Now in my experience, I
have created work across many forms of media, from print to digital. Being a
freelancer, I go into a lot of design agencies during the course of a year. And
I'm expected to be efficient in various software to deliver work to deadline. As
a graphic designer, depending on what job you're doing, you will have to use
particular design software. In this, I'm going to discuss the creative software
tools you will need as a graphic designer, and which software you might use for
which design scenario.
So as a graphic
designer, the main software you will find yourself using is Adobe InDesign,
Adobe Photoshop, and Adobe Illustrator. As you broaden your skillset, you may
find yourself using Adobe After Effects or Adobe Muse. As a graphic designer,
you will find yourself using a combination of the big three, Adobe InDesign,
Adobe Photoshop, and Adobe Illustrator. Each one of these programs has been
designed for a particular design task, and each has their particular tools. Depending
on the complexity of your design task, you may have to use a specific tool and
a particular program, or use a combination of programs and tools to develop
your end result. So now I'm going to talk a little about Adobe InDesign,
Photoshop, and
Illustrator. Adobe InDesign.
Adobe InDesign is the
most powerful desktop publishing program and has become the industry standard,
specializing in design
for layout. InDesign provides the ability to create and manage multi-page documents
with ease. InDesign provides powerful tools to work with grids and typography, while
offering maximum creative freedom to create dynamic layouts for both print and
digital media. InDesign works by placing external links, both raster and
vector, into compositions. These links are images or files, otherwise prepared
in Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator. Compositions are exported out as single,
portable documents, which are distributed and can be viewed online or sent to
be printed. The type of work you'd expect to do in InDesign is multi-page
leaflets and flyers, posters, books, magazines, print banners, brochures, business
cards, presentations for print or digital, interactive PDFs, typesetting, and
bespoke prints. InDesign is one of the key programs any designer should have in
their toolkit. If you're new to InDesign and wish to learn how to use the software,
I have a 13-episode beginner's guide course on my channel.
Adobe Photoshop
specializes in working with raster images and creating raster graphics using
layers and applying affects with filters. Put simply, a raster image is made with
many little square pixels. Together, these pixels build a picture, which we see
in Photoshop. If you're new to the subject of raster images, I have another
video dedicated to raster image principles. Adobe Photoshop was created
specifically for image enhancement and the modification of pixels that make up
an image. However, since Photoshop's release, it has been adding more and more
tools that has broadened the type of work you can do. In Photoshop, you'll be
working with images, creating initial layouts, and generally creating assets to
be used in other programs, such as InDesign or Illustrator. The type of work
you'd expect to do in Photoshop is image retouching, modification, and
enhancements, digital art and image effects, web design layouts and image preparation,
web banners and animated gifs, posters, simple print layouts,
and social media.
Adobe Illustrator offers
specialized creative tools for creating and modifying vector graphics and
working with color. In recent years, Illustrator has introduced tools that make
it behave like a desktop publishing program, though has limitations when
compared to InDesign. Adobe Illustrator was designed to create and modify
vector graphics, which are very different to raster images. Raster images are
limited to the quality of their resolution and DPI. Instead of being made of
square pixels, vectors are made with anchor points, which are joined with paths
to form curves, lines, and points. Vector shapes are mathematical expressions, represented
visually. This means that vectors can be scaled up to any size and will not
lose any superficial quality. Once created, a variety of color and stroke
effects can be applied. So, the type of work you would expect to do in
Illustrator is logo design, iconography, design for T-shirts and clothing, creating
typefaces, creating simple leaflets, flyers, business cards, and posters, presentations
for print or digital, infographics and blueprints and plans.
So those are the three
main programs any designer will need. Now I am of the opinion that none of
these programs are better than the other. Each has been designed and developed with
a specific task in mind. They are simply different tools in the toolbox that
can be used to tackle a particular creative task. Used together in the right
way, there is nothing you can't create. Now as you broaden your skillset, there
are other programs that you may want to explore. For example, Adobe After
Effects or Adobe Muse.
If you start to work
with video or motion graphics, After Effects offer specialized creative tools to
create motion graphics. As a graphic designer myself, I don't find myself using
the advanced tools of this program, only the basics. For me, I find this
program is great to enhance my video presentations. For me, I find it great for
animated type, color correcting footage, video presentations, video effects and
transitions, and simple animations.
So, the last program I'm
going to talk about here is Adobe Muse. In recent years, Adobe Muse has emerged
as a contender to the web design scene. For designers, this is the dream web
design product and puts the power in the designer's hands. Muse empowers
designers to create custom online experiences for desktop, tablet, or mobile, without
having to edit any code. Muse is much like Adobe InDesign, in the way you can
create a layout and import external files, which have been prepared using
Photoshop or Illustrator. You can then export your web design directly to your
FTP server. Adobe Muse works by exporting your web layout into HTML 5 and
JavaScript. Muse offers some great features like publishing with a range of
typefaces, parallax scrolling effects, social widgets, and the ability to embed
HTML. If you're interested in web design, I could not recommend this program
enough.
So those are the
programs you'll need in order to bring your design to life.
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