The Artist Portfolio

When you apply for a job, you typically use a resume that contains work experience you have accumulated over the years, maybe you even mention some projects you’ve done, and academic accolades. For an artist, it’s similar. But you show a lot more these things instead of tell.

These past few weeks I’ve been working on my art portfolio. The problem is: I’ve never made an artist portfolio before and I’m not sure what career direction I want to portray.

I did have a portfolio page up on my website. But it was just a link to all the images I had posted on my Instagram. I didn’t think much about it at the time because I believed that showing any of my art must be enough for a portfolio. But boy was I wrong. I started researching portfolios and I began to see that each type of artist shows different things in their portfolios. I feel like this is obvious but because I never really delved into what type of artist I wanted to be, I didn’t really think about it. Art is multifaceted, there are many jobs with in it. Just like when I was in computer science. If I wanted a job in a particular programming language, I would need to show that I knew that language or at least had the ability and/or experience to pick it up. I had to have the same approach with art. But even now, I’m not sure what sort of artistic path I want to focus on but I do have ones that I like.

Illustrator

I’ve done Illustration for books in my family. Whether it was for my mother growing up, or even from my aunt. There were writers in the family, and thus they needed illustrations. I even did a few for other clients here and there as commissions. I feel like this is the path I’m most geared towards and honestly feel the most comfortable pursing. I’ve illustrated my own little comics growing up in order to bring my own stories to life. I think the tedious part is always the writing but being an illustrator, that’s already done for you. The client you are working with typically has the story set. It’s the job of the illustrator to bring visuals to that story!

For a portfolio, I think it really depends on what type of illustration I’m getting into. Such as comic book or children’s book illustration, it really varies. But in a general sense, I would need a portfolio that shows a character in different poses, self portrait, characters (animals + people), interior and exterior scenes.

Storyboard artist

This one is new for me. I never thought much about storyboarding but I found it to be the closest thing to comic book making in the industry. You get a prompt/description (from a script) for a scene and you draw it out. Obviously it is more complex that just that. You have to position the characters in meaningful ways. It’s almost like you’re the camera man for a scene. Storyboard artists plan the shots of the scene utilizing drawn panels. It actually looks pretty fun. But they do often have to make changes if something doesn’t look or flow correctly.

Whenever I’d animate as I kid, I seldom used storyboards and I believed my brain was the best way to show a scene. I could Imagine a scene up in my head and then I’d translate it directly to Adobe Flash (now known as Adobe Animate) and call it a day. But If I look back at my old animations today, they were really flat in a way. They didn’t really flesh out a scene all too well. So much more depth in the environment and even in the characters could’ve been shown if I was willing to put in a bit more planning. I guess this is why storyboarding is interesting to me.

For a portfolio (based off what I’ve learned), I’d probably need some story sequences to show my storyboarding skills and dynamism. I’d want images that show I can draw in different genres, figure drawing would also be a plus, and gestures. I don’t think animatics would be necessary but probably the storyboard for the animatic would be ideal.

Animator (2d Character animator)

This one was a childhood dream. I had always wanted to be an animator growing up. But I never wanted to really do 3d animation. I feel I was never particularly good at sculpting and all that. But that isn’t the job of an animator. It is usually just manipulating rigs and portraying a sort of feel with the characters movements. Regardless, I preferred 2D animation. Drawing 2D a tedious process. It consists of redrawing a character in a slightly different stance over and over again. But in the end, it always felt rewarding to me. The idea of taking those childhood comics and storyboards and making them a reality was so intriguing to me.

For an animation portfolio, I’d probably need to focus on character design with turn arounds, small animations/reels and some storyboards. I would also have to start studying 3D animation because that is really big in the industry.

My Current Portfolio

My current portfolio consists mainly of drawings I’ve done over the years. But I also sort of added a CV style to my portfolio page as well. Showing exactly what I’ve been doing this past year for my entrepreneurial endeavors. You can check out my portfolio here. Right now, I feel like my portfolio is geared more towards illustration. Out of all the artist career paths, it is one that I feel the most comfortable with. I also feel like, with a bit more work, I can improve my portfolio to really show my experience with illustration. So far, I have a self portrait, characters with turn arounds, and large detailed scenes. I also have attached previous work I’ve done with illustration.

Conclusion

I know I have a lot of work when it comes to building a portfolio. What I listed as things I need for each career path is based on some research but I’m still new to all of this so I don’t know what’s best for certain. I feel like whichever path I decide to choose now, it won’t stop me from moving to the others. I never planned on doing the same thing my whole life. Careers and jobs are second to friends, family, and the things I love in this world. If they ever become to hard to bare, I will do my best to pivot as I am doing now. I know this journey will be tough but I sure am ready for it. I know it’ll take me to new and pretty cool places.

Let me know your thoughts on portfolios! Do you have any professional tips or even tips from your own experience? Leave them in the comments below!

Until next time, see ya!