Ship of Fools: Web Designers, please help me.

Thread: Web Designers, please help me. Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by The5thMary (# 12953) on :

Hello, all. I'm in the process of teaching myself web design. A little bit of background: In the mid to late 90's I went to college for Graphic Design. It was supposed to be a two year program at the community college but I also got interested in multimedia, specifically 2D/3D modeling and animation. I have always had depression and anxiety and the stress of school finally did me in and I quit, just shy of completing four more classes. I got into a fight with the Graphic Design instructor when she called me out on my inability to finish things! Okay, so years and years later I have gotten 100% better as far as depression goes and am wanting to break away from Social Security disability. I see awful web sites and brilliant web sites and tons and tons of jobs for web designers. I'm teaching myself web design through various online tutorials but I want to know whether more schooling is absolutely necessary (it's so expensive and I can't get grants...defaulted on a student loan) or can I learn what I need to learn without paying large sums of money for a college course? Besides HTML and CSS, what other things are really essential? I know I need to bone up on Photoshop and Illustrator.

Anyway, sorry this is such a long post! [Hot and Hormonal]

Any help and advice is greatly appreciated.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

A good place to start is w3schools

I don't think it teaches you everything you need to know but it will get you to the point at which you a) know whether you will ever understand it and b) know which courses costing real money will be worthwhile.

I've used it to become reasonably proficient at CSS and SQL queries. That plus practice.

[eta: c) understand the HUGE textbooks written about supposedly intuitive tools.]

[ 02. June 2014, 20:18: Message edited by: Sioni Sais ]

Posted by TonyK (# 35) on :

I can't offer any practical advice regarding web design, but I always look for 'Dummies' Guides' for these things.
Try Amazon.

Good luck

Posted by The5thMary (# 12953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by TonyK:
I can't offer any practical advice regarding web design, but I always look for 'Dummies' Guides' for these things.
Try Amazon.

Good luck

Thank you. The only thing I wish the "Dummies Guides" didn't do is wound so goofy sometimes. It's like the authors are paid to throw in a lot of extra chatter and banter. However, I never understood how to properly learn Spanish until I read a "Spanish for Dummies" book, so there is that. [Big Grin]

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

Since you've had some design experience, You might try using a simple program to build a site and then deconstruct how it was done. Microsoft Expression is now free. It is a solid, visual design tool that will get a website up and running. Like any tool, it is not perfect and will not substitute for knowing code. But it might help speed up the process.

Posted by The5thMary (# 12953) on :

Sioni: Wow, thanks! I really like the W3 website! Excellent.

Posted by Snags (# 15351) on :

If you want to get into it seriously you may want to think about which bit you like most: designing visuals or coding the functionality. The two are often quite separate skillsets, and on the visuals it's important to remember that the web and print are different beasts.

If you want to do complete solutions you will rapidly find yourself needing to get into CMS/blog packages (Joomla, Drupal, Wordpress etc.) and maybe getting down and dirty on PHP (or a framework like Ruby), MySQL, or take the MS shilling and get into .Net (Visual Web Developer Studio is free, as as SQL Express). Then you've got cross-browser issues to deal with [Smile]

BUT best thing you can do is start knocking sites together and building up a portfolio as you learn. There are plenty of numpties out there; if you have a good eye and understanding it will get you going better than the technical whiz bangs, which can be grafted on more easily.

Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :

OK, if you want to get into Web Design - that is the visual aspect of it - you have some of the core aspects that you need (HTML and CSS). Make sure that you are fully up to date with these. You need to be able to create artifacts too, so whatever you want to use for this is important.

The other thing that is worth getting your head around is some javascript/jquery, because some places would expect you to be familiar with this (jquery in particular, for making effects happen).

w3schools are superb for a basic insight, and also for lookup of features and functionality (I use them all the time).

I think some academic training in Graphic Design is also useful to have. I don't think you should need more formal training to get some jobs in the business.

The other thing is, learn to finish things. Learn how to do things to a schedule and a deadline. Learn how to accept less than perfect. Nothing is worse for a project than someone who insists on taking far too long to make something perfect. Design people are, typically, worse than development people at this.

Posted by The5thMary (# 12953) on :

quote:
The other thing is, learn to finish things. Learn how to do things to a schedule and a deadline. Learn how to accept less than perfect. Nothing is worse for a project than someone who insists on taking far too long to make something perfect. Design people are, typically, worse than development people at this.

Oh, boy, don't I know the truth in this! I'm notorious for getting almost done on a drawing (computer aided or just by hand) and then making a tiny error or thinking the entire thing is awful and throwing it all away to start over. I really have to work on that.

Posted by Net Spinster (# 16058) on :

Also remember accessibility. Not everyone is going to access the web site in the same way: mobile devices, text to speech devices (e.g., for those with major visual disabilities), different browsers each with their own quirks...

Posted by The5thMary (# 12953) on :

Ah, thank you for all your replies, folks. I just joined an Atlanta, GA web developers meetup group and hope to go to their meet and greet next week. In the meantime I plan to devote many hours to going through the first bunch of HTML tutorials. I do have another question, though. What's the difference between HTML and HTML5? I guess I have to learn both?

Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on :

HTML5 is a version of HTML. HTML keeps developing and you learn a specific version. There are features of older versions that are deprecated and may disappear at sometime in the future.

Html5 is very new. Most of the web is Html4 (parts of the web are in older forms) and that is what most resources will teach you. I would do a basic HTML course and when mastered look at html5 upgrade course (as that will also cover transitional techniques).

As for other things learning Php would not be a bad idea.

Jengie

Posted by Net Spinster (# 16058) on :

HTML is a general name, HTML5 is a particular version (it is also a rather vague term for a mish mash of other things). You may also see mentions of XHTML (also google on XML).

If you look at the top of a proper web page you'll note a DOCTYPE line which indicates what version and therefore what markup is allowed. Browsers use it to determine how to interpret things (but a given browser might not implement all the markup that the version defines). Google on doctype.

Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :

HTML5 is a significant upgrade of HTML. It is worth learning and understanding the differences, because when you can use it, it can be very good. However many sites cannot use it if they have to be accessible to multiple browsers (and older ones), so it is important to be able to work without it.

It is also worth your while learning the limitations of browsers - that is, how to do everything in a cross-browser fashion. That information is vital and an indication that you know what you are talking about.

Posted by Dogwalker (# 14135) on :

One thing I'd recommend to you is to DO a website.

It serves a couple of purposes. First, you get to practice what you learn, and figure out how to solve problems. Second, you have something to "show off" when you're looking for work.

Pick a topic you know something about, and start in on your own computer. After it's good enough (websites are never done!) consider putting on the web.

The whole reason my parish has a website is that I wanted to learn HTML, and it gave me a topic to start on.

Posted by The5thMary (# 12953) on :

I think if I can manage the financials, I may try to do the online college certificate thing. True, I can teach myself basic HTML but I suffer from lack of confidence in my abilities and it would be nice to have some hand holding from professionals who actually make a living from designing web pages. Thanks for all the many replies and advice, everyone.

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