Graphic design is a trendy career right now. Anyone with a creative mind and an eye for detail could become a great graphic designer after much-needed training and classes. The good thing is that there are multiple free courses available online. What is great about this is that anyone can take the courses. A person with a regular job could enroll and take the classes whenever they have time. For a small fee (and possibly a test or assessment), the course could provide a certificate of completion.
Image by Hugo Hercer from Pixabay
Here are a few online courses for graphic design:
Free Courses on Graphic Design Fundamentals
Any novice designer needs to learn the fundamentals before being actually promoted to the next level of learning. It is in the small things that unsolvable problems usually arise. Without the proper design foundation, any beginner designer could easily overlook minor issues and only resolve them when they are too big to handle. Here are a few websites online that provide courses on Graphic Design Fundamentals:
Udemy
One of the first lessons to visit should be learning about different graphic design software. There are introductions to Photoshop, InDesign, and even Illustrator. Through learning what tools are available, a designer could easily steer the direction of his training. The website also has lessons on how to transform an idea into a working model or product. This is also an important fundamental any beginner should learn about.
Coursera
What is great about Coursera is that there are resources that come from famous universities and design schools. These courses are provided for students, or any potential student young and old, anywhere in the world. What is even greater about this is that these courses are offered for free. A simple registration is required and anyone from anywhere in the world could have the chance to be a graphic designer.
Shaw Academy
This online resource provides opportunities for both web design and graphic design. On top of that, they also provide courses for design budgeting and management. When gearing towards a career in graphic design it is important to know all the nitty-gritties including the soft skills required for it. Shaw academy is a great resource for all-around graphic design learning.
Adobe Photoshop Free Courses
For those who want to learn specific languages or design tools, there are multiple resources available online as well. Here are a few courses focusing mainly on Adobe Photoshop:
Tuts+
This website is the best option for anyone wanting to learn Adobe Photoshop with a certificate. There are how-to tutorials, courses, ebooks, and even guides available. Tuts Plus offers action-specific tutorials like step-by-step procedures on how to create textures, overlays, grains, and more. The website also prvodides a syllabus type of learning where the progression of the course starts from introduction to master-level skills.
Free Illustrator Tutorials
Skillshare
What sets Skillshare apart from the rest of the websites is that they offer workshops that are perfectly curated with both feedback and support. This way, a learner would be able to know which parts they need to improve on and how. There are also hands-on projects available for learning and practice. Some resources are provided for a fee, especially for master-level skills and lessons.
Cinema 4D Tutorials With Certificates
This software is more commonly used by film makers and ad-creators. However, any graphic designer should be flexible to create projects for a variety of uses. The Plural Is Right and Coursesity websites are both very popular resources for learning Cinema 4D. They provide custom-curated learning paths to help individuals create a learning end goal (and necessary steps to attain them).
Online University Courses
There are also free online university courses available for those who want to take a more professional approach to learning graphic design.
Sessions College
Also an online resource, this institute is well-known for providing professional certificate training for graphic design. The students are expected to learn Photoshop, InDesign, and Illustrator at the end of the program. All activities are hands-on and are screened by actual teachers. The students would be taught how to design logos, posters, magazines, and images. They also offer a flexible and self-paced program where the students could download the lessons and learn in their free time. There are two levels of learning all spanning nine months of studying time. Each course could be between 30 to 60 hours.
ADMEC Multimedia Institute
This is one of the most popular online graphic design institute on the internet. One of their major selling points would be the fact that the faculty is made up of trained experts willing to share their knowledge to the students. On top of this, their curriculum is mostly focused on an individual approach where one teacher handles only less than 10 students. The institute will help the student create portfolios for future potential clients. There are also offers of industry internships and job placements.
