The Graphic Designer's Guide to Portfolio Design, 3rd Edition

Chapter 2

Planning Your Portfolio

If the portfolio functions as an evaluation tool for identifying the best applicant for a given position, then the way the portfolio is designed and arranged serves to demonstrate the designer’s organizational skills. The initial layout and overall display of the work in your portfolio should be the focus of your first attempts at its creation. You want to make it as easy as possible for a prospective employer to examine your work. To help you in that effort, this chapter begins with a discussion of the planning process for the portfolio and concludes with an examination of layout styles for the portfolio. (Note that this book is written to include many different design disciplines, so the concepts presented here often span the arts.)

It is best to start considering your portfolio as soon as you determine that you will need one. For many of you, that will be when you enter college or technical school. Developing the portfolio as you advance your education gives you the best opportunity to create top-quality pieces. Think about it this way: with each class assignment, you create a new piece to satisfy the requirements of that class. Thus, in time, you can build up a body of art. These pieces become the basis of your first developmental portfolio. Although this is an exciting process, at times it can also be overwhelming. Sometimes it seems as if there is simply too much to organize and no easy way to carry out the work. Don’t worry about where to ...