Portfolio website
GDES-425 spring 2017 · American University Design
Instructor: David Ramos ( ramos@american.edu · office hours )
Create a web-based portfolio of your best work, for self-promotion, job applications, and professional opportunities. The project involves creating the portfolio site, writing project descriptions, and compiling images of work. Portfolios should include enough explanatory text that they can stand alone.
The site could be built from scratch, with a content management tool, or with a software-as-a-service package. (Behance will not suffice.) You might use existing templates, provided that they present a sufficiently professional image. The portfolio site must reside on its own domain name.
Your portfolio must include:
- One website
- One mobile app
- The capstone project
- Three other projects
The portfolio will be evaluated based on:
- Content: the work’s breadth and depth, visual quality, conceptual strength, and embodied craft skills
- Presentation: everything that shapes the reader’s experience, including sequencing, layout and format, choice of images, photo quality, choice of headlines, and explanatory text
- Details and craft like correct spelling, working links, and code quality
You may need to rework or improve existing projects shown in the portfolio.
Hosting
Good software-as-a-service portfolio tools include:
Self-hosting a CMS/dynamic site, or hand-coding a static site, are also a reasonable approaches.
Existing portfolios
If you have an existing portfolio, it may be possible for you to carry out a smaller set of improvements and, instead, allocate more time and grade points toward the capstone project. Speak with the instructor.
Resources
See Portfolios and example portfolios.
Brand New does a fine job of structuring and writing about project stories.