The term Web-Designer is quite possibly one of the most over used & misinterpreted labels within the IT sector. Web-Design incorporates several diverse facets, and an understanding of these facets can help anyone considering getting in to the market. Basically, there are two key sides to web design; the 'creative' element and the 'technical' process. Many people believe a 'web designer' is somebody that is responsible for the visible aspects of the web-site. Many individuals might consider a 'web-designer' a kind of 'artist'. But in fact, in modern-day web-design it's becoming more and more difficult to separate the technical part from the creative element, because both of them are so intertwined. It will become a bit more apparent just how things fit together when we break the work up in to it's different roles.

Graphic artists should come 1st - they design and assemble the icons and pictures for a web page. They most often make this happen by utilising graphic lay-out & animation software (such as Adobe Flash & 'Photoshop'), and aren't strictly web designers per-se. Most graphic-artists attended university or college, with a background in art and design. This part is a lot more about a creative artistic expertise than anything else.

Secondly, there are the site designers, who use design-environments like Adobe 'Dreamweaver' to set-up the lay-out and 'feel' of the webpage. They take on the work completed by the graphic artist, and in conjunction with their client produce an initial style & navigational framework for the brand new webpage. An amateur web designer often starts with the 'form' of a website, instead of the 'function'. And yet, to truly develop a valuable website, it's important to start with an understanding of what you need the website to really do. Is it primarily an E-commerce website, which requires to have the facility receive payments securely, or is it a web based product brochure listing? Or perhaps it will have a lot of video & graphics. Then again it might be principally an informational web site, where it's essential to supply straightforward access to specific web-pages of textual content. Basically the web-site must be able to meet it's requirements - whatever those needs are. Such a lot of sites look fantastic but they are a headache to navigate & find what you need - and so users move on and never return. The aim of any reputable web-designer is to first & foremost construct an event that people enjoy and feel comfortable with - so that they return again.

The most important tools utilised by web-site designers are their design environments, with 'Adobe Creative Suite' (now in version 4 as of 2009/2010) being essentially the most popular commercially. The software which builds web-sites is Adobe Dreamweaver, & Adobe Flash accesses graphical content which can be animated & interactive. You could actually say that 'Dreamweaver' is the Word-Processor of the Adobe CS range. Text & graphics can be layed (within known limits) and then a basic interactivity can be produced via page-linking. HTML (Hyper Text Mark-up Language) program-coding is created behind the scenes with 'Dreamweaver', just like any other web design-environment. HTML is a script which in essence draws & controls the web-page on your screen. It is the language of browsers. Paired with HTML are the lay-out tag 'languages' like XML and CSS. These enable more stream-lined HTML code & more efficient lay-out methods, that will work on multiple-platforms (as they're standardised). And so which-ever web-browser someone uses, (Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, 'Opera' or anything else.) the web-page will (hopefully) look the same. Consequently the graphic blocks you're laying & the text you are including is being turned into code behind the scenes by 'Dreamweaver'. A comprehensive understanding of these languages is very important if you're going to be a commercially viable web-designer.

The most technically-trained internet experts are often the web developers. Not only will web-developers know the languages mentioned above, they will also have studied additional languages, such as 'C#', 'VB', PHP, Java, ASP.net and so on. A large number also have got an effective understanding of SQL, the database language - because the information on many sizable modern web sites is stored in this particular 'language'. A typical e-commerce web site does not have a group of web-site designers who've produced it's countless web pages in layout format. Rather, a place holder 'template' will have been built, and the material will be dynamically fed from a database. Apart from being vastly easier to construct, manage and up-date, it also aids in the feel of the site remaining consistent.

Many of these functions can & do crossover needless to say, we are involved with various independent website designers who all can handle almost all of the previously mentioned functions. But, it takes quite some time to develop that level of knowledge. An ideal professional web design training program therefore needs to instruct on a number of things: A basic introduction to web design, and then how to utilise Adobe 'Dreamweaver' and have a basic understanding of Adobe 'Flash'. The languages of HTML and 'CSS' need to be taught next, with some E-commerce instruction provided here. 'PHP' really should be covered so that dynamic web-sites can be constructed (ASP.NET is far more involved, & 'PHP' is easier to get into initially,) & a simple idea of databases & SEO should be mastered. Grasping these competencies will provide you with a chance to start working on a very good cross section of web sites. Much like learning to drive, you must first obtain the physical skillsets, before you ultimately progress beyond them & gain an element of 'finesse'. You would have to allow something like 400-500 hours to study and competently master a wide ranging training-program of this nature - so if your plan is to accomplish this along-side employment it could be completed within 1 year. Detailed preparation to obtain the correct training package for your needs is a good investment of your time - experienced career experts will help you sort the wheat from the chaff before you get started.

The most important point to stress is the fact that training itself will not make you a web designer; it will simply coach you on the methods. As you work on your training course, make an effort to create & develop a good range of your own web-sites to create a portfolio of your work. Build sites about your favourite hobby, your family, a favourite music group or TV programme. You might even build interactive web sites & get traffic on them. Every little thing you do will enhance your CV, and prove much more to an interviewer than an Adobe certificate.

Extra skill-sets which are very useful to professional web-designers are a knowledge of project management and E-commerce. SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) expertise is extremely useful for web experts - this concerns the skill of getting websites to or near to the top of the Search Engines like Google for commonly used search terms. And whilst they typically originate from a network-administration background, we should remember the valuable role of the web server installers and administrators, who keep everything working behind the scenes.

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