My portfolio is how I can express my style and showcase some of my favourite projects. A portfolio is a key tool in any designers belt and showcases their actual talents and potential, which is what employers are looking for. Having an online portfolio allows for future clients and employers to research you and your work before even meeting you.
We began by looking at existing designer portfolios to get an understanding what we should be showing in our portfolios and what specific design elements help to make the portfolio stand out even more. Two portfolios that I was inspired by the most was by the designers Oishee Sen and Gina Yu, as their portfolios are super creative and beautifully designed.
Looking firstly at Oishee Sen I really loved the range of colour she used as well as small animations to certain design elements which brought the portfolio to life. The portfolio is very simple as well with the typography choice being very simple but it pairs well with all the design elements used in the portfolio. It was her About page that I liked the most, as the information about her is clearly listed and easy to read through. The photo she used is also in black and white which helps keep the whole page simple with only a wee bit of colour coming through from boxes at the bottom which have some illustrations and facts about her.
Gina Yu’s portfolio is very eye-catching with the her bright use of colour and lively animations to bring a sense of life to it. Her chosen heading typography is a beautiful serif while the rest of her typography is geometric sans serif which helps balance out the text. What I really like about Gina’s portfolio is her text as it is very friendly with some friendly comments about her which creates a relaxed and playful tone and that is what I’d love to recreate in my own portfolio.
Gina Yu l UX Designer & Writer
My next step was to create a mood board which would include screenshots from other portfolio that I like and certain aspects of the portfolio that I think work really well and may want to incorporate into my own. This would give me an idea of what I want to see from my portfolio and it is a visual ideal of my portfolio.
Now I had to gather together the content I wanted to showcase within my portfolio. I began by looking at the pages I wanted to include and the first one was obviously a ‘Home’ page was showed would have some information about me and then it would also showcase some of my most recent projects. I then would have a ‘Projects’ page dedicated to other projects which once you click on them would bring you through the project process and how it was created. Lastly, there would be an ‘About’ page which would be some information about me such as skills, interest, education and just some facts to help create a friendly tone. It would also have a link to my notion blog where the rest of my work is.