I chose to speak to Mark because I has previously been to his talk that he'd done back in November and in addition to the fact that his design practice was kind of close to mine, he was also really enthusiastic and knowledgable.
When it came to the actual portfolio surgery, I wasn't too disappointed in my portfolio but I was aware that it needed some work and hoped that Mark could give me some direction.
One of the key things I noted from his talk in November was to never say 'What's wrong with it?' say, 'Where can I improve?' and although I thought i'd drilled this into my head - as soon as I sat down and he asked what I wanted to get out of the talk, I said 'Advice on...where I'm going wrong.' Duh? Thankfully, I corrected myself straight away!
Issues raised/discussed:
- My billionaire, lyrics as type piece - he suggested that I could actually Make it into a real thing - take it off the paper so to speak. He liked it as it was, but it is just done on photoshop so to actually make it out of a gold material would give it a much more tangible, aesthetic quality.
- On the whole, presentation needs some work. It wasn't awful but I could do relatively simple things to make it a lot better. Mark suggested I look at other peoples portfolios - go on the websites of the designers that I am inspired by and look at how they present their work - what works and what doesn't? He showed me some of the techniques he used and gave me some 'cheats/tricks'.
The presentation needs to compliment the work but not overpower it...or in my instance underpower it (by just putting a flat image on basic printer paper.
- Give the pieces a context relevant to the content i.e. the 150 pens piece that I showed him, he said looked like it would go on the wall of a design studio so put it in that context (or make it look like its in that context) but in contrast with that, the cockpit poster that I did should be on a more relevant context like the wall of a venue or flyposts.
- Photograph products (such as my cassette bag) Really really well. He really liked the bag, but I can't really take that to all interviews etc. so it needs to be photographed so well that it looks as good as the real thing, including texture etc.
- The identity that I had applied to the portfolio - doesn't reflect my design practice - comparing it with the portfolio I took along with me, I totally agree as it was all hand-drawn pieces and the identity was vectorised SO this needs addressing.
He mentioned how he felt that my line quality was a strong, consistant part of my work so my identity should reflect that - to the extent that I could just handwrite all of my business cards (time consuming but cheap...maybe)
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At the end of it...I was extremely happy that I chose to sign up for one and it showed me how useful they can be. It gave me confidence in my work and highlighted areas that I could improve.
