What People Think of Graphic Designers

Im sure all of us graphic designers have had to face the annoying questions after being asked what you do for a living or what you are taking in school. Such as, "So, what do you do?""oh, so your like an artist?"or my favourite "so, what can you do with that career wise?" 

      Well if you are one of those people wondering what we are and what we can do. Well here is a definition I found from (http://www.agda.com.au/about/what-is-graphic-design) Which I couldn't of said it better myself. "One who has the artistic sensibility, skill and experience and/or training professionally to create designs or images for reproduction by any means of visual communication, and who may be concerned with illustration; typography; calligraphy; surface design for packaging; or the design of patterns, books, advertising and publicity material, or any form of visual communication."

     On that note, many people often group graphic designers into the group of "starving artists" which is artists who specialize in just fine art and expressing there own feelings through there work and have a hard time getting jobs and selling there work. (Which is also a stereotype but I will let someone else fight that battle.) However, what people don't know is that you can be very successful as a graphic designer. There are many different career options since the field is very broad in what you can specialize in. Such as, working for a large or small graphic design firm or free lancing. However, like all careers usually you have to start at the bottom and work your way up, and build you reputation. What I am getting at is that people need to stop being so stereotypical when it comes to the field of art in general.  Which brings me to the picture I posted below. 

       I remember going to my highschool graduation in my first year of graphic designer and having people ask what I went to college for, and when I said Graphic designer I got several annoying answers. Such as, "Oh that must be easy.", "So, do you party a lot.", "Do you just draw all day?"etc. Even my parents don't understand what we really do after years of explaining it them. My mother constantly is asking me "So, would you do something like this?" when ever she sees anything and everything. It is a never ending battle of trying to get people to understand what we do and why we do it. As my sister always tells me, "You can't get mad at the ignorant" but sometimes it's just so hard not to.