Oh No! Another Portfolio!

Noisybast

It's about this time when I like to ask you, the Polycount cognoscienti, for your opinion on my portfolio.
I've just about got the style & the layout sorted, and I'm working on expanding the content in the 2D section.

C&C's please!

Click here to begin bashing my site (in a constructive way, of course)!

calbar

Hey man - site looks very clean, although some may consider that a negative for an artists portfolio.

Upon quick glance, my only real issue with it is being able to navigate the site without the browser controls - mainly the back button. Like when I click "About" I would expect either a "Back" or "Home" link to be available - you might consider having "Home" on every page.

Noisybast

OK, thanks Calbar.
Nav buttons coming up...

Noisybast

Nav buttons finished, and some more content uploaded.
There's also a hidden Easter Egg on the site, if anyone can be arsed looking for it...

Lore

Nice design, very clean as Calbar said. Here is my issues with it.

In your about page: “and I'd like a job in the games industry now, please.” This comes off sounding very desperate and might be a turn off to those who read it.

In the About page links on the bottom, the 3D link doesn’t work.

In your 3D gallery, Change the Telewest background from Black to a cool 25% Grey or go with white as your other stuff has a white background. Your shadow work is lost on the Cable Box with the black background. The same goes for your Lamppost thing (that’s a really cool object).

I don’t know how much space you have for your site. But you could show off the wiremesh. To show how the geometry is flowing across your shapes.

General overview of your 3D gallery gives me this impression. You tend to favor Cartoonish styled models and textures. Play on this style of yours and do more and ditch the Photo-sourced stuff as most of your style speaks the cartoony style. And don’t worry, as there is plenty of games out there that need artist the can do that style.

In your 2D gallery the 3D link doesn’t work. I can’t wait to see what you have planed for your 2D add ins.

As for your CV (résumé), I would place a downloadable Document or pdf so that those looking at it can see it all on one page. And maybe list how many years you have been working on the programs you have listed in your Other skills section.

Keep it up.

Cubik

No wires, no flats, few polygon specifications, no texturesize numbers, not all models can be viewed at a higher resolution. I don't like the fact the menu buttons jumps around from the right-hand side on the main page to the bottom on all you other pages and I'm not very keen on the fact that the white area keeps changing size from page to page.

No comment on the art.

animatr

I once had a professor tell me that wehn making a model, if it's supposed to look faceted, then have it be faceted. if it's supposed to be smooth, then it better not be faceted. A lot of your models are very faceted. This is just a personal aesthetic thing for me, and I dont know what the models were used for, but games can take a decent amount of polygons now and they can sure take enough to smooth out a surface that should be smoothed.

And this is another very picky thing that made me think, and that was on your links page you have some links that make sense and one link that may or may not get you in trouble. Thats the Micheal Moore link. Especially the "not so stupid white man" after it kind of reveals a little too much about your political opinion and I dont know if thats something you want to be interfering with what matters, being the art, from the beginning. Thats just my opinion, could be entirely wrong. I DO like the cleanliness of your site. It's very clean and organized. Some link issues, but those have allready been addressed. You can feel free to look at my site and crit it, it isnt great by any means, and I just started working on it, but if it'll make you feel better, I know mine sucks lol. good work though.
Jeremy

hawken

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And this is another very picky thing that made me think, and that was on your links page you have some links that make sense and one link that may or may not get you in trouble.

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peronality is good, better than being overly PC. I think it's good for those visiting to get a feeling of who he is and how he thinks, not everyone want's the appearance of a mindless art droid!

I think this site is funtional and down to earth. Not much to go wrong and displays the artwork well, without any annoying glitches or design flaws. Simple is best at the end of the day.
You cv could be all on one page though, think of how some poor SOB is going to print that.

Once you have the design down you might want to validate the markup and make it web standards compliant (or not, this only really applies to hardcore webdesigners, err... like me)

http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mattnicholson.co.uk%2F

http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mattnicholson.myby.co.uk%2Fabout%2Fabout.htm

(just two examples). When it comes to the crunch I would advise use of stylesheets instead of tables. However if you're using dreamweaver etc then you are much forgiven.

animatr

I think personality is good. I just come from a really bad liberal area...seattle, and I know from my experience talking politics here is not a good idea. But, being in Liverpool, dont see how that would be too much of an issue. I very much liked your site.