The Pro Designer » Inspiration

Thirty Five Awesome, Fresh Portfolio Sites

The Pro Designer — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 05:43:57 +0000

It is the eternal trade off; the number of work examples visible on the portfolio page verses clean, uncluttered looks and pertinent information. It’s important to give an overview of your work, and also and indication of the depth of your portfolio, but how is this best done on a single page?

Let’s look at some examples of how other designers have addressed this problem.

1. Daniel Sadlowski

The portfolio starts near the fold but is clearly visible. Overall design stands out with some great pieces of work, this site employs a two column grid.

2. Mike Ingham

A very clean bright site using a three column portfolio grid that dominates the page. The use of crop shots allows use of smaller images and leaves room for some text.

3. Skylar Anderson

This site uses a single column for its portfolio grid. This gives plenty of room for a large image and descriptive text.

4. Brian Ray

A musica portfolio, the site uses textures to good effect. Background colors are subdued as the portfolio content has plenty of color in itself.

5. Bret Glassett

One full width column gives a huge space for portfolio content screenshots. The designer has kept the rest of the site simple and dark, making the portfolio content pop.

6. Olga Trujillo

Working to a 9 column grid the site looks neat and structured.

7. Andrew Reifman

Using a menu system to select portfolio elements means that first impressions can be negative. But the click through allows a complete page dedicated to the portfolio item.

8. Mammut Medien

A bright clean look with a three column portfolio grid. Un-cropped screenshots leave no room for additional text requiring a click-through for more information.

9. Evertt De Sousa

With both typography and textures the designer has done well not to clutter the site. The main title is large, however and the neat two column portfolio grid is pushed almost to the fold.

10. Jai Pandya

Colourful yet simple. The background texture adds richness to the site without dominating. The portfolio grid is clear and uncluttered.

11. Mark Palma

An elegant grid design with a 4 column portfolio grid with crop-shots and text. With a lot of information on the page again the designer has done well to avoid a cluttered look.

12. Brett Chaney

Using a single grid for the portfolio elements down the left margin, the designer leaves the most of the main page for the preview. Effective use of space.

13. Lindsey Grande

Dedicating the full width of the page to a single column portfolio grid, the designer here uses dynamic elements to showcase the work, with plenty of room to also have text on the right.

14. Abbacus Technologies

A two column portfolio grid means the image size is big enough to have a full screenshot.

15. Annie Scotland

A very clean elegant design. Uncluttered with a little bit of a dynamic component makes a three column grid work extremely well.

16. Sebastian Mrazek

Again the texture is subtle and doesn’t dominate. The work is physical so big images are used to showcase the portfolio and hence the single column design.

17. Josh Sender

The portfolio content lends itself to simple display, necessary to make four columns work in the portfolio grid. The lack of color also acts to reduce the amount of stimulus from the page. Dynamic rollover for color adds this only where required.

18. Dasayev Teixeira

While clean and simple, a four column grid plus bright, high color motifs are distracting and confusing. Good use of angled crop-shots.

19. Tomasz Chmielewski

The background texture is strong, but well chosen so as not to dominate. No captions or text on the portfolio elements help to make three columns look good.

20. Valter Bicudo

Nice and clean. A single column of portfolio elements gives plenty of room for detail on each one, but it is not obvious that the portfolio continues below.

21. Dustin Allen Pace

Using a dynamic carousel the designer has managed to present several of his portfolio elements in a large format, direct style.

22. Amber Heyward

Bright and clean. A single column gives plenty of room for large images and text, but the user only sees the top item. If the elements where shorter then the second element would be visible.

23. Christopher Lee

Another dynamic showcase. Here only one element is shown at a time. Unlike a carousel, there is no indication of the extent of the portfolio.

24. I Love Dust

Split portfolio grid, with 2 showcased elements at the top and then a three columns below. Effective way of combining show-casing and a portfolio grid.

25. Fully Illustrated

The designer has managed to fit five examples across the screen. The difficulty here is to keep the site from looking busy. Using grayscale color scheme and crop shots help. The roll over color highlight also helps maintain focus on the element of interest.

26. Sven Prim

Full screen portfolio elements dominate the user experience. No text or explanation for each element. Click throughs used for more information. Click to move to next element. User is immersed in the first element, the presence of other element not immediately obvious.

27. Rich Brown

Another five column portfolio grid, this time in half a page, the designer has worked hard to keep the page uncluttered. Using only rollover color highlights, simple text and very cropped shots the result is reasonable.

28. Robbin Waldemar

A very simple line drawing site. Three column grid nicely spaced. Roll over for actual portfolio element image draws focus.

29. The Digital Invaders

Extremely dynamic site. Maintains interest while the user tries to figure out what’s going on. Difficult to understand what the portfolio elements are.

30. PointShop

Three column portfolio grid combined with crop-shots leaves plenty of room for ample spacing as well as text. Subdued background helps focus on the portfolio elements.

31. Alexandra Cohaniuc

Simple clean site. The designer has used an accordion for the portfolio elements, down the left hand side of the page.

32. Jeff Sarmiento

The designer has dedicated a large column on the right to non-portfolio elements leaving room for only a two column portfolio grid. starting late on the page.

33. Prakish Soni

Ample of use of textures lends depth and interest, but perhaps a little cluttered? A unique portfolio with elements scattered rather than in a grid.

34. Andrew Bradshaw

A clean minimalistic design. A showcase example pushes the main portfolio grid almost off the page.

35. Daniko

A single column portfolio grid, with the second element well below the fold. While well balanced and effective for the first element, it takes a moment to realize how the layout works.

There are a million different ways to display your work on the web and the above are just a few examples. There are no clear cut wrongs or rights, as what works depends on factors like what kind of examples are being displayed, what additional information is needed for each example and what else needs to go onto the page besides the portfolio. It can also depend on the target audience. An audience that only needs to be exposed to the graphical images can be given a clean site with just no distracting information besides the example images. Knowing your target audience goes a long way to working out what layout is appropriate for your portfolio.

The most important thing though, is that your get your work out there.

----- Ever wanted to start your own design blog, but you just not sure how? I'll so you how to Setup, Generate Traffic and Make Money Blogging...Just visit The Pro Designer to get started with 'Blog Your Way To Design Success'...

The Creative Digital Art of James White – Must See!

The Pro Designer — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 04:58:16 +0000

As a designer we can all appreciate the work of others, and James White is no exception. This guy does awesome work and I bet you will just love it as much as I did…

A little bit about James – He is a digital artist and graphic designer living in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. With ten years of experience, James has worked on an array of personal art projects and with clients including Toyota, VH1, Armada Skis, Red Bulletin, Wired Magazine etc. and has been featured in Computer Arts, Computer Arts Projects and Advanced Photoshop magazines. His website is Signalnoise.com so go and check it out.

Funny Storefront Signs That Will Make You Laugh Out Loud

The Pro Designer — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 10:40:50 +0000

It is always important to try and keep a sense of humor when looking at certain things, and these funny storefront signs are the perfect example.

Just imagine going down to your local and coming across a unexpected funny storefront sign, what do you do? You whip out you camera and you take a photo and post it on the net, that’s what you do.

Anyway I hope you enjoy this collection of really funny shop signs.

Perfect Examples of Beautiful Black and White Photography

The Pro Designer — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 06:57:18 +0000

Colorful photographs and designs are so eye-catching and capable in helping a design stand out from the pack, however black and white can also have that impacting effect if done right.

The black and white photography which is shown below, concentrate on the lighting, composition, its perspective and how the picture is shown in context is very important. You’ve got to have time and patience in considering the photos shown below. The samples below are very near perfect examples of beautiful black and white photography, I am sure you will agree.

But take note that this post is not the place to illustrate the best black and white pictures of the best photographers in the world. It is supposed to inspire such designers to test out black and white as a alternative or consideration to use rather than different vibrant colors.

I hope you enjoy these samples, because I know I did.

Amazing & Beautiful Cloud Formations That Fill Our Skies

The Pro Designer — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 23:19:05 +0000

Every single cloud formation is attractive and unique, in its own special way. Clouds fill our skies above and are a large component of our lives; even if most of the time they often go unnoticed.

However every now and then, someone is able to capture true beauty with their camera. This post shows some truly astounding cloud formations – the type that gets etched in your mind forever.

This list shows some of the very best cloud formations captured on camera.

85+ Twitter Logos That You Will Find Inspirational

The Pro Designer — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 07:08:41 +0000

As we all know twitter has exploded on to the social media scene and with that success, it has yielded many people and businesses capitalizing on the name.

So what I have done is put together a list of some of the very best twitter logos I could find, so check out these 85+ inspirational twitter logos, I hope you enjoy: -

Do you need an awesome logo design?

Giants From Above – Check Out these Giant Photoshopped People In City and Urban Settings

The Pro Designer — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 06:44:24 +0000

Today I came across some really huge people in small city environments, well small to some. These amazing photoshopped images are really cool and each image really gives you a realistic view from this unreal image, plus the city /urban setting they are on really has a great impact. I hope you can draw some photoshop inspiration from these images, cause I certainly did…

So anyway, check out these incredible photoshopped pictures below and gather some inspiration for your own work.

Source – Worth1000

50 Inspiring Websites Using Red As Their Impact Design Color

The Pro Designer — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 10:19:07 +0000

I really like the red color a lot (makes me think of Dracula). And we already know that the web is full of great examples of web designs (using red or not) to get some inspiration from, but only a few of them were listed in the same place. So I made a list of 50 great examples of web design that are using red as their main impact color.

As you will see, most of them are using variations of red along with dark colours. Nice choice for a design.

Alaska Trolley

Big Sound Mastering

Bills Are In

Bite La Pizza

Boxing For Fitness

Bridge Head

Cameron Moll Portfolio

Carrot Media

Carsonified Mission

Colouring Code

Dark Crimson

London Creative

Design Expedite

Electric Pulp

Fajne Chlopaki

Flexible CSS

Fuel Brand

Future Of Web Design

Green Label

Handcrafted CSS

Hein Gericke

I Am Jamie

Interactive Zoom

Jonah Levine

Kodu

Less Code

Logo Heroes

Lo Mob

Made By Tinder

Monday By Noon

RMI Move

Neubreed

New To York

Night Club Apps

Red Bullet

Revolution Driving Tuition

Red Ikons

Run Addicts

Serious Online Presence

StackOverflow

Swag Designs

Take The Walk

The Student Project

ThoughtBot

Underground Planet

We Design Wise

We Love The Bart

Wp Monk

Conservation Ark

Zona Sul Motors

60 of the Very Best Billboards You Will Ever See

The Pro Designer — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 03:37:21 +0000

Today I put together a really cool collection of the best billboards around.

To best showcase your products or services, there are so many different methods of advertisement you can employ, but above all, and if you have the budget, billboard advertising is one of the best ways for attracting your clients attention. These sorts of billboards will really attract the attention on coming traffic and will make you stop and think.

See below for 60 really creative and interesting billboard advertisements, I hope you enjoy…

50 Beautiful Email Newsletter Designs For Your Inspiration

The Pro Designer — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 10:24:01 +0000

A newsletter is a regularly distributed publication generally about one main topic that is of interest to its subscribers. Newspapers and leaflets are types of newsletters. Additionally, newsletters delivered electronically via email (e-Newsletters) have gained rapid acceptance for the same reasons email in general is gaining popularity over printed correspondence. But I bet you knew that, right?

Anyway, because a good designed newsletter can attract more and more customers or fans or whatever they will attract, I decided to show share with you 50 of the best newsletter designs.