5 Career Options with a Bachelor's in Graphic Design

Logo Design
Illustration
Web Design
Game Design
Packaging Design

As anyone with a Bachelor’s in Graphic Design knows, it’s all about communicating ideas with images. From a large corporation’s branding and logo to a small business’s website, opportunities exist for every designer. The following list highlights five of the most interesting career options for a graphic design professional.

Logo Design

Logo design is an excellent field for designers who want to creatively brainstorm endless ideas and communicate with clients regularly. Logos and branding are necessary for every business, making graphic designers invaluable. The biggest challenges in a logo design career are identifying what the client wants and encapsulating the client’s brand succinctly. To succeed in logo design, students working on a bachelor’s degree in graphic design will benefit from composition skills and knowledge of typography.

Illustration

Illustration is a competitive yet rewarding career. It’s a great match for professionals who can communicate complex ideas simply and efficiently. This career is especially relevant for graphic designers with drawing skills interested in visual narrative and storytelling. Although a graphic designer would typically focus on laying out a magazine page or designing a website, those design skills translate well to creating individual images. According to Forbes, the online world has created a much bigger need for quality images created by designers. These include such as art and promotional content on social media. With a career in illustration, designers can expect to face a wide variety of projects including:

children’s book illustration
editorial work
advertising assignments

Web Design

Building a strong web presence is priceless for businesses large and small. Despite the prevalence of seemingly easy-to-use website editors, it’s nonetheless challenging to create a website that stands out and looks professional. Today’s professional web designers focus on creating a website that is responsive and adaptive so it displays well on:

desktop
tablet
mobile devices

Likewise, web designers need to communicate information in a way that is both interesting and unobtrusive. Graphic designers can bring a different perspective to this field. They can make nontraditional design choices that push the boundaries of web design while keeping the user experience in mind.

Game Design

Although game design may be the most competitive career on this list, it is certainly a valuable pursuit for professionals with a Bachelor’s in Graphic Design. The skills required to be a good game designer overlap those of graphic design. Facing tight deadlines, rapidly producing work, and keeping the visuals simple are a few common requirements to succeed in this field.

Packaging Design

Professionals with a Bachelor’s in Graphic Design have an ideal set of skills for a career in package design. This career involves creating attractive packages, both in content as well as shape. A short trip to the grocery store will reveal just how important package designers are, and that is only related to food and home goods. The ultimate aim is to sell products. Therefore, a package designer should:

communicate the product’s brand
make the product appear enticing
collaborate with several different teams

A graphic designer’s broad set of skills is suitable for everything from designing themed cereal boxes to establishing a tech startup’s brand. A Bachelor’s in Graphic Design provides a wide variety of career opportunities and avenues for professional development.

Related Resources:

5 Career Options with a Bachelor’s in Graphic Design

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