Portfolio Site Critique

Hello,

I've just created a portfolio site on Wix.com. Despite a a few server problems (on their part), I've found the site to be very convenient, given my lack of web skills.

My issues are twofold:

1) I would like to see how this site "plays" on a variety of platforms and screen resolutions.

2) I need a general overall critique of my portfolio. It is basically print oriented, geared toward magazine and educational publishing.

As we are all aware, it's a bad time to be looking for work, but that's where I stand. I've never been out of work from this business for longer than six weeks. I'm now going on five months unemployed with leads few and far between.

Competition is brutal- employers are looking for the slightest excuse to put your resume in the "dead pile". I can't take anything for granted. As anyone who's been in this business for any time knows, a thick skin is essential to one's survival. I have one. Please be as constructively honest as you can. I can take it.

Thanks!

Portfolio site:

http://www.wix.com/greglosborne/portfolio2010

Hey ntrigue,

I AM trying to show a diversity of skills but do I think the cartoon pieces are a bit weak. Trying to give the educational publishers something...

That's always the problem, I guess– trying to be all things to all people in a buyer's market.

The "3 clicks" thing is a good suggestion. The old school of portfolio review says to put your best piece first and your second best piece last. That was assuming that the artist was physically present and had a modicum of control over the interview. Three clicks is probably about the attention span of the average HR person or art director. I certainly can't fault them when they're dealing with literally thousands of submissions.

THANKS,
Greg

As one who gets really annoyed over "Flash over Function" (I 'm an old Bauhaus guy) I tried to keep the special features to a bare minimum.

Just browsing some of the Flash-based examples on Wix's gallery page was testing my patience. The thumbnail carousal-type features, etc. are great to look at, when they're not bogging down your connection.

Knowing that if this bothers me, some overworked AD/CD/Hiring Manager isn't going to wait for my little 'dog and pony show' to load.

To minimize this, I decided to forgo the fancy features and present a simple slideshow- half the reason for my post is to get a sense how the site is acting on other systems.

My problem is not knowing how to build websites from the ground up (just starting to learn)- and being too broke to hire anyone who can build me something reasonably slick and professional, i.e. functional. (I need to have something to show now- hence Wix.) I will check out the suggested links.

The most annoying fault with Wix, at least on my end, is its very spotty performance on Safari. There are times when my page, and the Wix home site refuses to load for me. It gets so bad at times, that I have to switch over to Firefox. Considering that the vast majority of potential employers are most likely Mac shops (at least I hope) – it's also very scary.