Your portfolio repels jobs

    Nice article written by Jon Jones. Use these as guidelines when designing your portfolio and applying for jobs. After having looked at art portfolios nearly every day for about a year now I couldn't agree more with what Jon has written up here.

    Direct link: [email='%7Boption%7D'][email protected]"[/email]

    That's all he needs to know. Keep it simple.

    3) Do I provide a clear line of action?

    This is also important. Sadly, good art doesn't sell itself. It's one thing to present art, and it's quite another to funnel them toward offering you a job. First you serve up the art, and then you show them that they should offer you a job, and here's how to contact you. The easier this is, the better.

    Here are two huge mistakes people often make along these lines:

    [*] No stated desired position - The desired position usually isn't obvious. Most artists feel the need to put all their 2D art, 3D art, animation, illustration, paintings and even poetry on their website. That makes it impossible to divine what kind of position you're looking for! Be specific. Companies do not set out to hire generalists, they hire specialists. (Whether or not they ultimately USE them as specialists is another matter entirely.)

    If they're hiring a character artist, seeing you say "I do everything!" isn't going to make them think of you for the job. It's easy: Be the guy they're looking for by being specific. If they're looking for a character artist, the more ways you can match the pattern they're looking for, the better. A good place to start is by saying "Hey, I'm a character artist."

    [*] No contact information - If I like your work, how am I supposed to contact you? Keep it visible at all times and don't make them hunt for it. If you're concerned about spambots farming your favorite email address to add to spam lists, make a new email address solely for job solicitations and just deal with the spam.

    That's all there is to it, really. It's simple enough if you think about it, but that's the problem: Most people don't. If you start thinking about it, you're already ahead of the game!

    Thanks again to Jon Jones for the excellent article.

    The Flash Players penetration into the PC market is 97.6%. What he says about a lot of people not having Flash player simply isn't true.

    Yes it is. I have seen some of our HR people not having DivX installed to look at reels and me having to walk all the way up there and setting them up. You'd be surprised.

    Avoid any difficulties that you can avoid.

    I personally don't see the point of a portfolio site made in Flash to be honest. All you need for your portfolio is a page with clickable thumbnails of your work and contact information. That's it. When I'm hiring an artist I don't want to wait for flash animations to finish playing nor do I care about a button animation when I hover my mouse over it. The content is what counts and I need to be able to reach it easily.

    But it still holds truth: don't do things you like simply because you like them, do things that work. Which in this case it keeping things simple.

    Good read. Makes me think about my portfolio: right now it's not aimed for getting a job simply because I'm still a student. But there's some things to change in the future, methinks.

    Flash has the ability to enhance any page, portfolio or not. A welldone Flash page can easily top any other page usability and presentation wise. The problem is a lot of designers have the idea that more is better, and add every bell and whistle even when it doesn't make sense.

    There is a reason every large company launches uses Flash at least a tiny bit. Flash can be used to create an unforgettable website, but more often than not its used to create useless things. Content can be MORE easily accessible in Flash sites that are done well.

    PS- DivX and Flash are completely different monsters. Its likely that a person who doesn't have at least one version of the Flash player installed isn't involved any rich- or interactive-media wise.

    I didn't have Flash installed when I got my work computer. So there. The whole point is that it's an unnecessary risk to take. It's for the individual to decide what he's gonna do with his portfolio but to me personally it's a risk I wouldn't be willing to take.

    Personally for me Flash sites are a turn-off. The point of a portfolio is not to make your website unforgettable but to present work that is unforgettable.

    A perfect portfolio to me is a single page with thumbnails to your art, a short description of what you do and who you are and contact information as well as a link to your resume. That is all. I don't want to click through 10 pages just to get to the 3D section. Also a problem with flash is that you cannot right-click and save elements.

    I have eye-witnessed people's reactions about several portfolio sites and I can honestly say from a professional perspective that it DOES INDEED MATTER.

    So once again, I advise you to keep your folios simple and to the point and to leave out unnecessary things.

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    I personally don't see the point of a portfolio site made in Flash to be honest.

    there's a point if you use your portfolio to not just break into the game industry, but other multimedia industries as well, ala web development. Flash is a growing market and the user stats are rising, and Lurker's estimate was not far off.

    I get more and more clients wanting to switch from html to flash. And these are wholesaler and end user distribution clients, not game companies or movies. After flash 6 and actionscript 2 were released, flash has the ability to directally connect with databases and server side scripting, making it just as functional as any html/php/asp/cgi/etc site (still need the asp or php though, cuz we use that to pass information to and from the db), but the ability to add animation and life to the site. Before long, flash will be integrated automatically in every browser.

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    The point of a portfolio is not to make your website unforgettable but to present work that is unforgettable.

    whats wrong with a healthy hybrid of both?

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    DivX and Flash are completely different monsters.

    100% true. Any decent browser will prompt you to install flash when it detects you dont have it. There is also a very easy script you can write in javascript that auto detects if flash in installed (although no one uses these anymore due to the aformentioned browser prompt). All you have to do is click "Yes, I want to install" and you're done. It boggles my mind how so many people can have trouble installing flash when the browser does everything for you.

    Divx has no auto detect, as it is played through the wmp plugin. I can understand the frustration of divx, but you simply cannot compair flash with divx.

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    There is a reason every large company launches uses Flash at least a tiny bit.

    true. When I first started out doing web development, it was a rare occasion that a client wanted a site with the littlest bit of flash. That was four years ago. Today, a current client of mine, midwest copier exchange is the largest wholesaler of copiers in the US (quite possibly the world). Their original site, designed by my brother who is a db programmer and not a flash programmer/artist had no flash in it at all. Now I'm being paid to turn everything into flash. Why is that? Why on earth would a copier wholesaler whose primary viewer on that page would be a business owner who probably still uses ie and dell machines?

    Answer: Its where the market is heading. More and more people are getting a kick out of flash sites because they are different. Flash can either make or break your site. If you have a carefully designed site that makes logical sense and is not confusing for a user, you will get people that see it to say "Wow, that was a cool site. Hey, Jimmy, did you see this?". If you have a poorly designed flash site (est 80% of flash sites out there, maybe and most definitly more. If this weren't the case, I would not be getting paid large quantities of cash to make flash site), you repulse people to stay away from your site.

    Dont condem flash. Flash is an interesting entity. As I just stated, it can either make or break your site. If a site is designed well enough, it will do far more than any html site could ever do for you.

    Section_Ei8ht, I realize that but in case you didn't notice... this is a game art community. So of course I am talking about portfolios for game art jobs.

    And yes, there's nothing wrong with a 'healthy hybrid of both' ... the sad part is only that most people don't know how to create a healthy hybrid and "overflashify" their portfolios. I've seen it so many times.

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    Section_Ei8ht, I realize that but in case you didn't notice... this is a game art community.

    yes, klein, i realize that. No disrepect to you or anything. All I'm trying to point out is that you shouldn't say that flash are a turn off. Maybe for you. Maybe for the HR people you know. Not everyone likes flash sites, but not everyone hates them.

    This is a game design community with some of the greatest talent I have ever seen, so it shouldn't be too hard for anyone that frequents this board to learn a thing or two about flash and use their pre-existing knowledge about good design to churn out a flash site that would make you change your mind.

    Quote from Section_Ei8ht

    yes, klein, i realize that. No disrepect to you or anything. All I'm trying to point out is that you shouldn't say that flash are a turn off. Maybe for you. Maybe for the HR people you know. Not everyone likes flash sites, but not everyone hates them.

    yes that's why i said

    Quote from kleinluka

    Personally for me Flash sites are a turn-off.

    i don't know what the big fuss is about. i just suggested people avoid it and gave valid reasons. its up to you what you do with your portfolio.

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    Lurker's estimate was not far off.

    Wasn't an estimate, its a figure straight off http://www.macromedia.com

    As far as Flash portfolios go, I'm in complete agreement that the majority of them are useless and should be in HTML. That being said, what I've tried to point out is that WHEN Flash is used correctly, it WILL enhance, not detract, from the user's experience.

    When you're posting a portfolio, you're selling a product (yourself). Your site is the packaging.

    My 2 (or more) cents:

    They are not hiring you for your flash skills (unless you're applying for a job as their webmaster). They're hiring you for your level design, texturing, modeling, skinning, designing, etc. Anything on your portfolio that isn't that needs to go away.

    There is a difference between a portfolio site and a personal site. Put flash on your personal site all day long. That's for you to advertise yourself to the general public. Be splashy all you can. Your portfolio site is just a digital resume. Your skills are going to have to sell yourself. On my paper resume I don't put down half the jobs I've had, because a politcal party doesn't care I worked retail. They do care about my political jobs though. Same thing here. You want a job moddeling, don't show them your flash skills. If it comes up in an interview if you have any other skills, feel free to drop it in there.

    I have to agree on the "Flashy" sites made by artists. I've had to go through a lot of portfolio sites to find people for our mod, and some of the sites were so badly made by people trying to appear unique / as if they think outside the box that I just gave up and closed the site. Primary hate is sites that have images with parts you click, but it's not clear which parts are clickable, or what they represent. I even had one site where there were random characters all over the place, and you clicked a character that took you to a link, but it didn't tell you what the link was. I wanted to punch the idiot that made the site. I also agree about the image branding stuff. People never put pertinent information in a filename when they submit them, and the images are rarely branded either. I just handle recruitment for a mod and I get maddened by it, so professional recruiters are probably 100x more irritable.

    Game site often use flash stuff too, driving me completely nuts half the time. I just want to see screenshots of the damn game and not 3000 hours of animated intro, loud music or other such crap to then finally be pressented with 400x300 res screenshots..Portfolio sites often do the same kind of thing and thats real bad yeah. But if they manage to do it properly it might be cool, or the artist could make 2 versions, the flash one and a simple version..

    Rest of article was pretty good but I dont agree with having your entire portfolio on 1 page with just tumbs, often its just too much work or info to post on 1 single page. Doesnt help the readers focus and itll load slow too prolly

    And I often like a lot of info or news pages or stuff because it shows how active or involved the person is and if I have more info I know better with who Im dealing and who he is and what exactly hes doing so I dont have to go ask 300 questions in the interview or email conversation. If it appears the guy doesnt want to relocate for example Id like to know such info as soon as possible

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