How to Become a Graphic Designer

Introduction

In this article, you will get to know how you can become a graphic designer as a beginner. It will be a step-by-step process for you to easily understand the dos and don’ts in the journey of a good graphic designer.

This article is for beginners who want to start learning graphic design and want to unfold this creative field of graphic design. Let’s dive into the first stage of graphic design.

Types of Graphic Design

Graphic design has various types. If you want to become a graphic designer then you must know what type of graphic design amuses you and what is your interest. This is the first and most crucial step in the life of a graphic designer. So let’s just talk about various types of this creative field.

Illustration
Web Design (UX/UI Design)
Print Design
Logo Design
Brand Design
Advertisement Design
Esports Design
Thumbnail Design
Poster Design
Apparel Design
Environmental Design
Type Design and many more.

These are some of the most demanding types of graphic design that you can choose and pick the right one for you.

I know it can be difficult to pick the right one for you, but you can search for each type and learn how it can be done in various ways. You can even try to make things on your own in the beginning for more understanding of each type of design. Once you get the right type for your journey, it’s time to jump onto the second step.

Also read – 5 Tips for freelance graphic designer

How to Learn Graphic Design

Now you may think of which could be better to learn graphic design, Is it any design college/institute or online resources like YouTube and Udemy?

If you ask me I have never been to any design college, I have learned everything from online resources and with the experience of working with real-world clients and solving daily problems that a designer experiences. I would suggest if you have a really good design school or institute then you can join because most of the stuff that one can learn is already available online. The only advantage that I feel one can have in a design school is good connections that one can build during the assignments and all.

Other than community in college there’s no need to go to a design college or school for a design degree, Because these days the only thing that matters is your skill and how good you are with that skill.

To learn online you can check many courses on Udemy and if you want free resources to learn designing then I guess YouTube is the best platform.

Here are some YouTube channels that I recommend for you.

You can learn with these YouTube channels and there are many more channels that I might have missed but you can check and research on your own.

Let me tell you one thing I started learning from YouTube in the beginning and after 3.5 years, I’ve decided to get some courses to enhance my skills and thought process behind every design. So you don’t need to go for paid ones in the beginning, firstly just start and go with the flow in your learning process. (If you’re wondering what courses I bought, those were from Sir Rajeev Mehta)

And you can also upskill your game with design books that are available in the market.

I know many of these books are a bit expensive, If you don’t have enough budget then you can also go for the digital version of these books which you can get on various websites.

Required Devices for Graphic Design

Graphic Design is a big industry on its own and there are many types and ways to do it. So let’s just talk about what devices you may require at the beginning of your design journey.

If I may ask you what tool or device do you require for graphic design? You may come up with the answer of any high-end laptop or PC, right? But that’s not the case, You can start graphic design on mobile and any low-end laptop or PC too.

I also started my journey with my 3 GB RAM mobile phone, I started graphic design on my mobile for almost 1.5 years and then I shifted to a Windows laptop which I got with my earned money from graphic design. I just want to tell you that you can start with fewer resources and then you can upgrade accordingly as you grow in your journey. Many designers are solely designing on Android and a low-end PC or laptop. So there’s no excuse for you to not start.

If you want to upgrade your devices and improve your workflow and quality. For graphic design, I highly recommend going with MacBook or Mac Devices because these are designed for productivity. And you can also go with a Windows laptop or PC with good specs and graphics card. And if you are a Logo Designer then you can go with iPad too.

Currently, I have a Macbook and Asus Vivobook.

Portfolio Building

When you’re into Graphic Design, It’s very important to have a portfolio. A good portfolio is crucial for getting clients and to put yourself out there. A portfolio is your identity which shows how good you are in your skill. So let’s talk about how you can build a good portfolio for yourself in the beginning.

So when you are in the beginning and learning stage, You can build your portfolio with the work you’re doing. Simply portfolio includes your best work. And portfolio shows your journey from the first graphics to the latest ones, Which shows how much you have improved throughout the journey. You can check my portfolio on Behance and scroll down from the oldest posts to the newest.

I’ve seen many designers and editors with very bad portfolios, which affect in there client approach. There are many designers who just send some random drive link of work to their clients, which is very unprofessional.

How to build a portfolio?

There are many ways to build a portfolio and it’s very important to have a professional portfolio when it comes to attracting clients for your services. Always remember while choosing a particular website or any tool for your portfolio that it must have a fast loading speed and should be responsive for different devices. Because it will highly affect when a client checks your portfolio.

The simplest and easiest way to build a portfolio is through Behance. In the beginning, you can start with Behance and then you can shift to a better alternative like having your own website as a portfolio.

Currently, I have My Behance account and frivestudios.com as my agency’s portfolio.

Social Presence

A Graphic Designer should have professional social media accounts to represent their work. You definitely will need clients as you grow in your journey of Graphic Design and for that, you must have social media accounts to put yourself out there.

Many designers don’t focus on this but I recommend you build a habit of posting at least one piece of your work as content throughout the social media. And by social media I mean Instagram, X (Twitter), LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Behance for big projects. As you grow in your journey you can also grow in social media and you can’t imagine how crucial it will be for you to bring clients.

You can build your personal brand, Which can help you in the future to grow your business as you advance in your field.

Conclusion

So, that’s how you can become a graphic designer and start your journey in this creative field. From choosing the right type of graphic design for yourself to your social media presence, I guess I walked you through the whole process a graphic designer must follow at the start of their journey.

Hope you enjoyed reading this article.

If you have any confusion or query you can ask me in the comment section.