This week I worked a bit more on tweaking my website design that was chosen in class.  At first, this was not the design I really liked, but now that I have had a chance to develop it a bit more, it is becoming my favorite of the three.  It just needed a bit of polish.  I tried to think of how to make it appear multilayered and interesting, while maintaining a flat, simplistic look.  After browsing some sites for inspiration, I accomplished this (I think) by using drop shadows to suggest multiple layers of the dark textured surfaces of the website.  I also added a bit of shine, literally, to the header and footer of my page.  Having large, flat areas seemed to be a bit boring so I added a bit of visual candy to help.

A website portfolio is probably going to be the best bet for me when applying for other jobs.  Me being almost a complete web person requires it.  As it said in "Building Design Portfolios," sometimes it is just the best way to view your art.  It was created to be viewed on the web after all.  Other things that I must pay attention to are ease of use and navigation.  I also must pay strict attention to filesize on everything I include in my webpage.  I have a lot of textures, but since they are small and in most cases only two colors, I can save a very small repeatable pattern and save people download time.  My navigation is pretty straight forward too.  Just buttons at the top left of the page for each section.  Portfolio will have a drop down too for subsections.  This is very important for me especially.  I have to impress with my website because I am focusing pretty much solely on web design.  Since I do little to no video editing, I have no business creating a demo reel hahaha.  Stick to your strengths!!

In "Designing a Digital Portfolio," the author talks about retouching physical artwork after it has been digitized into your computer.  This makes sense after thinking about it.  When you scan something like a printed brochure on fancy, textured paper and embossing, these things don’t really show up.  You must bring the scan into photoshop and physically add in the embossing to the image by painting it.  You can also create a very detailed scan of a paper texture and repeat it as a pattern on the background of your original design file to have a very realistic and perfect looking print example on your website.  Also when adding your stuff to your online portfolio, it is also important to write small introductions to each of the pieces.  Since you are not there physically presenting your portfolio to potential clients or employers when they view your site, you must write in what you would like them to know about each piece.  This does not include what programs you made it in, by the way.  Most of the time, people don’t care and they can also find out what programs you have experience with in your resume anyway.

I like to use patterns and textures in my web designs.  I think this sets me apart from a lot of others, especially textured pages.  I have built up a large collection of links for these sorts of things (probably nothing compared to some other people though) and would like to share a few.  In case you missed the links in my post, here they are again:

http://www.desktopanime.com/resources_textures.php  <– A great site with a lot of paper textures that I use in stuff.  There are more than just paper textures though.

http://www.k10k.net/pixelpatterns/  <– I used a lot of these in my latest design for the class.  There are a TON of great pixel patterns there for free.  I highly recommend this site.

http://patterns.ming-ling.net/  <– This site contains a lot of oriental looking patterns.  Kinda like those you find on rugs.  I can think of a lot of interesting uses for these.

No Comments »

How you present your portfolio can easily make or break it for you.  This week in “Building Design Portfolios,” it tells how to present a print portfolio.  You must select the best examples of your work and order them in a way that flows.  Having random works of art from different time periods of your development as a designer won’t cut it without proper coordinating.  When presenting the print portfolio to a person directly, you must be prepared to pick up on the flow of the meeting, like if they like something in particular, make sure you spend a bit more time on that piece.  Also be prepared to defend your design decisions.  No one likes an unconfident or standoffish designer.

When you are promoting yourself to potential clients or employers, you should produce some self promo pieces.  They don’t have to be expensive, which is why they are so practical.  Sending out a cheap pamphlet with some samples of work can be a good way to land in an employers call-back pile when they need work or a designer.  Also sending promo pieces via email is a very cheap way to promote yourself.  All you need to do is author some PDF’s and attach them to an email.  Free and easy.

When job hunting for the first time, you have to remember common courtesies that will set you apart from most other people, like how to appropriately send out your resume, how to act during interviews, how to call people on the telephone.  Little things like a thank you note for an interview, or being on time make the difference.

You have to also make sure that your digital files are of the highest quality possible.  In “Designing a Digital Portfolio,” it talks about the most common tools that you must use in order to produce the highest quality digital images or video.  I already know about all of these methods (like cropping, adjusting tone, fixing pixelated areas, etc…) so I figure I am safe in this department.  I know the differences the right format or encode can make when saving something, believe me.  I deal with it daily at my job.

This week I added color and other style elements to my website mockups from last week.  I have one pretty strong idea that I really like.  Hopefully it will pass the test : ]

No Comments »

I was working on my website comps today and decided to use my old style on this website on one of the designs, but with a much more minimal use of colors and texture.  I like the style and after reading "Building Design Portfolios," I realized that the style can always be updated later.  I also thought about the audience further.  I am not actually designing for small business owners…I’m just trying to get hired by a design firm and noticed.  I’ve gotten work already with my current portfolio anyway so I don’t think the textured style is keeping people away.  Plus I already have a web design job lined up for myself upon graduation at a design firm, so if I don’t find better offers, I have that to fall back on.

Also when reading the book, I found lots of cool information on other types of portfolios like physical books and things.  It is apparently always good to have a print version with you and this makes perfect sense to me.  What if your website is down?  The person can always look at high quality prints in your design book or on a computer in the form of PDFs.  I think I want to put together a PDF version and a printed version in one of those spiffy metal binders.  Aluminum binder just seems to go hand in hand with a web designer.  It looks kinda like a macbook pro.

I also experimented with another graphic style on one of my other website comps.  This was more of a flat color style with some pixel patterns in it.  It looked pretty cool, but I’m definitely not feeling it as much as my other design.  The last one, I want to try to do some kind of style with very few colors.  VERY minimal.  Something I haven’t done before.

This week in "Designing a Digital Portfolio," it talked about how to integrate 3D and other types of work into your portfolio as 2D images.  It went over the various methods of converting to best quality…but my work doesn’t really apply to this.  I have a few photographs, but I’m not trying to market myself as a photographer and I don’t have that many really good shots anyway.  The main stuff in my portfolio is exclusively digital, either a digital photo alteration or a digital website.  I shouldn’t have a problem with image quality, because a screen shot is a screen shot.

While out doing research for my web design comps, I came across a pretty decent article on Smashing Magazine about how to create a successful design portfolio.  I think it is worth reading for anyone making one at the moment.  Smashing Magazine is a great source for design related articles (especially web) and I frequent it daily.

No Comments »

This week I read about what makes a good design brief and what makes a good design process.  As with many other subjects in this area, there is no perfect method to use for everything or everyone.  You must find your own method that works for you, but there are some good guidelines to start off from.

Design briefs are personally something I think are very important.  I always feel I need a little guidance when I’m going to be working on a project.  Just to get started.  This is because I don’t want to create something that the person wouldn’t like.  I want them to be as detailed as possible when outlining their needs and wants for a website.  I have had the experience of creating a site for someone who ultimately designed the site for themselves…which left a bad taste in my mouth.  It made me feel frustrated and like I wasn’t doing a good enough job.  Now that I read about this in Adrian Shaughnessy’s book, I feel a bit better because even this senior designer has encountered it many times in their career.

The process of designing something is different for everyone, but Shaughnessy points out some very important parts that must be included if you are going to be successful.  Mainly research.  Before I DID do research, but not as much as I probably should have.  Research helps you develop ideas that you may not have just designing from what was already in your head.  Borrowing elements of a design you like is fine as long as you adapt it and change it for your own purposes.  Trying to be completely original will just result in a massive headache, which is something that I have learned myself first hand when first starting out with creating web sites.  Better design comes with experience, which is something I wish I could have known when I was younger.

This week I worked on creating thumbnails for my new portfolio website as well as comps in photoshop.  I had a few really cool ideas I think.  This time around, I’m going to be going much more minimalistic and with less of an emphasis on textures (which is something I have done a lot in the past).  I want to use more solid colors, but with slight gradients and textures in some areas.  My comps are grayscale right now because I want to select a design before I get into the colors more in depth.  Here are some samples:

I am also in the process of debating which web projects I should include in my new portfolio.  I mean I have done a lot for my age, but I wonder if they are good enough to really include?  I know some of them will probably need some reworking.  Another thing, trying to find your work can be tough.  Luckily for me, I have a pretty well organized system with lots of backups, but for other people, I can imagine it being tough.  While reading "Designing a Digital Portfolio," the author recommended some programs for archiving work, namely FileMaker Pro and iView.

Also, some people who may want to work on creating a Wordpress site, I used this tutorial, by Small Potato to help me get started.  It seems like a lot of work at first, and it is, but it’s not too difficult, just time consuming.  That tutorial is really helpful.  Wordpress helps you keep your site very organized while still allowing you to design static web pages and include them in your site.  It’s great.

No Comments »

Over the past week, I read about clients and many ways of dealing with them.  Now I always knew that dealing with clients wouldn’t be easy, but I didn’t know it could potentially be VERY hard.  There are many dos and don’ts when dealing with clients.  For instance, there are many designers who complain about their clients.  These designers are wrong if that is all they do.  You have to think that they are trying to cover up their poor ability and skill by blaming their clients.  A practice that will ultimately lose them clients and put them out of business.

Some things you should do is treat your client as you would treat a friend.  That way they feel welcome when you do business together.  You must also take the client’s views into consideration, which is what arrogant designers may not do.  Be aware that your client/designer relationship is give and take, no one will get anywhere if they won’t listen to each other’s opinions and views.

In order to attract new clients, you must be able to find ways of producing work in unique ways that will get you noticed consistently.  Having one big success will bring you work for a little while, but the flow will not last forever.  You must try new things consistently in order to get attention more frequently.  Adrian Shaughnessy suggest entering design competitions, designing for a reduced rate so you can try something experimental, keep in contact with design colleges and such.  These things will help you get noticed and attract you new business.

This week I began to think about format.  Format of my portfolio that is.  I think I will need three versions to have all my bases covered.  I would like to have an online portfolio so people can browse work on their free time from anywhere with an internet connection; a PDF version for mailing and download (today there are online file storage systems that hold larger files should the PDF version be too large to email) and lastly a printed version of the PDF version in a nice book to bring with me when being interviewed.  With this combination, as I said, I would have all my bases covered.

No Comments »