Visualiser Career Information
If you love traveling and meeting the best of creative people like musicians, writers and performers the advertising industry is your key to it.
Ready for name, fame and glory - this way please!
What a Visualiser does
Advertising offers very interesting, lucrative and mentally satisfying career options. Before you plan to enter the field you need to know how a typical advertising agency is structured. Generally, the various departments are:
• Client Servicing/Account Management
• Media Planning
• Creative, which includes Copy writers and Visualisers
THE CREATIVE DEPARTMENT - Visualisers
As a visualiser in an agency it's your job to give shape to the creative ideas developed from the client's brief. You will participate in the creative planning process and bring out the idea for an advertisement.
You'll put your ideas or illustrate (in the form of drawings) on paper or on computer and prepare the artwork to be presented first to the agency you are working for and then to the client.
Once the initial artwork is approved, as a visualiser you will have to make the final artwork, get a final nod from the client and give it to the production team. You will act as an integral part of the creative process in the agency.
You will start as a Trainee Artist/Illustrator/Visualiser. Then you can become a Junior Visualiser and thereafter a Senior Visualiser. The next step would be as a Creative Director.
In many agencies, you are just called a creative team member and not a Visualiser.
Job Opportunity
You have very few options to choose from:
• Advertising agencies
• Marketing departments of various large companies
• Creative Consultants
Career Prospects
Do we really have to tell you about the prospects in this industry? As a Visualiser, you must have gauged it by just going through the number of ads appearing on television and newspapers. The need for trained people in the advertising industry is always on the rise. Don't take our word for it - just go through these facts:
The advertising industry has seen unprecedented growth in 1999-2000. It has grown almost at a rate of 25 per cent. This is in spite of the fact that most companies have actually cut down their advertising budget.
Companies in the IT and insurance are investing a lot of money on advertising. Not to mention the traditional spenders like the FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods like soaps, detergents, salt, cooking oils, etc.) sectors.
We now have a new medium - Internet and it's fast gaining popularity.
The growth in the industry has pushed the need for manpower. The industry pundits are also predicting a positive growth in the industry over the next 5 years.
With the growth in the digital medium like multimedia which uses advanced technology to develop communication tools and materials the demand for skilled professionals is on the rise.
Advertising professionals can also move into the marketing department of a corporate house in a mainstream industry. For instance, an Account Executive with 4-5 years of experience can work as a Brand Manager in a FMCG company.
Abilities & Traits Required
- Good (make that wild) imagination and ability to express it in an art form like writing poetry, writing stories, etc.
- Ability to visualise concepts, ideas etc.
- Ability to demonstrate concepts and ideas in the best possible words. You must be able to draw metaphors.
- Keen interest in various art forms like cinema, drama and music
- Interest in politics, religion, philosophy, history, sports, economics, Internet, culture and ethos, nature, human psychology, etc.
- Keep yourself in touch with the latest happenings in the world
- Good communication skills
- Good presentation skills-ability to present ideas and convince your client.
- Flamboyant
- Good observation skills
- Interest in human psychology - you should understand how one behaves in a given situation, how does one feel, how one is likely to behave.
Qualifications
You can graduate in Fine Arts/Commercial Arts and get placed as a trainee, artist or visualiser.
Alternatively, you can also do your graduation in Communication Design/Graphic Design/Animation Design, as there are highly rated by the agencies.
Professionals from the art department of newspapers, publication houses, television company, etc. can also get in to advertising.
Of course, it goes without saying that a visualiser's job is more creative than anything else. So this field is also open to people without any formal training in Arts.
Salary
Artist/trainee: Rs 12000 - 15000 a month in a big agency. In a medium scale agency, you will get about Rs 10000 - 12000 per month and in small agencies Rs 10000 a month.
Junior Visualisers: Rs 20000 - 25000 a month in a big agency. In medium scale agency, about Rs 20000 - 22000 and in a small-scale agency, you will get about Rs 15000 per month.
Senior Visualiser: Rs 30000 - 45000 or more a month in large agencies. In medium scale agencies about Rs 30000 - 40000 a month or more and in a small agency about Rs 30000 to 35000 a month.
Creative Director or Chief gets about Rs 60000 – 100000 or more a month, plus perks in large agencies. The medium scale agency Creative chiefs get about Rs 45000 - 60000 a month. And in small-scale agencies, there is often no such post. If it is there, the salary can be in the range of Rs 35000 - 50000 a month.