On 7/12/07, Hassan Schroeder <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

, you are wrong about graphic design.

..but seriously, I have *never* seen an ad for a "Graphic Designer"
(or worse, mislabeled "Web Designer") that looked for anything but
Photoshop/Illustrator, possibly Flash, proficiency. Nothing about
BA/IA/UX/ID. Zip. Zed.

For the vast majority of such positions, it's all about "purty". :-)

Seriously. I do know exceptions -- Darrell Sano, who I worked with
at Sun, comes to mind -- but they're few and far between. Far too far.



That is an error in the Ads you've seen, and in the Advertiser's
understanding of Graphic Design being just as flawed as yours. This is not
an error in my definition of Graphic Design. I will not dispute that many
self proclaimed "Graphic Designers" hold the same flawed view. This is a
serious problem, which may be too big for me to singlehandedly handle, but a
problem nonethless. To give an analogy, one could easily advertise for an
accountant who is proficient in the use of Quicken and TurboTax. However
this would be a flawed advertisement, as proficiency in those programs does
not a qualified accountant make. Nor does proficiency in photoshop make a
qualified Graphic Designer, nor would proficiency in Dreamweaver make a
qualified Web Developer, nor Proficiency in MySQL a qualified Database
Designer.

Indeed, a common view of Surgeons may be that all they do is cut people up
and shift things around, discounting any knowledge they may have of human
anatomy, or medical science. Now imagine if there were a bunch of surgeons
running around getting hired who had the same flawed perspective. It would
be very difficult for a proper surgeon to gain any sense of credibility
wouldn't it? That problem is real in both Web Development, and Graphic
Design. Given that it's something both fields have in common, I would expect
us to be able to team up to fight such perceptions, but sadly this is not
the case for practitioners in either profession, as they each suffer from
the misperceptions of the other.

It makes me sad.


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