Graphic designers work with companies to develop the visual components of marketing and communication initiatives, including advertisements, logos, packaging, brochures and websites. These professionals must understand their clients' goals and create designs that impact the target audience.

 

In order to be successful, graphic designers must be able to communicate with clients, collaborate with other design professionals and deliver unique, effective designs. These tasks require a mix of business savvy and technical design skills. On a given day, a graphic designer might meet with a client, create a communication strategy, design the layout of a Web page and make changes to an existing publication.

 

Graphic designers use colour, typography, photography, artwork, layout and occasionally animation to convey a client's message to its target audience. Most of today's design work is done on the computer, so graphic designers must have a solid understanding of design software like Adobe Photoshop,  Illustrator, Indesign, Dreamweaver, Acrobat and Flash.