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A company called Sapient just bought Studio Archetype (Clement Mok) for US$19m. Sapient is a "systems integrator," - which is a fancy way of saying it does IT (Information Technology) consulting and implementation work. It also sells "business consulting services," which many IT consulting firms sell nowadays as a precursor to doing the IT bit.

Sapient's rationale for the acquisition is to create a "one-stop shop - business strategy, marketing/branding, content design, and technical integration services." Interestingly, both techie groups characterise the mergers as complementing technical skills with marketing savvy.

The other recent significant acquisition/merger of this type was between USWeb and CKS, which gave rise to a beast called Reinvent, with about 1,800 employees. As with Sapient, they are also aiming to create a one-stop shop, but on a scale not seen before. The way USWeb grew to be so large was by acquiring about 30 small-medium sized (i.e. US$2-3m average turnover) web developer businesses over the last 2.5 years.

First point

For those of you thinking about an exit strategy, here is an option! Start making friends with some large system integrators and talk up a storm about the importance of high quality website architecture and interface design. Bear in mind, though, that in both cases mentioned, the creative principals not only decided to stay around, they have both assumed "Creative Director" positions in the resulting larger companies. Therefore it is not exactly a true exit strategy, but rather a merger with a really big "welcome to the family" financial incentive [oh that we were all made to feel that "welcome"!]

Working from the Studio Archetype figures, an internet design studio is worth roughly double the turnover. A thought-provoking point for anyone asking that question of themselves at the moment.

Studio Archetype turned over US$10.4m with 140 people, which works out to about A$140,000 sales per head (at an exchange rate of 0.65 - weighted ave of the last year). So, if you're in the internet game, what's your turnover per head?

"I have a better description for Graphic/Finished Artist.

Graphic Lackey.

Thats basicly what we are. How many graphic Artists are there out there who are under paid and over worked?? I mean, I worked 16 hour shifts in an ad agency for what?? I certainly didn't get the assistant art director role they held in front of me like a carrot.

Prepress Artist?? If you're a graphic artist then you should know all aspects of pre press! I am so over this industry. I have met too many overpaid and underskilled people in my time who spend their day keeping the talented few down.

I'm an Apple Tech, graphic artist and designer. I have 6 years experience in pre press, advertising and packaging. I have worked as a designer, graphic artist, mac operator and apple systems manager....weight me and pay me what I'm worth!"

"Hello Josh,

This is more in direct response to your query, rather than the article above. I know it's a couple of years' late, but others might find these definitions helpful. Readers should bear in mind that no two designers will ever agree on what constitutes "precise" definitions of these titles, but my definitions below are based on observations of the industry over 15 years.

Unfortunately, it's not generally understood - and certainly not explained - that the titles you've listed are not strictly job descriptions, but task descriptions within the job of COMMERCIAL ARTIST. The problem is that, with the variety of new and traditional design media that inundates the industry today, these skills are being divided between different personnel, with each artist combining any number of these tasks within their work - but rarely all of them.

COMMERCIAL ARTIST:
A general term for an artist that is skilled in rendering art suitable for commercial use, and which can easily be developed for one or more reproduction methods.

CREATIVE DIRECTOR:
The person who oversees all design projects collectively - rather than a single project at a time (see ART DIRECTOR) - to ensure continuity and re-enforcement of corporate identity between projects.

ART DIRECTOR:
Oversees all design tasks on a single project. This means communicating between all design personnel and liasing with other concerned department - such as the printers - to ensure that progress runs smoothly, and that there is continuity of quality and theme when all separate elements of the project are brought together to finished art stage.

GRAPHIC DESIGNER:
Conceives the overall design, but not necessarily the individual elements. Usually also acts as the finished artist (see below). The designer might create the layout to include a variety of elements, such as a logo, a photo image, an illustration, and so on, but may not have skills to produce any one or more of those elements. In which case, the rendering of those elements is left to the...

GRAPHIC ARTIST:
Usually produces artwork as a single entity, such as an illustration or logo, that will be used by a graphic designer to be included with other elements to make up a composite piece of art, such as an advertisement.

FINISHED ARTIST:
Produces art as it will appear when printed. This involves bringing together all actual elements to be included in the finished design - illustration, logos, text, titles - and positioning them on the "page" to form a single high-resolution piece.

PREPRESS ARTIST:
Develops finished art to the stage where it can be used immediately by a printer (eg: Separates full-colour image into four separate files - cyan, magenta, yellow, black - that are then printed to plates for use by the printer. In traditional screenprinting, it often means that the artist manually produces spot-colour separations based on the finished art. This is a different process to four-colour separating, and as far as I know, can't be done automatically by any of the current computer programs. So, a competent prepress artist is worth their weight in ink to spot-colour printers!)

AD-BUILDER; DESKTOP PUBLISHER; DIGITAL DESIGNER:
As far as I can tell, these are titles that have been coined on the spur of the moment to define a particular task, rather than a collective set of skills.

Unlike the above titles, no artistic talent or knowledge of reproduction methods seems to be required for these tasks, and is certainly not considered an essential skill by the employers, judging by most of the people who land the jobs. The extent of creative rendering is usually limited to grabbing a few bits of clip-art and stock photography, adding text, and slapping them all together fairly neatly on a digital document (It should also be noted that in many cases, the computer program itself is relied on to assist in layout design).

My biggest beef with the industry is that many training colleges equate "desktop publishing" with Graphic design! This assumption is particularly frustrating to printing firms who have to waste time fixing artwork that isn't compatible with their prepress procedures."

"A quick question: what's the difference between a pre-press designer, a digital designer, a graphic designer, a graphic reproducer, a creative director, an art director, a finished artist, a mac operator, a desktop publisher, a creative, a designer, a graphic artist, a commercial artist, a digital systems integrator, and an ad builder???

There are more I'm sure, but these were the ones that showed up in the paper the most, if there is not much difference then, no wonder we have no integrity as an industry, do we have an 'ACT' at all???
Please help, it seems the more experience I get as an artist, the less qualified I am becoming."

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andrew@lam-po-tangcom