Professional Pracice

Getting A Job

Creating a CV

There are 6 standard sections when writing a CV but no right or wrong way to set it out. These sections are as follows:

·         Personal and contact information

·         Education and qualifications

·         Work history

·         Skills relevant to the job

·         Interests

·         References

References should be from people who know you well and can tell an employer about what you have done in the past. They are usually your last two employers, but if you haven’t worked before, you can use a teacher or a tutor from school or college.

When talking about your interests it is better to show off skills that employers look for. Some good examples of this are:

·         Any examples of working in a team

·         Relevant voluntary work or work experience

·         Positions of responsibility

·         Any activity that shows off using initiative

It is very important in a CV to have a section dedicated till your skills. The skills you mention depend on the job you are applying for, but some good example of relevant skills are:

·         Computer skills - including using commonly-used programs, writing a blog or knowledge of web design

·         Communication skills - if you’re confident in speaking in front of groups and calm and friendly on the telephone

·         Team-working - if you’ve ever worked in a large group of people like a sports team or a drama group

·         Problem solving ability - think about any problems you have overcome and how you did it

Remember to keep your CV to a maximum of two A4 paper. Employers receive a lot CVs so it’s unlikely that they will read them all. Most employers will make a decision about you within the few seconds of reading your CV.

Creating A Portfolio

Just because you have a good portfolio doesn’t mean you will get the job. This can be because it didn’t contain the sort of work the client wanted. To prevent this, research the client and look for commonalities.

Your portfolio:

·         A list work, B list work and an archive

·         Think about the number of work samples (how long are you going to talk about each piece for)

·         Try to have a maximum of 10 samples

·         Choreograph your presentation

·         Back up samples (something different from the rest of your work)

·         Decide between individual sample or animated presentation

·         Is the work digital or live or hybrid

Targeting Employers or Clients

·         Find out how much time your interview has been allocated

·         Confirm access to any extra hardware you may need

·         How do they look? (Look at their shoes)

·         How do you think they feel?

·         What are they hoping for?

·         Always follow up with phone calls or emails to show that your keen about the job

Interviews and Portfolio Presentation

Yourself:

·         Rehearse your presentation (short, medium and long version)

·         Appearance

·         Clothing

·         State of mind

·         Confidence and nerves

·         Be yourself (as much as you can)

·         Research your target thoroughly

Presenting Your Portfolio

·         Arrive ahead of time

·         Smile

·         Remember basic manners

·         Good body posture

·         Eye contact

·         Remember to present in allocated time (not too long or not too short)

·         Precision before waffle

·         Don’t mumble, avoid speaking to quick, speak clearly

·         2 eyes, 2 ears, 1 mouth

·         Answer all questions honestly

General Work Skills (A)

Scheduling and Planning

Stage 1

·         Enquiry

·         Research

·         Brief

·         Estimation of cost & production

·         Conception work

·         Concept Presentation

 Stage 2

• Application of concept
• Final Artwork

Stage 3

• Proof Printing

Inquiry and Related Research

• Web
• Contacts
• Previous Work
• Pros & Cons

Brief

• Part 1: Sit, Look, Listen to what the client(s) want
• Part 2: Take notes in verbal brief, this helps you to remember everything and form an 'estimated cost’

Production Schedule
Time management (offline monthly template). Time management is the key to everything (move on to the next step in time and finish the project itself in time).


Once estimate of costs and production schedule is completed, create a 150dpi PDF document and email it to the client. This will give both you and the client a detailed outline of the project and make you look professional.




Budgeting and Quoting

·         Rough estimate of cost and email client based on the brief so far

·         List what needs doing and then break down into separate costs. Always follow up estimate with client(s). This will save time, focuses the clients attention and produces a formal estimation

·         Both you and the client should clearly understand both costs and requirements of the proposed project

·         Create a branded proposal

·         Consider creating a Adobe InDesign document based on 'ballpark' email. This can help you keep time and looks very professional

·         At the end of each part and process of the project give a total cost for that section to show how the budget is spent. Keep each element seperate (e.g. Web design and web development are different sections)
Consider...

·         A section for your terms of payment

·         A section for any project start-up costs (any software, services, or materials you don't have and need)

·         A section for a deposit... a contentious point but worth considering

Formats

In graphic design there are 4 main file formats:

·         PSD (Photoshop)

·         AI (Illustrator)

·         Indd (InDesign)

·         PDF (Portable Document Format)

When sending work to print it is best to send it as a PDF format than a PSD, AI or Indd. The reason for this is because a PDF compresses all files from different formats and documents into one formatted document. This means you do not need to worry about a piece of work going to print with missing links.

Print Specification, Proofs and Press Passed

Concept Work

• How many concepts? Based on the budget, bigger budget with lots of time will need more concepts than a project with a small budget and time period
• Application of concept - Use on letterhead, business card, website, vehicle, etc.

Print specification & quotation

• How it's supplied
• Format
• Printing
• Delivering
• Billing

Artwork Stages

• First stage artwork
• First stage amendments
• Final artwork approval

Reproduction, colour proofing and proof approval, 'Show & Tell'

Press Pass

Designer goes to the printers and looks at the items(s) being printed, check quantity and quality.

• Pros - Check quality. Being in right place at the right time if something goes wrong and rectify it. Dealing with the press minder
• Cons - Time consuming, very early starts and very late finishes, hanging around for hours, dealing with printers

Delivering Invoice is the BEST part of the process!

Commissioning Suppliers
Sometimes a designer can't do all the work themselves, they need help. If a client would like a piece of work that is animated and the designer does not how to do this it is up to him to commission an animator who knows how to produce what the client would like. Some design jobs can have a whole team of commissioned suppliers, all the depending on the clients desire for the final outcome. Of course, the commissioning of the suppliers will effect the budget and should be accounted for.

General Work Skills (B)

The Balance Between Craft and Technology

In the present climate most graphic designers use computer technology, this is because it’s time saving, much easier to create and alter type, images and photos, etc. Also, computers and technology are such a big part of the current design industry it is compulsory to understand it, but there are limitations, especially when it comes to the hand made effect. Although in programs such as Photoshop you can create a sleek image you don’t get the flow of a paintbrush or the natural shading by hand, basically that human touch. Even though it may be good, technology can fail you, no matter what your knowledge about computers are there can still be problems. 
Although hand craft and technology are two different things they can be combined together. For example, typefaces can be drew out by hand on to layout paper, this will give you natural curves the the handwritten effect. It can then be transferred on to a computer and rendered to give it a much sleeker and modern day style.
Older designers tend to use hand crafting techniques more than computerized imagery. This is due to the way they where taught the trade and prefer working like this. This can give them the upper hand as some clients prefer that hand made touch.

Colour

CMYK

Definition: To reproduce full-colour photographic images, typical printing presses use 4 colours of ink. The four inks are placed on the paper in layers of dots that combine to create the illusion of many more colours. CMYK refers to the 4 ink colours used by the printing press. C is Cyan (a blue-green colour), M is Magenta (a reddish pink colour), Y is Yellow, and K is a Pure Black ink, the key plate or key line colour.

RGB

Definition: A common color mode, RGB stands for the colors of Red, Green, Blue. Add red, green, and blue light to create white light. Because you ADD the colors together to get White, we call these RGB colors the additive primaries. Colors on screen are displayed by mixing varying amounts of red, green, and blue light.

Paper

Size	Height x Width (mm)	Height x Width (in)
4A0	2378 x 1682 mm	93.6 x 66.2 in
2A0	1682 x 1189 mm	66.2 x 46.8 in
A0	1189 x 841 mm	46.8 x 33.1 in
A1	841 x 594 mm	33.1 x 23.4 in
A2	594 x 420 mm	23.4 x 16.5 in
A3	420 x 297 mm	16.5 x 11.7 in
A4	297 x 210 mm	11.7 x 8.3 in
A5	210 x 148 mm	8.3 x 5.8 in
A6	148 x 105 mm	5.8 x 4.1 in
A7	105 x 74 mm	4.1 x. 2.9 in
A8	74 x 52 mm	2.9 x 2.0 in
A9	52 x 37 mm	2.0 x 1.5 in
A10	37 x 26 mm	1.5 x 1.0 in

General Work Skills (C)
Speed Skills

A common thing clients want from graphic designers is quick work at a low cost. This can be done but the quality of the work will suffer. With sufficient funds and time, superior work can be produced. If a client would like quality work in a quick time they will need to be charged more as there is no point in pushing yourself to the limit for a small fee.

The Psychology of Marketing

People buy things to meet their needs or satisfy the wants and desires. As a marketer, you are looking not at what your product has to offer, but at what is motivating your target audience to buy your product or service. Examples of this are people who buy perfume. They buy it for romance, not for it’s aroma. And even children, who want the latest game, not to play with it, but to be popular and fit in with their friends. You need to remember that at some time every consumer has been swindled, they will not jump at a product unless they have a sense of trust and confidence in the seller. You will gain the customers trust by being honest and not trying to be everything to everyone.

Copywriting

Definition: A copywriter writes copy for advertisements like brochures, catalogs, direct mail, print ads, radio and TV commercials, sales letters and websites.

An advertising agency copywriter is part of the creative team and works under the Creative Director to develop ad campaigns for clients. A freelance copywriter usually works from a home office and freelances through ad agencies or works with business owners directly to write ad copy.

Art Direction

An art direction is the management side of the artistic and design aspects of a project in film, television, advertising, publishing etc.

Normally work alongside a copywriter to come up with the original artwork and choosing the finals for a project.

Typography and Grids

Definition: The design and use of typefaces as a means of visual communication from calligraphy to the ever-developing use of digital type is the broad use of the term typography. However, the art and practice of typography began with the invention of moveable type and the printing press. Typography is sometimes seen as encompassing many separate fields from the type designer who creates letterforms to the graphic designer who selects typefaces and arranges them on the page.
Leading
Leading is the space between each line in a paragraph, commonly known as line spacing. Newspapers are quite dense and as such use a tighter line spacing value than you would find in magazines, brochures, or posters. There are a few things that need to be considered when leading text:

• Long lines of text may require extra leading
• Bold face or sans serif type requires more leading

Leading also changes when the size of the type changes, such as 9pt text requires 12pt leading.
Kerning and Tracking
Kerning is the distance between two separate characters whereas tracking is the distance between all the characters in a word. Kerning can be helpful as some letters together look to close and others look to far apart so need moving together, such as OT and VO.
Serif and San Serif
Serif fonts are typefaces such as Times and Georgia. These typefaces have slabs at the bottom of top of the letters. San comes from the latin without, so it's without serif, some examples of fonts are Arial, Verdana and Helvetica.

A good way of organizing content on a page is by using a grid, using any combination of margins, guides, rows and columns. Grids are commonly seen in newspaper and magazine layout with columns of text and images. One grid, or a collection of grids, may be used across an entire project to achieve a consistent look and feel. The grid is invisible in the finished product, but following it helps in creating successful print and web layouts. 

 

Working In An Agency

The Importance of Communicating, Time keeping, Dedication, Professionalism and Internal Culture

There are many different areas in a design agency. Each area has its own hierarchy and it's own deadline. Good communication from the whole team insures the best result and a successful team, not just the final work outcomes itself. Teams are commonly made up of designers, copywriters, art directors, project managers and client managers. They are each responsible for different parts of the design process. The client managers responsibility is to attract the client and usually has marketing experience. Project managers talk to the client to ensure the brief is fully understood, the deadline and that the accounts are up to date. Designers and copywriters work together to fulfill the requirements of the brief and produce the visual outcome the client desires.  

Account Teams
There needs to be a complex relationship between a supplier and a customer managed by global account managers. Global account managers tend initially to focus on managing the complexity of the customer to ensure ongoing sales and maintaining service standards, however the challenges of managing their own internal complexity to deliver a seamless service to the customer can be even more difficult for global account managers and their team members.

Briefs (Verbal and Written)
Every design project starts with a brief, whether it is written, verbal or sometimes neither. It is the designers job to understand the brief so it must be researched, questioned and sometimes even challenged. A designer needs to learn to say no as not all briefs will suit a designer. Sometimes a brief can be a discussion so it is very helpful to take notes to make sure it is fully understood. If a client does not supply you a written brief you must write one yourself. A project without a brief can be dangerous and can give the client the upper hand. Writing your own brief for the project can be a good thing as it can give you a deeper understanding of what you have undertaken.

Working For Yourself

Setting up as a Freelancer

Pros
  •    Independent with all projects
  •    Easier to start business
  •    Decide when you work
  •    Choose when you work and your holidays
  •    Tax & VAT: Claim a percentage of expensive and overheads against your annual income
  •    Opportunity to create a business that is as you want it to be (a venture that truly reflects your enthusiasm, passion and values)

Cons
  •    You will be the alpha and the omega
  •    You will be responsible for costing and quoting, generating sales, attending meetings, taking briefs, production, invoicing, cleaning
  •    Responsible for debts
  •    If you don’t work, you don’t get paid
  •    Try not to be sick or hung-over

Use ‘F’ Words
  •    Fear:
     ~ Motivational tool
     ~ Fear of paying bills
     ~ Fear of losing success
     ~ Don’t let it control you
  •    Ferocious
     ~ Approach like a lion, attack and devour
     ~ Chase and hold on
  •    Focus
     ~ Laziness is the bane of most freelancers due to no management of supervisors
     ~ Staying focused = Success
     ~ Eliminate distractions
     ~ Use technology to get more done
     ~ If you are really lazy use a calendar with a reminder via email or text message
  •    Fast
     ~ Work faster = Paid faster
     ~ Impress client by doing great work in fast time
     ~ Work hard and fast and reward yourself when your done
     ~ Working faster doesn’t mean producing low quality work and cutting corners
     ~ This means slicker, streamlined designs
  •    Feedback
     ~ Seek often, show concepts and ideas as often as possible
     ~ Saves hours of revision
     ~ Aim for the clients centre
  •    Fun
     ~ Enjoy what you do
     ~ Not all projects are fun and things DO go wrong
     ~ If your stressed have a break, get out, go for a walk, watch television, etc.

What is ‘Commercial Creativity'

Job Bags

• Copies of emails (dated) (to and from)
• Desk diary (calls, emails, letters, work done, etc.)
• Proof
• Samples

Client Services (Honesty and Humour)

  •    Communication
  •    Dedication
  •    Desire
  •    Drive
  •    Empathy
  •    Energy
  •    Enthusiasm
  •    Expertise
  •    Honesty
  •    Humour
  •    Intelligence
  •    Knowing the price of ‘a pig’
  •    Passion
  •    Personality
  •    Professionalism
  •    Time management
  •    Trustworthy
  •    Values