| For several years now, graphic design agencies | | | | Today's digital media is a more fluid, more |
| have been offering their services designing web | | | | dynamic, and much more rapid animal. Today, |
| pages, under the moniker of "digital media" or | | | | text, graphics, video, sound, interaction, |
| "digital marketing". But something is not right in the | | | | commerce, live content and technical analysis |
| world of graphic design - small businesses seem | | | | must co-exist in a seamless whole. Users won't |
| to be doing most of their work for friends and | | | | wait five minutes for a beautiful piece of flash to |
| family (for free), and even the larger, established | | | | download, unless there's something else worth |
| companies are finding their revenue stream being | | | | watching in the meantime. Users don't care what |
| progressively pinched off. It seems that | | | | visuals are on a website when they use robots to |
| something is changing in the world of digital media, | | | | download podcasts - they care about the content |
| and the graphic design business model is no longer | | | | of the podcast. And nobody cares what's on a |
| viable. | | | | website if they can't find what they want through |
| I think the problem is caused by two, main | | | | the search engines. That's the challenge facing |
| factors. On the one hand, modern technology is | | | | modern digital media - to step away from the |
| reducing the perceived value of what graphic | | | | traditional forms of separate media, to truly |
| designers do. Today, schoolchildren can put a | | | | embrace the digital revolution, and to create |
| website together (really - it's part of the national | | | | unified, digital media experiences which change the |
| curriculum!), and almost anyone can become a | | | | perceptions of the people who experience it - |
| master Photoshopper, assembling spectacular | | | | wherever and however it's experienced. |
| images out of the least promising material. This is | | | | That's why there's a new breed of digital media |
| rather what happened to music production and | | | | designers springing up. They're visually literate, just |
| distribution over the last ten years: now anyone | | | | like the traditional graphic designers, but they're |
| can record and distribute a rock album (as good | | | | also successful at handling video and sound, and |
| as a bought one) from their bedroom, and | | | | they understand how writing works. But more |
| consequently the record industry (and all the | | | | than any of those: they understand how to |
| related businesses) became virtually redundant. | | | | integrate them all - they understand the |
| Graphic designers can still do a more "professional" | | | | underlying technology and the overarching |
| job than their juvenile competition, but - | | | | psychology of the web. |
| unfortunately - neither their prospective clients, | | | | The Webgineers is a showcase for this new kind |
| nor the visitors to their websites have the visual | | | | of design: it looks good, and while it's a |
| sophistication to notice the difference. Visual | | | | comparatively sparse design, it is nevertheless |
| design has been "dumbed down". | | | | characteristic and expressive (it's supposed to |
| The other factor is the nature of digital media | | | | look industrial). You can look at that website on a |
| itself. To trained, experienced, talented graphic | | | | modern web browser (at any screen size) and it |
| designers, "media" means visuals. But other | | | | loads in a moment. You can look at it on a TV, or |
| specialists regard "media" as something else: | | | | on a phone, and it still works. You can't see the |
| writers see it as writing, videographers see it as | | | | heavy-lifting going on behind the screen. You |
| video, and so on. But, in the new digital age, | | | | never even notice the flash loading. Within three |
| "media" means all of these, and more: the digital | | | | weeks of launch, it was fully indexed by all the |
| revolution has driven the convergence of all these | | | | search engines, and it's got a strong presence in |
| different media. Today, images, text, video, | | | | the blogsphere as well. The designers know, from |
| sound, gameplay, social interaction, e-commerce, | | | | the logs, that people are finding that site and |
| and everything else all coexist in unified, integrated | | | | spending time on it - and are converting: the |
| experiences. "Digital media" is becoming a much | | | | psychology works. And that, fundamentally, is |
| larger concept than it was, and both customers | | | | what matters: do people see the media, and do |
| and users are developing the sophistication to | | | | they click away changed? |
| embrace that. Specialist designers - whatever field | | | | Now, I'm not suggesting that traditional graphics is |
| they're working in - generally haven't got there | | | | dead. It's not, and there will always be a need and |
| yet. | | | | a place for great visual design. But what is |
| Traditionally, creative effort, in graphics, in video, | | | | changing is that, firstly, traditional forms of design |
| and in sound, has been based on the originator of | | | | (such as print and packaging) must co-exist with |
| a work taking control of the user's experience of | | | | digital media (vide, for example, The Matrix, which |
| it - graphic designers specify every aspect of the | | | | integrated film with video games to create the |
| page or display surface, video artists fill a screen, | | | | overall experience), and secondly that digital media |
| musicians turn the volume up. But in today's | | | | is itself an integrated and ubiquitous form, and is |
| multi-media fully-connected world, that control no | | | | becoming much more so (most music and games |
| longer exists. Where a graphic designer used to | | | | sales are now made direct to phones). Those two |
| be able to control the shine on a piece of paper, | | | | observations mean that the nature of graphics, |
| now he can't even control the size of it. Where a | | | | and the nature of digital media creation, are |
| musician used to be able to sound-engineer an | | | | changing radically. The task facing today's design |
| entire concert hall, now he has to compete with all | | | | companies is to ride those trends into the future. |
| the other ringtones. | | | | |