Tech Skills for Art Directors

Besides understanding how to turn concepts into completed designs, art directors need to keep in touch with current tools and design trends. Here are some creative production programs and skills that show up as requirements in recent job listings for art directors:

• Dreamweaver
• Flash
• Motion graphics/animation
• PowerPoint
• InDesign
• Photoshop
• Illustrator
• Quark Xpress
  

Many of these are very expensive to own. If you're a student, you may be able to get lower-cost "education versions" of some of these programs on which to learn. However, be aware that their makers often place restrictions on whether these versions can be used to produce commercial work.