it depends on your priorities as a person and a creative. if it's stability, go for in-house/agency, but keep in mind that progression is kinda slow in this field and there's little to no room for creativity (depending on clients/team you work with). in terms of growth as a designer, i've learned so much working in an agency setting compared to in-house. there's less hand holding too in agencies because everything is fast paced so there's that :/
i'm lucky that our creative director doesn't mind us doing freelancing on the side. so yeah graphic design has its pros and cons and you really need to have the drive, discipline, and the right network* (like any other profession i guess) to progress.
ali99 some days i enjoy it, most days i don’t 😭 specially during this time of the year when the holidays are approaching and everyone is scrambling to get things done before the christmas break. the team i work with makes it tolerable enough to stay. i get to work on different projects and collaborate with people from other agencies/studios. can be very fulfilling at times!
my experience with in-house wasn’t good, only bc i wasn’t challenged enough? i felt stagnant since work was very templated. what i appreciate though is how thorough the onboarding process was when i joined, had a good mentor too. but in the end i still believe leaving was the best decision ive made for my career.
(SORRY FOR RAMBLING 😭)
I wonder how many graphic design positions there will be in the future. Canva andtools like it make anyone feel like a designer, like digital cameras made everyone feel like photographers. People don’t notice poorly lit, poorly processed photos and probably won’t realize they’re making junk with whatever AI graphic design apps come along. This means a creative, artistic graphic designer should be all the more valuable, but I’m not optimistic about that happening! Hopefully someone with agency experience will chime in to actually answer your question!
I graduated in animation, did a bunch of different things in design, illustration, photography etc. etc as a freelancer and through full-time jobs designing, eventually falling in love with print design and art direction. I enjoy world-building to an extent, so that thought process really comes in handy for print production and building brands for companies.
there is something so deeply intimate about knowing a person’s penmanship. you could know someone for years even but not know what their handwriting looks like. i had a coworker (turned friend) at my old job tell me how when she misses me she looks at the post-it with the passwords i had written for my work accounts. (sharing mine here bc in my head i’m friends with everyone who comes across this post. pi.fyi community has gotten me through some tough times last year and i love learning new things through people’s recs here!!)
it still baffles me that there are people out there who heavily rely on chatgpt, maybe even have fully replaced google, to make the decisions for them. idk which is worse using chatgpt or tiktok as a search engine bc what the actual fuck ?? 😭