DIGITAL PORTFOLIO

By :
Ahmad Anis b. Mohd Fauzi
Faculty of Creative Multimedia,
Multimedia University
63100, Cyberjaya.
anis.fauzi@mmu.edu.my

The Advantages of Going Digital

Once, a portfolio was a well-presented folder taken to interviews, but the Internet has changed all that. The web’s increasing ubiquity means there’s never been a better opportunity to present your wares to the world, but how do you best make an interactive portfolio and what are the benefits?

While some people embrace new technology at every opportunity and have probably had an interactive online portfolio since Netscape Navigator first supported images, you might be wondering what all the fuss is about, especially if you’re a traditional illustrator or graphic designer or multimedia designer.

Whether you’re a freelancer who’s been in the industry for years, or a newcomer looking for a break, why bother putting your wares on the Web or on a CD when you may already have a perfectly good printed portfolio that you can present to people?

Two important reasons immediately spring to mind: time and money.

Even if you’re the most traditional of designers, you don’t want to spend time or money creating dozens of costly, heavy, printed portfolios to send to anyone who takes an interest in your work.

The nature of the Web means it’s relatively simple to enable numerous people to see your work, and for them to spread the word just by emailing a link.

In many ways, an interactive portfolio acts as kind of free-roaming agent, without any sort of fee.

Easy Access

The fact that everything’s in one place is also an advantage – to both you and the potential visitor. It’s often easier for them to visit a user-friendly, easily navigable site, than to rummage around the back of a filling cabinet for old hard-copies.

A similar principle applies to illustration source books and annuals. Instead of paying over the odds to have a handful of featured illustrations each year, you can have a Website for a fraction of the cost. As you’re in control of such an entity, you can ensure that your most current work is available and also rapidly update it to suit any major changes to your style.

Of course, overtly interactive companies often have requirements for more traditional illustrators, too, and the first place they’re likely to look is on Web.

Another spin on interactive portfolios, primarily for those still wanting to break into the industry: Someone who works primarily in the online medium, interactive portfolios are the only thing employers (agency) look at when evaluating a potential hire. While resumes and schooling are great, employer (agency) need to see how a designer approaches the medium in which employer (agency) will expect them to design. Many other agencies echo this sentiment, even those biased towards offline activities.

Moving Images

So, apart from being more cost- effective and convenient, what advantages do interactive portfolios have over their traditional paper counterparts?

The very fact that they’re interactive and exist in the online medium makes them powerful tools for designers to express themselves and show their abilities.

It is like a print-based portfolio, you can create a consistent look to display varied work, but an interactive portfolio can go much further and contain moving images, movies and games – all within a single interface.

You can use subtle animation to encourage a visitor to explore a specific section of the portfolio or view a certain image, and you have the choice of displaying things in a linear or non-linear fashion. Of course, many of these points are a particular advantage for cross-media companies such as MEOMI (w) www.meomi.com, whose quirky site is both informative and entertaining. The portfolio page invites you to “try a turnip for a happy surprise”, each of which, once clicked, shows projects stills in a pop-up window, this suits the nature of the company, and anyone hankering for a more standard interface can instead choose from the selection of work displayed below the turnip patch.

However, everyone should benefit from an interactive online portfolio – avoiding creating one is the real problem:
If you’re a print designer or a photographer and you don’t make the step to display your work online, you’re essentially cutting off so much potential exposure.

Like the majority of designers, the Web is the delivery medium of choice for any sort of interactive portfolio:
The design world – regardless of whether it’s print, broadcast or Web – uses the web for everything: inspiration, information, research and certainly to check out work of potential hires.

The relatively low cost of set-up and creation, immediate accessibility and ease of updating, cement this decision for most people.

However, there are alternatives:
The delivery mediums choose when creating an interactive portfolio is very dependent on the brief and audience. You wouldn’t want to send a CD-Rom to someone who has no time for direct mail and is happier reviewing work online.

However, interactive portfolios on CD are great for displaying content that has large file sizes, such as movie footage and large games.


Know your medium

Once certain of which delivery medium you’re going to use, ensure that you’re familiar with it. If you blaze ahead regardless, the end result will be a failure.

“I’ve seen work from great print designer who simply don’t understand the interactive space – and it shows,” says Mr. Faizal Redza Alwi of Bridgethree Malaysia.

If your interface is poor, or the coding sloppy, then there’s a danger that the work will be perceived in the same way. Those without the know-how to get their work online may find that a collaborative project reaps great rewards – something Mr. Mokhlis aka MUKEH discovered with the relaunch of his Website [w] www.s0lidmind.tripod.com “Although I designed the site, and the portfolio work is obviously mine, the majority of coding horse-work totally designed by me too.
The result is an elegant, easy-to-use site that’s tight in both design and coding.

Also, don’t get distracted by interactive technology, as a first-time Photoshop user does with filters. “Software should be chosen for a reason, and not because you think it will impress,” states Senior Designer,Mr. Faizul Syazli of Acube dotMedia Sdn Bhd. “ If in doubt, build a simple, functional HTML site and steer clear of wacky, experimental interfaces. Your portfolio should be showing off your work, so don’t make it anything other than really easy for people to explore.”

No longer is the new kid on the block, Flash what most people turn to when requiring more movement than HTML can provide. Flash-based portfolios tend to be a little more involved than their HTML counterparts: examples include the polished interfaces of Faizal Redza Alwi –Bridgethree [w] www.bridgethree.com and Tonic’s shoot Productions [w] www.shootproduction.com, both of which contain click, subtle animation.

However, they do perhaps suffer with regards to the presentation of the work itself, which is often too small to make out properly – if you’re aiming to impress with illustration, it really needs to be bigger than a couple of hundred pixels across.

Airside’s Nadav Kander Website at [w] www.nadavkander.com takes ideas of motion within a portfolio further, with an engrossing non-linear interface that enables visitors to rapidly view numerous thumbnails, which when clicked display the work at a suitably large size. Take care when choosing this route though, as the flash plug-in happens to run very slowly on Macs – a potential problem if the bulk of your potential clients are likely to use that platform.

Also, some people will not have time to wait for comparatively lengthy downloads or excessive animation – some people simply want to see the work.


If that’s the case, then Preshaa’s simplistic interface at [w] www.preshaa.com should impress. More akin to a PC or MAC’s file view than an interactive portfolio, there’s no denying that it’s easy to use, and the ‘put images in a new window’ checkbox is a particularly nice touch.

However, its minimalist stance might also be detrimental: potential clients might take one look at the site and head elsewhere. Then again, upon further exploration, Preshaa’s work itself is rather minimalist and the point in a stylish way, so the site’s appearance is a logical front-end to the portfolio.

Ultimately, you have to ask yourself what’s important to you as a designer and design your interactive portfolio to reflect that!