AEMM students frequently ask us if they need a portfolio. Our answer is yes. But to support our opinion we've asked several professionals in arts & entertainment management roles what they think about portfolios. Julie Darling, one half of event production and public relations partnership DC Inc., spoke to us about she expects to see in a potential employee's event production portfolio. (mp3)
MySpacers, Facebookers, etc.; put thy social networking skills to use for your career. If you're unawares, social networking refers to any web-based networking system. Although the aforementioned social networking giants are well known, there is a growing metaverse of social sites that focus on specific interests, hobbies and careers. (Indeed some industrious Columbia students have started one specific to our school.)
MyCreativeCommunity is one such site which focuses on screenwriting and screenwriters. It's new, so it's not yet what one would describe as "jumpin' off," but it's getting there with the help of a little media buzz.
Non-screenwriters, take heart. If a social networking site relevant to your career isn't out there, you can get one started. Networking is after all a part of the portfolio process. What good is great work unless you have people (other than your roommate and mom) to show it to.
With everyone putting their portfolios online, lots of you are asking questions about how to protect your work from being used- or, rather, stolen. Do the benefits of the online portfolio outweigh the risk of having someone take your work?
The answer is: yes. An online portfolio is an invaluable tool- and keeping people’s grubby little mitts off your work is fairly easy, but, there are a few things you should know.
Any time a piece of original work is affixed to a medium (paper, clay, ink, document), it is immediately protected under copyright. Copyright is exactly what it sounds like: the right to copy work. As the creator, you are (most of the time) considered the owner of the copyright and allowed to dictate the terms of what and how your work maybe copied by others. You don’t even need to put in the “©” or “all rights reserved”; thanks to the Berne Convention, copyright is established the moment the original idea takes a physical form. It’s as simple as that.
The most common special cases for students involve intangible ideas and work you do for an employer. Ideas or concepts cannot be protected- which is one reason you should never include an undeveloped idea in your portfolio. Additionally, when you create work for an employer, the employer holds the copyright- meaning you cannot use it anywhere (including your portfolio) without his/her permission. While many employers allow students to use work from internships and projects, some do not; ask first. If you are allowed to use it, this is a case where the “©” must be used to show who owns the copyright (since everyone who sees it will assume it’s you.)
The complicated part of protecting your work comes AFTER someone has used it and, should you choose to press civil charges, you will be asked to prove that you created the piece first. There are three main ways to establish when you own the rights:
1. Any website/digital document will be assigned a time stamp that indicates when it was created. This is sufficient evidence for any piece of work as a “born on” date.
2. The “poor man’s copyright” is used by artists, writers, record label owners and pretty much everyone. Put your piece in an envelope, go to the post office and mail a copy to yourself using “registered mail.” Should the need ever arise, you can use this to threaten anyone who has taken your stuff- since you have proof you committed it to a medium by a certain date. However, the poor man’s copyright does not stand up as official evidence in court, should things escalate to that level.
3. If you’re really concerned about someone stealing your work, the most official way to protect it is to register each piece of work with the U.S. Copyright Office. For 45$ (per piece) you can be sure no one will touch your stuff without a smack from the swift sword of federal justice. It’s the priciest option, but, if you’re really concerned, can you put a price on piece of mind?
And, there may also be cases where sharing your work increases your visibility and acts as free publicity (or, maybe you just love to share.) In that case, you can dictate the terms of your “right to copy” by registered for a Creative Commons License. They’re free and, once displayed on your website/work, they let people know the terms of how they can use your work.
Our friends at Carnegie-Mellon, a really well respected institution located in Pittsburgh put up a portfolio basics page on their career center site. (They were also a guest institution conducting grad school portfolio reviews at this fall's Go Go Graduate School event.) It's a good reference with tips for portfolio organization, web based portfolios and specific advice for architects, artists, designers, musicians, performers and writers.
We don't know if we would take 100% of their advice as gospel, but it never heards to read, consider and make informed decisions now does it. Thanks Carnegie...Mellon.
Recently recruiters Kate Robinson and Isabelle Cote from Liz Claiborne visited CCC to promote the company's summer design & management internship program in NYC and interview interested intern hopefuls. This was their first time visiting Chicago for recruitment and with over 40 brands, the folks at Liz Claiborne know a little something about fashion design so it was great having them look at developing portfolios for 19 students.
Overall we think the students impressed our guests with their abundant ideas and creative approaches to fashion. However, Kate emphasized the need for illustration skills. Illustration examples should be included in a portfolio because on the job a designer is asked to sketch so employers want to see that you can do so well. Kate also mentioned that only having one collection in a portfolio is acceptable. Just be sure you include everything from a mood board to flats. Many times fashion employers want to see what inspired your collection. Kate left us with a simple sketch (see below) representing one way designers can organize their portfolio. Thanks Kate!
We have other fashion design portfolios in the Portfolio Center Archives.
Most radio stations receive dozens of airchecks and resumes weekly. Please be sure you put the correct call letters on your cover letter. And take the time to find out the correct person to submit to. These tips seem pretty obvious, right? Well when we spoke to Program Director Patty Martin of 97.1 "The Drive" WDRV we found out that those mistakes are fairly common. Patty had tons more advice for on-air and production demos. (mp3)
One way to become familar with various ad agencies in the area is to temp or freelance. At least that's one positive way to look at not being hired full-time. And if you're considering freelancing you probably want to get to know such recruiting firms as Manuela Guidi LLC. One of the company's Creative Recruiters Allison Sagehorn spent an afternoon at the Portfolio Center reviewing student ad art books. Afterwards she gave us feedback about preferred portfolio formats and creating campaigns for a range of products. (mp3)
There's no getting around it. Whats on the demo is the what makes a good demo good and a bad demo bad...but...a well designed CD package might just get played before the crypticly hand-scrawled one. Let us know if we can help.
Proofreading is essential if you want anyone to take you or your work seriously. You can spend hours of the material, work with a Portfolio Advisors, gets a professional web cite created, but, the butter the portfolio, the more glaring the typos.
You owe it too yourself to check each and every peace of copy - obviously including you’re resume- at least twice before you ad it to the finished portfolio. Reed it out loud word buy word. Get a friend too look it over. Alls it takes are one teeny tiny mistake and an employer stops reading an moves one.
Are we being too hard on you? No. Were not. That extra ten minutes of reading means a huge difference in how you present your self. Simple typos make and employer question you’re ability to pay attention to detail, submits quality work and the pride you take inn what you’ve done. No employer want to compromise on these issues- we don’t care what industry your in.
Microsoft Word made this process Evan easier a few years ago when they addled a super sophisticated grammar and spelling editor to their programs. Guess what? Its not perfect. It missed 30 errors in this entry alone.
Gallery Director Susan Aurinko of Flatfile Galleries loves emerging artists. But she is more impressed with artists who take the time to do their research before submitting work to galleries. We had the opportunity to talk with Susan and find out what she expects from artists when being approached. (mp3)
I'll bet parents of some of our game design majors have been rolling their eyes when they learned just what their son or daughter was planning on studying. They shouldn't. I found this article Can game design make your company more efficient? from the tech blog ZDNet. It points to a bright future and a diverse set of career options, outside the obvious.
"Going forward, people in game design will be increasingly important," said Castronova. "Let's imagine a PhD in game design. The good that person could do in an entertainment environment is obvious. In a company, that person could make customer service more efficient by making it more fun. It's a new construction."
These projects go beyond what companies have been launching in Second Life. The next phase of applying virtual world design would be to create a corporate culture inside a role-playing game similar to World of Warcraft and applying it to real-world management practices.
While this approach may sound wacky to some there are solid reasons why executives--including chief information officers--may want to ponder it. After all, better corporate use of virtual worlds could be a form of what Julian Dibbell, a contributing editor for Wired magazine, calls "open source problem solving."
It recalls the comments of Geoffrey Frankel, a Creative Director at Critical Mass, and a guest at the fall 2006 event Too Flashy. He said, in addition to interactive design skills, employers, such as himself, were increasingly interested in people's ability to create provocative virtual artifacts and characters. He mentioned Second Life specifically as a "place" where virtual accomplishments can land "real world" rewards.
One challenge for our game design students going forward will be to adapt their skills for work environments beyond the EAs, Midways and Wideloads. A robust game design portfolio will be judged by a criteria that far exceeds good action and cool looking backgrounds. This may involve collaborating on projects outside the major. Let us know if we can help. The Portfolio Center would love the chance to hook creative game design students up with students in other departments.
It's official. Show Off 2006 is going in the books and we're closing out with a visit from one of the nations premiere post-production operations, Cutters. Cutters reps will visit the Portfolio Center on Friday, December 8th at 1pm to meet seniors, grad students and Spring '06 grads who have a working editor's reel and want some feedback on imporving it.
As always, if you've already registered with us, kewl. You can just call 312.344.7280 to sign up to meet Cutters. If you haven't registered, ok, you can do that now....and then call.
Speculative work, or spec work, can bulk up your portfolio into a polished piece employers gush over or set you up for more a more difficult career down the line. The camp is divided. Who’s right? We’re not sure, but, we thought you should know all the facts.
What is spec work? Spec work is work you do without a client involved. You might be fleshing out that ad campaign you thought might be cool, redesigning a website you thought could improve or creating a brand and logo for an imaginary company. No one asked you to do this work, but you’re creating it anyway.
Pros of spec work:
1. Spec work is a great way to build up your portfolio with work you’ve done outside of class.
2. Most professionals won’t expect you’ve done much paid work right out of college (because you’re obviously looking for more.)
3. Spec work is a chance to show how creative and targeted you can be without a client dictating any specifications.
4. You can do spec work anytime, anyplace and at any point in your career.
Cons of spec work:
1. Spec work shows an employer that you will work for free- so why should they pay you?
2. Many professionals are vehemently against spec work, as they feel it devalues their work.
3. You don’t get the opportunity to work with a client, which is a key part of most design jobs.
4. Spec work can’t be protected, meaning anyone who sees your portfolio can use your work.
What is a recent grad to do? That’s your decision. If you ever need advice or a professional opinion, we’re happy to help, but, be sure to make the portfolio really does show your best work- no matter where it came from.
With the popularity of websites such as Atom Films, ifilm and YouTube and even dare I say, becoming a staple in life, your short form film and video content has numerous options to be seen outside of film festivals and your parent's living room. One (relative) new kid on the block is Pawky. I recently read about them in Screen Magazine. Based in Evanston, I hear the founders are avid film watchers and festival goers. Their site provides a forum for filmmakers to distribute shorts and receive feedback from other filmmakers and fans. One distinctive feature though is that the site allows members to post a resume and a reel as well.
Check out www.pawky.com for more information on how to post films and such. And if you're currently a senior and need help putting a reel together check out The Portfolio Center's portfolio production services.
The Chicago Motion Graphics Festival 2007 is a four-day premier Midwestern event catering to 3D and compositing effects. It takes place January 25th through 28th in downtown Chicago. The festival features an awards ceremony, industry mixer, HD screening, a 4-day educational conference, and year-round online coverage.
CMGF will screen work that includes: special effects, compositing, music videos, commercials, experimental, machinima, game graphics, animatics, web motion designs, dvd intros and micro-cinema. The festival accepts entries from all over the world, but will emphasize work from the Midwest.
This year we will give special attention to work at HD resolution.
The DEADLINE for entry is 8 December 2006.
To submit a motion picture for consideration, please enclose a print out of the application form (pdf), a check for the $15 entry fee made payable to Design After Next, LLC, your entry in one of the accepted formats, and mail to:
Motion Graphics Chicago
1573 North Milwaukee Ave #510
Chicago, IL 60622
All entries should be submitted on DVD, MiniDV, HDV, BetaSP or compatible data file formats such as an uncompressed Quicktime file.
Entries should also include:
(1) A brief artist or company bio.
(2) A list of the software used to create the work,
(3) An indication of the content's original format (i.e. computer animation, live action footage, hand-drawing, stills, etc.),
(4) A description of the work of 35 words or fewer, and
(5) An optional, separate description of not more than 100 words.
Please send an email with your name and the name of your project to filmfest@mgchicago.com when you have mailed your submission, and we will notify you when your entry has been received.
Entry Fee is $15.00 per person or company. Each person or company can include as many pieces, works, or movies in their entry as will fit on their entry DVD.
Please Note: All submission become the property of Design After Next, LLC to be used at their discretion. All relevant permissions and copyrights are assumed to be cleared by the entrant. The accepted festival entries will be shown at the festival screening, MGChicago events, on the festival website, and on the festival DVD.
If you have a question about your entries eligibility please contact filmfest@mgchicago.com.
This is not exactly portfolio related. And the Portfolio Center is not hosting the workshop. However, I thought it would be a good idea to post info about the seminar below since I know several students (from dance to film & video to AEMM majors) who have started or are interested in starting not-for-profit organizations. And of course we want to support you as you find independent ways to outlet your art & media.
The Lawyers for Creative Arts will again present its workshop on Not-for-Profit Incorporation and Tax Exemption on Thursday, December 7, 2006 from 5:30 p.m.- 8:45 p.m.
This workshop will discuss whether to start a NFP, how to establish a NFP, as well as certain recurring operating problems. Also covered, how to obtain a 501(c)(3) tax exemption and discuss several legal issues regarding maintaining tax exempt status. The cost is $75 for one person, and $100 for two people.
Please call LCA at 312-649-4111 to register. Visit www.law-arts.org for more information.
