35 Best Graphic Design Portfolio Examples & Tips

https://www.shillingtoneducation.com/blog/35-best-graphic-design-portfolio-examples

 

The work in your portfolio shouldn’t just be the finished, polished product either, you should use your portfolio to show process too. It’s a great idea to show how you got to that polished product, from your initial concept and ideas onwards. Again, your portfolio is all about showing you as a graphic designer and what you are able to do.

  1. Let go of lesser work

When you’ve put a lot of time, effort and emotional energy into a particular project, you naturally want to show it off to people and include it in your graphic design portfolio. But if you want your portfolio to be the best it can be, it needs to be ruthlessly edited. And that means being tough with yourself about only including the very best work.

There’s no hard and fast rule about how many pieces to include, but remember that you can’t predict what people will dive into, and so your reputation is only as good as your last good piece. More reason, then, to ditch the weaker pieces, and only include the work you can be truly proud of.  Since you have a short amount of time to grab the art director’s attention, ideally, you should include 10-12 top quality pieces that highlight your best work to make the most impact.

 

Be selective with the work you show in your portfolio. While it might be tempting to include …(Text Size)

 

  1. Focus on the process, not just the finished work

The biggest mistake many graphic designers make with their portfolios is only showing the finished work. That’s frustrating for many potential clients and employers, who typically want to know things like who else was working on the project, what your contribution was, what the brief was, what the challenges were in fulfilling it, and how you went about overcoming them.

Very little of what can be seen in one glossy final image, so make sure there’s extra content that shows the process you went through to get there, including sketches, screenshots and other works-in-progress where appropriate.

Designer and illustrator Jane Bowyer stresses that not every project you include needs to have been a success from start to finish:

  1. Think about formats

Employers will also be expecting you to have some kind of social media presence, too. Again, focus on one or two platforms you can consistently maintain, rather than trying to populate all of them. But it’s important to have a design-specific account that’s separate from your friends and family images.