: Graphic Design Conferences Does anyone know of good/reputable graphic design conferences/conventions in the states? I'm looking to attend one that focuses both on web and print design. Your recommendations

@Hamm6457569

Don't forget Adobe MAX: max.adobe.com, which has absolutely everything.

Which conventions/conferences you should shell out your hard-earned bucks for depends entirely on what you need and want out of them. My own leaning is toward the practical and technological, rather than theoretical or "inspirational."

Award-winning design is not always (by a long, long way) successful design, in terms of actually increasing the client's revenue, so I recommend you don't let yourself be seduced by that kind of peer adulation. I regard it as my principal job to make my clients more successful, so I haven't see a lot of return-on-investment in the HOW and AIGA conferences, which have leaned a bit too far in the other direction.

If it's P2P Mind-Melding, networking and information sharing you're after, you'll get a lot out of your local user groups and online design communities -- quite often more than you'll get from an expensive once-a-year conference, where the networking possibilities are less than you might think. (How do you pick who to network with, out of 3,000+ total strangers? -- I've done it, but I can't say it's been productive in any real sense.)

The UIE and aneventapart conferences that DA01 referred to are excellent. They are practical, nitty-gritty, how-do-you-get-from-A-to-B in their focus. The HOW and AIGA conferences are probably more useful from a career-advice standpoint than design practicalities.

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@RJPawlick971

HOW Design conference is the big one for graphic design:
www.howconference.com/ehome/index.php?eventid=17015&tabid=23071&
AIGA has one as well:
designconference2011.aiga.org/
And there are handfuls of more niche conferences all over the place (marketing, branding, etc)

As for web design, that's really a different path and there's a ton of different conferences for that. Some well known ones:

UIE's UI:
www.uie.com/events/uiconf/2011/
UIE's Web App Masters Tour (I've attended this and highly recommend it)
www.uie.com/events/web_app_masters/2011/
An event apart:
aneventapart.com/
Barcamp (free conferences held in locations throughout the globe.)
barcamp.org/
And there's many, many others.

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