Best time to do professions?

So i'm completely lost with what little i've seen of the crafting/gathering profession. I'm used to World of Warcraft where I hammer away at nodes and gather stuff I need to sell. Crafting was just putting the parts together and making something to level it up.

Now in WoW I would level my toon to max, then go back and do my crafting professions because by then i've accrued gold to buy a lot of the stuff I needed. If I made a new toon, i'd often do gathering professions to get gold as I leveled up.

What's the best strategy in this game? Should I get do a gathering profession or two to level up and earn gil by selling the stuff? Or should I max my level first as a lancer/dragoon before doing the professions?

If you don't want to be frustrated because of lack of materials or gil to pay for them, I'd suggest that you level both the gathering classes first, then look up what cross dependencies your choice craft has, and level those a little by making the crafts that are needed in your choice proffession, then start on your choice proffession, and either buy cross dependency materials, or level cross dependency proffessions, to get the synthesized materials you need for your choice profession. :)

As for leveling a battle class? All you need is level 10 to be able to gather. So unless you want gil to spend, you don't have to level it.

So to summarize: For the sake of efficiency - Do gathering professions now or later, but do them before doing whatever crafting profession I want. Obviously taking into account to level the gathering class that corresponds with the crafting profession.

I just don't want to get caught into a Gil-sink early in the game and get frustrated. So that advice seems pretty smart.

You missed another part of my response that's pretty important: Professions are interdependent.

Examples:

Armorer needs stuff that Weaver and Leatherworker crafts (Cloth and Leather), in order to make a lot of the gear.
Leatherworker needs stuff that Armorer/Blacksmith and Weaver crafts (Ingots and Cloth).
Blacksmith needs stuff from Carpenter and Leatherworker (Wood for hafts, etc. and Leather for grips).

Sorry about that :), its late and my mind isn't 100%. Alright I'll decide what I want to main and figure out how to get the depency items efficiently. Thanks!

I'd also recommend doing the story quests so you get access to your retainers (about level 20).
You'll need these for storage and to sell some of your items from gathering /crafting.

Really only need a DoW/DoM leveled for crafting if you're doing Leather crafting. If you wanna do a craft in order to put materia onto gear, you'll need to be around the same lvl as the gear is (as well as the right DoH, like weaver for cloth armor)