Your first portfolio is in a lot of ways your best opportunity to present yourself and your work. As creatives move through their career, their portfolio will continually evolve. The work will be less about their own creative process and subsequent outcomes and more about the work they have done for clients. As you progress in your career, people will want to see if you can sell your ideas, not just create. So use this moment in your career to really show off.
The contents of the portfolio should be varied in scope and style and presented in a clear and cohesive way. In a lot of ways your presentation can be the biggest portfolio piece of all. Stay away from the over-sized black leather portfolio with plastic pages, brushed metal case, etc. Think about your work as it relates to you and then develop your own system of packaging that says something about your potential as a designer.
The specifics that need to be addressed are the same as any project. Develop a cohesive, tight, representative plan to execute. Approach the development of your portfolio as you would any project. Determine your audience, plan your strategy, and then spend the necessary time with the details. This means focus on the big picture and how to carry out the look and feel throughout the process.
Develop a typographic solution that can be utilized throughout your entire body of work. Make your resume, portfolio, and all other aspects of the presentation seem like a complete unit. It?s not enough to think your work will sell itself. More than likely that will never be the case. In the end you will always need to sell your work.
In addition to the portfolio, which will contain your samples, think about creating companion pieces that can be left behind or delivered in advance. This can be something printed and packaged to be sent, it can be in PDF format, or it can be a website with your work. Whatever the format, the look should be consistent. You are a designer; design.
By no means am I endorsing the concept of anything goes. On the contrary, just as you must be able to explain exactly why you made certain design decisions as it relates to your work, you must also have solid reasoning behind the packaging of your work. What does it say to prospective employers or clients about you as a designer? Does it communicate what potential clients and employers can expect to see in your work? If the answer is no, then keep working.
Think of your first portfolio as your most important project yet. Do not relinquish it to an afterthought, just something to house your projects. Just as future portfolios will reflect the changes in your career, be sure your first portfolio fully reflects your creativity and strategic thinking, right now.
Kelly Klawonn is the Vice President at Buzz Company, a Chicago-based creative recruitment firm specializing in advertising, design and motion graphics, and a frequent professional guest of the Portfolio Center.
