So I'm making a portfolio, and I need some feedback!

[Cymae]

Okay, so I need to make a portfolio. I've decided to use Adobe's Director MX and make it an autorun DVD which will allow me to distribute it with a resume.

My preliminary ideas are as such:

Main screen:
This main area of my portfolio will be sky-themed. It will consist of a background of clouds and the top banner will be a little plane that flies onto the screen from the left to the right and hovers at the right edge. I was thinking of a bi plane, something like this:
http://www.clipartguide.com/_small/0041-0503-1613-5451.jpg
The plane would pull a banner which said "Ioana Croitoru: Portfolio". Small puffs of cloud would come together to form letters which will be the headings for my sections as follows:

- 3D Animation - Motion Picture
- 3D Stills - Audio
- Photography - Digital Art

After that, I think I'll try to do something neat with each heading, but I need some suggestions...

Audio:
I was thinking of doing an mp3player/stereo type thing where you can select the tracks usng the buttons on it and view the titles on the display, something like this:
http://www.allcam.biz/images/mp3player03.jpg

Motion Picutre:
for this I was thinking of doing a film strip where i'd have all the features of the film strip down the sides and my center would be the actual movie.. I havn't quite figured out how I'd swap the movies over or the menu system....I'd appreciate some suggestions. Here's roughly the idea:
http://www.unco.edu/film_studies/graphics/Film_Studies.gif

Photography:
For this I was thinking of doing a small film where you see a desk and the pictures fall onto it one on top of the other, so you'd see something like this with photos practically raining down:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/53/278672002_160acfd80c.jpg

And the rest:
I'm not sure what to do with Digital Art, 3D Stills and 3D Animation...any suggestions would be GREATLY appreciated as I'm at a complete loss. Also if you have any suggetions on how I can improve my design, I can use all the help I can get.


Thanks for listening! I'm sorry if this is in the wrong area, but as I work on it, I'd like to post my progress...like a modlog if you will but for my portfolio ;)

Do tell me if it's in the wrong area and please please please give me some suggestions if you have em, no matter how far fetched they seem!

[D1337]

I'd rather this turn out nice, so dont think im being harsh. If i dont suggest an idea, that means ill post back later with one, as its 6 am.
I dont know how good your drawing or animation skills are, so i dont really know what to give as idea's seeing as it may be to hard. examples please?

Plane dragging a banner? VERY unoriginal.
Idea: (animation/flash) Man cutting his grass with a lawn mower a ground hog pops up out of the ground, the man scratches his head then does an evil grin and proceeds to run over the animal, the ground hog goes into the ground and comes back out,the man tries to run over it, this keeps happening and in the end It shows your name spelled in the grass.

Motion picture: film strips are annoying and just look like it was thrown on, just because you could.

Idea:Merging reality with art, example you put toast in a toaster. Push down the lever thing, then cut to 2 seconds before it pops up, but instead a really nice photo of the bread pops up you go to eat the "toast" screen loses focus and comes back to show a plate with the real toast missing a few bites. You could do that with several different objects.

Photography: Pictures would most likely fall white side up.
Get one of those video camera's that takes frames every x miliseconds, print the frames. Plus a photo thats pure green

Then start up a video camera holding all the photo's looking through them and shredding them one by one, after thats done stop the camera remove the scraps, put the green photo in, start the camera and open the shredder and pick up the photo. Use some program to merge the photo;s creating a frame by frame show.

[Cymae]

Then start up a video camera holding all the photo's looking through them and shredding them one by one, after thats done stop the camera remove the scraps, put the green photo in, start the camera and open the shredder and pick up the photo. Use some program to merge the photo;s creating a frame by frame show.

Thank you for the suggestions.. I might try to give it a bit more thought :) I like this last bit though, it gave me an idea. I can do a reverse take of a shredder so my photos sit in a wastepaper basket and un-shred....what do you think?

Also. if I scrapped the original idea for the plane...how about a photo of my head, with my hair done nicely up and a whole bunch of pins with ribbons hanging off them and the ribbons have the headings written on them? what do you think of that? maybe holding a little mirror or a foundation box open..so i can have some headings on that too..id probably write them on so they're actually in the photo instead of post-producing..that tends to look shoddy

[D1337]

The reverse shredding sounds good on paper, but if you try it, your gonna see the shreds float back up into the air, go through the shrdeer and back into your hand.

It depends if your ok with the floating.

Some employers will judge you on how you look, no matter how unbiased they say they are. I would use the foundation box (is it a make-up box?) or nice mirror, (no plastic!) to cover your face so only that your eyes and head are showing.

I would engrave the headings onto a wooden framed hand mirror, then use a sharpie to add the slightest depth to the writing

[Cymae]

The reverse shredding sounds good on paper, but if you try it, your gonna see the shreds float back up into the air, go through the shrdeer and back into your hand.

It depends if your ok with the floating.

Some employers will judge you on how you look, no matter how unbiased they say they are. I would use the foundation box (is it a make-up box?) or nice mirror, (no plastic!) to cover your face so only that your eyes and head are showing.

I would engrave the headings onto a wooden framed hand mirror, then use a sharpie to add the slightest depth to the writing

it was only going to be a face portrait. Was considering a fan rather than a mirror...I've got a blank one that I can paint which might be nice... got a makeup artist and photographer who will work for free if they can use it for their portfolios...
I don't mind floating showing up on the shredder...will work out the details later.....worst case scenario, i can do it in 3D and it will look reasonably realistic..

[D1337]

Youtube is great for some idea's
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tkq2Kq-LmJg

for audio you could do one of those video's where you video tape yourself playing each note, then digitally make it into the song(if you dont know what im talking about ill look for the video). Or better yet if you can program in flash, you could make it so that the user could make any song with your beats and listen to it.

[Scotty]

There's one thing your portfolio has to be. That's ORIGINAL.
There's one thing your portfolio has to do. That's IMPRESS.

If your Portfolio isn't original and doesn't impress right from the start then most people who look at it will think you have the same creativity as many other people. Something that's radical but will grab the attention will work.

[Cymae]

Ok, general consensus seemed to be that nobody really liked it, so I've redrawn my drafts and come up with more original things to use as my menus. It's kinda late here though so I'll scan them in in the morning and post them tomorrow. Thanks for the feedback!!

[Commando]

Professional, professional, professional.

Even if it is 3 seconds long make it look professional.