it that's related to the design field.
I know quite a few music producers who use Ableton on Windows machines. I myself worked in 3D design for years and had no issues with Windows.
I really couldn't see why a Mac would be better for webdesign than a Windows machine, you're likely to be using the same software regardless of OS.
There's a hell of a lot of benchmarks out there showing Macs aren't always the fastest at design type tasks.
expertreviews.co.uk/general/1283776/ubuntu-10-10-vs-windows-7-vs-mac-os-x-10-6-snow-leopard
So learn basic HTML/PHP first, i'd say CMS systems are a little above total beginner anyway. Loading a template in etc is easy enough, but actually modifying them does require a fair bit of coding knowledge.k0nstantine wrote: »The OP is looking into LEARNING, you know, trying to gain new skills, knowledge etc and when someone starts to learn something they normally start at the beginning then work their way up to the complicated stuff.0
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