Any Graphic Designers out there?

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sugarlovebug
sugarlovebug Posts: 158 Member
in Chit-Chat
To those in graphic design or at least dabble in it. What Adobe package do you reccomend? I have recently (as of yesterday) started school for graphic design. GO ME! After quiting college 7 years ago. Anywhooo... I was pricing out the creative suite packages. OMG!! they are quite expensive! I since started searching ebay. Do they programs very that much from each versions? Would it be okay to start with suite 3 and then over time as I get more involved and have an income coming, update from there?

any advice is welcomed as I am new to this wonderful group of graphic design!

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  • ohwhataday
    ohwhataday Posts: 1,398 Member
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    I would say at least Illustrator and/or Photoshop.
  • ohwhataday
    ohwhataday Posts: 1,398 Member
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    And I'm sure if you wanted to get CS3 you would be fine. There aren't many differences but I personally am obsessed with CS5. There's a few awesome new things on it.
  • katheern
    katheern Posts: 213 Member
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    A lot of schools offer HUGE discounts on student versions of the Adobe packages. I got Adobe Design Premium for only $309 (retail $1799) and it comes with Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Flash, DreamWeaver and Acrobat. I would say the most important of the two are Photoshop and Illstrator, but InDesign is also great for templates. Also if you plan on doing web design which I know a lot of graphic designers do, Dreamweaver is nice to have.
  • kristydi
    kristydi Posts: 781 Member
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    My hubby is a web designer/developer.

    You may want to ask at school. They may have some specific stuff you need for certain classes. I believe my hubby does most of his work in Photoshop and Flash. I'll ask him when he wakes up (he's mostly nocturnal) and come back with a better answer.
  • m5johnson
    m5johnson Posts: 21 Member
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    I'm not a graphic designer, but an architectural drafter. When I was going to school, there were offers out there to purchase a student version of AutoCAD. It was much much less expensive...maybe they have something similar for the programs you're interested in.
  • kapeluza
    kapeluza Posts: 3,434 Member
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    To those in graphic design or at least dabble in it. What Adobe package do you reccomend? I have recently (as of yesterday) started school for graphic design. GO ME! After quiting college 7 years ago. Anywhooo... I was pricing out the creative suite packages. OMG!! they are quite expensive! I since started searching ebay. Do they programs very that much from each versions? Would it be okay to start with suite 3 and then over time as I get more involved and have an income coming, update from there?

    any advice is welcomed as I am new to this wonderful group of graphic design!

    I love Illustrator. I use it mainly along with Photoshop! I'm using CS5 on both. Also, meddled with InDesign but I like Illustrator better.
  • tawnya1981
    tawnya1981 Posts: 9
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    I was going to say the same thing katheern said... you can definitely get the educational discount if you're in school. CS3 is not that different from CS5... and if you're just starting out, you'll be fine using CS3, in my opinion. Good luck!! :)
  • sunrise611
    sunrise611 Posts: 1,850 Member
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    There are Photoshop "snobs" who will steer you in that direction. It IS the cream of the crop of graphic design programs but has a steep learning curve.

    I usually don't have patience for that program and use Fireworks, which is part of the Dreamweaver web design package. I've experimented with many programs over the years like PaintShop Pro (also popular).

    Inkscape is another freebie that you might want to try for creating images and logos. Gimp is another one but I find that interface confusing.

    Irfanview is my default graphics viewer and good for quickly resizing images or converting from one type to another (gif to jpg).
  • DanOhh
    DanOhh Posts: 1,806 Member
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    Get what you can afford at first. There are improvements to each Suite but not enough to make the investment to CS5 while still in college. There are some great differences between CS5 and CS3 but you can always invest in the upgrade once you are making money.
  • sugarlovebug
    sugarlovebug Posts: 158 Member
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    Yes, I have looked into the student license. Which is really cheap. BUT... once you are done with school you must buy the full license in order to sell any of your work. You can not make a profit off the student license. So really there is no point in buying the student license since I must buy it over again after school. Which my brother is letting me use his CS5 for now, but I have to delete it when I am done with school, so I am not violating the license.
  • sunrise611
    sunrise611 Posts: 1,850 Member
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    And I'm sure if you wanted to get CS3 you would be fine. There aren't many differences but I personally am obsessed with CS5. There's a few awesome new things on it.

    I'll have to check that out. I have CS3 and love it.
  • aunprawn
    aunprawn Posts: 4
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    If you can get a copy of CS3 second-hand, then that should do plenty for what you need right now. I work with a couple of freelance designers who only have CS3 at home.

    I'd recommend InDesign, Illustrator and Photoshop if you're doing mainly print-based work; Flash/Fireworks if you're looking at online graphic design.

    That said, if you buy second hand, make sure it's all legit in terms of the registration/validation code, otherwise you won't be able to use it.

    Also, if you're working on a Mac, the latest OS (Lion) isn't fully compatible with older versions of Creative Suite. Snow Leopard and earlier, you should be fine.
  • sugarlovebug
    sugarlovebug Posts: 158 Member
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    I am full on PC. At this point I can't afford a Mac. I thought that once I get the ball rolling and have a good income coming in, that I may invest in a Mac and upgrade to better CS. which by the time I get a good income coming in, it will be years from now and there maybe CS14. lol!
  • Fiesta80
    Fiesta80 Posts: 35
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    check www.journeyed.com or www.studica.com - they have student discounts on the adobe suite packages.

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