Thread

I think the two are equal. 😊

I’m a developer so I guess I value anyone with graphic design ability more.

what if your both?

Don’t forget Code can be learnt, as opposed to Design….you can’t teach creativity (IMO)

This is a nice topic. I remember the day when we were calculating the per hour rate of developers and designers. This thread could give more insight although I think developers would win this debate in a developer’s forum :|

IMO, both are important (salary-wise, i think developer has higher pay)

Just to address the concept that design is just the paint on the walls: This is a really flawed analogy. If your designer is just applying gradients and dropshadows to your buckets of content, you seriously need to look into getting another designer.

A designer’s job is to make sure that the way the web site operates makes sense. As the lead in-house design guy at my company, I’ve repeatedly told our developers, “No, you can’t do it like that because people will hate it.” A user shouldn’t be expected to go through four steps to upload an image, even if the backend supposedly ‘requires’ it. I’m currently in a back-and-forth with a developer who is of the opinion that the only way to build a certain schedule synchronization interface is to go through a full page refresh every time the user makes a change to one of the inputs (there will be a half-dozen to a dozen different parameters), which will be a frustrating workflow to say the least.

“Don’t forget Code can be learnt, as opposed to Design….you can’t teach creativity (IMO)”

That’s a matter of opinion.  Anyone CAN learn to code from a technical standpoint, but it takes creativity to solve the really big problems.  There are developers, and then there are the visionary developers that make it a pleasure to use the application. 

As far as the designer goes, you can’t just say it’s paint on the walls and interior decorating.  Michaelangelo was a painter.  He created things that people wanted to look at and even made their imaginations want to be part of it.  A great designer can do this.  Again, there are designers, and then there are true visionary designers. 

It depends upon the creativity and the skill level of the developer or the designer before you can really put a price tag on it.  A great developer is worth much more than an average designer, and a great designer is worth much more than an average developer. 

I do both.  I believe I am an exceptional developer, but I am only an average designer.  Then again, I look for truly exceptional work when I look for a designer, and no offense, but 999 out of 1000 designers don’t hold up to my standard.  If I’m going to do exceptional development, then I want exceptional design.  There is really nothing wrong with the 999 out of 1000 designers, I just want to work with the 1000th.

For that 1000th designer, I’d gladly pay the premium, because you can be sure I’m charging the customer a premium for it, and the customer is willing because it is that good.

I have to vote for the true designer.  The developer gets the application specs and writes the code.  Then the designer has to deal with the customer on things like “Can we change this to this color, and move this over to the left, no further left, no, maybe to the right instead.”  These kind of people can make a designer’s life crazy, and it takes a special person to deal with it.  I can appreciate that as a developer.  I would rather have a job where I don’t have to talk to the customer and pay someone else to deal with the customer’s front end design whenever I have a choice.

In MVC pattern, developer takes 2 part which are model and controller but designer only take 1 part which is view. So the developer is worthier than designer.

This is an interesting thread and I tend to think that it is a bit of a “How long is a piece of string?” argument.

What I will say is that a designer is not just a decorator for the developer(s). Designers on small web projects often take on the role of IA, Usability along with their duties as a designer of the user interface, color scheme, templates and client liaison.

I also feel that the suggestion that the developer is the architect is flawed since architects (the what) are designers. Developers are more construction/structural engineers (the how). Obviously developers are also similar to building contractors who actually implement the engineers and architects plans.

Who is more valuable in the real world is entirely dependent on the project. Just because you built it doesn’t mean you thought of it and just because you thought of it didn’t make it happen.

somesays, bad designer will need a good developper and bad developper will need a good designer. If both are good, they usually work as a team, so the rate is usually same, but often, one of them work less hours depend of the project.

i think smashingred got the point right.