Are all of you coders or artists?

[Dane D.]

Having posted some questions about web design, I have noticed most responses are from peps who are coders. Is there anybody that has been trained in graphic arts or makes a living in graphics arts? I don't have the time or the desire to learn code. To me, coding is left to the non-creative types. My background is in print media (product labels, cartons, brochures, technical sheets, etc). Having produced a web site for a local school (www.ecsv.org) I find the whole process tedious and frustrating. In print media, we can layout are designs, set type, and refine the design easliy. In web production the process becomes a mess. Example, I have a up-date to do on a website and have to re-do the entire page, have 3 pages to up-date. In print, this wouldn't happen, all I would have to do is move some graphic elements and set the type and it is done. Not with websites, I now have to hire somebody to do the three pages, grrrr. Seems to me, website production is better left to coders who can follow a layout and can fix said pages when needed. Just some rants from a print media artist.

 

[jsw]

I'm not sure why it is that you assume someone can be either an artist or a coder. I know many who are both - and good in each area.

I wouldn't call someone who paints fences an artist - at least not in that job. I wouldn't call someone who does hack work a code artist. But there are coders whose work is far more creative than you'd think - just as there are a lot of very formulaic "artists". Software programming is a creative endeavor at all but the lowest, simplest levels. And, as mentioned, there are artists (visual arts) who also write some mean apps.

Anyway, if you need to hire someone to update 3 pages, odds are that you've got the wrong software.

 

[Cooknn]

Having posted some questions about web design, I have noticed most responses are from peps who are coders. Is there anybody that has been trained in graphic arts or makes a living in graphics arts? I don't have the time or the desire to learn code. To me, coding is left to the non-creative types.

Heh, I believe the coders are more creative than you give them credit for I design print media and have done a few websites in my day as well. Some of the best stuff on my websites have been done by the coders - that I hired. But not for basic layout stuff. You should look into Adobe Creative Suite, and take a look at Total Training's Design to Delivery by Steve Holmes. This Creative Suite Premium Bundle will enable you to fully utilize the ultimate tool for creative and print professionals, offering a complete design and publishing solution for both print and the Web.

 

[Blue Velvet]

What is so creative about a product label?

 

[Mr. Anderson]

I'm actually both

Although my schooling isn't in Graphic Design, it was Computer Science - my emphasis was on coding 3D graphics. And I've had plenty of design courses as well. But that was all years ago. Now I'm mainly doing animation and design and my coding background helps with Action Script and other such things.

D

 

[gamestriker]

I'm a coder, though I also have good enough skills as an artist to get by.

 

[Dane D.]

Just find the whole web production process maddening. When I use Photoshop, Illustrator and QuarkXPress, the elements can do anything you what. They can be placed anywhere, you have total control over type and fonts. With the web design process, you are restricted too much. For me, designing a site is O.K., it is the process that bugs me. I don't like the fact that a site has to work in IE, because it is the 800 lb gorrilla. Then the issue of web standards I get reading about. With my work in print as long as it is produced on Mac and in the aforementioned apps, I can get it printed (on a 4/c press) with no problems. As long as you send along all fonts and artwork. My initial question was not to stir up emotions but to get a feel for what is needed in web design process. Am I right or wrong in that producing websites calls for knowledge of coding? Because there is no coding for printed matter. To me it is a language that does not come easy to me since I have no formal training in it. As for the response to the person who said "What is so creative about a product label?" Sit down with a client who wants a carton or package label and see what is needed ie. the message of the product, the photos, the copy, the little things like addresses, upcs, logos, etc. then tell me about creative.

 

[mkrishnan]

To me, coding is left to the non-creative types.

And...you expect hugs and support for a comment like this!?

Perhaps you should try to appreciate coding from the perspective of a person who is into it. I mean not just what you think their perspective is, but what it actually is. Start with the assumption that people who code aren't coders purely or necessarily because they have no creative skills. That's an offensive and ridiculous assumption. Something that stems from what they're good at, what they love, and what makes their eyes light up must have gotten them into what they do. Perhaps not for all of them, but for many of them.

If you are able to see that, and to grasp the zen of coding, then you're probably going to interact much better with them. And you might find that while they appreciate what you do, they don't operate from the perspective that you're an exalted person who is blessed with creativity and they are lowly worker bees.

I'm neither, for what it's worth. I'm in psychology.

But I used to be in engineering, and this same kind of thing happened on both sides of the CAD designer / engineer fence. The designers thought that the engineers were paper-pushers, and the engineers thought the designers were drafters, and both assumptions are preposterous.

 

[angelneo]

Just find the whole web production process maddening. When I use Photoshop, Illustrator and QuarkXPress, the elements can do anything you what. They can be placed anywhere, you have total control over type and fonts. With the web design process, you are restricted too much. For me, designing a site is O.K., it is the process that bugs me. I don't like the fact that a site has to work in IE, because it is the 800 lb gorrilla. Then the issue of web standards I get reading about. With my work in print as long as it is produced on Mac and in the aforementioned apps, I can get it printed (on a 4/c press) with no problems. As long as you send along all fonts and artwork. My initial question was not to stir up emotions but to get a feel for what is needed in web design process. Am I right or wrong in that producing websites calls for knowledge of coding? Because there is no coding for printed matter. To me it is a language that does not come easy to me since I have no formal training in it. As for the response to the person who said "What is so creative about a product label?" Sit down with a client who wants a carton or package label and see what is needed ie. the message of the product, the photos, the copy, the little things like addresses, upcs, logos, etc. then tell me about creative.

I don't think you need too much of programming skills for designing on the web. Although you have to understand how the web works and interact with your designs, also how design on the web is somewhat different from designing on print. It would be an advantage if you have a basic of the coding skills needed.

On another note, I feel that programming can be an art as well. how to write your code in an elegant manner so that it can be twisted and changed for different purposes. How to achieve your desired effect with the codes you written. Any mistakes can render the code useless and leave the creator puzzled by the output. Millions and millions of codes weaved and interwined to form the image that you are looking at now.

Btw, Blue Velvet is very much into designing...

 

[Blue Velvet]

As for the response to the person who said "What is so creative about a product label?" Sit down with a client who wants a carton or package label and see what is needed ie. the message of the product, the photos, the copy, the little things like addresses, upcs, logos, etc. then tell me about creative.

I'm a print designer with over 20 years experience in the industry. I just found your manner condescending and naive.

 

[RacerX]

I think a lot of this has to do with the fact that the web is a different medium than print. When teaching graphic designers (coming from a print back ground) how to do web pages, the first thing I do is tell them that web design is like page layout on rubber paper. The one thing they seem most attached to from designing for print is that they can fix the page size. In wed design you can't so you have to build in the ability for elements to reflow depending on how big someone's browser is displayed at.

Personally, I often design for browsers set at about 800 pixels wide and then make some elements reflow or stretch for larger windows so that the viewer thinks I designed with them in mind.

There are a lot of trade offs, and each medium has it's strengths and weaknesses. For example, I was struggling with how to put instructional pages together for Rhapsody in a standard page layout format to make a PDF book. When I decided to go with a web site instead of a PDF format, I was able to just make every section a page where I didn't really care how long the page ran. I didn't worry about organizing things to try to get images near text on a page, I just dropped images in where they were needed as I only had one page.

On the other hand, I do a web site for a local sports magazine in which I get a lot of content as the PDFs that were sent to press and I'm needed to convert these to a web format. I try to retain the spirit of the original graphic design... while designing it for the web. The pages don't look exactly the same (between the printed version and the web version) but the look and feel of the articles is preserved.

I don't think this has anything to do with being a coder or a graphic artist. I've seen coder's sites that were just as bad as print designer's at being flexible. It has everything to do with wrapping your mind around the medium you are working with and playing to the strengths of that medium.

 

[ham_man]

I am a coder primarily, I guess, but that doesn't mean that I could not be an "artist". In fact, I know one guy who is the best coder and the best graphic artist I have met. YOu can be both, you know...

 

[dornoforpyros]

ugg I am so sick of pretenses "artist" or "designer" types acting like the coding side is for for uncreative types and using their "designer" tag as an excuse for doing bad HTML/CSS.

The fact is I do BOTH and I do both very well. I hate being in interviews and their like "are you a designer or a coder" like I'm a web designer, they go hand and hand. If you can't code valid HTML that's cross browser compliant than please, leave Web design alone, go back to your print pamphlets and let some one who know's what their doing get involved.

Hey Look I can code
And I can also design

</rant>

sorry I've just spent alot of hours fixing up "designers" HTML

 

[Blue Velvet]

It has everything to do with wrapping your mind around the medium you are working with and playing to the strengths of that medium.

Exactly. The harnessing and expression of creativity is not limited to one particular discipline of design and production.

Working successfuly in print design also requires a certain amount of technical knowledge.

There's no need to put a metaphorical beret on and start getting precious about being an artist.

 

[feakbeak]

To me, coding is left to the non-creative types.

Just to throw my two cents in. While I think your comment about coders not being creative is bulls#!t, I can understand where you are coming from. It is not like traditional art such as painting, scultping, music, etc. To me, those arts appeal to the emotional aspect of humanity.

I believe that elegant and effient coding is very creative. Efficiently and elegantly solving a problem in ways few others could is creative. Just like an elegant proof in mathematics or a revolutionary concept within science. These are creative art forms too, they just happen to appeal to our intellect more than our emotions, although they do appeal to our emotions as well.

I am a programmer and that is how I make a living. I also enjoy mathematics and science. I'll be honest, I am not very creative with the traditional arts. I have a high appreciation for it - I'm just not very good at it. Just my genetics, I guess.

Your view of creativity and art seems to be very narrow. Aren't "creative" people supposed to be open-minded? (I'm just poking you, no offense)

I'll finish my post with this quote:

"The mathematician's best work is art, a high perfect art, as daring as the most secret dreams of imagination, clear and limpid. Mathematical genius and artistic genius touch one another."
- Gosta Mittag-Leffler

 

[crap freakboy]

Exactly. The harnessing and expression of creativity is not limited to one particular discipline of design and production.

Working successfuly in print design also requires a certain amount of technical knowledge.

There's no need to put a metaphorical beret on and start getting precious about being an artist.

Well Ms.Blue Velvet sums it up nicely there.

 

[dornoforpyros]

just to lighten the mood a bit:

 

[cube]

Programming artists appreciate the beauty of Lisp.

 

[Dane D.]

Opened a can of worms

Boy opened a can of worms on this question. To me the whole thing with the website process is much more work than print; testing on various browsers, checking code and the hoping it works once uploaded. From all the responses I see, it seems the best approach would be to layout the pages and turn them over to somebody that actually likes to put them together. I'll just have to find good people who can do what I want and leave it to them to produce. Final note on writing code, I don't like it. Reminds me of my early days in college when I had to take FORTRAN; I knew than that it was not for me. Eventually dropped the course. The whole writing computer language thing is not for me.

 

[dornoforpyros]

it seems the best approach would be to layout the pages and turn them over to somebody that actually likes to put them together. I'll just have to find good people who can do what I want and leave it to them to produce.

it seems to me you would be better off not doing web sites at all

the bottom line here is print design and web design are very different animals. You really need to have a good knowledge of the differences to do both. Personally some of the worse websites I come across are done by print designers playing web designer. A magazine page or a poster is ALOT different than an interactive UI.

just to clarify this comment, why would you hire 2 ppl (1 designer 1 coder) to do a job that 1 person can do? "leaving the HTML go some one one who likes it" seems like a cop out to me.

 

[Cooknn]

Boy opened a can of worms on this question.

I think if you would have phrased your question a little differently you would have received more favorable responses. People skills. Gotta get up from that desk every now and then and interact. Trust me - I'm in process on that one too

[EDIT] Just checked out your site. I think by publishing all the faculty e-mail addresses you're opening up your clients to the wonderful world of spam. You might want to revisit that page.

 

[RacerX]

"The mathematician's best work is art, a high perfect art, as daring as the most secret dreams of imagination, clear and limpid. Mathematical genius and artistic genius touch one another."
- Gosta Mittag-Leffler

Well I've always thought of my mathematics (differential geometry and topology) as a form of art. And it often helps to have some artistic ability to express what you have in mind. Like this image I drew for my wife of the real projective plane or this series of images (also of the real projective plane).

I've never believed that any of this stuff is mutually exclusive. Being able to do one thing doesn't exclude you from doing anything else.

 

[Dane D.]

Thank you all

"the bottom line here is print design and web design are very different animals. You really need to have a good knowledge of the differences to do both. Personally some of the worse websites I come across are done by print designers playing web designer. A magazine page or a poster is ALOT different than an interactive UI.
"

Thanks for the comments much appreciated. I should of re-phased the initial question to something like:

If designing websites does one need a good understanding of html, CSS, Flash and the differences in browsers?

That website I mentioned was the first website I had ever done. The school insisted that the email addresses be included, even after tring to talk them out it. I used Adobe GoLive to put it together because I have no knowledge of html,CSS or Flash. I had no help building that site and found the process to be frustrating. People are correct in that website design is DIFFERENT then print, much different IMO. Also try working for bosses that are 60+ years old, they demand total control over everything. They can't stand the fact that the medium is fluid and will be slightly different in the various browsers and OS's. Concerning my comment about hiring someone to revise 3 pages on another site, our company designed it but didn't produce it. Now the client wants changes and we don't know how.

Personally when I look at the code of websites, it means nothing to me, just a bunch of words. I can appreciate the knowledge of coding but learning it is another story.

 

[decksnap]

it seems to me you would be better off not doing web sites at all

the bottom line here is print design and web design are very different animals. You really need to have a good knowledge of the differences to do both. Personally some of the worse websites I come across are done by print designers playing web designer. A magazine page or a poster is ALOT different than an interactive UI.

just to clarify this comment, why would you hire 2 ppl (1 designer 1 coder) to do a job that 1 person can do? "leaving the HTML go some one one who likes it" seems like a cop out to me.

There is some validity in what he is saying, but also in yours. I am both a print designer and web designer myself, and the 'playing web designer' comment is a little brash IMO. Anyway, there ARE cases where splitting up the work to play to your strengths does make a lot of sense. I know html, but when I do a dynamic site for instance, I pass off my resources to the ASP guy to set that up in the end.

 

[dornoforpyros]

and the 'playing web designer' comment is a little brash IMO.

I apologies than. That wasn't meant as a direct attack on print designers it just seems I come across alot of print designers who don't have any real knowledge of web or even designing for screen over print. Thus I've spent hours/days fixing up horrible code and websites done by some one who should have just stuck with magazines.