What is the difference between a visual designer, a graphic designer & a web designer?
I've been called a lot of things in my life. I'm good with that.
What I'm struggling with is my job title. At risk of putting a guy in a box, how would you compare these 3 titles?
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Jul 7, 2014
Graphic designer and visual designer are more general terms, web designer typically means most of your experience is in web design or interactive. The first two do not specify a specialty the later does. At least for what I see.
Jul 7, 2014
"Web Designers" design strictly for online experiences, and although they are not "developers", most have at least some basic proficiency in html and css.
"Graphic Designers" traditionally/historically designed mostly for print, but most have become web/print hybrid designers over the years as their jobs require so, and also to be more marketable, career-wise.
"Visual Designer" is somewhat of a loose term. As the name implies, if they are in a web environment, they mostly deal with the visual aspect of digital experiences and rarely touch code. However, its a somewhat vague term, because in the offline world for example, you may come across an interior decorator or a landscape artist that would argue that they are "visual designers."
Jul 7, 2014
I completely understand. Here is how visual design is described on a very popular job placement site. http://aquent.com/hire-talent/role/visual-designer
Graphic Design is more print based though you can broaden it to encompass web through your skills and experience description. However if you are less interested in any print, you might choose visual or web as your title.
Jul 7, 2014
My take on Aquent is that a Visual Designer is a web designer that also designs for mobile. Sounds like a web designer to good web designer to me. ~:-)
Jul 9, 2014
My take is that they break it out Visual Designer as a little broader with overall brand experience throughout the digital and interactive spectrum but web encompasses the specific web design and programming. Graphic Design skews more towards print with maybe some online experience. It depends on your skills and how you want to be identified or if you have a specific job you are pursuing.
Jul 7, 2014
Hello, Oscar.
I'm curious about your remark: "At risk of putting a guy in a box..." There are different schools of thought on being a specialist. Many say its ideal to be a generalist designer and not claim any specific or focused expertise. Which side of the fence you land on that debate will provide a clue to what your new title should be.
And I agree with Terri; Graphic and Visual Designer are general designations. Not very specific and, yes, more or less interchangeable (depends on the environment). To say one is a Web Designer, though, is to specify expertise. To claim a narrowed focus.
So, with nailing down your job title, I think you need to ask yourself at least this question:
What do I want to do—or do more of? Put another way, for what skill do I want people to seek me out?
If your answer centers around a particular design discipline—User Interface Design, for instance—then you want a title that clearly projects your narrowed and deep expertise.
If, however, you're in love with all things design and have professional-grade produceable skills in multiple design disciplines, then you may want to build your reputation as more of a generalist, establishing a title that isn't specific to any one area of design expertise.
Specialist or generalist, Oscar. Which are you?
Jul 7, 2014
Ralston, great questions.
I love great design and smart marketing.
The vast majority of my work has been in web site design. For many of my clients I've designed logos, tag lines, newspaper ads, cards, letterheads, rack cards, brochures, kiosks, eMail Marketing, social media campaigns, power point presentations, etc.
If I had to choose one area of focus it would be more tech (responsive web design, ux & app design). But, I do enjoy helping layout the whole brand regardless of technology.
Specialist or Generalist? Yes.
~;-)
Jul 7, 2014
Find a box you love, and make it your own: go deep rather than broad. There are too many designers already who think they can design anything, but who are only semi-competent in any particular field because they haven't focused enough attention to become truly good.
Jul 10, 2014
I hear what you're saying, Oscar, but I have to agree with Ray. Go deep, and be sought out for that depth.
Besides, I think while presenting yourself as a highly skilled User Interface and User Experience designer, opportunities to help clients with other aspects of brand development/expression will present themselves. And, when they do, you can decide whether you want to produce that work yourself or form great alliances with other creatives to collaborate on projects with broader requirements.
Choosing to present yourself as a specialist takes a lot of guts, faith and trust, but I think the rewards are well worth it. You can get the work you want faster when prospective clients spend less time scratching their head trying to figure out who you are, what you do and why it matters.
Put another way, if my SAAB 9-3 is mysteriously broken down, I'd be OK with a handyman mechanic, but I'd quicker choose, pay and have full faith in a proven SAAB specialist.
Jul 7, 2014
Honestly, as a graphic designer, I think they are all pretty much the same. I can call myself any one of those terms because as a "graphic" designer those all fall under it. I do visual design, web design, multi media design, print, etc... So I consider graphic designer as the basic term and the rest are more specific, I suppose. Maybe visual designer isn't specific, but if you said interior designer, that doesn't fall under graphic designer. It would only fall under visual designer, I think . I usually claim graphic designer then specify accordingly.
Jul 7, 2014
I agree with Liz. A designer is a designer, it is just the mediums that differ and each type of designer may use different software. Each "designer" mentioned in the question will use the more or less the same principles when creating a design. On the other hand as Liz said, interior and fashion designers are another ball game.
Jul 8, 2014
there can be a number of reasons why people call themselves a Visual Designer. In my case it is to encompass all of the following into one shorter description:
UX Designer, UI Designer, Interaction Designer and Motion designer.
Jul 8, 2014
When I started in this business 30+ years ago there was only graphic-deisgners and creative people (advertising). The graphic designer developed brands and collateral material.
Today, the term visual-designer as far as I can tell covers both digital and print, While Web-designer covers just digital.
Jul 8, 2014
Thanks to all! We have quite a variety to opinions.
So a visual designer is a either a generalist or a specialist in UX.
~:-)
Jul 9, 2014
These (3) titles all interact harmoniously together:
A web designer is responsible for the complete design layout of a website using html and css, but not a developer.
A graphic designer may utilize Adobe Illustrator or other software to create design elements such as logos, animated presentations, but may also work on designing the website to make it visually appealing.
A visual designer is not limited to the digital world but can also work on a physical landscape to enhance an interior space or display a product. They are used in many creative areas whether offline or online.
Jul 9, 2014
Hey Oscar!
There are a few people who've nailed it on the head. "Graphic Designer" and even "Visual Designer" are very general because they all deal with visuals of all sorts anyways. Being a "Web Designer" means you're a graphic designer with a web design niche or preference. This also means you have experience in UI, UX, and interactive design. But I'd say that the term "graphic designer" unites all of these sorts under a general title. This includes people like art directors, creative directors, production artists, etc..
Jul 18, 2014
Graphic designer and graphic designer is more likely the same term I think. And they are the one who prepares visual presentations by designing art and copy layouts while web designers are the one who plan, create and code web pages, using both non-technical and technical skills to produce websites that fit the customer's requirements.
Jul 28, 2014
Nowadays, they're all terms for the same thing. We wear a lot of hats - most designers now ARE web, print, visual etc...but it depends on your area of expertise. Whatever you think you're strongest in/like doing the best is what you should go with...or simply call yourself a designer. The term assumes a lot of skills by default.
Sep 17, 2014
Graphic designers and Visual designers are separated by tech mostly. Web designer is beyond the drawing and CAD table to the actual website development.
Jul 11, 2015
Often people make mistakes on using these terms but it is obvious, as all these terms look similar. Well, Graphics design and visual designing are slight equivalent of each other. Graphics designing is an older but mostly used term in the field of study and practices but now it is more prominently know as Visual designing. We can consider Visual/graphic design as an arm of the visual arts that refers to communicating information visually.
Now talking about web designing then it’s a broad term that employs creation of web pages with particular design. These created page together with other elements, give a website flattering appearance. Not just this, but a web designer has to think about features, content, and accessibility of the website. As such, after the emerge of different online developer tools and predesigned template (i.e http://dailynulled.com/category/theme/), web designing work has become slight easier but when it comes to custom page designs then expert skills would be needed.
To know more, you can also see http://bit.ly/1IObG0x.
Terri, Thanks you.
Do you see the terms "graphic" and "visual" to be interchangeable?