cb designers future plans, discussion Options

[brooklyneast05]

let's talk about your past and future with graphic design.

what made you initially get into design? for those of you are pretty heavily into designing now, where do you plan to go with it? do you plan to pursue it in college(if you aren't already) or are you planning on doing something else? if you're planning on doing something else professionally, do you think you'll still continue to do design in the future anyway?

[Mikeplyts]

I first got into designing almost a year ago when I saw a layout that my friend had made a layout for me on myspace. I thought it was the bomb (which it wasn't) but I eventually grew old of it so I decided I could design my own. I made my first div with a blinking background and just some separate black content boxes with light red font. I was so accomplished so I decided to take my skills up a notch and began to use Photobucket to design stuff. After that though, I actually figured out I had PSP XI on my computer already and messed around with it. I looked at tutorials from here and a bunch of other sites and eventually just taught myself how to make layouts that actually looked pretty good. Then, I joined CreateBlog.com and tried to submit some stuff. Gabi (schizo) was the first person I interacted with on here when she rejected my first few layouts. I feel kind of ashamed that I threw a fuss at her and called her a bitch. Anyways, she kept giving me some advice and codes that could help me out and soon enough, my layouts were getting accepted! It felt nice to have an approved layout and I kept making more. Then, I experimented some more and started making graphics and writing/studying HTML and CSS. When I had a couple of layouts, graphics, scripts, and tutorials, I decided to put a site at BraveHost.com. The ads were annoying though and the coding I wanted to use wasn't allowed, so I shut it down. Then, around December of 08, my dad got me a hosting plan at FatCow.com and I created mikeplyts.net. Afterwards, I studied a lot more about PHP and Javascript and basically a lot of other syntaxes. I also got Photoshop CS4 at the time and I kept getting advice from here on how to improve my layouts and graphics and I just became better and better. Now, I'm still in the making and I do hope that someday I can pursue graphic and web design in college and even if I don't, I'll still be a freelance graphic and web designer. I pretty have everything planned in my mind.



Sorry for the long read.

[schizo]

^I don't remember you calling me a bitch...was it just to yourself or did you actually say it to me? I pretty much remember everyone that was ermm...difficult with me, and I don't remember you being one of them.

I actually started on the nick.com message boards when I was ten. They allowed you to have HTML signatures, and I just thought they were so cool and taught myself how to do them. They were really gross...millions of filters, glow, borders. Yuck. Then I got a xanga account and the same thing happened. I opened around six sites on there. All of them were pretty popular, but my designs were horrible. When I came to the depressing realization that xanga was dead, I moved to Myspace and started Schizo. That's when I first tried submitting to CB. I had a lot rejected, but I eventually got pretty good (if I may say so myself) and my accepted submissions brought me 20,000 Myspace friends. I then opened Atomic Affliction, got on staff here, yada yada yada, here I am now.

I actually can't see myself doing anything with web design after high school. I just feel like I'm supposed to do something else, but I have no idea what. Even though it seems like I'm making a ton of money now, it won't be as much once I have to pay bills and such. I just think that being numero uno out of a class of 988 people is telling me I should go for a career in law or medicine or something like that. At least I still have three years to mull it over.

I doubt anyone will read that book of a post, but it was nice reminiscing.

[Mikeplyts]

^I don't remember you calling me a bitch...was it just to yourself or did you actually say it to me? I pretty much remember everyone that was ermm...difficult with me, and I don't remember you being one of them.

lol, I replied to you when you rejected that first layout I made.

*looks for link*

EDIT:

actually, it was that one you rejected I made for a 'request'. Oh god. haha. LMAO.

[brooklyneast05]

i read it i read that on your site too. it's interesting to me.

i hope you don't end up skipping over graphic design as a profession though just cause you think you should be doing something else. i mean if you wanna do medicine or law or something like that then that's all good and you should. it just drives me crazy when people think art isn't a prestigious enough career or something. but then again that's probably because people are always on my case asking me why i'm majoring in art when i could be majoring in something "smarter".

[hi-C]

Even if it's something you don't see yourself continuing in graphic/web design after a certain point, and even if you want to do something different, it's a useful (and bankable) skill to have. Like me: I majored in English and Africana Studies, but recently, I've been doing a lot of really basic design work because I can do it and because it helps with building your resume, networking, etc. Hell, as soon as I get the money, I'm going to get my AA in graphic design/interactive media.

[pandemonium]

^I don't remember you calling me a bitch...was it just to yourself or did you actually say it to me? I pretty much remember everyone that was ermm...difficult with me, and I don't remember you being one of them.I actually started on the nick.com message boards when I was ten. They allowed you to have HTML signatures, and I just thought they were so cool and taught myself how to do them. They were really gross...millions of filters, glow, borders. Yuck. Then I got a xanga account and the same thing happened. I opened around six sites on there. All of them were pretty popular, but my designs were horrible. When I came to the depressing realization that xanga was dead, I moved to Myspace and started Schizo. That's when I first tried submitting to CB. I had a lot rejected, but I eventually got pretty good (if I may say so myself) and my accepted submissions brought me 20,000 Myspace friends. I then opened Atomic Affliction, got on staff here, yada yada yada, here I am now. I actually can't see myself doing anything with web design after high school. I just feel like I'm supposed to do something else, but I have no idea what. Even though it seems like I'm making a ton of money now, it won't be as much once I have to pay bills and such. I just think that being numero uno out of a class of 988 people is telling me I should go for a career in law or medicine or something like that. At least I still have three years to mull it over.I doubt anyone will read that book of a post, but it was nice reminiscing.

i just read that today in your site not too long ago

well i first started with photoshop cs3 trail back when i was a freshman in HS because i had seen and awesome image on someone myspace and looked on yahoo answers to how to edit and downloaded the trail and edited one image and didn't look for tutorials i was a total noob so i just left it.. so later on myspace.. i had seen an awesome layout that wasn't like any other layout i thought it was the greatest thing.. then i started to search.. and found out it was called DIV layout.. well i found a generator which had templates and made the boxes so i looked to free photoediting software and found Paint.net and made some small graphics like msg, pic, cmnt for the layout.. (now i see it as crap, and cheap ), later i found a tutorial on mygen.co.uk's forum on how to make a DIV layout on photoshop and dreamweaver and made a new layout which was wayy better.. and after a few layouts i once stumbled upon createblog looking for some codes.. and that was it and after a year or so stumbled upon this site again.. and stared to look around and decided to join.. and contribute with my layouts.. ..
now designing is just a hoppy i always wanted to be architect since i was in what.. elementry school.. but then i was introduced to photoshop and had my doubts but then i found out that i could just have a minor in it.. so im going to try that and if it doesn't work im still gonna do it, it's my hobby
it's just that art atracts me i've always liked art..

[lovescream]

Uhhhh..

Past
2004: I WAS 11 YRS OLD LMAO. Began w/ xanga. cB really really helped me with making my own layouts and also taught me a lot about HTML and CSS. Although, at that time, I worked with PAINT! OOOOOO, Paint + Word can do wonders. It's no photoshop, but still~
Learned about DIVs and stufff.
Late 2005:I got Photoshop 7 sometime around here. At this point I was so into designing. I had a myspace and even did DIV layouts on this and stuff haha. This also taught me a lot more about CSS and HTML that I never knew before.
2006?: Got my own domain. Umm I have to give props to Mark(ster) on this, cause he helped me code my website w/ PHP and he gave me tips and everything with the colors and whatnot. I learned a little about PHP because of him. Haha. Unfortunately, due to my laziness, my site was never FULLY coded. I had the layout and most of the PHP, but the pages I planned to have were never completed.
2007: Started my freshman year at a magnet (high) school. We have 'majors'. Basically, they are classes we focus on much more than our others. My major was graphic design. In this year, I learned how to use Illustrator and indesign. I even learned how to do 3D programs on my own at home, because I was just THAT into it haha. I learned so much this yeaaar, forsrs.
2008: Learned how to use flash and became comfortable with it. I have yet to try to make a flash website but I can make flash animations and flash music players~~~! :DDDDDDDDD
Got really comfortable w/ illustrator and indesign too. But my passion to continue with this in the future has burned out a bit. Mainly because I did some real life contests, projects and worked in groups of people. My teacher said that in real life, many graphic designers have to work in groups often times. I'm not a group person, so I guess I went all AHHHH because of that. We had a lot of disagreements w/ designs and aesthetics. Beauty really is in the eye of the beholder, lol.
ALSOOOO, hmm, we did projects such as designing a cellphone (from scratch!) and then creating it in a graphics program, kinda like this:

click to enlarge

(not mine, just giving examples of what the designs looked similar to)
We also had to design our own music albums and whatnot. Pretty cool projects but I learned a lot about organizing things, fonts, consistency (especially in group projects, everyone has their own style but somehow we had to collab), color schemes, etc. and I guess in this year my eye for design REALLY began to change.

Future: Uh, well, I don't plan to become a webdesigner/graphic designer anymore. I am definitely not crossing this out as something I'd like to do in the future, considering all else fails. I guess I'm widening my options. Before I was all I AM GOING TO BE A GRAPHIC DESIGNER, FORRRRRREAL. I even was almost sure about majoring in the advertising field Now I'm considering to do other things as my future career. I've been jumping around with interests but I think they still are in the designing field. Like I was really into fashion design for the longest time. Drew my own things and stuff. But I'm not sure anymore. I'm just going with the flow now, see what I really love doing. I'm not even in college yet so I still have time to experiment


@ schizo LOL OMG. I remember those nick.com stuff. HAHAHAHA so nostalgic And holy f at being number one. I think you have a bright future, lmao.

[theerinkal]

what made you initially get into design?

I liked expressing my creativity in a 'complex' way. I started off at neopets but then I went into freewebs then to myspace and now I've got my own domain name(:

for those of you are pretty heavily into designing now, where do you plan to go with it? do you plan to pursue it in college(if you aren't already) or are you planning on doing something else?

I plan to get a bachelor's degree in college with some kind of website design.

if you're planning on doing something else professionally, do you think you'll still continue to do design in the future anyway?

I'm also planning on owning my own business on the side but becoming a teacher for most of my money and so I can keep the website up and running with some kinda income. $$

[brooklyneast05]

interesting reads for everyone. i'm amazed the age of most of you guys when you started lol. 11 years old, when i was 11 i had barely even used a computer and i'm only 21 now so it's amazing to me how fast stuff changed.

it also speaks to how crazy competitive the field of graphic design is going to be. it's already really competitive, but to think that when you guys get into college you will have already been doing it for years and years is crazy. i'm a design major and i always liked art, but never really cared or knew i was interested in it until i was like 18 or something. i don't know how i'm going to compete with people who have been doing this stuff since they were like 13 lol.

[lovescream]

Jc (lol is it alright that I call you that?), i'm curious, what do you do in your classes exactly? i'm really naive about actual careers and stuff. my only experience is contests that my school district has specifically for students but.. well, contests are naturally competitive. haha.

[brooklyneast05]

Jc (lol is it alright that I call you that?), i'm curious, what do you do in your classes exactly? i'm really naive about actual careers and stuff. my only experience is contests that my school district has specifically for students but.. well, contests are naturally competitive. haha.

lol yeah of course you can call me by my name.

well, i feel like i'm just now getting into "real" graphic design classes so i feel kinda naive myself. to take any kind of design courses, at my school at least, you have a bunch of general art prerequisites first. so i had to take 2d design, 3d design, drawing fundamentals before i could even get to the point of working with computers. as far as design courses that lean towards graphic design...

computer applications in art - this class was required but it was more about learning the programs than it was about doing actual design.

graphic design 1 - was pretty much just all projects where we had a "problem". the professor would present us with a scenario like a business needing branding and stuff done. then we'd have to put everything together, picking colors, fonts, designing logos, stationary, ect. my teacher for this though wasn't really a teacher, she was filling in for a teacher who was out for the semester, and she was usually a working graphic designer with her own business. so becuase of that we also go to learn more about the "real world" of graphic design and the business aspect of it.

advanced design - i'm in this now, and it's not limited to graphic design but we do a lot of that. it's a project based class too. it's really open though, like my professor will say "ok you're theme is opposition" and then we have create something that addresses that. using colors and just different design elements.

next semester i'm taking a web design class, and a typography class. i think those will be project based too. so i duno if that answers your question really about what the classes are like, if not then feel free to specify more. but in mine it's mostly just project, critique, project, critique. it's not a lot of sitting there listening to someone lecture or anything.

[Maccabee]

I thought it would be a good idea, for me to go to graphic design college but I got a little turned off when my multi millionare uncle told me not to get to stuck on computers cause I can't make that much money. Even though he was basically saying I cant become a millionare like that.

[rickysaurus]

I'm becoming a graphic designer, period. There's really nothing else I can see myself doing. I got started when I volunteered to do my badminton team's T-shirt design for the season. That was probably in January of 2008. I fiddled with Photoshop before but it was just playing with filters. Then I found Illustrator and fell in love with its flexibility. I've learned a crazy lot since then and I had a bunch of people at my school asking me to get graphics done for their sport and clubs and departments by like November of the same year. Around about August I started submitting stuff to Threadless and when I didn't get scores high enough to get printed, I played with the idea of starting my own clothing line, which I ALMOST got to fruition but then I realized how craptastic my skills still were and put that idea on the back burner.

My future is pretty much set. I'm going to be graphic designer/illustrator. Freelance or with a studio is still up in the air. I like working by myself sometimes but I also like working in groups sometimes too. Going to Cal State Long Beach as a pre-graphic design major but I'm going to transfer out to an actual art school a year or two in after.

[manny-the-dino]

What really sucked me into graphic design was when I become apart of the yearbook staff in my junior year of high school. We had to use InDesign for the templates/yearbook pages and Photoshop for photo editing. But before that I already had an account here on cB. I used it mainly for layouts and some graphics but never submitted anything. Anyways I took advantage that we had Photoshop at school so during my free time in yearbook class, I'd go on cB and look at the tutorials. I remember my best friend and I tried doing this tutorial but got stuck on the animation and saving part. But we eventually got it. Then I learned about cracks and torrents so I got Photoshop at home. That's when I started making my tutorials and graphics. Graphic design has never been a big thing for me because I'm not nearly as talented as some of you here so it's just a hobby for me. I love making things in my spare time. I don't think I ever abandon graphic design because it's taught me so many things and it's something I like to do.

[1angel3]

I started out drawing when I was young then I got burnt out and lost interest in drawing, so then I got in web design and from that I got into graphic design because I love art so much. I've been learning and practicing web and graphic design for 5 years now. I took a graphic design class in High School and now that I graduated, I plan on continuing studying graphic arts in college. I'm going to a community college to get my associates and then transferring to the Art Institute of Charlotte to finish and get my Bachelors in Graphic Design. So those are my future plans.

[synatribe]

Well I got started from myspace when I was like 14 I never had a Xanga and was foreign to the computer before 14. Then I thought customization was cool and I went everywhere looking for myspace layouts and I found this place, learned some cool tricks and I'm where Iam right now. Createblog is the first forum I joined, then I joined all these other web designing forums and now I'm sort of addicted :]

I dont plan to use my web designing as a main career, instead I want to take what I learned and apply it to my own business like an online shop or something like a sidejob :]

[schizo]

actually, it was that one you rejected I made for a 'request'. Oh god. haha. LMAO.

I remember that. I didn't know it was you, though. That was....really bad, haha.

I probably will end up doing something with graphic design in my future even though I don't really feel like I will right now. There isn't really anything else that I'm interested in. I think it's the fact that it's so competitive is what's turning me off. I'd hate to go into it and end up a failure when I know I could have done something else, you know? It doesn't help that people are assholes and act like I killed someone when I tell them I decided to get my required credits through fine arts classes instead of foreign language.

[karmakiller]

Haha, Mike, you have really improved.


I'm not big on design, but when I was 12 I would play around on the internet and I was fascinated by it. I got one of those free sites on Geocities and did the best I could coming up with stuff using programs online (which was terrible, because I had dial-up.) I don't remember exactly when I finally got an image program, but I had been asking for one for a long time. Then, I opened a site and actually got quite a few affiliates, but after a couple of years I just didn't want to do it anymore. Now I just create stuff when I'm bored. The cool part about my experience is that there were other personal sites that I was affiliates with and when I stopped my site a lot of the owners added me on Myspace, and we still keep in touch. None of us own a domain anymore and we're all in college.

[heyo-captain-jac...]

My history with Flash got me into regular graphic design. I don't really plan on going anywhere with it, I'm never satisfied with anything I make.

[synapse]

I got started doing myspace layouts, very simple stuff, using generators, and the what not. I found out that you could actually do your own layouts after reading a bit about CSS. So I learned to dissect code from a generator, changing properties, etc. I learned DIVS pretty much alone, at the time, there was no decent DIV tutorial for myspace websites. So it was pretty much what you had to do. I stopped designing due to lack of inspiration, and helped people code, that's when I was starting to be pretty active in the resource center/myspace help. I just started about a year ago, actually hard core designing/redesigning websites. I've enrolled in 12 community college credits for design related classes. Mostly beginner stuff, since they don't care that you taught yourself, it has to be on transcripts to skip the class. I'll probably get my associates in interactive design, and my bachelor's in biology, or related science. I'll probably make it a full-time thing until I get an internship for the science field. And afterwords a hobby.

[Tomates]

Well first off when i was really young i spent some of my time on thedollpalace and i noticed people got more into layouts and i had a friend who would edit her photos and i thought it was the coolest thing ever. So then i decided to get photoshop myself and try some of that stuff. Then after a while i wanted to learn how to make a layout and i made my first layout when i was in 9th grade. So i guess i started late in the game? Anywho i always was pretty artsy but my mom discouraged me from being an artist when i was older. So then my sophmore year i decided that i would try to major in graphic design when i head to college. Then my boyfriends brother found out and told me how he was doing graphic design and how he's had fun with it. So going to college in about a year and a half i've decided that i want to major in graphic design.

[AncientWhisper]

Although I didn't really submit layouts until just lately...

I started webdesigning around 2003. It was during sixth grade where one of my many friends said that I should create a xanga. So I did.

I made pretty much a lot of horrible layouts and I had to learn HTML/CSS all by myself... I made around ten before I decided to submit it into another site like createblog called blogring.net. I was never rejected before and supposedly my layouts were "good" but now that I think of it, it's horrible... very terrible. When I first discovered div layouts, it was in Blogring with this one designer whose name was Kevin. He was basically the person to inspire me. Then again, his layout was the FIRST DIV layout I ever saw. XD So it was just random luck. I have improved a lot over the years. Xanga became a drag and I was tired of people mimicking my layouts that I sorta left. :|

I stopped for two years and just made layouts for myself during those times. Then a few months ago, I decided to start contributing my layouts again but for Myspace since the audience is bigger. I have taken Web Designing class in High School but my skills were wayyyy ahead of everyone so I barely learned in that class. It was my "blow off" class.

I can make layouts for websites but I just choose not to. I also plan to proceed into Game designing/ conceptual artist/designer instead. That had been my "calling" since I was four. Hahaha XD

However, I also believe that I will still design layouts. It's a great hobby for me and I will most likely be able to make a part-time job out of it if I really wanted to.

Too bad I'm lazy. x[

[Simba]

Although I didn't really submit layouts until just lately...

I started webdesigning around 2003. It was during sixth grade where one of my many friends said that I should create a xanga. So I did.

I made pretty much a lot of horrible layouts and I had to learn HTML/CSS all by myself... I made around ten before I decided to submit it into another site like createblog called blogring.net. I was never rejected before and supposedly my layouts were "good" but now that I think of it, it's horrible... very terrible. When I first discovered div layouts, it was in Blogring with this one designer whose name was Kevin. He was basically the person to inspire me. Then again, his layout was the FIRST DIV layout I ever saw. XD So it was just random luck. I have improved a lot over the years. Xanga became a drag and I was tired of people mimicking my layouts that I sorta left. :|

I stopped for two years and just made layouts for myself during those times. Then a few months ago, I decided to start contributing my layouts again but for Myspace since the audience is bigger. I have taken Web Designing class in High School but my skills were wayyyy ahead of everyone so I barely learned in that class. It was my "blow off" class.

I can make layouts for websites but I just choose not to. I also plan to proceed into Game designing/ conceptual artist/designer instead. That had been my "calling" since I was four. Hahaha XD

However, I also believe that I will still design layouts. It's a great hobby for me and I will most likely be able to make a part-time job out of it if I really wanted to.

Too bad I'm lazy. x[

wtf you're still alive no wai

[AncientWhisper]

wtf you're still alive no wai

Yeah, I'm still alive. Just not active on Xanga and have kept myself in a low profile for a year or two. (Then again, anyone could have found me on Myspace)

x]