Interaction design: do I need to be an artist?

December 30, 2007 4:01 PM

Conflicted about a career in interaction design, please help!

I'm really interested in interaction design but I'm hearing a lot of confusing things from different people about how important a graphic design background is. My interest is more in HCI/human factors/user research and my artistic skills are fairly lacking. I can do rough interface sketches, but more advanced graphic design stuff escapes me.

To anyone working in the field already: are there people working in design with these kinds of interests alongside the artists or is it more typical that the designer is a combination of my interests and artistic ability and my kind are the "analysts" doing user testing on prototypes and crunching numbers? I know it probably varies a great deal between companies but I'm hoping to find a general consensus so I know where I stand.

Thanks!

posted by saraswati to grab bag (6 comments total)

From my experience working with interaction designers, you don't need visual design skills. Indeed some interaction designers I've worked with can barely use Photoshop.
posted by jedro at 4:05 PM on December 30, 2007

I've worked in this field for over seven years, and my experience is that there are more and more of the "analyst" types alongside the "designer" types. It varies, of course, where you're working: I work for an Interactive Marketing agency in New York, and it's very different (from what interviewees tell me) from working at - let's say - Oracle, helping refine their product.

Part of the reason (I believe, anyway) that there used to be so many more "designer" types is because those people fell kinda backwards into the career. There didn't used to be university programs for the field and it was never universally defined.

I think you'll be fine - no need to sweat becoming more of a visual designer than you are. Just be proficient at doing enough design to communicate your ideas, and make sure to look for a company where you will succeed. Learn Visio if you haven't already, since that's what I find many companies with a serious practice tend to use, and it can't hurt to know how to HTML, Photoshop, or Illustrator your way out of a jam (I've never found anyone using Omnigraffle beyond the enthusiast point), but you're really just trying to effectively communicate, not be a visual designer.
posted by dammitjim at 4:28 PM on December 30, 2007

It's actually a very standard approach to divide the responsibilities along exactly the lines you've described. I got started in the industry 10-15 years ago as a "functional" designer, where I would define the functionality of the application (CD-ROMS, back then), and worked closely with a visual designer to then create a graphical representation. Several years later, he and I actually teamed back up again to start our own agency, with the same basic division of responsibilities, but again, that's nothing new.

Most digital agencies use some variation on that approach. What you probably _will_ find, though, is a lot of variation in the formal structure around those two groups. Sometimes, both roles are considered part of the "creative" department, but in other places, "creative" just means visual/graphic design, and "information architecture" (or "user experience" or whatever you want to call it) is a totally separate group.

That's not to say that there aren't a lot of very talented people who handle both aspects very well--there are. The division generally comes about for two reasons:

1) Most people are generally better at one, or the other, and it's better all around for them to focus on getting really good at that one thing, rather than pretty good at both

and

2) Most projects are large enough that the division of labor makes sense--it's not realistic to ask someone to generate a comprehensive set of wireframes/task flows _and_ an overall visual design, all at once. (And they almost always need to overlap.)
posted by LairBob at 4:29 PM on December 30, 2007

As always, it's a little more complicated. Do you need a graphic design background? No. Does it help? Yes.

Two things to remember:

1) You'll be working with designers. These are visual people. Not the greatest communicators. The more you can speak their language, the better.

2) Generally, the people who will hire you have a design background. Design is a bit of a cult and designers tend to think better of fellow designers than non-designers, and therefore prefer candidates have some design experience, even if it's not directly related to the position.

My advice: don't worry about a design degree, but do what you can (take classes, participate in AIGA events, etc.) to gain a sensitivity for design. Then play that up during interviews.
posted by ochenk at 4:30 PM on December 30, 2007

I've been an IA/IxD for the last 7+ years. Worked at agencies almost exclusively. For the first time in my career, I do not work in the Creative department but a separate area for IA, Analysts and Planners.

It always helps to know at least a little about the work your teammates do--so yeah, have a basic grasp of visual design but don't worry if you can barely use photoshop or whomp up a bitchin' grid system. You'll also want to get account management, project management, tech, etc. in similar ways.

If you sense that an interviewer or company expects you to be a graphic/visual designer, then run, run for the hills. Design is, ultimately, problem solving--this is the skillset you should be showcasing and what a company should be looking for.
posted by gsh at 4:48 PM on December 30, 2007

My husband is an IA and uses both Visio and another program called Acture. He is artistic, but the things he makes as part of his job are line drawings, not crazysexycool renderings.
posted by Medieval Maven at 8:54 AM on December 31, 2007