There are a lot of different factors that determine what your salary will be as a graphic designer. First, it depends on the type of job you’re looking for. For example, if you want to work from home, you’ll likely earn less than if you want to work in an office setting.
The location where you’ll be working is also important. For example, in New York City, graphic designers can expect to make over $50,000 per year; whereas in smaller cities like Des Moines or Dayton, Ohio, they might make closer to $40,000 per year.
The industry you work in can also have an impact on your salary as a graphic designer. For example, those who work in advertising or marketing tend to make more money than those who work in industrial design or web development.
Finally, experience definitely plays a role in determining how much money graphic designers earn. Those who have worked with companies for years tend to earn more than those who are just starting out their careers as graphic designers.
Graphics Designer Salary In Us
Graphic design is an applied art that uses text and graphics to communicate visually. Graphic design utilizes the aesthetics of typography and the compositional arrangement of text, ornament, and imagery to convey ideas, sentiments, and attitudes beyond what is expressed by the language alone. With its origins tied to the rise of printing in Europe in the 15th century and growth of consumer culture in the Industrial Revolution, graphic design emerged as a professional practice closely associated with advertising by the late 19th century.[
Applications
Graphic design can have many applications from road signs to technical schematics and reference manuals. It is often used in branding products and elements of company identity such as logos, colors, packaging and text as part of (see also advertising).
From scientific journals to news reporting, the presentation of opinion and facts is often improved with graphics and thoughtful compositions of visual information – known as information design. With the advent of the web, information designers with experience in interactive tools are increasingly used to illustrate the background to news stories. Information design can include data visualization, which involves using programs to interpret and form data into a visually compelling presentation, and can be tied in with information graphics.
Skills
A graphic design project may involve the creative presentation of existing text, ornament, and images.
The “process school” is concerned with communication; it highlights the channels and media through which messages are transmitted and by which senders and receivers encode and decode these messages. The semiotic school treats a message as a construction of signs which through interaction with receivers, produces meaning; communication as an agent.[citation needed]
Typography
Main article: Typography
Typography includes type design, modifying type glyphs and arranging type. Type glyphs (characters) are created and modified using illustration techniques. Type arrangement is the selection of typefaces, point size, tracking (the space between all characters used), kerning (the space between two specific characters) and leading (line spacing).
Typography is performed by typesetters, compositors, typographers, graphic artists, art directors, and clerical workers. Until the digital age, typography was a specialized occupation. Certain fonts communicate or resemble stereotypical notions. For example, 1942 Report is a font which types text akin to a typewriter or a vintage report.[23]
Page layout
Main article: Page layout
Golden section in book design
Page layout deals with the arrangement of elements (content) on a page, such as image placement, text layout and style. Page design has always been a consideration in printed material and more recently extended to displays such as web pages. Elements typically consist of type (text), images (pictures), and (with print media) occasionally place-holder graphics such as a dieline for elements that are not printed with ink such as die/laser cutting, foil stamping or blind embossing.
Tools
In the mid-1980s desktop publishing and graphic art software applications introduced computer image manipulation and creation capabilities that had previously been manually executed. Computers enabled designers to instantly see the effects of layout or typographic changes, and to simulate the effects of traditional media. Traditional tools such as pencils can be useful even when computers are used for finalization; a designer or art director may sketch numerous concepts as part of the creative process.[24] Styluses can be used with tablet computers to capture hand drawings digitally.[25]
Computers and software
Designers disagree whether computers enhance the creative process.[26] Some designers argue that computers allow them to explore multiple ideas quickly and in more detail than can be achieved by hand-rendering or paste-up.[27] While other designers find the limitless choices from digital design can lead to paralysis or endless iterations with no clear outcome.
Most designers use a hybrid process that combines traditional and computer-based technologies. First, hand-rendered layouts are used to get approval to execute an idea, then the polished visual product is produced on a computer.
Graphic designers are expected to be proficient in software programs for image-making, typography and layout. Nearly all of the popular and “industry standard” software programs used by graphic designers since the early 1990s are products of Adobe Systems Incorporated. Adobe Photoshop (a raster-based program for photo editing) and Adobe Illustrator (a vector-based program for drawing) are often used in the final stage. Some designers across the world use CorelDraw. CorelDraw is a vector graphics editor software developed and marketed by Corel Corporation. Open source software used to edit the vector graphis is Inkscape. Primary file format used in Inkscape is Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG). You can import or export the file in any other vector format. Designers often use pre-designed raster images and vector graphics in their work from online design databases. Raster images may be edited in Adobe Photoshop, vector logos and illustrations in Adobe Illustrator and CorelDraw, and the final product assembled in one of the major page layout programs, such as Adobe InDesign, Serif PagePlus and QuarkXpress.
Powerful open-source programs (which are free) are also used by both professionals and casual users for graphic design, these include Inkscape (for vector graphics), GIMP (for photo-editing and image manipulation), Krita (for painting), and Scribus (for page layout).
Related design fields
Interface design
Main article: User interface design
Since the advent of personal computers, many graphic designers have become involved in interface design, in an environment commonly referred to as a Graphical User Interface (GUI). This has included web design and software design when end user-interactivity is a design consideration of the layout or interface. Combining visual communication skills with an understanding of user interaction and online branding, graphic designers often work with software developers and web developers to create the look and feel of a web site or software application. An important aspect of interface design is icon design.
User experience design
Main article: User experience design
User experience design (UX) is the study, analysis, and development of creating products that provide meaningful and relevant experiences to users. This involves the creation of the entire process of acquiring and integrating the product, including aspects of branding, design, usability, and function.
Experiential graphic design
Experiential graphic design is the application of communication skills to the built environment.[28] This area of graphic design requires practitioners to understand physical installations that have to be manufactured and withstand the same environmental conditions as buildings. As such, it is a cross-disciplinary collaborative process involving designers, fabricators, city planners, architects, manufacturers and construction teams.
Experiential graphic designers try to solve problems that people encounter while interacting with buildings and space (also called environmental graphic design). Examples of practice areas for environmental graphic designers are wayfinding, placemaking, branded environments, exhibitions and museum displays, public installations and digital environments.
Occupations
Main article: Graphic design occupations
Graphic symbols are often functionalist and anonymous,[29] as these pictographs from the US National Park Service illustrate.
Graphic design career paths cover all parts of the creative spectrum and often overlap. Workers perform specialized tasks, such as design services, publishing, advertising and public relations. As of 2017, median pay was $48,700 per year.[30] The main job titles within the industry are often country specific. They can include graphic designer, art director, creative director, animator and entry level production artist. Depending on the industry served, the responsibilities may have different titles such as “DTP Associate” or “Graphic Artist“. The responsibilities may involve specialized skills such as illustration, photography, animation, visual effects or interactive design.
Employment in design of online projects was expected to increase by 35% by 2026, while employment in traditional media, such as newspaper and book design, expect to go down by 22%. Graphic designers will be expected to constantly learn new techniques, programs, and methods.[31]
Graphic designers can work within companies devoted specifically to the industry, such as design consultancies or branding agencies, others may work within publishing, marketing or other communications companies. Especially since the introduction of personal computers, many graphic designers work as in-house designers in non-design oriented organizations. Graphic designers may also work freelance, working on their own terms, prices, ideas, etc.
A graphic designer typically reports to the art director, creative director or senior media creative. As a designer becomes more senior, they spend less time designing and more time leading and directing other designers on broader creative activities, such as brand development and corporate identity development. They are often expected to interact more directly with clients, for example taking and interpreting briefs.
