In today’s increasingly tech-driven world, creative professionals can naturally give themselves a competitive edge by honing their digital skills. After all, with the sheer variety of design software available on the market today, being able to showcase proficiency in a few will naturally make your CV or freelancer profile stand out to prospective employers.
If you’re wondering what tech skills you should focus on as a creative professional, you’ve come to the right place. Keep reading to learn about the top digital competencies you should hone to thrive in today’s industry landscape.
Photo Editing
Photo editing is at the heart of many job descriptions for creative professionals. Whether you’re designing visuals for a social media campaign or creating a brand logo, knowing how to remove an image background as cleanly as possible or merge different visual elements and touch up existing pictures are all essential foundational skills.
But there are more than even a few ways to edit photos. As mentioned, the wide range of digital design software available on the market today has provided digital designers with more platform options than ever before. Mastering some of these (like those in the Adobe Creative Cloud suite) can take years of learning and experimenting. Whereas others (like Adobe Express) have a learning curve of just a few weeks.
So use your downtime to engage with all the tools available to you. As most graphic design tools possess similar user interfaces, your operational skills on one could potentially transfer to other tools as well. This means if you come across a job description that outlines required proficiency in a tool you’re still learning, you may still have the editing skills needed to perform well in that role thanks to your proficiency with another similar tool.
These days, it’s no longer sufficient to be able to sketch images with paper and pencil. Digital photo editing is an essential foundational skill for all creative professionals. Familiarise yourself with the different platforms available to you to ensure you can add more proficiencies to your industry CV.
Artificial Intelligence
Many professionals are split on the role artificial intelligence should play in creative tasks. Whatever your position on this topical issue, there’s no denying that AI can boost creativity when used in the right way – whether it be by supporting brainstorming processes during topic or concept ideation, by providing prompts for design work, or any of the other many dynamic ways that professionals are utilising AI tools.
ChatGPT is one of the most popular and widely used AI tools in the world. This large language model is being used primarily to write code or craft email responses, but also to draft press releases, produce creative ad copy, and even social media posts and blog posts. Recently, ChatGPT’s developers also introduced the ability to generate images based on users’ prompts.
There are other AI tools available to creative professionals, including Claude, AdCreative.ai and Gemini. Much like you can benefit from engaging with different photo editing and design software, so too can you benefit from building proficiency with multiple different types of AI solutions.
AI’s purpose in the workplace isn’t to take away human ingenuity. Rather, it should be used as a tool to increase the speed at which creative professionals can accomplish their tasks and improve the quality of their output, as well as speed up menial and administrative tasks. Learn how to use it to your advantage, so you can stay ahead of your competitors.
Video Production
Aside from knowing how to design images, creative professionals also have to know how to produce attractive videos, for marketing or PR departments of businesses. Often, creative professionals are required to be able to both edit existing clips into workable videos, and create animated content from scratch. Some of the tools you should familiarise yourself with include Adobe Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro and DaVinci Resolve.
If you’re hunting for jobs in video production, it always helps to have a portfolio to back up your CV. Choose your best work and upload them to an attractive, user-friendly website. By including videos in your portfolio, potential employers can get a better idea of your style and will feel more confident in making the commitment to hire you.
There’s a growing demand for creative video production among modern businesses. By honing this tech skill, you can ensure that you’ll be getting plenty of work both now and in the future.
Digital Communication
As a creative professional, you won’t be working alone. Even if you have the best artistic skills in the world, it will be hard to thrive in an office setting without good communication skills. Today, this necessitates being able to communicate effectively through digital means too.
First, brush up on your email skills. Familiarise yourself with the layouts of various email service providers like Gmail and Outlook, and learn email etiquette. You also need to be comfortable using instant messaging tools like Slack and WhatsApp for more day-to-day interactions.
Whether you’re working in-person or remotely, being able to communicate digitally is key in the modern workplace.
Web Design
A large portion of the work available to creative professionals involves web design. In order to boost your chances of finding employment, it’s vital to know how to build an attractive website, whether for clients, or to market your own services.
While many creative professionals with more traditional skills might not be too familiar with web design, it isn’t too difficult to learn so long as you use the right resources. Of course, the best way to learn any skill is through hands-on experience. If you can find an entry-level role or internship at a company working under a more experienced website designer, you should absolutely jump at the chance. Alternatively, you can also hone your skills through online courses, in-person classes and private tutorials made possible through local initiatives such as The Art of Living Social Project.
Web design is an essential part of many creative professionals’ jobs. To succeed in this line of work, you won’t simply need to know the technical ins and outs of web design: you’ll also need to work closely with other IT professionals responsible for handling the other parts of creating a website. Learning technical jargon and understanding basic coding can help tremendously in this regard.
Reach New Heights as a Digital-Ready Creative
The world is changing. Today, creative professionals need more than artistic talent to succeed: they also need to be proficient at certain digital and tech skills in order to advance their careers.
In this article, we’ve gone over some of the most crucial of these skills. Start learning them today to enhance your chances of finding success as a creative professional.
Author Bio: Ainsley is a digital marketing specialist who currently works as a freelancer. He is a recent graduate of the University of Melbourne’s Master of Publishing and Communication. His professional interests include SEO, branding and social media marketing.
ThePrint BrandStand content is a paid-for, sponsored article. Journalists of ThePrint are not involved in reporting or writing it.