Graphic designers and UI designers are both important members of the design team. They have different skills, but they both help create beautiful things that people want to use. That said, there are some key differences between graphic designers and UI designers—and I’m going to tell you about them.
Graphic design is about making things look good.
Graphic design is about visual communication, and it’s not just about making things pretty or interesting—it’s also about making sure that your audience understands what you want them to know. You can have the nicest graphic designs in the world, but if no one understands what they mean or how they might benefit from them then it doesn’t matter.
What is a Graphic Designer?
Graphic design is a way of making art. It involves the creation of logos, advertisements, web graphics and more. A graphic designer combines visual elements to create an appealing product or service that will be appealing to consumers.
A graphic designer’s job requires creativity and problem solving skills in order to come up with solutions for clients’ needs. They use a variety of tools such as Adobe Creative Suite including Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign in their work process.
Graphic design is about design elements.
Graphic designers design visual elements – how we see something. UX designers design interactions – how we use something. The former might involve a specialized set of design-related skills, like color theory, typography, and computer-aided design. The latter involves a multidisciplinary set of skills that includes design, user research, information architecture, wireframing, and prototyping.
Graphic designers use visual elements to communicate a brand message. Therefore, their focus will often be on staying true to their brand identity. UX designers create for the user, making sure a product meets user needs in a way that is accessible, intuitive, and enjoyable.
Graphic design can be a standalone skill.
Graphic design can be a standalone skill. It’s not part of user interface design, and it doesn’t have anything to do with the user experience (UX). Graphic designers are creative and artistic, designing everything from logos to websites. Graphic designers create visual elements that help tell stories about your brand or product.
You’d also want your logo to be colorful and fun so people will want to use it. A good graphic designer can make these things look good without having any technical expertise in programming languages like HTML or CSS. They’re responsible for making sure that all the elements of their project—from its color palette through its fonts—look great together as well as ensuring that there’s no room left over when they’re done creating them (this means keeping track of pixel dimensions).
What is a UI Designer?
A UI designer is responsible for the overall look and feel of your website, as well as its usability. They are also responsible for making sure that users have an enjoyable experience when navigating through your site.
Although it may seem like a simple task at first glance, designing effective user interfaces requires knowledge in many different areas. For example, familiarity with graphic design, programming languages, user experience research and psychology to name a few.
UI design is about making things work well.
UI design is about making things work well with a focus on functionality. It’s not just about looking good, it’s also about being easy to use. The most important thing to remember in UI design is that a user should be able to accomplish their goals as quickly and easily as possible.
This means you need to make sure your designs are intuitive, but also have enough information on them so that users can figure out what they need without having too much extra information cluttering up the screen.
UI design requires planning
You might be thinking, “Isn’t UI design just like visual design?” Well, yes and no.
Visual design is about making something look appealing to the eye. It involves putting color schemes together in an interesting way and ensuring that everything works well together on a page or screen. But when it comes to UI design, it’s more about planning than it is about visual design. In fact, if you think about it too much—if you focus too much on how things look—you’ll end up with an unusable interface instead of something that works well for your users.
UI designers are responsible for making sure that all parts of their product work together as smoothly as possible so that users can do what they want with them. They also make sure there aren’t any bugs or problems with usability within their product before releasing it into production; this includes testing out every single feature including its flow through various scenarios such as coming out from different pages.
UI design requires research and analytics
If you’re thinking about going into UI design, it’s important to understand that research and analytics are two key components of the process. While your design skills will be essential, they won’t be enough by themselves. You’ll also need a good understanding of how to use research and analytics to inform your designs.
Keep in mind that UI is about designing usability for the end users. You need to know what elements are useful to them, what they need and how to combine these two in order to create a highly functional and useful product.
Analytics is needed in order to make sense of your data. What works? What doesn’t work? Why? These are just basic questions that need to be addressed especially when you are designing an app, website or game for starters.
The two aren’t identical
While there are definitely skills that overlap between graphic designers and UI designers, the two aren’t identical. Graphic designers use their skills to create a visual representation of a product or service. For example, if you’re designing an app for your company’s website, it would be helpful if you can draw up some mockups before making any changes to the code. This is something that most graphic designers are able to do because they have access to programs like Photoshop or Illustrator.
UI designers on the other hand focus more on how users interact with their designs so they can create something that is easy-to-use and understand at first glance. For example: A good UI designer will ensure that buttons are located in logical places within an interface so people don’t get lost when navigating through menus; meanwhile graphics artists might also include certain images within their designs so users know what each button does without having googled around looking for information about how things work beforehand.
Bottom Line
It’s probably best to think of these skills as different parts of the same process. Graphic designers are artists who work in the field of visual design; they produce everything from posters, logos and even websites. UI designers are more technical coders who work within an organization’s IT team.
