Hi all,

 

I'm fairly new to all this and I've got somewhat of an idyllic picture of what I expect my future career in Web Design to be like; flexible working, constantly developing new skills, fun creative workplace etc etc. Oh, and the ability to make a half decent living too.

 

I've got a fairly decent job with a big company at the moment, reasonable wage, company car, hotels etc all week but the ol' heart aint in it, hence spending every night on Lynda.com or with my head in a Sitepoint book!

 

So, what are peoples honest opinions? How is life as a Web Designer/Developer? Is the grass really as green as it seems?????

 

G

It is not a life... It is a Half-Life...

 

Don't scare the poor guy before he even gets started. Actually, there are a lot of good points to a freelancer's life like " flexible working, constantly developing new skills, fun creative workplace etc etc". Many people love it. You just have to be careful to understand that nothing is for free. There is a lot of hard work and frustration involved. But that is the same for any job. So I say ... if your heart is in it, why not go for it.

Oh , your good heart, Jean!

It really depends on whether you end up working for someone (for an agency etc) or going freelance...

 

If you work for someone you'll get a salary, the entry level pay may not be anything like what you've been used to (initially at least) but being in a creative environment can be reward in itsself. Additionally an employer will most likely help you develop your skill set by providing mentors or sending you away on those lovely paid for courses with beer allowance

 

If you go down the freelance route it's best to not think about earning a conventional salary, instead it's more of a lifestyle choice where you often end up trading financial security for lots of freedom. Sounds scary but if you can get by and live comfortably being freelance you'll be glad you made the change

Edited August 9, 201016 yr by BlueDreamer

basically, what blue said is correct, It also depends on your levels of experience, how you design and then code the websites, (coding is better than a wysiwyg btw). How friendly you are and how you get on with your clients. Me and one of my best friends are starting a business together, we were both going to go freelance, but that cos we had the same ideas etc. We are also gonna do web hosting later on But its up to you what road you take mate. Good Luck

Thanks for your feedback guys, all useful stuff and great to hear what it's really like at the sharp end.

 

I'm prepared for a bit of a pay cut initially, a piece of advice that sticks in my mind is that you should never take a job based on what it pays, it is what it will teach you and whether it is helping you get to where you really want to be that is important. As long as I can pay the bills & eat every now and then!

 

So I've got my self made curriculum of Lynda courses, at the end of which I'll be versed in XHTML & CSS (well on my way now), proficient in Dreamweaver and Photoshop, have a good understanding of W3C standards, cross browser issues and accessibility plus a base of SEO & design principles. Oh, and a foundation in Javascript too. If all goes to plan this should take around 6 months, based on 10 hours studying per week, allowing time to get a few portfolio sites pulled together too.

 

Hopefully this is going to tie in nicely with the end of my current project at work (during which I'll be doing a Prince 2 qualification too).

 

What's are peoples thoughts on the plan - will there be any major gaps that will hold me back? Will I be an attractive prospect to agencies with this skill set? I know it all depends on what I can demonstrate in my portfolio, but just trying to get a general idea.

 

Thanks again guys.

 

G

It sounds like you have got a clear plan.

 

The only thing I'd add is to avoid learning proprietry software, rather learn techniques instead. For instance, learn to code HTML and CSS rather than "learn Dreamweaver", or learn image creation and manipulation techniques rather than learn "Photoshop".

 

It's a subtle difference but can be important in the long run! The tools don't matter, it's what you do with them that counts

Edited August 10, 201016 yr by BlueDreamer

Cool thanks BD.

 

Would definitely not just focus on just learning Dreamweaver - the power's in the coding!

 

Good advice on the general principle though, never really thought about it with images & graphic design etc but I guess Adobe isn't 100% ubiquitous...95% maybe....

 

Cheers

G

Your plan sounds okay. I jumped in the deep end about 7 months ago now, it was a scary change after working in a reasonably highly paid secure job with a fixed income every month. So far it has been good, the cash flow is much more eratic but I am much more in control of what I do and how I do it.

 

Looking at your plan, stay away from Dreamweaver if you want to build professional sites and be able to compete in the web design world.

 

One important factor you seem to be missing is some sort of server side language - to handle user interaction and especially database functionality. Without this you will only be able to build the most basic of sites, and very few clients I come across these days want only that. Most want even a basic admin to update some part of the site.

 

My current focus is HTML/CSS/jQuery (basically Javascript extended) and basic Photoshop but I work with a designer who generally takes care of the design and supplies the photoshop files to me. For server side I use ASP.Net in C#. I would go with either ASP.Net or PHP as a server side language, this is a matter of opinion though and there are others to consider.

 

Best of luck

Looking at your plan, stay away from Dreamweaver if you want to build professional sites and be able to compete in the web design world.

Care to elaborate?

 

One important factor you seem to be missing is some sort of server side language - to handle user interaction and especially database functionality. Without this you will only be able to build the most basic of sites, and very few clients I come across these days want only that. Most want even a basic admin to update some part of the site.

Good advice! +1

Care to elaborate?

 

From my experience those developers that have developed using dreamweaver never really learned html/css/javascript very much themselves, relying heavily on DW. So as soon as a problem arose with it, or the client wanted something that was not provided by a DW plugin they struggled.

 

I found their structure of CSS and proper use of it to be terrible, with massive duplication leading to the maintenance of sites to become painful. Almost every element was fixed in place with absolute positioned layers, completely disregarding any flow layout - again making maintenance and adding/removing content painful. Also the markup and particularly javascript always seem unnecesarily bloated.

 

I guess it comes down to what you want to acheive and in some cases DW will suffice, but as I said if you want to deliver professional sites I do not think it is the way to go. You will never properly learn HTML/CSS/JS unless you are handwriting it yourself and as client side technology with things like jQuery, Ajax and HTML5 keep evolving you will always be a step or two behind unless you can utilise them properly as well.

From my experience those developers that have developed using dreamweaver never really learned html/css/javascript very much themselves, relying heavily on DW. So as soon as a problem arose with it, or the client wanted something that was not provided by a DW plugin they struggled.

 

I found their structure of CSS and proper use of it to be terrible, with massive duplication leading to the maintenance of sites to become painful. Almost every element was fixed in place with absolute positioned layers, completely disregarding any flow layout - again making maintenance and adding/removing content painful. Also the markup and particularly javascript always seem unnecesarily bloated.

 

I guess it comes down to what you want to acheive and in some cases DW will suffice, but as I said if you want to deliver professional sites I do not think it is the way to go. You will never properly learn HTML/CSS/JS unless you are handwriting it yourself and as client side technology with things like jQuery, Ajax and HTML5 keep evolving you will always be a step or two behind unless you can utilise them properly as well.

I partly agree with that, but as discussed on WDF before - it depends how you use DW and your capabilities as a designer/developer. DW can also make some tasks quicker and has some benefits also.

I partly agree with that, but as discussed on WDF before - it depends how you use DW and your capabilities as a designer/developer. DW can also make some tasks quicker and has some benefits also.

 

Thats fair enough I can imagine this topic has been covered before, my stance on this is pretty obvious

 

Anyway this is just from my own experience and really refers to learning and evolving a set of skills. It some cases I would agree DW may suffice and do the job at hand.

Thats fair enough I can imagine this topic has been covered before, my stance on this is pretty obvious

 

Anyway this is just from my own experience and really refers to learning and evolving a set of skills. It some cases I would agree DW may suffice and do the job at hand.

Thank you for elaborating.

If you go freelance or start up your own agency be ready to work 20 hour days, have a mildly pissed off partner and the financial instability.

 

We found that our first three months were really tough on our cash-flow and time. However it has started paying for itself several times over.

 

If you are brave and good at what you do - nothing better than taking the plunge.

 

Part time = Half hearted (in my opinion)

Thanks for all the advice guys, much appreciated.

 

I knew someone would pick up on the lack of server side stuff! Was thinking PHP, don't know why because I haven't really looked at the options...what's everyone's opinions?

 

Also, I'm only using Dreamweaver as my code editor, just thought it may be useful to learn some of it's time saving features too (as Cavking suggested). What do you guys use for coding? (I'm windows at the mo by the way...don't shoot!!).

 

Charlie - cheers for the advice, expecting some tough work but I'd rather do that and get the long term benefits myself than coast through a regular 9-5 (where's the fun in that!?). Ha bet that sounds pretty naive to some of you guys! Plus, the missus is back off to uni in Sep for 4 years to become a dentist (apparently being a vet doesn't cut it salary wise) so thinking now is a good time to get my head down.

 

G

Charlie - cheers for the advice, expecting some tough work but I'd rather do that and get the long term benefits myself than coast through a regular 9-5 (where's the fun in that!?). Ha bet that sounds pretty naive to some of you guys! Plus, the missus is back off to uni in Sep for 4 years to become a dentist (apparently being a vet doesn't cut it salary wise) so thinking now is a good time to get my head down.

 

Yeah man - I wouldn't trade working for myself for the world. Just be prepared to juggle finding new work, meetings with existing clients (They are so worthwhile for the human touch and contact to speed things along) and actually getting your work done. I was lucky enough to be part of a partnership so we halve that (I go out to most client meetings and take on the SEO and Social media work - whilst the other guy does the web design / builds for now).

 

Great time to get your head down - as long as you don't relying on regular payments (e.g. Rent)

 

Also for the record - get everything in a contract. Even for mates. You'll get burnt once - and it will hurt - save yourself the pain!!

 

C

 

Also for the record - get everything in a contract. Even for mates. You'll get burnt once - and it will hurt - save yourself the pain!!

 

C

 

So true +1