The term Web Designer is quite possibly one of the more over-used & misunderstood labels within the IT market. In reality, web-design does consist of several distinct aspects, and so it may well help to clarify things a little if we go through each one. Essentially, there are 2 key sides to web design; the 'creative' element & the 'technical' side. To the average man or women on the street, a 'web-designer' is somebody that designs the look and 'feel' of a web-site. Which means a web designer is fundamentally an artist who has had some technical training. Having said that, a modern web designer will in actual fact be as involved with the technical element of things as much as the creative element. We can illustrate this with greater clarity if we separate web design down in to its various parts.

Individuals who design & put together the images & graphic-icons to go on a website are known as graphic-artists. They most frequently make this happen by utilising graphic lay-out and 'animation' software (like Adobe 'Flash' and Photoshop), & aren't really web-designers as such. Normally, they'll have come from an art background, & may possibly have studied at university level. This particular aspect is a lot more about creative ability than anything else.

Second of all, we have the web designers, that work with design environments such as Dreamweaver to produce the layout & 'feel' of the webpage. They employ the visuals that are supplied by the artist, & talk with their client to start to create the feel and navigational framework of the web site. A novice web-designer tends to start with the 'form' of the web-site, instead of the 'function'. Yet, to actually produce a useful web-site, you need to start with a clear understanding of what you need the site to really do. Is it principally an e-commerce web site, which really needs to be ready to take payments securely, or is it a web-based product brochure listing? Or potentially it will consist of lots of video & graphics. On the other hand it could be principally an information web site, where it is necessary to supply simple access to specific web-pages of text. Whatever the customer needs from a site, the essential necessity is that it actually fulfils the basic specification. Consumers will abandon a web-site and not return if it's too tricky to navigate - however attractive it looks on the surface. The purpose of any good web-designer is first and foremost to construct an experience that visitors enjoy & feel happy with - so that they return again.

The Adobe Creative Suite is regarded as the most commercially popular design-environment employed by web-site designers today. These key tools are currently ('10) on Version 4. 'Dreamweaver' is the software that builds web sites, with Flash delivering access to interactive & animated 'graphical' content. Dreamweaver might be looked at as a glorified Word Processor in many ways. Text and graphics can be layed (according to certain limits) and then a basic interactivity can be created through page-linking. 'Dreamweaver' (as with any web design environment) produces 'HTML' (HyperText Markup Language) program code behind the scenes. Basically, this 'language of web-browsers is a script which draws and controls the web page being viewed. Together with HTML are the layout 'tag' languages - for instance XML and CSS. As these tag languages are standardised, the smoother & rather more efficient results perform successfully on many different platforms. The theory is that the page will appear exactly the same on any browser, whether it's 'Mozilla Firefox', 'Internet Explorer', 'Safari', Opera or whichever. Subsequently the graphic-blocks you're laying and the text you are putting in is being turned into coding behind the scenes by 'Dreamweaver'. Its very important to gain a thorough understanding of these languages to be able to be a web-designer at the commercial standard.

The most technically apt internet experts are often the web-developers. These people will not only understand 'HTML', 'CSS' & 'XML', but they will have trained in 'proper' programming-languages like PHP, ASP.net, VB, 'C#', 'Java' etc. They'll generally also have got a solid understanding of 'SQL' Database technology, as this is one way the majority of big web sites store their data. In reality, it's un-likely that a big E-commerce web site has been created in lay-out form by a crew of web-designers. Instead, a place holder template will have been built, & the details will be dynamically fed from a database. This makes not only the construction, management and enhancements vastly more efficient, it equally makes for a far more consistent web site.

Many of these functions can & do crossover obviously, we are involved with various independent web designers who each can handle a lot of the above jobs. You will need time however to create such a range of professional skill-sets. You have to be trained in several things on a professionally feasible web-design training package: First, an introduction to basic web design, followed by teaching in Adobe Dreamweaver & an understanding of the main components of Adobe Flash. This would then move onto a knowledge of 'HTML' & 'CSS', and then vital insights within the area of e-commerce. 'PHP' must be taught so that dynamic web sites can be built (ASP.NET is much more involved, & 'PHP' is more straightforward to get into initially,) and a basic understanding of Databases and SEO should be achieved. The main reason you require each of these aspects is they will give you the technical ability to work on a range of website builds. Similar to when you were taking driving lessons, you must first acquire the physical skillsets, before you can essentially progress past them and gain a degree of finesse. Most trainees can get through a versatile program like this within a yr - based upon part time study and practice of approximately 400-500 hrs. Careful preparation to get the best training program for you is a great investment of your time - skilled career advisors will help you to sort the best route for you before you decide to start.

Commercial web-site designers can also up-grade their offering if they branch out into areas like project-management and e-commerce for example. 'SEO' (Search Engine Optimisation) know-how is extremely valuable for web experts - this concerns the skill of getting internet sites to or near the top of the Search Engines for frequently used search terms. And whilst they typically originate from a network-administration background, we should remember the valuable work of the web server administrators & installers, who keep the whole thing working behind the scenes.

It's important to appreciate that even the finest web design courses can only teach you the methods and processes - not one will be able to turn you in to a professional web-designer. Put together as many sites as you possibly can as you go through your course - the process will be invaluable and you will have a portfolio to show what you can do. Build sites about your hobby, your pet, your favourite music group or Television show. Create an inter-active web site, & start generating 'traffic' towards it. Everything you do will add to your CV, & prove more to a company than an 'Adobe' accreditation.

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