Welcome to Gaia! ::

Okay, well I'm from Perth, Australia. Its hot, and dry, and... fairly isolated. The city is fairly big for Australian standards (being one of the main cities), but still small enough to have lots of those little 'heyyyyy i know you from somethingsomethingelse' coincidences all the time.

In general, job prospects for graphic designers, web designers, and other jobs like at are not too good. There just isn't a huge demand to do big cool stuff here in Perth, so there are less sucessful designers, and a lot of unemployment for those who don't have the talent or luck to find a job.

Everyone around here seems to have the mentality that web design (which is what I want to do) is easy, as if there is some kind of 'create web page' button that we can press, and make a perfect webpage magically appear. Of course this isn't the case, but clients seem to have trouble understanding why oh why they have to pay sooo much per hour, when all we do is press a little button on our l33t software.

So because of the general lack of respect, and all these 'webpages for dummies' books making people think that they can just make their own site, if they could be bothered, web designers in Perth are generally undervalued, and totally underpaid. It sucks sad

I'm planning to move to the other side of Australia eventually, where things are slightly better. I'd rather not move out of Australia, because I really do love it here, isolation and all heart

I think it is a general misconception that its easy to be creative. Anyone seen the Staples commercial with the EASY button? A coworker of mine stenciled "easy" onto one of those lights you push to turn on, and it looks just like it. That would be nice...

Yeah, it did take me awhile to find a good one, but I love the job I have. I have a couple complaints, refer to my thread about that....

Boise is the capitol of Idaho, and its the biggest city, around 200,000. There are A LOT of those small-world occurences... like how my coworker's brother bought my parent's van when they sold it about a month or two ago. razz ! I like it here, there isn't too much traffic or craziness, but its definly getting bigger. We do have this darn inversion during the winter that makes it all foggy... Hizzahn is in Caldwell, which is about 30 miles from Boise, and is just plain yucky sometimes.

Check it out, check it out, check it out, check it out... here are some pretty pictures and cool facts. My friend Jeff has taken some great pics too, I'll post the link to his site when it goes live.
Boise!

sweatdrop wow, I never realized how good I have it sweatdrop

I live in MD, USA ^__^ heart it's.. green here, lots of gree because we have both decidious (oak, maple, etc..) and Evergreen trees all over the place... hm.. it's kinda hilly, but no huge mountains... the mountains in western maryland are in the "getting flat" stage ^__^ heart temperature ranges from about 10 Degrees F to about 110 Degrees F (if you want meteric... er.. I have to look it up or call my friend who knows the conversion rates.. she thinks americans are silly for using the English system still...)

Lets see I live between Washington DC (U.S. Capitol) and Baltiomore (a city based on a large shipping port). The Baltimore area has better pay for web designers than the U.S. national average, so I guess I am pretty well off ^_^ heart Also, since DC is the capitol there are tond of large, important copanies, that are more than willing to pay professionals... I just have to find a company to work for.. (my mom keeps saying "go get a job" but I have alot of school work when classes start up and I have never had a normal teenage job at a store.. I have only worked at the advertising agency... something tells me there is a huge diff.)

however, the webpage for dummies books are crazy popular here too... the library is chock full of 'em.. close to 100.. not a sing book on PHP though stare you would think they could at least have one.... *sigh* I'l have to go get them from the library at school when the spring symester starts... I'm supposed to be book shopping for school books right now... *sign* why does a stack of paper with letter on it cost so much?!?!

By the way, Chisa, have you ever thought about offering web design and/or graphic design.. through the web? like you could design for people here in the states or in europe or wherever they speak something you can understand ^___^ that way, you aren't forced to only work for the people near you who don't see your value.

Hizzahn - I'm in my last year of university now, so too late to go study in America sad That is a seriously sweet deal though. I would love to redo my university's site, its a horrible tangled mess where no one can find anything xp

Raine - sounds great for creative people where you live xd Sounds like a nice place too. There are only a few computer books in my library, but if you want to buy them, they're all sooooooo expensive xp

Oh and you're so lucky to have a job at an advertising agency as a teenager! I started from Hungry Jacks (Hungry Jacks = Burger King in the US), now working in $2 Shop, and just got some contract work at a web and graphic design company (hooray!).

I hail from the Mighty NorthWest, NW Washington State, to be exact from a tiny little town called Sumas. There I grew up as an innocent child living the life working on farms and going to my HS where I never had to work very hard to get A's. This of course left me lots of time to take independent study courses where I chose to teach myself C++, HTML, DHTML when it was big, javaScript, etc... In highschool I made pages for local companies when the web was young and you didn't need sites. Then I moved to Caldwell and just finished up my CS Minor. Here around Boise the job market doesn't seem all that super great for web design but I havn't looked terribly hard yet either. I think eventually I will be moving on to some other small town b/c I really enjoy that kind of life. The ideal place is where I can work on my cars, do my job whatever that ends up being, and just kickin it with friends.

I live in north-eastern US (Massachusetts, to be exact). The city I live in is rather small and unkown to most, but it's about one hour's drive from Boston.

Since it's rather small, I don't think there are many job opportunities for graphic designers around. I know because I haven't really tried looking. sweatdrop Kinda hard to get a job while still in high school with no training. There aren't very many courses available either; what they have at the high school I've pretty much already learned on my own.

I'm not sure on the attitudes about graphic designers either; all I do know is, within the school, the students in the trade courses are seen as "too stupid for regular academics."

As for moving, I think I'd like to go to a big city, either still within the US or outside. I'd be moving more for personal reasons than job opportunities though; I just happen to like big cities more than small ones. sweatdrop

I'm originally from Denver, Colorado, USA, which is a city on the plains in front of the rocky mountains... Very warm and sunny there, around 330 days of sunshine in the year. Even in winter, we get 50-60 degree temperatures. However, now I am in Laramie, Wyoming, USA. It's somewhat north-west of Denver. It's even drier and less vegetated than Denver, if that's possible, and it's COLD. Constant 10-20 MPH winds, and a lower base temperature than Denver to boot. I'm attending the University of Wyoming in Laramie, undecided on my major. I'm a meddler in Photoshop, and I use Terragen, MojoWorld, and Bryce to create CG landscape renderings. People here think that my art is "cool" and compliment me on it, but they really don't appreciate the uses of design as applied to most things in life. They're perfectly content with stock clipart and little curlicued borders. *cries*