Art Seeks Visual Solutions in What Is Often Called the rules Process

If there's an occupation that is 100% linked with the public's idea of what blueprint is all about, it'due south graphic blueprint. From the familiar golden arches of the McDonald'due south make to the typography and colors of movie posters, graphic designers create some of the well-nigh iconic and ubiquitous designs around u.s.. So why would a graphic designer like you want to change your career to UX blueprint? Well, for one, much can be said virtually the sense of satisfaction and fulfillment derived from getting "under the hood" of the products yous work on rather than working on the exterior. Furthermore, according to PayScale, the average bacon for a graphic designer in the U.s. is $41,000(1), but the same for a UX designer is a whopping $74,000(2).Whatever the reason for the movement, it's clear that it can be a very rewarding one. Simply how do you go nigh switching from graphic blueprint to UX pattern? Let's find out.

What is User Experience and User Experience Pattern?

The user experience (UX) is what a user of a detail product experiences when using that product. A UX designer'due south job is thus to create a product that provides the all-time possible user experience. How does that happen?

Well, it starts with a lot of research. You can't create anything of value to a user unless you understand what kind of problems they want to solve and how yous tin solve those problems, and then that the user volition want—or better still, need—your solution. Yous tin but get that understanding by interacting with users.

UX designers tend to exist concerned with, every bit you tin can see from the image beneath, 3 primary factors: the look of a product, the feel of that product and the usability of that product.

The look of a product is all near creating a product that has visual entreatment and which, in item, harmonizes with a user's values and captures the spirit of what they expect in that product. In other words, it has to not only look nice, just expect right as well. In doing and so, information technology establishes a bail of trust and credibility between the product and the user.

Next is the feel, which is really about developing products that are "a joy to use". That is, whether you lot're interacting with them or reacting to them, products should provide a pleasurable experience and not just a functional ane.

Lastly, usability is the cornerstone of user experience. If a product isn't usable, the feel of using it tin can never exist skillful. UX designers want to create products which tin can, ideally, be tailored to meet a user's specific needs, but which provides functionality that is predictable.

If you're still unsure of what UX design is all almost, don't worry! We've got a series of articles which may help y'all make up your mind—they examine some of the high-level key concepts of UX design in a bit more detail than nosotros can here:

An Introduction to Usability

Usability vs Desirability

What is Interaction Design?

What Do Graphic Blueprint and UX Design Have in Common?

Emotional Design

Graphic design is about emotional advice through typography, color and images; serif fonts and nighttime, duller colors evoke seriousness, while san-serif fonts and bright colors tend to bring out a sense of joy or excitement. Graphic designers are hence very often emotional designers who arm-twist specific reactions in a user. UX design is also concerned with shaping the emotions of the user, although it tends to take a broader, big flick view of the entire user'due south feel with the product. On top of focusing on the right typography and colors, UX designers are also concerned with motion design, the tone of the content, and information architecture, amongst others.

Creative thinking

Graphic designers and UX designers are both equally skilled at creative thinking. For graphic designers, creating visuals that adhere to conventions (and thus communicate finer) while retaining a sense of originality (to stand up out among the contest) requires some serious creative and critical thinking. In the same fashion, UX designers accept to create products that solve users' bug—and sometimes, conventional solutions aren't always the all-time or about appropriate ones.

Prototyping

Graphic designers often create mockups and wireframes of their designs prior to delivering a finished pattern. It gives a chance for clients to offer feedback on their designs and for them to amend them without having to start from scratch. UX designers create mockups and prototypes likewise, just these tend to be less focused on the "await" of the product and more on the "experience" of it. Is the prototype useful? Is it usable? Is information technology desirable? These are the questions a UX designer wants answers to.

The Differences between Graphic Pattern and UX Design

User-focused vs pixel-focused

Graphic designers tend to pursue pixel perfection in their designs. Ensuring that texts take perfect kerning and colors adjust to make guidelines often take up a significant portion of graphic designers' jobs—and for practiced reason, too. UX designers, nonetheless, are primarily focused on users. They study the interface between users and the production, finding ways to ensure that the product answers to the user'southward key needs. And they practise then by conducting a lot of research—by talking to and observing users, creating user personas and stories, doing usability testing on the products, and many more than. Graphic designers looking to switch career tracks will need to do a substantial corporeality of piece of work finding out how to comport user research (more well-nigh this a bit after on in the article).

Iterative problem solving

UX blueprint is very much an iterative problem solving process, and information technology tin can be very dissimilar from what you're used to doing equally a graphic designer. Information technology begins with the identification of a problem; this is often constitute through user enquiry, and if it'due south not, it will then be confirmed through user research. At that place is no point in solving problems that users don't care about; they won't pay to solve those bug, and that means your visitor won't make money.

From the problem identification stage, more enquiry is conducted into how all-time to solve the problem in a way that the user volition be happy with—ordinarily via observations, surveys, ethnographic studies, etc.

This enquiry then informs the product's design. Designs are then tested with users to run into if the research led to the right solutions. The designs are constantly iterated until research confirms that they are skilful enough.

In one case this happens the production is launched, merely the design process is not over. The design will be continually tested and user feedback will be taken, thus beginning a new round of user inquiry. Future improvements to the blueprint will be fabricated based on this feedback.

Multi-disciplinary vs specialized

Graphic design is a specialized bailiwick, and at that place is a certain level of adroitness and set of specialized skills (such every bit typography and colour theory) required to produce great visuals. UX design, on the other mitt, is much more multi-disciplinary and involves many schools of cognition. UX designers take to constantly learn about human psychology, interaction design, information architecture and user enquiry techniques, merely to name a few, in social club to create the right solutions to a user'due south problems. Don Norman, the man who coined the term "User Experience", explains that user experience covers "all aspects of the person'south experience with the system including industrial design graphics, the interface, the physical interaction and the manual."

The Big Benefit of Graphic Design Experience when Moving to UX Design

Aesthetics

The biggest benefit for graphic designers moving to UX design is that they can make things bonny. A very common misconception near UX design is that adept usability trumps aesthetics. On the reverse, skilful aesthetics have been institute to improve the overall user experience of production—by making users more relaxed, creating a positive beginning impression, and mostly just showing that y'all care(3).

Aesthetics likewise help designers communicate with the internal stakeholders in their companies. Ex-graphic designers can present inquiry results in a fashion that makes stakeholders sit down upward and actually take observe. Graphic blueprint skills are often idea of every bit optional in UX research, only it would be hard to deny the impact of well-presented beautiful findings. If you do make the modify, yous'll demand to remainder your tendency to make things gorgeous with the need for moving your design projects forward. There are times in UX design when a few scribbles on the back of a napkin are more enough to get things going; don't spend 3 days producing a poster when this is the instance.

Conventions and trends

Coming from a design background not only means having a practiced grip on pattern terminology, just also that you're likely to be familiar with the conventions and trends in web or app designs. Most times, UX designers make use of standardized conventions (like a toggle switch for on/off states, dropdown listing for multiple options, etc.) because users accept come to wait these interactions on a website. Graphic designers—especially if yous've created prototypes in the past—are also familiar with such conventions. That means you'll arrange more than apace to a UX pattern office than someone who comes from a not-pattern background. This might not sound like much, but advice is the core of any UX design project and existence able to talk-the-talk is a big benefit.

How to Raise Your Skills to Make the Jump from Graphic Blueprint to UX Pattern

Is there a gap between graphic pattern skills and UX design skills? Yeah, but it's not an insurmountable i. Graphic designers already speak the linguistic communication of design; they only need to brush up their skills to include those that are unique to UX blueprint.

Once y'all accept those skills, you lot tin can offset to piece of work them into your graphic design work (because user experience design tin can inform graphic blueprint only as much as information technology tin can inform product design) and start to tailor your CV to highlight your UX skills besides as your graphic design skills.

As we mentioned above, the real key for graphic designers is to empathize user research in all its forms. All the courses we've highlighted below should address this need to a greater extent.

Online Courses

Interaction Design Foundation

Nosotros'd like to modestly present our own course offerings for this, as the Interaction Design Foundation is the world'south largest specialist design education community. Don Norman, the same human being who coined the term "User Experience" and who is one of the earth'south best known designers, says that we're "a goldmine of data on interaction design"; Forbes magazine says nosotros supply an Ivy League level of UX design education!

In that location are three courses that we have put together specifically with a career change or commencement task in UX design in mind. In Become a UX Designer from Scratch, you'll be introduced to all areas of UX work, learn basic practical skills to deport UX work, and gain the confidence to work with UX clients as a consultant. In Get Your Commencement Job every bit a UX (or Interaction) Designer, you'll find out how to get the feel in UX that prospective employers are looking for, learn to develop a winning encompass letter, CV and portfolio to get a UX interview, and negotiate a task offer. And in User Research – Methods and Best Practices, you'll acquire the various methods of conducting user research, so putting the inquiry results into action.

We also offer a bunch of other courses (32, and constantly growing!) to help y'all further develop your skills in UX design. The adept news is that with a low annual fee, you lot get access to all of our courses for a year with no boosted charges, and you get admission to our customs too.

You tin can discover out about our other courses hither.

Coursera

You might too want to endeavour the folks at Coursera.org, which is a depression-cost but high-quality education provider which delivers courses on a broad range of subjects including UX. It does partner with universities and companies to offer courses, Professional Certificates, and degrees, and courses are mostly very skilful. All content on the platform, with the exception of degrees, is available on demand. It's also worth noting that their caste programs are only available for new applications during set windows. They too recently launched a Google UX Design Professional Certificate to assistance learners build job-ready skills in under six months.

Udemy

Udemy is the earth's biggest broker of training. They don't design their ain training; rather, they enable course creators to sell their courses on their platform. They offering literally thousands of courses in almost any conceivable field of study. The problem is that Udemy provides no quality control, and while y'all can find some great courses there, in that location are a lot of not so great courses as well.

Classroom Courses

Nielsen Norman Grouping

If you have deeper pockets and would prefer to learn in a classroom than learn online, then yous might want to cheque out the classroom courses offered past the Nielsen Norman Group. The grouping has an splendid reputation and is one of the world's virtually respected UX consultancies. They offer their courses in a range of locations, simply we tin't guarantee that you'll find one on your doorstep and you may have to travel some altitude to take function in them.

General Assembly

We besides think that Full general Assembly has a neat reputation for providing immersive classroom preparation for UX design. Once more, it's not cheap but that is always going to exist true of professional classroom training. You can choose between part-time or full-time courses. As they're short, they repeat every few months. They are, nonetheless, available only at select locations, and y'all'll need to factor travel and living expenses into the total cost, in case you don't alive nearby.

University Courses

We're not certain that university is the all-time option for those seeking a change of career direction; it'south not just the coin required, just besides the fourth dimension taken. You could be earning and learning using a different method rather than spending 3 or 4 years on a bachelor's caste or 2 years on a Master's programme. However, if yous practice decide to go the academy road, yous'll want to spend a lot of time researching exactly the right program for you. We've got a couple of examples for you hither merely there are literally hundreds of programs globally and we couldn't promise to encompass them all.

Carnegie Mellon – HCI Programs

York University – MSc in HCI Technologies

We'd urge that you sit downward with a calculator and think about the costs associated with going to university before booking a place. HSBC, as reported by Summit Universities, found that the average Usa university course will cost you lot $36,564 a twelvemonth (including hire, tuition, books, etc.). (4) Over a four-year caste, that ways shelling out a cool $146,256—and that's without the costs of a loan to encompass those expenses.

Just that's not all—you'll also accept to give up full-time work. Co-ordinate to the US Census Agency, a non-graduate earns an average of $27,351 per year.(5) This gives us a 4-year opportunity toll (that is, the income that you've forgone while in university) of $109,404. That ways four years at academy volition set up you back a huge $255,660!

If you lot don't know which kind of learning to invest in, that's OK. We know information technology can be confusing trying to work out what will add the most value to your career. With that in heed, we've put together a piece that walks you lot through calculating the Return on Investment in learning here; hopefully that will assist yous decide what's correct for you lot.

Networking

Once yous've brushed upwards your skillset and you feel y'all're fix for that kickoff UX role, yous might discover handy to do some networking. The best opportunities are almost always found when someone already in the field recommends you for a position. Ane of the best places to start with your networking is LinkedIn. Join some UX groups, start contributing, and build that all of import network with your peers. Just accept it slow; don't merely prove up and start asking for a job. You need relationships with people before they will assist.

We besides offer some awesome networking opportunities to both our members and not-members likewise. Members tin join our global community of UX professionals in the many discussion groups and forums that we provide; we have the largest specialist design community on world so there are plenty of opportunities to exist uncovered there. For members and not-members, we also have local group meetings in many places around the planet. These meetings are completely free to attend and are a great mode to meet people doing UX in your home town or city. Observe out more at our Community folio.

One other useful way to get-go networking is to follow famous members of the UX blueprint community on Twitter. Not only volition you larn a lot from them, you can as well interact with their followers (who are likely to be designers like you too). Nosotros've put together a list of 20 people you should follow on Twitter in the UX sphere here to go your started.

Mentoring and Feedback

Another peachy style to develop your career is to piece of work with a mentor in the UX field who has "been at that place, done it and bought the t-shirt", at to the lowest degree so to speak. Yous may discover a mentor through your own network nd that'south an crawly fashion to connect with a mentor, only if y'all can't then our IxDF Design League members can admission our network of blueprint mentors as part of their annual membership fee.

The Take Abroad

If you want to change from graphic design to UX blueprint as a career, that's crawly. Information technology's not going to be as difficult as yous might think either. You just need to get a fiddling training nether your chugalug then that you're familiar with what it is a UX designer does, and then you tin can put some of those techniques to work in your current role. Then when you think the time is right, you can offset networking and lining up some interviews for your new job!

References & Where to Learn More

Payscale'southward enquiry on Graphic Design salaries - http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Graphic_Designer/Salary
Payscale'due south inquiry on UX Blueprint salaries - http://www.payscale.com/research/Us/Job=UX_Designer/Bacon
UX Myths: Aesthetics are not important if you accept adept usability - http://uxmyths.com/post/1161244116/myth-25-aesthetics-are-not-important-if-you-have-expert-u.s.
How much does it cost to report in the U.s.a. - http://www.topuniversities.com/pupil-info/educatee-finance/how-much-does-it-cost-study-u.s.a.
Earnings by education: US Agency Of Labor Statistics - https://www.bls.gov/emp/chart-unemployment-earnings-pedagogy.htm

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Source: https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/topics/graphic-design