Designer - Interactive Media
The role of the Designer,1 is to create the 'look and feel' of an interactive media product. What this actually involves can vary, depending on the size of team the Designer is part of, or the type of company they are working for.
The role often overlaps with Information Architect2 and Producer3, especially in more senior positions, or where the Designer is working alone or in a very small team.
The Designer must combine creativity with an awareness of the tools and technologies that will be used to build the product, and an understanding of what these can and cannot do.
The role sometimes also overlaps, or may even be merged with, that of Developer4 , especially in smaller companies or teams.
Designers may be employed in permanent positions within a company, or may work on a freelance basis. Amongst freelancers, there tends to be most demand for those who are both good designers and have technical expertise, or who can combine several roles.
What is the job?
The Designer produces visuals of user interfaces, using software such as Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator. They usually follow a design brief that may be given as verbal instructions, a written specification or 'wire–frame' diagrams.
The Designer will normally produce a separate visual for each type of screen within the product – for example, different sections of a CD–Rom, or the home page, first–level and lower–level pages of a web site.
As a minimum, these visuals must show the screens' layout, colour scheme, typography and any conventions for presenting images or other assets. However, they usually also specify – either through annotations or additional visuals – how interface elements should respond to interaction by the product's user.
For example, this might include specifying colour or style changes for hypertext links that are clicked or rolled over, or designing animated buttons or menus. Depending on the type of product being created, the Designer may also need to specify how, where and what sound effects or background music should be used.
Designers must prepare designs in a way that allows them to be easily implemented by Developers. This means designs must be appropriate for their intended purpose and visuals must be provided in the right format and at the correct size and resolution.
Typically the visuals will be sliced and optimised before being incorporated into the product. This task may be carried out by a Production Assistant, or it may be the responsibility of the Designer or the Developer – they usually work closely together and these roles often overlap or have blurred boundaries.
Sometimes the roles are combined, with the Designer–Developer being responsible for implementing their own designs – especially where the entire interface is animated or where a CSS–based web design approach is being used.
Typical career routes
The job tends to be divided into various levels of seniority, based mostly on experience. As a general rule, the greater the seniority, the more responsibility the Designer will have for the overall user experience, including the design of navigation, features and functionality. At junior levels, Designers tend to be tasked with only some aspects, typically the visual styling, of the interface.
There are no typical career routes, but many interactive media Designers come from a traditional design background – such as graphic, print or information design. Sometimes they combine this with experience or study in a more technical subject – such as computer science, engineering, mathematics or psychology.
It is this combination of creative and technical disciplines that tends to distinguish the best interactive media Designers and enables them to progress into more senior positions, either within the Designer role, or in roles such as Information Architect or Producer.
Essential knowledge and skills
Designers need creativity and artistic flair but also a certain amount of technical understanding. The nature of interactive media means that they must often design within many unknown or variable parameters – for example, the user's screen size, or the amount of content to be included on a web page.
The Designer must therefore be able to identify these factors and think laterally so as to produce flexible designs that work correctly in a range of circumstances. They need to understand usability issues, the principles of interaction design, and any user–interface conventions and standards that are relevant to the product. Awareness of the technical process used to implement their designs is also important.
Key Skills include:
Training and qualifications
Most interactive media Designers have Bachelor's Degrees, and some have Master's Degrees. Although there are now various specialist interactive media courses available, many Designers' qualifications are in more traditional art-related subjects. Architecture and product design are particularly useful backgrounds, as they tend to encourage the combinations of creative and technical thinking that interactive media requires – design in its broadest sense. Experience is generally valued most, however, and a good portfolio of interactive media work is essential.
Where to go for more information
Skillset is the Sector Skills Council for the audio visual industries. The first sources of information for all jobs in the industry are the National Occupational Standards. Browse Skillset's website for links to our network of training partners, information about training and access to the comprehensive Skillset/BFI course database. Finally, Skillset Careers is the UK's only specialist media careers advice service; for detailed media careers information and advice, visit www.skillset.org/careers.
Websites
British Interactive Multimedia Association: www.bima.co.uk/
New Media Knowledge: www.nmk.co.uk
The Zen Garden: www.csszengarden.com
Design Shack: www.designshack.co.uk
WebMonkey: www.webmonkey.com
Publications
New Media Age Magazine – New Media Age
Glossary
User interface: what a product's user sees on-screen
Sliced: when an image, such as visual for a screen design, is cut up into component parts
Optimised: when an image or other media asset is converted into the most appropriate format for its intended use within the product
CSS: an acronym for Cascading Style Sheets; these provide instructions that tell web browser software how to display a web page CSS-based web design: a best-practice approach whereby web page layout is specified with cascading style sheets, rather than the more traditional approach of using HTML tables
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Designer - Interactive Media
1 As with most roles in interactive media, actual job titles tend to vary considerably. Examples of titles that are sometimes used with this role include Interaction Designer, Interface Designer, Web Designer and Multimedia Author.
2 The Information Architect role is about deciding the product's features, functionality, organisation of content, and navigational structure. These may be documented through wire–frame diagrams, site maps, and/or detailed functional specifications that together serve as a design brief and technical blueprint.
3 The Producer role is about ensuring the overall business vision and creative direction for the product are identified and maintained. This role may also be called Project Director, Project Leader, Creative Director etc. and is often merged with Project Manager.
4 The Developer role is about building the product, typically using authoring tools (e.g. Director, Flash etc.) and/or scripting or mark–up languages (e.g. JavaScript, ActionScript, Lingo, HTML, CSS etc.); by contrast, the Programmer role tends to be more concerned with higher–level coding.
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