FlipBook Portfolio

Richard Kain

Sigh, lost my job recently. And now its time to hit the brikcs and look for a new one. And that means brushing off and polishing up the ol' Portfolio.

Will's new webpage

Naturally, this one is just the first edition. I'll be updating it pretty regularly over the next couple weeks. I've got a lot of back-logged projects to polish up for it. (including some of the projects already on display) I could just use some criticisms and suggestions.

Ferg

Dont use flash.

Zephir62

[ QUOTE ]
Dont use flash.

[/ QUOTE ]

Richard Kain

I'm sorry, but that's not really an option. The jobs I'm planning to look for are going to be in web design, flash animation, user interface design, and actionscript. 3D is a hobby for me at the moment, not a vocation. Most of the places I'm going to be applying are going to want to see examples of flash work.

In fact, I'm even working on a section for my portfolio that will showcase flash design and programming. (Though I will probably pop-up link to any functional examples) Flash has pretty much been my day job for the past few years. I have a much better chance landing a flash job than a 3D gig.

aesir

it seems really small in the center of my screen. My res is large, but not THAT large, so maybe make it slightly bigger. Not many people are running 640x480 anymore.

cholden

Stick to web design for this portfolio. Your models are all blocked out roughs, as are the sketches. Nothing really past a few minutes work, let alone portfolio quality. The web sites stuff seems fine. A resume would be a nice addition.

Campaignjunkie

It's unclear "how to flip pages" - it took me a little while to figure it out, and I'd assume you wouldn't want to frustrate whoever's look at your portfolio, even a little. Maybe some kind of mouse-over/hovering word bubble, "click here" or something. Or even do away with that altogether and emphasize the buttons only.

... And that's assuming you want to keep the flash interface. I thought art directors like being able to save jpegs to their hard drive / being able to print stuff?

TWilson

I think your site requires some more obvious info around if you're looking for a job. Your name should be very obvious, your job title (dont expect people to try to choose your job for you), your location in the world, and a resume link.

moose

not holding any punches here...

think for interface design, you could put a little more thought into how the pages are flipped, how the content of the pages is presented, and in general, making the information on the site accessible.

Right now, it feels more like an exercise as opposed to a portfolio, or even something that I would look at and think "hey i need that guy to do X!" If you're set on the book idea, make it look like a book! do some interesting things with bookmarks/stickie notes to indicate sections, instead of the pre-hashed Flash AS3 buttons (if they arent, they sure look like they are :P)

you dont do button animations for button states. its flash, you've gotta do that, or at least to some extent, feels very "clip art" (heh... is that a word still?) or not developed. Its Flash!! add some motion in the interactivity!

Id nuke the 'go to' element, you dont show what page you are on, or have a bulk number of pages, so how will anyone know what page to go to? Why would anyone want to go to page 5? Doesn't accomplish anything by having it there other than looking like an underdeveloped area of your design.

Everything is so small! Maybe you could code up some area-zoom thing, that allowed the user to zoom into areas and pan their mouse around. That is annoying though, so i dunno. Needs more screenspace though, for sure.

As others have mentioned, wtf is this site about? If you didnt mention it was a portfolio, id have no idea why this site even existed other than to be someone's early tests with flash flip books.

I gotta admit though, the click+drag page turn is pretty slick, i love that.

Do more with the art side of it. Make it look awesome in addition to being awesome. I accidentally discovered you could click drag the pages to turn, maybe you should try to force the user to put their mouse on the book element, instead of the buttons on the side. Accenting that corner lift may help some too (darken shadow some, highlight tip). Maybe adding a subtle gauss blur on the previous page could help stylize it some too, and fade it as the page is closer to being turned.

I'd remove all of the 3d models and drawings from it, and just show web/interface stuff. Sure you can do it, but it isnt helping the rest of the portfolio out currently.

also, be sure to remove the contextual menu options you dont want/need.

edit: is that page turn your actual work? If you're showing off your AS skills, may want to make your own instead of using wildflip? Or did you write wildflip?

gl!

JDinges

I'll echo the other's advice in ditching all the 3d and sketch work, it's bringing the overall quality down. Stick with your strongest asset - web/flash design.

The_Kozmonaut

Until I read Moose's comment I didnt realize you can actually flip the pages by hand. I just hit those arrows to go from page to page the first time I went on there. Maybe there is a better way to make it clear that there is an option to flip them like a book.
Also, as others have said, everything is really small. My resolution is 1280x1024 which isn't all that high and the flip book is still quite small.
Otherwise, I like the turning pages. keep it up.

Richard Kain

A lot of good comments so far, thanks guys! Okay, so it definitely needs to be bigger. There is a consensus that it needs to focus much more heavily on web and flash, and leave out less finished 3D and sketch work. I'm also hearing that it would look much better if the "flip book" element was more closely tied to the overall theme of the site. Possibly make the site look more like some sort of book, possibly a notebook?

No, I did not use wildflip, but at the same time, I did not create the template that this flipbook was created with. I can change the template anyway I want, and have actually added a zoom/pan feature to it in the past. I didn't want to use it here because I felt it wasn't necessary. The current implementation is very rough, I wanted to have something up there that could be referred to, so that I can start cranking resumes out. But then again, that's why I posted it here, so that I could get wonderful suggestions like these.

I know about, and agree with the need to put personal info, that was actually the next thing I was working on. Thanks about mentioning the location, TWilson. I hadn't thought of that. Defintitely a point that potential employers would be concerned about.