Graphic Artist

Definition

Graphic Artist

the role that is played when a person creates or obtains graphic artwork for the user interfaces of one or more related systems or applications

Classification

As illustrated in the preceding figure, Graphic Artist is part of the following inheritance hierarchy:

• Type: Concrete
• Superclass: Content Producer
• Subclasses:
  • None

Responsibilities

The typical role-specific responsibilities of a Graphic Artist are to:

• Elicit graphic artwork needs (e.g., content, size, and partitioning) from their respective users:
  • Marketing Organization.
  • Deployment Team.
  • Digital Branding Team.
  • Hardware Development Team.
  • Training Team.
  • Customer Representative.
  • GUI Designer.
• Obtain existing reusable graphic artwork (e.g., from the marketing organization or a vendor over the Web).
• Create new graphic artwork:
  • User-Interface software components:
    • Website content such as photographs, computer graphics, scanned physical artwork, and digital (GIF) animations.
    • Brand logos and tag-line fonts for digital branding.
    • Backgrounds.
    • Icons (e.g., buttons and horizontal rules).
    • Fancy text as artwork (e.g., as opposed to using simple HTML text).
  • Digital brand identity.
  • Shrink-rapped product packaging.
  • User-oriented documentation (e.g., user manuals or operation manuals).
  • Job aids (e.g., posters, keyboard covers).
  • Training materials.
• Digitize any physical artwork (e.g., with a high-quality color scanner).
• Format this new graphic content for graphic size (height and width).
• Verify the graphics with their respective users.
• Archive these original artworks including sources, prices, copyrights, etc.
• Optimize the formatted digital graphic artwork for file size and transmission speed by:
  • Selecting the MIME type (e.g., GIF, JPEG).
  • Determining the size of the color table.
  • Setting the JPEG resolution.
• If necessary, partition the optimized graphic artwork into smaller images to properly fit into the correct cells of any webpage formatting tables (e.g., to create the illusion of a single, seamless, impressive background).
• Provide the optimized and partitioned graphic files to their respective users.

Graphic Artist typically inherits the general role responsibilities from the Role method component.

Personal Profile

To fulfill these responsibilities, a Graphic Artist typically should have the following personal characteristics, expertise, training, and experience:

Personal Characteristics

A Graphic Artist should typically have the following personal characteristics:

• TBD

Expertise

A Graphic Artist typically should have the following expertise:

• An indepth knowledge of content requirements and sources.
• An indepth knowledge of the customer’s products and services.
• Experience using multimedia tools.
• A bachelor’s degree in graphic arts, marketing, sales, public relations, or the equivalent.

Tasks

Graphic artists typically perform the following role-specific tasks in an iterative, incremental, parallel, and time-boxed manner:

• Content Management:
  • Content Creation (graphics)
• Digital Branding:
  • Digital Brand Production (brand identity)
• Training:
  • Training Materials Production (graphics)

Graphic artists typically inherit common role tasks from the role method component.

Teams

Graphic artists typically perform these tasks as members of the following teams:

• Content Management Team.
• Digital Branding Team.
• Training Team.

Work Products

As members of these teams, graphic artists typically produce all or part of the following work products:

• Content Management Set:
  • Content Management Plan
  • Data Components (Graphic Files containing graphic content)
• Digital Branding Set:
  • Digital Brand Board
  • Digital Brand Prototypes
  • Digital Brand Description Document (brand identity)
• Training Set:
  • Training Materials (graphics)

Guidelines

• Content need not be created from scratch. It may also come from a content producing system or a legacy content source.
• This role is unnecessary if content management is not a requirement (e.g., there is no human interface or the human interface does not contain human produced content).
• This role typically inherits the common team guidelines from the roles method component.