05-17-2014, 05:39 PM
I studied industrial design and I've worked in the industry for approx. 2 years now so I believe I'm qualified to give you some advice and thoughts from my real life experience.
First off you have to understand that industrial design is about mass manufacturing designs, which means that it is important to learn all about materials (plastics, metals, spray coatings, etc), manufacturing processes and new technology, prototyping, sustainability a.k.a life cycle of your product design, basic drafting, and mechanical design. There are more aspects to industrial design, but those are some of the key things you'll have to focus on. Also, the industrial design industry requires designers to know how to use Solidworks as a standard 3D software because all designs you do would have to have precise dimensions and tolerances. Let's just say that industrial design is all about working on the details of every little thing down to the nuts and bolts to use or type of protective coating for the product.
So! if you like to get hands on with making things, industrial design is the way to go.
When I was in ID(industrial design) school, I was only interested in doing concept design and 2D sketching for presentations. I don't regret learning ID in university because the knowledge of "how things work" has helped me a lot with doing concept designs for entertainment design. If I could go back in time though, I might have just pursued entertainment design instead. When you said Visual Arts, I assume you mean entertainment design (concept art/design, visual development).
The great thing about having an ID background is also being able to switch back and forth between the industrial design industry and entertainment design industry. Not all industrial designers are great at sketching concepts so this is where awesome visual communication abilities come in handy to make a portfolio stand out.
As for going to school for visual arts, I believe self-teaching or taking tutorials online (Gnomon or CGMA) is better than going to a university. I recommend that you read an article by Noah Bradley about schools. Google this and you should be able to find the article "Don't go to art school — I. M. H. O. — Medium"
I'm currently self-teaching myself concept art and there are PLENTY of free tutorials online to study from. The key is to be disciplined and this is why I joined this site to get to meet some art buddies to study with.
If you need more info about the industrial design curriculum, pm me and I could give you more information to help you decide which route you'd like to take.
First off you have to understand that industrial design is about mass manufacturing designs, which means that it is important to learn all about materials (plastics, metals, spray coatings, etc), manufacturing processes and new technology, prototyping, sustainability a.k.a life cycle of your product design, basic drafting, and mechanical design. There are more aspects to industrial design, but those are some of the key things you'll have to focus on. Also, the industrial design industry requires designers to know how to use Solidworks as a standard 3D software because all designs you do would have to have precise dimensions and tolerances. Let's just say that industrial design is all about working on the details of every little thing down to the nuts and bolts to use or type of protective coating for the product.
So! if you like to get hands on with making things, industrial design is the way to go.
When I was in ID(industrial design) school, I was only interested in doing concept design and 2D sketching for presentations. I don't regret learning ID in university because the knowledge of "how things work" has helped me a lot with doing concept designs for entertainment design. If I could go back in time though, I might have just pursued entertainment design instead. When you said Visual Arts, I assume you mean entertainment design (concept art/design, visual development).
The great thing about having an ID background is also being able to switch back and forth between the industrial design industry and entertainment design industry. Not all industrial designers are great at sketching concepts so this is where awesome visual communication abilities come in handy to make a portfolio stand out.
As for going to school for visual arts, I believe self-teaching or taking tutorials online (Gnomon or CGMA) is better than going to a university. I recommend that you read an article by Noah Bradley about schools. Google this and you should be able to find the article "Don't go to art school — I. M. H. O. — Medium"
I'm currently self-teaching myself concept art and there are PLENTY of free tutorials online to study from. The key is to be disciplined and this is why I joined this site to get to meet some art buddies to study with.
If you need more info about the industrial design curriculum, pm me and I could give you more information to help you decide which route you'd like to take.