Mike Jones - Graphic Design

TECH CAREERS:

Mike Jones

2012 TSTC Publishing

ISBN 978-1-934302-90-3 (softback)
ISBN 978-1-936603-12-1 (ebook)

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or any portion thereof in any form. Requests for such permissions should be addressed to:

TSTC Publishing
Texas State Technical College Waco
3801 Campus Drive
Waco, Texas 76705
http://publishing.tstc.edu/

Publisher: Mark Long
Editor: Ana Wraight
Art director: Stacie Buterbaugh
Graphics specialist: Grace Arsiagta
Marketing: Sheila Boggess
Sales: Wes Lowe
Office coordinator: Melanie Peterson
Indexing: Michelle Graye (indexing@yahoo.com)
Printing production: Data Reproductions

Manufactured in the United States of America

First edition

Publishers Cataloging-in-Publication
(Provided by Quality Books, Inc.)

Jones, Michael, 1946 Dec. 20

Graphic design / Michael Jones. -- 1st ed.
p. cm. -- (TechCareers)
Includes index.
ISBN-13: 978-1-934302-90-3 (softback)
ISBN-10: 1-934302-90-2 (softback)
ISBN-13: 978-1-936603-12-1 (ebook)
ISBN-10: 1-936603-12-8 (ebook)

1. Graphic arts--Vocational guidance. 2. Commercial arts--Vocational guidance. I. Title. II. Series: TechCareers.

NC1001.J66 2012 741.6023

QBI11-600198

Just about everyone is connected these days. Everywhere we look, we see people using their cellphones or working at wireless laptops. How many times a day do we access the Internet for information and entertainment like recipes, music tracks, and rock band tour schedules or to contact friends via social networking websites like Facebook, Twitter, or MySpace?

The more this personal digital evolution expands, the more it works its way into virtually every moment of our lives, and the more it will also expand your exposure to advertisements, pop-up graphics, text boxes, and Flash animations. You may not be aware that every bit of advertising you see was crafted by a team of marketing professionals (sometimes even by just one hardworking, talented individual) with the sole objective of grabbing your attention long enough to get their message through to your busy brain. Since so much of the information you see consists of a cool photo, a lively animation, an interesting text font, or a thought-provoking illustration, chances are youre responding to the work of a graphic designer.

Graphic designers often begin their journeys with a lifelong fascination with color, drawing, photography, storytelling, or the way certain things or music call up an unexpected emotion or memory. As they settle into their careers, they work with writers, videographers, and clients to create advertising and marketing materials. They may work alone in a small community or with a huge, big city advertising agency, fielding several teams and coordinating to produce everything from kiddie meal prizes to billboards, product jingles for TV commercials to glossy symphony concert programs, unforgettable corporate logos to elegant, 400-page annual reports. A single designer may be tasked with a single drawing or with planning and directing the whole design process, from coming up with a fresh concept for achieving the clients marketing objectives through creating thematically related messages for TV, product packaging, promotional materials, and apparel featuring the clients unforgettable logo.

Profile: Michael Albee, Freelance Graphic Designer

Michael Albee, an accomplished freelance multimedia designer, illustrator, and graphic artist based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, likes to say, I make things pretty.

Albees initial studies in Visual and Speech Communication at Stephen F. Austin State University led him into the world of professional design. After graduating, he moved from Nacogdoches, Texas, to Dallas, where he began his career with famed department and catalog retailer Neiman Marcus. He gained not only theoretical knowledge in this position but also practical application of design theory at the same time. The constant challenge to come up with something new and exciting, to promote something as complex as high-end fashion, made me dig even deeper into my work, he says. He soon was promoted to the position of Design Coordinator for Corporate Visual Planning and Presentation and tasked with designing and producing seasonal promotions, in-store visual displays, signage, and window displays for all of Neiman Marcus thirty-six stores. He also received practical experience with duties such as locating source materials, finding vendors, negotiating discounts and budgets, and managing a seasonal budget.