Key Software That Graphic Designers Use

By AALofts Design

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By AALofts Design

If you have the right eye for visual aesthetics, you should consider becoming a graphic designer. Graphic Designers need to think creatively, come up with original concepts, & work well as part of a team.

Graphic designers also have to be skilled in using technology on top of the required creativity. Most graphic design schools have specialized courses designed to help students develop proficiency in Adobe CC which is currently the industry-leading graphic design software.

Read on to find out the key software programs that graphic designers use.

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indesign greeting page aalofts design

One | Adobe InDesign.

InDesign is one of the essential programs for graphic designers to know inside & out. InDesign is a program created by Adobe (the same people who make Photoshop). It’s designed to handle large projects like books or magazines, but designers use it for creating & editing all kinds of visual materials.

InDesign doesn’t embed images; rather, it links them. This makes the working file much smaller & therefore, your computer doesn’t have to work as hard.

InDesign permits character & paragraph styles, meaning you can quickly format your text to all look the same. It may not seem like a big deal, but when you’re working on a 90-page document, it can save hours.

InDesign also permits master pages. Essentially, a master page is something that tells all of the other pages what to do. You can put an automatic page number on your master page, & the pages will auto-populate numbers. Again, saving hours, rather than manually inputting.

photoshop greeting page aalofts design

Two | Adobe Photoshop.

Adobe Photoshop is software that is widely used for raster image editing, graphic design & digital art.

It was created by brothers Thomas & John Knoll in 1988. In 1989, John sold the program to Adobe Systems, which marketed it as “Photoshop.” Since then, the program has become the de facto industry standard for raster graphics editing.

It uses layering to allow for depth & flexibility in the design & editing process & provide powerful editing tools capable of just about anything when combined. It contains many features for photos, such as cropping, editing, colour-correcting, & re-sizing.

Designers can also create & edit graphics in Photoshop. Unlike the simple editing features on your smartphone’s camera, Photoshop is a professional-level program for high-quality productions.

illustrator greeting page aalofts design

Three | Adobe Illustrator.

This program is a sister program for Adobe Photoshop. While Photoshop is the go-to for photo editing, Illustrator is the software for creating vector images. These high-quality images can be scaled up or down without losing quality.

Illustrator was initially released in 1987, & it continues to be updated at regular intervals & is now included as part of the Adobe Creative Cloud.

Illustrator is widely used by graphic designers, web designers, visual artists, & professional illustrators throughout the world to create high-quality artwork. Illustrator includes many sophisticated drawing tools that can reduce the time need to produce illustrations.

Illustrator is commonly used for designing logos, charts, diagrams, illustrations, or graphs. Creating these illustrations requires understanding concepts like paths, groups, layers, text, colour, & effects.

Illustrator is included with Adobe Creative Cloud subscriptions but can also be licensed independently. Because it is part of the Creative Cloud artwork from Illustrator can be shared with other Adobe Creative Cloud applications including After Effects, InDesign, Photoshop & Premiere Pro.

Code Javascript and Programming

Four | HTML, CSS, & Javascript.

Understanding HTML, CSS, & Javascript can be an essential skill for Graphic Designers. These are the programming languages that are behind web content. Knowing how to code in these three languages allows you to manipulate images, modify the type, & work with animations.

If the notion of coding scares you, don’t worry, there are many tools like Macow & Webflow that help you design web content without fully coding.

Microsoft Powerpoint and Office 365 on Laptop

Five | PowerPoint.

While Adobe CC is the cornerstone for Graphic Designers, it is also essential to be skilled at PowerPoint since many corporations & small businesses use it. As a Graphic Designer, you may be called on to help a co-worker with their PowerPoint deck, to make it look more professional & align it with its branding.

PowerPoint presentation, more popularly known as PPT, is software developed by Microsoft. PowerPoint is included in standard MS Office suites with other software. It is a collection of slides containing text, image, video, audio clips, & many other cool tools.

Tools present in PowerPoint presentation does not require any technical knowledge. It uses the basic algorithm of drag & drop. PowerPoint presentation is a widely used software because of its ease of use.

If you are working in a team, you can easily save your PPT in drive & share it with your teammates to work on it together.

SketchUp Software Greeting Page

Six | Video & Animation Tools.

Multimedia production seems to be getting more & more sophisticated every day. Being comfortable with video & animation tools can help to make you a more versatile Graphic Designer.

In this age of rapidly improving technology, there are always new tools to help Graphic Designers stay on the cutting edge of design. There are plenty of free & paid animation makers on the market, & deciding on the best one for you can be a challenging task at hand. I’m going to name the best below:

3Ds Max (Autodesk) has been – & still is – impressively ubiquitous in all 3D markets & is arguably still the king of the competition. There’s almost nothing it can’t do that any other software on the market can accomplish.

Maya (Autodesk) Autodesk acquired Maya in 2005. It depends on what person or studio you talk to, but the consensus is that Maya is friendlier to animators’ specific needs than 3ds Max is. However, they’re both still exceptional programs that everyone should consider.

Cinema 4D (Maxon) It may not be as rampant in the 3D gaming industry. Still, it’s seen an abundance of use in the film industry for dozens of high budget box office hits, & because its popularity is newer, by comparison, knowing it might give your career an edge as its demand rises.

Blender is the free & open-source 3D creation suite. It supports the entirety of the 3D pipeline—modelling, rigging, animation, simulation, rendering, compositing & motion tracking, even video editing & game creation. 

Seven | Microsoft Office Applications.

While professional graphic design work should never be created in Microsoft Word, it never hurts to be skilled in Microsoft Office applications, such as Word & Excel. Depending on where you work, team members may come running to you whenever they have layout problems in their documents.

It’s a good idea to be able to help out. There is currently Microsoft Office 365, a subscription service to allow Office applications & Microsoft 365, a subscription service offered to enterprises that include Office 365 & Windows 10 Enterprise.

Which specific Office applications are included in the subscription depends on the type of subscription. Each subscription plan provides a different set of services, including OneDrive, SharePoint, Teams, Exchange, & Skype.

If you’re interested in further reading, please see the links to my trusted resources page & related articles below. To find out more about AALofts Design, please click here. If you found this content helpful, want to collaborate on a project, or would like to request an article topic, please click here to get in touch via the contact form. Feel free to share & connect on social media, if you found this content helpful.

Article by Amy Lofts.

Article by Amy Lofts.

Owner of AALofts Design

Welcome! I am a graphic designer & digital marketer with over ten years of experience within a range of industries including; e-commerce, architecture, cruise liners, textiles & interior design. Having grown with exposure to various disciplines of art & design, my brand reflects my love of elegance, beauty & exploration. Get in touch or learn more.

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