BoredAtWorkFilter

October 3, 2006 12:38 PM

My job: prepress technician / production artist / deigner. My question: Where do I go from here?

For the past 7 years I've been deeply immersed in the production end of the graphic arts industry and I recently started a design company on the side. Problem is I'm bored. I know all the design programs, from the Adobe apps on down the line to Microsoft publisher. I'm familiar with three RIP systems and various image-setters. I've used all of the major pagination and imposition software. I've taught myself web-design in my free time. I've got a pretty good theoretical knowledge of the nitty-gritty aspects of how the big presses work, whether they're web, offset, or screen-print.

But I think I plateaued. I'm constantly bored at work.

With my skill-set, where do I go from here? I've got very little interest in sales, but that's the only avenue open for me. Am I missing something really obvious? Should I just ride it out?

posted by lekvar to work & money (12 comments total)

What DOES interest you? Maybe it's time for a more severe career change.
posted by doctor_negative at 12:41 PM on October 3, 2006

All sorts of stuff. The big problem with "following my passion" is I have a family to feed so I can't really go off on a lark. I need to move into a field that will allow me to make a living. I can't afford to start over from the beginning, that's why I'm trying to figure out what I can do that with my current skill-set.
posted by lekvar at 1:14 PM on October 3, 2006

I understand your dilemma.
Have you ever been over to PrePress Forums? There's a lot of guys over there in the same position you are.
Have you considered teaching?
One constant I've noted from the discussions at PPF, is the incredible lack of knowledge on the part of designers these days when it comes to prepress issues. If I was teaching design, I would drag someone with your skillset into the classroom and teach the little buggers about the real world they will soon be working in.
posted by Thorzdad at 1:36 PM on October 3, 2006

How about management? You know the tools used in the printing industry. You could start learning how to direct others in their use for profit.

Alternatively, you could move laterally and look into press operation. It sounds like that might be interesting for you. There's a lot of ground to cover in that particular aspect of printing (understandably).

Have you thought about investigating web design (or programming) further?
posted by Kikkoman at 1:40 PM on October 3, 2006

Get into newspapers. Your technical skills will be very useful in the production/design side of things. If you have an interest in English, once you're in the door you can look towards some of the more detail-oriented areas of journalism, such as editing.
posted by bonaldi at 1:45 PM on October 3, 2006

you could become a studio head in an ad agency. or take a couple classes at an art school and see if being a graphic designer, illustrator or photographer interests you. or fine art perhaps.
posted by krautland at 2:22 PM on October 3, 2006

If you know the programs and have creative tendencies (and talent) the next natural progression is to move into the design aspects of your field.

I don't know whether you work with screen printing prepress or print prepress, but see about looking for a job doing strictly design.

Currently I do screen print prepress (and design work) and I definitely find the actual design work more rewarding... but I went from doing strictly design to doing prepress.

There are plenty of places looking for people who can design collatoral, banners, etc.
posted by finitejest at 2:39 PM on October 3, 2006

I love the unintended pun in your first line. It sounds like you have been doing a great deal of "deigning" lately.

I think you actually have a lot of options available to you. It's a matter of choosing to invest in one of them instead of dabbling. Do you enjoy prepress/production? Then find the best printer in that area and get even better at it. Do you enjoy designing? Then commit yourself to finding an agency in your area that does a lot of print work so you can bill yourself as a designer versed in pre-press. Do you want to abandon print entirely and move to web design? There's obviously a lot of options there and it's going to continue to be a growing industry.

If all of these options make you wince then get yourself back to school and start working on a plan B.
posted by quadog at 4:26 PM on October 3, 2006

I'm the production director at a magazine and have come at it from the opposite direction -- knowing next to nothing about the prepress/design side but learning a hell of a lot through day-to-day experience. I find it completely UNboring not just because of the technical learning curve, but mainly because I am a manager of a staff, a process/workflow analyst, a partner with marketing and advertising staffs in effecting gimmicks and other weird production-related projects, the primary interface with our printer and all that entails (pricing, bindery and distribution issues, quality control, press checks, etc.); I could go on and on, especially as printing technology continues to evolve. If you have the technical chops and then can translate it into working with a diverse group of dynamic people in a variety of areas, including managing a staff of people like you, you might find it more challenging than the sort of "technician/designer" mode you seem to have fallen into -- meaning, find an organization where your technical skills can be used to further an enterprise's strategic direction rather than just get pages made. Certainly better than sales!
posted by rleamon at 6:18 PM on October 3, 2006

I went from prepress into writing VBA to take info from an Access DB and do page layouts in InDesign.

Maybe do something like that. Use your knowledge but build on it. It got me into programming, certainly enough to know that I enjoy the heck out of writing algorithms to do my work for me!
posted by Brainy at 6:21 PM on October 3, 2006

Thanks for your input, everbody, this is great. It's like using someone else's brain to brainstorm!

"Deigner" ... sheesh.
posted by lekvar at 6:47 PM on October 3, 2006

How about the fine arts? Do you have any interest in drawing, painting, illustration? I'm in the same field, and had the same issue with boredom a few years back. I started taking classes, eventually got a certificate in scientific illustration, and now I have a completely new direction I can take my life.
posted by TochterAusElysium at 9:33 PM on October 3, 2006