art director vs. graphic designer
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- vaxorcist0
hah!
AD's job is to go into a meeting and control the client expectations and experience and cause them to trust the process and hand off a vague set of ideas to a GD, who comes up with a product which the AD then uses his Reality Distortion Effect to convince the client to accept without any changes or "make the logo bigger" moments...
Graphic Designers are often canon-fodder in a meeting if there's no AD there to control the client....
at least in my previous experience...
but to fire all the GD's would result in slower work output by far....
- strange how this makes an AD sound more like an account exec... but that happened at one agency....vaxorcist
- honest0
art director = "Yes / No / Maybe... / Oh that's interesting..." graphic designer = "I want your job... I'm so much better than you... can i go the fuck home now?!?"
- i_monk0
I've never worked anywhere that the AD was half as competent as the srGDs or srPDs.
- DaveO0
I think it differs studio to studio. Being a good art director is all about being a good communicator to the people around you, and getting the best out the talents at your disposal. Half the time it's the "yes / no / maybe" that make the difference rather than a GD working away at something that fundamentally doesn't work.
- monospaced0
I've never worked anywhere where the GDs are half as competent as the ADs.
- MarleyMarl0
Half the idiots here should be glad they have ADs or CDs above them, Based on the way you act and talk here I wouldn't let you anywhere near a client.
Also realize that an AD in a graphic design studio vs. an AD in an ad agency are completely different.
- twokids0
An art director should be able to do what a graphic designer does. A graphic designer may or may not be able to do what an art director does.
this is what that is: meet with clients to understand what the fuck they want and talk them out of stupid ideas and make sense of everything so it can get done in a reasonable time frame. give the GDs direction and then steer them back to reasonable when they go off the rails, or kick them in the add if they aren't getting the general idea.
Then, if the GD fails, they do the design themselves and look for another GD.
- maikel0
I think the main difference between GDs and ADs are than the latter have fffffffound invites.
- Difference between AD and CD is CD has QBNProanimatedgif
- _me_0
clients rape CDs who rape ADs who rape graphic designers. since time immemorial.
[ to be honest tho the fucking shit graphic designers come out with these days - they need shooting not raping. ]
- OP310
I feel like it depends on where you work. I'm in a small agency and have an AD job title, but I think elsewhere I'd be considered a senior designer. Job titles to me are kind of BS in small shops.
- MarleyMarl0
The difference between AD/CD and a Graphic Designer:
AD/CD: Actually works hard all day. Builds strong relationships with upper management and clients. Focuses on making the work in the agency better and acts as a buffer between the shit hitting the fan and the Graphic Designer. Replies to a billion emails.
Graphic Designer: Wastes their day away on sites like QBN, FFFOUND, Dribbble, etc, thinking it will actually make them a better creative. Bitches and moans about how the AD/CD make all the cash and call all the shots. Cries over the fact that they had to change that key line from 0.5pt to 0.75pt.
- Knuckleberry0
Here is the structure where I work (this is where it gets fucked because my boss has never worked for anyone):
Design Admin > Junior Designer > Designer > Sr Designer > Design Director > Creative Director... seems fine... but, I am a designer and another guy is a senior designer and we both tell the design director and creative director what to do. We manage all the jobs, talk with the client, email everything... this place is weird.- << Not wired at all - very similar here where I work, and it works great.RIZ
- *weirdRIZ
- Good to know...Knuckleberry
- RIZ0
I work for a large design / branding studio. We have 1 Creative Director, 2 Design Directors and 7-8 designers.
Our Design Directors are the closest things we would have to an Art Director - and they are freaking incredible graphic designers, who now manage designers under them. There is certainly no room here for a traditional 'Art Director' - someone who scribbles out ideas and expects designers to act like mac-ops and visualise them.
Design Directors should be able to jump on the tools and design a better identity, poster, page layout then the designers under them - but I very much doubt that would be the case with most Art Directors.
I don't really think the term Art Director applies to the design world nearly as much as it applies to the Advertising world. Designers are designers - with their own ideas, Art Directors simply direct Mac-ops.
- DaveO0
So what we learn from this thread is that all workplaces are different, and everyone's terminology is different, and that it doesn't really matter. End of thread.
- gramme0
Ah hell. Haven't we already thoroughly canvased this topic in the past?
- kirshar120
I do agree and understand with what you guys are saying. I've come to my own conclusion that the reasons given for their laying off wasn't the truth.
Would it stand to reason that most AD's come from originally being a graphic designer or production artist? We have one girl who went from being a traffic assistant to an AD, and I refuse to comment on her artistic ability because I'm a nice guy, but I'm still trying to figure that one out.......
- hahaha what a joke, wonder why the other ADs didn't kick offanimatedgif
- i_monk0
Before it bites me in the ass, I should say by "competent" I don't mean creatively, I mean more detail-oriented. I've had ADs hand me stuff with the wrong brand colours (close, but wrong), glaring inconsistencies in type styles, misalignments, butchered artwork, things that just won't print (layer effects with Pantones, for example)...
- That's still not a fantastic point as the bigger picture stuff is the ADs forté rather than artworking
DaveO - ADs worry about the concept, the big idea. Studio/Mac Artists are for making sure colors are correct, etc.MarleyMarl
- I would hope an AD would know their client's branding better than a GD.i_monk
- That's still not a fantastic point as the bigger picture stuff is the ADs forté rather than artworking
- cannonball19780
One uses a mac and one uses a PC obv.
- MrT0
In my experience the more convoluted and apparently senior the job title is, the more of a simpering cock-lord the individual is.