What is Web Design?

Web design surrounds many different skills and disciplines in the development and maintenance of websites. The different areas of web design are web graphic design, interface design, UX design, SEO, etc. Individuals usually work in teams covering different aspects of the design process, although some designers will cover them all.

What is Graphic Design?

Graphic design is the process of problem solving and visual communication with the use of typography, illustration and photography. The field is considered a subset of visual communication and communication design, however sometimes the word “graphic design” is used synonymously.

Graphic designers create and combine symbols, images and text to create a visual representation of ideas and messages. To create visual composition, they make use of typography, visual arts and page layout techniques.

Differences between Web design and Graphic design

1. Visual elements

Colors

The color that graphic design and web design uses are completely different. Due to rely on printing, graphic design typically uses CMYK color mode. Because the color that is used on graphic design focuses more on visual impact and flow guidance. While web design uses RGB depending on its special imaging mode and it focuses more on teasing out the relationship between the information structure. Because too much strong colors on the website may cause visual fatigue to website visitors.

Fonts

Typically, in the design process, choosing font is more freely in graphic design because it’s not important to worry about the implementation of the final effect. All the font/text will eventually output for the graphics printing. While in the web design, you need to consider more comprehensive. It only has a small scope of choice, in order to avoid the pressure on the server by the output. Due to the characteristics of HTML, all fonts are based on the default font of user’s operating system. With the development of technology, this gap gradually narrowed. The recent API based on HTML5 can achieve the use of personalized fonts without the need of output for graphics. That greatly enhances the user experience while without the risk of increasing the back-end pressure at the same time.

Graphics

When it comes to graphics, graphic design has more performances than the web design, especially for the product websites. The modular design makes the idea become more clear, same on the visual performance. Also, graphic design doesn’t need to take the final effect into account. In terms of the size of the unit that is used in the design, the graphic design uses the concept of physical sizes, like inches, centimeters, millimeters, etc., while in web design it uses pixels.

2. Presentation methods

3. Information carrier

4. Browse mode

The browse mode in graphic design is in a progressive way, the overall process can’t be presented in series. While on web design, it has scroll bar and buttons to support the scroll down and up, and the link jumps to browse more information. With the same information structure, web pages users have more choices on the information than the graphic users. On the contrary, the advantage of graphic design presents on the picture-oriented book.

5. Information spreading

Graphic design is a traditional information media design, it typically spreads through posting, sales, mail delivery and other forms of communication. This kind of spread is only appropriate for a small range with high cost. The web design information spreading ability is stronger than the graphic design but it rely on the support of the third-party media. When it comes to audience, the graphic design can be accepted by different ages. While the website is not suitable for all ages. By the continuous popularity of network information in the future and the continuous improvement of the terminal media user experience, the online information can be accessed and accepted by many people.