Advertising is everywhere. Try to get through a day without seeing a printed advertisement, a television commercial, or a pop-up ad on a web site. Advertising is a dynamic, multi-billion dollar industry that helps us decide what we buy, what places to visit, where we eat, what we drive, and how we look. Advertising ranges from the smallest classified listing in the local paper to the biggest, slickest, all-encompassing campaigns that become part of the popular culture. Do you ever wonder who creates the ads that you see, remember, and talk about?

Someone had to think up the idea, kick it around, and manipulate design, composition, color, typefaces, and photography until an ad began to take shape.

Advertising artists - also called commercial artists - are indispensable to this creative process, whether it's designing a company logo, an annual report, a brochure, or a sign on the side of a bus. The very best advertising artists consistently impress a public innundated by thousands of advertising images every week - and the results show up on the client's bottom line profit while giving us unforgettable catch phrases and characters that make us laugh, cry, or groan. In fact, you already know some of their most famous creations. Remember the Jolly Green Giant? Charlie the Tuna? How about Mr. Clean, Mr. Whipple, and Mrs. Butterworth? Everyone from the Hamburglar to the Taco Bell Chihuahua to the lonely Maytag repairman is a product of a creative advertising professional. Like the Energizer Bunny, they keep going and going, and they all started out as an idea in someone's head and a sketch on a drawing board.

In today's fast-paced, visually oriented society, companies want and need imaginative people to develop effective, innovative advertising art at every level in every market. Advertising artists and the art directors who supervise them are constantly striving to cut through the clutter, make the client happy, and enjoy the artistic satisfaction of producing an entertaining, enlightening, and informative image that didn't exist until they created it.