Web Design or Graphic Design: Which to Learn?

A recent tech support question brought back some old memories that I thought I'd share with you today. I had completely forgotten about it. If you are new to web design then you might be struggling with the question, "Do I want to learn web design or graphic design?"

Don't worry, you are not the first newbie web designer to make this decision. After all, it seems overwhelming to envision yourself trying to learn both at the same time. Trust me, I am aware of how that feels. I personally struggled with this decision for months way back in 1995. I wasted a lot of time. I really liked them both.

Back then there were few people who actually designed websites. No joke. There were few people to ask with any level of experience in the field and there certainly was not anyone locally who could be my mentor.

Then one day it hit me like a ton of bricks. The results of web design will communicate with people. The results of web graphics will decorate that communication. They go hand in hand! If I don't learn both, I will always feel a little lost. So I learned web design first - hand coding HTML. Yep, I learned the hard way, but now when I look at code, it is easy for me to read what it means and pick out what might be wrong or what does not need to be there (like unnecessary code added by an HTML editor).

Then I learned web graphic design. It was fun. I could be super creative, and I made some really cool 3D layered stuff that blew away my friends. The problem was those cool graphics interfered with my communication to my website visitors. Dialup speeds couldn't handle them. Uhoh, now what?

The answer was simple. In order for me to communicate to my website visitors, I had to design a website that loaded fast. The graphics could be creative, but not overpowering or distracting. Otherwise, my website would not be effective at all. What would be the point of having a website then? So I learned to use my artistic creativity in a lean way and mesh both concepts.

In the end this is why I was hired to design web templates for BasicTemplates.com. BasicTemplates has always gone to great lengths to educate designers and website owners on the necessity of clean and lean designs as well as promoting the development of "effective" web design and templates using external CSS and swap-out graphics. I feel honored and proud to be part of a team of designers who is successfully educating the World Wide Web about "effective web design". BasicTemplate customers and visitors learn what it means to the success of your website and how it effects their website visitors' experience and first impressions about them. It really does matter.

// posted by BasicBeca on 6/11/2005 06:35:00 AM / Permanent Link