Freelance web designers in Vancouver are on the rise in numbers, and more and more graduates of schools such as the Vancouver Film School Digital Design Program and the University of British Columbia (UBC) Multimedia and Web Development Program are going the route of freelancing instead of securing full-time employment with a design or advertising agency.
There are benefits to being a freelance designer or web developer. Most importantly, you can take this experience and build your portfolio by working on some smaller projects until you are confident enough to present your portfolio to prospective employers. Also, you will be getting real world experience with cleint negotiations and dealing with the business side of the design and web development industries.
Freelancing can also help you hone your skills even further than your training at school. Many of the tricks and industry secrets come to the surface while on the job in the beginning of your career. You will be researching and developing in your industry standard applications such as Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign, Adobe Dreamweaver… along with all of the web programming languages that you either touched on or studied in depth at your school of choice.
Studying to gain a solid foundation in the principles of graphic design, web design and web development is very important. Many people claim to be “graphic designers” or “web designers” just because they own a computer and know how to use Twitter, Facebook and perhaps a Blogging system such as WordPress or Blogger. That couldn’t be further from the truth. A true professional in the industry knows how in depth the work can be, and that is what the education is for!
Being your own boss has its pros and cons, and it isn’t for everybody. However, many companies would like to see a portfolio and not just design or development school projects. They will also be more inclined to hire you if you have some real world experience and business sense to go along with your well deserved skill set.
In conclusion, becoming a freelance designer or developer could be a wise initial path to take when you are still wet behind the ears and fresh out of the gates of college or university based on the points made in this blog posting even if your end goal is to secure long-term and full-time employment with an established design, development or advertising company in Vancouver or any other city of choice.
Enjoy your freelancing experience, and live and learn along the way 🙂
