Professional Designers Survey Part 2

[Alphabet Man]

Firstly, thank you to Joel, Fraser, Jim and Jordan for the other survey.

I managed to get more than a page out of your responses.

For this survey, its mainly to do with relationships in a design firm, in the process of developing a visual communication (art).

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From the other thread, a basic introduction:

So I've got a SAC for VCAD due at the end of May, and I've had this since about mid-April.

Basically we gotta interview professional designers (I think freelancers may be able to get away with it too).

Instead of interviewing just one, I'd like to use quotes from all you guys and answer the questions in paragraph form, try make it look like im intellectual.

I'll break this down into 5 parts I think it is, I haven't looked to far ahead, but I think I'll break the essay/report down into parts, one survey equals one part or page of the essay. Yes, that's 5 pages of writing. (My last SAC was 4 pages which wasn't too bad).

So if you could help, that'd be great.

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To give you an idea of what I have to do, the SAC is: a written report to discuss the roles and relationships involved in the design and production of visual communication in a professional setting.

• Your name (first name is sufficient), design firm/business name, city and country.
  
• Q1: What role do other specialist personnel have in the process (of developing the visual communication)?
  
• Q2: What is the relationship between client and practitioner (designer)?
  
• Q3: Does one practitioner (designer) undertake all the design work or are they a part of a team?
  
• Q4: At what point is the work taken out of the hands of the designer and sent for production?
  
• Q5: What relationship do you have with the printer (person) for layout and graphic tasks? (others: the builder for architecture, the labourer for landscape design, the pattern drafter for fashion, the illustrator, cartoonist etc.)
  

Thanks for your help.

[Davidson]

fraser davidson/ broadcast designer/ mainframe/ london/ uk

Q1. other specialist personel? other than me? we occasionally use freelance illustrators for projects in order to get a fresh look for a project. because we work in video, there are often many different skilled peolple required on jobs before i get my grubby hands on footage. directors, cameramen, the lighting gaffer, and the rest. what role they play in the process differs from project to project like anything else. depends who employs who, and what we want from particular people.

Q2. again, this is different for every client. depending on the type of client. its always a tug of war. the better the cleint, the more they trust you to do your job without them interfering beyond what is necessary.

Q3. once more, you need to understand that or the most part design studios are not factories. we choose jobs we want to work on, these often vary and consequently every project has different man-power requirements.

Q4. most companies will be set a deadline (ususally artificial if the client is clever) in our case we deliver to tape and send the stuff straight to the various tv/ film companies. we do this from the office therefore our deadline is ofetn very close to 'their' (the real) deadline.

Q5. i hardly ever have to deal with printers as i am a man of RGB thank god.

[Mings]

Thanks for letting me know about the survey Matt. I will fill this out as to what I see in the Architecture/Construction business, not necessarily what I have experienced (if applicable).

Joshua Mings, currently working with Global Design Studio (aka with my professor in a Design Consulting firm) Indianapolis, Indiana

Q1: What role do other specialist personnel have in the process (of developing the visual communication)?

We have structural engineers to help ensure that the structure we design is plenty strong enough. Sometimes architects have a graphic designer in house to create presentation boards, websites, etc. In my case, that is all me as well as coming up with design concepts. Overall there are tons of specialists, Structural, Mechanical, Electrical, Civil Engineers etc.....

Q2: What is the relationship between client and practitioner (designer)?

Usually is strictly business with a contract and confidentiality agreement. As part of the firm I work for, we are a little more lax on that since we are very small and it is mainly conceptual work.

Q3: Does one practitioner (designer) undertake all the design work or are they a part of a team?

Of the projects we have done so far, it has all been me. My professor takes care of the business stuff.

Q4: At what point is the work taken out of the hands of the designer and sent for production?

I'm not quite sure what you mean by this, as work in the architecture field is never truly taken out of the hands of the designer. He/she has a lot of input still after construction begins.

Q5: What relationship do you have with the printer (person) for layout and graphic tasks?

Also a business relationship, but can be more casual. You do end up seeing a lot of the same Construction Project Managers, Foremans, etc.... so you develop a rapport with them. They come to you with concerns, and you go to them with issues.

[Alphabet Man]

Dear Joel, Fraser, Jordan, Jim and Josh.

I would like to whol heartedly apologise for my mistake.

I went to my VCAD teacher today to try get some greater understanding of this SAC.

When it said interview a designer, I didn't realise that he had arranged for a graphic designer from RMIT to come in and talk to us. I thought it would be 'go find your own designer'. That's how the handouts come across as.

I apologise for the mistake, but thank you for filling surveys out.

It kinda makes my page and a half written so far, utterly useless.

Thanks for taking the time to fill out surveys.

[creativelysain]

No problem, I'll say that I (and I'm sure the rest of us) was/were glad to help anyways. Good luck with it!