Why are most web designers not good at graphics? All you seem to see is just some what I'll call craps. Sorry if that hurts, but it's real. Is it that they just jumped into the industry, learnt HTML and of course some layouting, then into the industry? Could it be that graphics it not meant for them? Just wondering.

This thread will still span through other sections revolving these two group anyway.

well before i chip in my quota i would want you to change that heading to Web Design VS Graphic Design or  Web designer VS Graphic Designer

Is it that they just jumped into the industry, learnt HTML and of course some layouting, then into the industry? Could it be that graphics it not meant for them?

You just answered your own question.

I can't say if it's a Nigerian thing, but it probably is. I'm not saying there aren't bad designs out there, but some programmer decides to venture into web-design, feels (hopes) that his skill at programming will overshadow the fact that he doesn't know you shouldn't mix light green with a shouting shade of pink and refuses to get someone that is actually GOOD at design, because he's probably greedy or lazy or both.

Or more annoyingly, some random person ventures into it for business purposes and doesn't care which way it turns out one way or the other.

Online I see outstanding portfolios EVERY DAY from people that call themselves web designers. And none of that template foolishness. Obviously original and creative work. And yes, they are functional (for all you functionality enthusiasts). From people that were not necessarily graphic designers and otherwise. They take the pains to learn everything they need to know about turning a good design idea into a compliant site. Many of them are 2 or 3 man shows where one person designs & one develops/programs. These are people that are always looking for ways to make code look as good as possible with as few images as possible, and they do GOOD. They see it as a thing of pride that their works are simple but gorgeous.

It's different here though. And then the ones that are good with design, are totally rubbish with web development and create pages that are 80% images and 20% useful code. It's a bit frustrating really. I've seen too many emotional justifications of ugly sites on this board ("But it's functional!". I don't believe it's that hard. There are too many inspirational sites online for a web designer to say he's bad at design. It's all a matter of looking around, and gathering the knowledge necessary. You don't need to know how to paint like Picasso. Just the basics.  I think most of them are just lazy. They'd rather go for something ready made to tinker with. Or worse, their own opinion of what looks good.

IMHO.

they dont know that two the field goes together .I think that should be noted

Some thoughts:

1) First off, I would say design (graphic wise) starts as an art, and ends as an art. Some have the gift (inherent in them), while others have the calling (They might start off on shaky ground, but with effort/time refine themselves). So you can say most of them are still finding their feet. And given how everyone wants to make a quick killing in the industry, why would anyone spend more time learning design when a client is looking for creative services for as low as 10k?

2) Another thing one should consider is the starting-end point. It is more likely for someone, who started out as a graphic designer and ended as a web designer (converting to HTML) will always have a more appealing layout than someone who started with HTML/coding and then moves to a graphic program like Photoshop.

3) One man's meat, you know the rest. Be prepared (If it still happens) for people to dig into your portfolio, website, and come back with mud slings and evil grins.  

first off, Web Designs is 100% differents from graphic designs, 

Web Design = HTML+ CSS+Flash

Graphic Design = Print + media+Ad

You see have known yawa for sometime now  but she will never say she his a web designer despite the fact she knows what makes a good design

Design is all about creativity and all that,  you must pay attention with colours combination very very well if you not creativity inclined how do you know a good design ?  is not all about slicing and dicing   for some days now reading the CSS tutorials yawa sent  i concluded to be known as a Visual Person,  i like what Web Monkey said, some are just born creative

if i'm designing a web i go for CSS +XHTML + Flash (if necc.) and imagery to places neccessary  and if i'm working on print  i make sure i put in my creativity to work

A Competent Web Designer is someone who utilises full XHTML code and CSS styles all of which is hand coded too. However, a few graphics designers I know think they know all about creating web pages because they use Dreamweaver!  And a web page is more than just HTML code and graphics - its about accessibility and interoperability these days too.

A Web Designer who use images+ Flash and then uploads is not a Web Designer But a Graphic Director

Just because you have Dreamweaver on your PC doesn't make you a Web Designer, a graphic designer produce for print and web designer produce for web

alot of guys just call them selves web designer because you can slice up one photoshop images and add some functioning code and you upload don't make you one  after reading some CSS i got from  yawa and some other CSS article i had to change my Mindset thanks to yawa

But some peeps i know here now are Web Designers now  i can't mention names but atleast one of them has change his website to full CSS  and XHTML putting images where it suppose to be  not using image for a link  that can't work for me  anymore  i had to change my mindset  and if i'm producing any web raleted job   i'm purely going for CSS-XHTML-FLash and imagery at neccessary place but making it 90% CSS is even better.


I'm an “art director, with a company” what they were looking for was  just a contract Web-designer now the issue is this if they want to talk about web stuff,  they say " Hey we need some kind of image, image this image that" i told them see if you want me on contract on Web Stuff, you better take a graphic Director i can't start designing some graphics and at the same time still be on your web or better still if you want ART Director,  i can do that and you go look for a web man outside" at the end of the day i settle for Art Directing  now they got another person for ART Director and why i adjust to be the Web Architect

Now why all this,  i told them graphics designer aren't samething with Web Designer  i guess the word "Designing is really confusing you guys more" regardless of what medium I am currently working in. I think the distinctions being drawn between what type of designer you may be is good for defining a niche, but at what cost? what is really confusing people is the " Design " thing at the back   those peeps that program and design crap website are not website designers for goodness sake they are Programmers just because they have 20% knowlegde on FW, PS, DW don't make them graphic designer


Like a guy here humm,  he has an office his a good programmer but when i had to go see @ his office i saw some guys working on designs why he concetrates on the backend,  but all the same the companies out there calls them Web Design Company

Conclusion : If you are a Web Designer is your choice, and if you want to be Graphic Designer it is your choice too,  and also you want to be the both fine

Creative Design Agency aren't Web Design Agency

Creative Design Agency = Branding, Advert, all marketing material design, and web is included as a marketing thing

Web design Agency = Web Design + Development Only,  that saves the headache.

Sure web and graphics designs are different but they still converge in a way - the design. That a web designer is not into graphics design doesnt mean he shouldnt have the little knowledge of colors, layouts etc. Another issue with most naija web designers is the too much reliability on WYSIWYG apps - no, im not starting another critism about WYSIWYG apps here. Its just that he so called designers want the apps to design the site from scratch to finish.

I am personally a developer but that doesnt mean I can't do a simple color and layout work. IMHO, if you are into web designs, having an average graphics design ability/orientation is necessary. Developers are pardonable to this effect. They can always give out the design part while they take care of the backend.

Why are most web designers not good at graphics?

Short, sharp and simple "let's end this post here" answer:
Because they aren't designers but developers, programmers, coders or whatever you want to call it.  Check it up in a dictionary, on the wiki or wherever.

I have said it for as long as I have been on this forum and will continue to do so. WEB DEVELOPMENT IS NOT WEB DESIGN.

ehen thank God i Contributed, ya-wa just finished everything now, so thread closed

Let's quote Wikipedia shall we?

For typical commercial web sites, the basic aspects of design are:

    * The content: the substance, and information on the site should be relevant to the site and should target the area of the public that the website is concerned with.
    * The usability: the site should be user-friendly, with the interface and navigation simple and reliable.
    * The appearance: the graphics and text should include a single style that flows throughout, to show consistency. The style should be professional, appealing and relevant.
    * The visibility: the site must also be easy to find via most, if not all, major search engines and advertisement media.

So yes, creating a site, involves, design. Shock horror.

I agree with kehers. Perhaps Omnipotens did not phrase it well.Or perhaps I misunderstood his original question. But basically he asked why most web DESIGNS he sees have poor graphics. Maybe he should have said poor DESIGNS. Whatever your point may be. I don't know where this whole graphic designer term came in from. Web designers, DESIGN websites. They should KNOW how to design sites. They should know certain DESIGN elements like colours and basic typography. If you don't know how to design, then why call yourself web DESIGNER!?!?

@smartsoft.

are you trying to say that no creativity should be put into web design? if so, why? How does it end up becoming an aesthetically pleasing design if you think no creativity should be involved?

smartsoft:

ehen thank God i Contributed,  ya-wa just finished everything now,  so thread closed

perhaps, perhaps not. and please, try to get my screen name correctly, no additions. Okay?

@hanen: U type too fast. Compliment.

I'm happy you all pretty understand what I meant here. Kudos to you all. Keep contributing as there is someone here who even until now is still doubting having read the posts here. He is of the side that a web designer and a graphics designer is the same. The difference being that the graphics designer knows no code.

hanen, I believe the "graphics and text" part of your bolded statement has NOTHING to do with the actual XHTML code for instance, unless of course you want to call that text too. I see nothing there that refers to the actual code (XHTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP, etc)

Template? 
When you build your first page, typically the home page, and use that as the basis for other pages of your site, I believe that first page is a template for other pages.  So what is the problem with using a template.  Or do you mean boiler plate template?  I have covered this ad nauseum (sic):

https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-149270.0.html - check it out.

@yawa

I'm not getting into the tired template discussion again. You know what I mean when I say templates, or boiler, or whatever.

And you're right. The graphics and text aren't part of the code. They're PART OF THE DESIGN. The design of a WEB PAGE. The person that designs a WEB page is a WEB DESIGNER. To be honest, I'm not even totally sure what you're driving at. The point of this discussion was to find out WHY MANY WEB DESIGNS were crappy. All this webmaster vs web developer vs web whatever, to me, is sort of irrelevant.

I've already said my own bit. The web designer should have some knowledge of basic design and layouts and colours. Most of them don't. As they're either programmers or very uninformed, so they don't see the importance or the relevance.

This issue "web designer vs graphic designer" as @hanen mentioned about probably Nigerian thing.

For me, not only Nigerian thing, it does happen in the US and UK for the same argument "web designer vs graphic designer" for years and years since i took Visual Communications bachelor degree distance school---where professor teach us in online classroom for the same thing about this debate.

This is not new to me! It is everywhere in the Information age around the world.

I rest my case!

cooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooourt

hanen, come on. u r pretty smart, and you know what I am driving at. I was responding to your (off topic, I should add) quotation from the wiki. If you didn't intend to go off course, you shouldn't have opened that window.

The graphics and text aren't part of the code. They're PART OF THE DESIGN. The design of a WEB PAGE. The person that designs a WEB page is a WEB DESIGNER.

My point exactly. You can design a web page in photoshop and upload it to the server as a jpg or gif or whatever file (I still see some people doing this unfortunately) as opposed to "slicing and dicing" the said graphics file, which is where "development" comes in.

@smart
I will join you in saying, "coooooouuuurt". LOL, pretty funny.

Yawa, you invited us to 'define it in wikipedia'. And I was still defining the design. Last I checked, design was part of the topic. But what do I know.

Did i miss any part? Where did d template talks hopped in?
@yawa
Are u saying slicing nd dicing is developement nd not design?

kehers, not exactly.

what I am saying is, when u take a graphic file, you have to slice and and dice it to get the pieces you want, then u use XHTML to lay these pieces out on a page along with text, use CSS to present the content and JavaScript to determine behaviour (if I click this button or image, this happens, etc).

Did I clear up things?

@smartsoft:

Web Design = HTML+ CSS+Flash
Graphic Design = Print + media+Ad

WTH? You mean you can create compelling FLASH content without
knowing the basics of what you term 'graphic design' ?
The lines have been blurred and it is only in Nigeria's archaic University curriculum
that you'll see this kinda argument,

@yawa: you nailed it with your first comment, why bother?
In my humble opinion, web developers and programmers can learn how to be
good designers, you just gotta take a cue. As per colour and stuff, there are wonderful resources
like www.coluorlovers.com etc.


Gotta bounce for now,

@olushola what i mean is, you must be graphically sound  to be a designer itself if you aren't  sound you will be the one dumping colours anyhow  take for instance you work up this morning and you have shirt and trouser  to wear your belt can't be brown why your shoe is black  your brown belt and and brown nice shoe can go well  right or wrong ?

It is pretty nice to understand that this also goes out to other countries and not just peculiar to Nigeria. One thing is understanding that the two are not the same thing and another is dropping one for the other or learning the curves around the two and utilizing them well. No need making one good and abusing the other.

I really noticed something here. When issues pertaining to a particular field is discussed, some members shy away so as not to be known to belong to that group. Taking this thread as a case study, even the web designers in here are all at large, leaving the programmers to speak for them. One thing or will I call it a culture we should try and inculcate is, be proud of where you are and stay tight there. Defend it and you'll be adding more "plus" to the context of your personality and career.

Cheers!

This is an interesting Post, Yawa am glad you here to smooth things out. He said all no need to contribute. But I can testify, I migrated from Graphic Designer to Web Designer to a Developer, this occurred in a span of 10 years working underground. Its shares a common trend.

But its hard to reverse from Developer to Web Design, such one might not produce the same stuff like a Designer. I take my leave.

Lets do a little recall to our JSS1 days when we were introduced to bussiness studies. You probably learnt a little about the difference between a large office and a small office.
One key difference is the issue of specialization. When you are running a small web development outfit with (sometimes) just a staff or two, you will be at a disadvantage if you begin to segrgate tasks inthe manner that large companies with specialist ought to. In small firms you will probably play a swiss-army-knife kind of role where you are the designer, programmer, graphic artist, marketer etc. In a larger company they will value more specilised roles. In the graphic department alone you could have a graphic director, one ore more sketchers, photographers, modellers and so on. Something similar will apply to the programming department.

As a small operator you have to be above average in as many things as possible since this will save you cost on the long run. In larger companies you can afford to segregate tasks for efficiency and thats when you probably need to make distinctions between web designer and graphic artist.

When it comes to it, in my small firm I am the pitcher, marketer, graphic designer, computer programmer, video editor, animator/modeler, accounts officer, logistics director, Janitor, creative director, sound engineer, and on some realy dry months I am the friggin client!!!

and on some realy dry months I am the friggin client!!!

How is that? LOL. You just made my day tomX

you just made my day tomx

Well, at least I get to design my own website and softwares so that makes me my own client.

@@tomX
Well, good for you.