Portfolio Advice

[Chris8920]

Hello

I am currently rebuilding my portfolio, sorting out some work I did for college and also rearranging the way my physical portfolio is presented.

At college we had to mount everything on black A2 board, even though we never designed anything bigger than the A3 size. We had to have an A2 portfolio, but I hate having an A2 portfolio. I think it's big and clunky, heavy to carry around and as a designer I don't like it.

I want to have an A3 folio and but I'm not sure how to place my work in it. I have a few A3 posters and I know that work looks better when mounted but if I have an A3 poster and I want to mount it in A3 it won't work.

Am I better to just have an A2 portfolio with mounted work or does anyone have any suggestions on how they arrange an A3 portfolio if they are using varied sizes of work such as full A3 posters and smaller A4 flyers.

I was thinking of having a piece of printed work on paper on each side of the sleeve, and then in the middle have a bit of board just to keep things sturdy and easy to look through. However doing it this way the work would not be mounted and I'm not sure if it would look that great.

I hope someone can reply quick as I am struggling for time as I have an interview soon, thanks in advance.

 

[remmy]

They made me do this at college, setting it in a A2 folder and its such a bad idea.

Personally I make A4ish sized books for mine. I decided on this size in case I ever need to send it in the post.

You may be able to find a book binding service, this does cost a bit, and means that you need to reprint and rebind if you want to add work in the future. Although for me this is an opportunity to re-design as I still need practice.

 

[remmy]

ooo just seen this...

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/200418/

 

[Chris8920]

They made me do this at college, setting it in a A2 folder and its such a bad idea.

Personally I make A4ish sized books for mine. I decided on this size in case I ever need to send it in the post.

You may be able to find a book binding service, this does cost a bit, and means that you need to reprint and rebind if you want to add work in the future. Although for me this is an opportunity to re-design as I still need practice.

I appreciate your post and I'm glad you feel the same way. However I don't want to do something that would require that much time as I am in a little bit of a rush. I want to keep things straight forward and simple but I do still like the idea of doing something creative like that.

If I have an A3 portfolio and have board hidden in the sleeves between each piece of printed work, the only problem I have is showing something like an A4 flyer. Do I just ask the print shop for an A3 print with no crop marks in the centre and then just put it in the sleeve without mounting, or would that look crap?

 

[remmy]

Hmm personally I would not mount it.

I might have all the work the same size, or occupying the same area with a short block of information about the project at the bottom or top. Try to make all the pages uniform, landscape or portrait depending on work with the work filling the same space if you get what i mean?

 

[CMD is me]

don't use boards. lugging around a box of boards is really heavy. you don't want to show up to an interview all sweaty because you just walked 10 blocks with a 30lb portfolio! mount flat art on black PAPER and use sleeves. don't mount books/fold-outs. good luck!

 

[Chris8920]

don't use boards. lugging around a box of boards is really heavy. you don't want to show up to an interview all sweaty because you just walked 10 blocks with a 30lb portfolio! mount flat art on black PAPER and use sleeves. don't mount books/fold-outs. good luck!

I know what you mean, especially when I had my A2 portfolio it was heavier that should have been.

If your saying I should mount the work, then what about an A3 poster? Do I just slide it in the sleeve, and then if I have anything smaller just mount it on black paper?

 

[CMD is me]

If your saying I should mount the work, then what about an A3 poster? Do I just slide it in the sleeve, and then if I have anything smaller just mount it on black paper?

Yep. Mount each smaller piece on its own sheet -- never on both sides. That allows you to move pieces around to taylor your presentation. And use good paper rather than the sleeve inserts that look like craft paper.