Why Creatives Make the Best Progammers

By / March 16, 2009 /

Now before you blast us for the title of this piece, let us quickly qualify that statement by saying that if you have a knack for creative expression, were born with an eye for layout, color, and design… AND go through the diligence of learning the proper techniques to effectively build a functional and scalable piece of software, then you will be a better programmer than someone who doesn’t make the most of the right hemisphere of their brain.

You may never possess the hardcore programming prowess of some of the geeky computer science gurus, but having the ability to effectively develop a functional interface, with an eye for creative may be more valuable than you think.

The issue most non-creative developers suffer from is the inability to see the exact vision of the design team. Paying little attention to the fact that the designer moved that image 1 pixel to the left for a very specific reason. This can lead to hours of frustrating babysitting for the design team or creative director, going through every detail with the programming team, simply trying to get the final product to look like the approved comp.

The other leg up a programmer with a design background will have is the ability to create their own assets on the fly, in-line with the creative language of the project. Why trouble the design team with a bunch of requests for button skins, image frames, or other little assets that you should be able to create yourself?

We know that during these uncertain times, many designers and art directors are looking for ways to better leverage themselves as in-demand resources in a fiercely competitive marketplace.

As many firms and entities shift from traditional marketing such as print and outdoor, to more popular online trends such as blogging, micro-sites, Facebook applications, and even iPhone apps, it’s no secret that digital and online is the place to be right now.

From what we’ve seen (and from what we have heard from a few of our contacts in town), those who have been able to harness the ability to not only design, but also develop a software-based application are thriving these days.

We’re not promising it’s going to be easy, in fact, we’re certain it won’t be. But if you’re willing to put in the late nights, work hard and stick with it, there’s no reason you can’t become the next Bo Jackson of the design and development world.

Here are a few recommendations for those looking to make the shift:

While you can develop a website with HTML exclusively, it’s a very clunky and non-scalable approach. In order to truly be an effective web developer, you unfortunately need to be somewhat savvy in at least a few areas. The basics include HTML, CSS and JavaScript.

From there, if you want to take it to the next level, you might take on PHP or NET. Both are technologies designed to allow you to build dynamic websites, based on database content. But while the power of server-side development is great, you will also need to take on database technologies, such as MySQL.

So, as you can see, the more effective you want to be, the more you have to learn about a slew of various technologies. It can be daunting, we know. But do remember, the more challenging something is to excel at, the fewer people you will have to contend with in the open market. And don’t forget, you will have the eye for design to give you that edge over the rest.

If all these acronyms have turned you off to the whole thing, you might consider taking on Adobe Flash development.

Flash is a much more consolidated web development platform, and chances are, many of you may have cracked open Flash for basic animations already.

From a designer’s perspective, Flash is advantageous, as it functions with the creative in mind. Think of it basically as Adobe Illustrator, but with interactivity.

And while its certainly not something you can always bank on, you will find that Flash-based websites can more often get away without being connected to any server-side technologies and databases, and style sheets, etc.

Basically what we’re saying is that Flash can more easily stand alone than HTML, and it’s much easier to control the design elements than HTML. Once you get the hang of Flash, and maybe even some ActionScript (Flash’s native programming language), you will start to find ways to get even more tricky via XML, PHP, .NET, etc.

Beyond websites, Flash can also be used for self-contained components such as banners, image slide shows, or other compelling animated graphics.

If any of this sounds like something for you, buy some highly rated books on Amazon to help get you started, or try to find an instructed course locally (although this can be expensive, and may be less effective than just starting to tinker on your own.)

Best of luck out there.