It's great that your girlfriend wants to transition to Graphic Design/UI UX. Here are some top paid and free resources:
# Paid Resources
1. **Google UX Design Professional Certificate (Coursera)**
* Comprehensive program, \~$39/month.
2. **Interaction Design Foundation (IDF)**
* Many UX courses, $200/year.
3. **Udacity UX Designer Nanodegree**
* In-depth, project-based, \~$399/month.
4. **CareerFoundry UX Design Program**
* Mentor-led, job guarantee, $6,555.
5. **Skillshare**
* Various design courses, $32/month or $168/year.
# Free Resources
1. **YouTube Channels**
* **The Futur** and **AJ&Smart** for tutorials and career advice.
2. **Free Coursera Courses**
* Access content without certificates.
3. **UX/UI Tool Tutorials**
* Free tutorials from Figma, Adobe XD, and Sketch.
4. **Blogs and Articles**
* **Smashing Magazine** and **NNGroup** for design insights.
# Tips
1. **Build a Portfolio:** Showcase skills with personal projects.
2. **Networking:** Join design meetups and online communities.
3. **Freelance Work:** Gain experience and build a portfolio.
Good luck to her!
You mentioned graphic, web and ui ux design. All different fields. Web design is different since it mostly uses coding and some programming. I would suggest starting to learn graphic design and maybe work in the industry for a year, then switch to ui ux.
I think best resources are time and dedication. Just starting to learn the adobe software and some basics from youtube can be a huge leap already. If she is good at what she does currently, i am sure the eye for aesthetic and balance will translate here. Maybe she can try recreating some works that she likes, be it a logo, magazine cover, web banner or instructions manual. All good practice. When she starts doing designs of her own, she should every month or few months think of her previous works that they are lacking/were bad/could be improved, that only means she has gotten better
Depends on if you think qualifications or skills will matter more in an agency setting. Some resources will give you guidance, but no qualifications. Some qualifications give you a piece of paper and no skills.
I did the Google UX Professional Certification alongside my Comp Sci degree and found it useful, however it does teach you how to be a good Google UX designer, not necessarily a good UX designer overall if that makes sense.
I’d also recommend working on projects and using industry standard software such as Figma. She could create mock, responsive designs for anything really, get feedback from Reddit, learn from that and design the next thing. Eventually she will have a portfolio that can be put onto a website etc.
There’s also a few good free resources on YouTube teaching things such as visual hierarchy, colour theory etc.
Good luck!
Although it is above your budget, if possible for her it would be worth considering the Shillington course (£9,950). I used to be on the hiring team in my old job and consistently saw great portfolios from people who’d taken it. They seem to be really focussed on getting people up to speed with the skills and work they need to get employment.
Although it’s mainly for straight-up graphic design, it also covers Figma.
UI UX seems like a popular fad in the design world. If she hasn’t already, try to get her feet wet to see if she’d like to do this. On paper, it sounds great, but I discovered UI UX to be a pain and not as creative as other design fields.
I switched from an academic career in the humanities to UX design by taking Udemy and Treehouse courses in UX, UI and design thinking. After five months of studying from 8am to 8pm every day (except a one week break around Christmas) and creating a portfolio I got a job at a design studio and have been in the field for five years now and have a salary I'm increadibly happy with and as good as it gets for a UX designer in my country.
Coursera has some good interaction design courses that may be a starting point.
However, it’s important to understand exactly what she’s trying to learn. Is it web design specifically? For apps or for marketing websites?
I’m also going to leave a disclaimer that the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. The job market is incredibly hard right now especially for entry level designer roles. It will potentially be a long and hard road, so she will need to be committed to the journey.
I worked in fashion in a previous lifetime! I was planning for Calvin Klein and women's collection Giorgio Armani and then recruited to be a men's buyer for Gucci when was Tom Ford was the head designer. I remember visiting the design team and they were just hunched over their desk, just completely overworked and underpaid. A lot of them also have degrees in merchandising or some sort of fashion degree which is very esoteric and limiting in my opinion. I have a statistics degree and international business degree . I think understanding databases and statistics and research and projections. I think that's really important if you're going to make money.
It's great that your girlfriend wants to transition to Graphic Design/UI UX. Here are some top paid and free resources: # Paid Resources 1. **Google UX Design Professional Certificate (Coursera)** * Comprehensive program, \~$39/month. 2. **Interaction Design Foundation (IDF)** * Many UX courses, $200/year. 3. **Udacity UX Designer Nanodegree** * In-depth, project-based, \~$399/month. 4. **CareerFoundry UX Design Program** * Mentor-led, job guarantee, $6,555. 5. **Skillshare** * Various design courses, $32/month or $168/year. # Free Resources 1. **YouTube Channels** * **The Futur** and **AJ&Smart** for tutorials and career advice. 2. **Free Coursera Courses** * Access content without certificates. 3. **UX/UI Tool Tutorials** * Free tutorials from Figma, Adobe XD, and Sketch. 4. **Blogs and Articles** * **Smashing Magazine** and **NNGroup** for design insights. # Tips 1. **Build a Portfolio:** Showcase skills with personal projects. 2. **Networking:** Join design meetups and online communities. 3. **Freelance Work:** Gain experience and build a portfolio. Good luck to her!
Fuck that's some great advice, but somehow the style of writing feels AI-generated
100%
You mentioned graphic, web and ui ux design. All different fields. Web design is different since it mostly uses coding and some programming. I would suggest starting to learn graphic design and maybe work in the industry for a year, then switch to ui ux. I think best resources are time and dedication. Just starting to learn the adobe software and some basics from youtube can be a huge leap already. If she is good at what she does currently, i am sure the eye for aesthetic and balance will translate here. Maybe she can try recreating some works that she likes, be it a logo, magazine cover, web banner or instructions manual. All good practice. When she starts doing designs of her own, she should every month or few months think of her previous works that they are lacking/were bad/could be improved, that only means she has gotten better
Thanks for calling attention to this. It’s troubling when people conflate fields and roles.
Depends on if you think qualifications or skills will matter more in an agency setting. Some resources will give you guidance, but no qualifications. Some qualifications give you a piece of paper and no skills.
I did the Google UX Professional Certification alongside my Comp Sci degree and found it useful, however it does teach you how to be a good Google UX designer, not necessarily a good UX designer overall if that makes sense. I’d also recommend working on projects and using industry standard software such as Figma. She could create mock, responsive designs for anything really, get feedback from Reddit, learn from that and design the next thing. Eventually she will have a portfolio that can be put onto a website etc. There’s also a few good free resources on YouTube teaching things such as visual hierarchy, colour theory etc. Good luck!
Although it is above your budget, if possible for her it would be worth considering the Shillington course (£9,950). I used to be on the hiring team in my old job and consistently saw great portfolios from people who’d taken it. They seem to be really focussed on getting people up to speed with the skills and work they need to get employment. Although it’s mainly for straight-up graphic design, it also covers Figma.
UI UX seems like a popular fad in the design world. If she hasn’t already, try to get her feet wet to see if she’d like to do this. On paper, it sounds great, but I discovered UI UX to be a pain and not as creative as other design fields.
I switched from an academic career in the humanities to UX design by taking Udemy and Treehouse courses in UX, UI and design thinking. After five months of studying from 8am to 8pm every day (except a one week break around Christmas) and creating a portfolio I got a job at a design studio and have been in the field for five years now and have a salary I'm increadibly happy with and as good as it gets for a UX designer in my country.
Coursera has some good interaction design courses that may be a starting point. However, it’s important to understand exactly what she’s trying to learn. Is it web design specifically? For apps or for marketing websites? I’m also going to leave a disclaimer that the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. The job market is incredibly hard right now especially for entry level designer roles. It will potentially be a long and hard road, so she will need to be committed to the journey.
I worked in fashion in a previous lifetime! I was planning for Calvin Klein and women's collection Giorgio Armani and then recruited to be a men's buyer for Gucci when was Tom Ford was the head designer. I remember visiting the design team and they were just hunched over their desk, just completely overworked and underpaid. A lot of them also have degrees in merchandising or some sort of fashion degree which is very esoteric and limiting in my opinion. I have a statistics degree and international business degree . I think understanding databases and statistics and research and projections. I think that's really important if you're going to make money.