How to transition from ID to another discipline? Arch? UX?

So after months of job hunting entry level ID work seems close to nil. A decent amount of internships for no pay, and mid level positions I don’t have credentials for. Has anyone here transitioned to another design discipline? Just going through the creative listings, I see UX/UI design all the time. Maybe the grass is greener? I’ve always been interested in architecture and landscape design also. Has anyone made this transition? How did you do it?

Does anyone have UX web resources I could look into? Besides the Core77 forum, what else can I look into?

You are going to give up on your dream that easily?

It took me 6 months to land a full time gig out of college with working on my portfolio for 10 hours a day or picking up the odd freelance gig here and there.

How would you compete with Architecture, Landscape Arch and UX students coming out of school with portfolios and internships tailored to this?

I haven’t given up, and I don’t think I could compete with others trained in their discipline. I just wanted to see if anyone has made transitions to other disciplines and how that played out for them. What steps were made? What kind of company did they join? I’ve always been pretty interested in web development and the tech world, so I wanted to learn more about what IxD and UX people actually do, maybe acquiring some of those skills will give me an edge.

If you were to pass on internships with no pay, you missed out on great opportunities to build up on your portfolio! Companies who want to hire you would really need to see your abilities even if its giving you an internship with no pay.

You don’t get any opportunities for full time work if you don’t have creditable work experience and portfolio to show.

The thing that got me over the hump was excepting a 2 month contract to do freelance onsite for very low pay. It totally got me where I needed to be in terms of figuring out how to build a professional portfolio even if the experience was less than pleasurable itself.

I checked out your portfolio and your resume and it seems like you already have quite a bit of experience with internships and junior ID work under your belt.
So I will save you the “internships can give you much more than just money” speech as I am sure you know this.

If you are really interested in IxD and UX, I would look into going back to school. In order to be competitive in this day and age, a solid foundation is crucial. From the looks of it, you don’t have a masters.
I wouldn’t consider it too much of a stretch to apply for a UX masters with an ID background. A masters at a reputabe school would also give you the oh-so important network within the field.

Maybe there is a way of snagging an unpaid UX internship somewhere? That would definitely be worth it, considering what you would learn without having to go back to school.

Thanks Bepster, that’s more like what I was looking for. I don’t plan on going back to school, at least not right now. I’ll try to look into internships. Or I’ll try to align myself within that field. It would be great to hear if others have similar stories.

I would say look at what’s in front of you if you can’t see what’s beyond your eyesight.

I mean seriously, you never know what’s going to give you and who’s going to know who. And a good thing about internship is that you get an experience for few months but if you don’t like the job, then you can easily walk away after it ends. There is no commitment or anything. It is literally a learning experience. Realizing if you like it or not itself is one of the biggest outcome of an internship.

I would say if it is really hard to find the job you want to, maybe it is a good idea to try out some opportunities that came to you, rather than contemplating about changing your career direction, etc. If you start wandering with a purpose to find an easier way to find better things, you never know when that wandering is going to end…

I don’t know if it is even guaranteed that someone is going to find a better job easier just because they changed their path to the high-demand / many job opportunities field. If a car can go only 45 mph at its fastest speed, it is still going to go 45mph either on the stone-sand road or nicely finished highway.

I would recommend that you find your passion, really think about what you really want to do, and be patient to see bigger things to come to you one day. But before, small steps are always the most important things.

Really, no matter what you do or what the job market is like, if you can show you can do it, you will do it and get it.

^ KayKim (from Seattle right? hope all’s going well), good words there.
I agree with the rest, enter competitions, take two-week projects, meet new people, get out there. The thing to realize is that you are at this point, a one-man design team with your one-man marketing team, offering companies your value proposition. If you can find a company that you can bring a lot of value to, and you can convince them of it, I’m sure they will hire you.
Funny thing, I know quite a few IDers who have moved to UX design.