Industrial Designer
Industrial designers integrate functional art with engineering towards the goal of manufacturing products that better humanity. Depending on how one looks at working in a single career for many years it can be interesting and rewarding work. An example might be car commercials where you see several colleagues molding clay forms of products that constantly change according to consumer’s behavior. Experts tend to agree that the need for industrial designers is expected to remain strong in the near future as technology continues to change and improve. An example of this might be one of several products where features are becoming more and more customized towards what the consumer wants in a product. All of these options need to be designed with ergonomics, efficiency of cost and other parameters and visual appeal in mind. The background and interests of an industrial designer involves some measure of an artistic talent and an engineering, or problem solving, mindset. This position really blends two fields into one for the goal of designing high quality products that function and are pleasing to look at.
How To Become An Industrial Designer
If one is seriously interested in becoming an industrial designer there are a lot of points to remember during your path towards this unique career. Try to take as many art and design classes as you can and try to excel. Not only do technological advances in computers affect art but the materials used in modern art are also in a constant state of change and continually improve. Try practicing your creative streaks in class and at home or during the summer and don’t be afraid to take on a long-term project that takes more than a day or week to complete.
One of the most important, if not most important skill for modern industrial designers is the ability to use computer aided drafting (CAD) software programs and use them extremely well. They are practically the lifeblood of the industry and this is how industrial designers design and communicate with their colleagues and even other engineers and staff. Most high schools offer some type of CAD classes and some middle schools might even offer them.Offer build stages and prop sets for plays, signage for the school or help design a backdrop for any televised school news network. These are just some ideas and just asking friends and school administration might get the ball rolling in the right direction.
Be Competitive, Get an Education
To be competitive in today’s industrial design industry it is probably best to have higher education related to the field and this means obtaining a college degree. Most colleges have design departments or even colleges of design. Make sure to talk to your advisor about all of the details and if you know you want to specialize in a certain area of industrial design. There might even be some online courses you could enroll in or even take classes from an online college. Make sure these credits transfer if you want to enroll in a different school in the future to become an industrial designer. Some measure of online coursework is becoming more and more popular.
