I think the format of your portfolio depends on the type of work you want to do. Flash is preferred if you want to show your interactive abilities, website for web work, etc. PDFs like you show normally convey a print designer, unless they are downloads linked from a more extensive website.

I think the number of examples you show seem appropriate. Breaking your portfolio into three parts I consider a good idea.

I would certainly agree with Ken’s point. You’re not an interactive designer, and there’s no problem with that. But a static PDF page isn’t much different from a static web page, except that it’s a big hassle for me to download the PDF instead of just see it on the fly on your site. I like the breakdown and the presentation, I’d just build it all into web pages.

Also, some wise (and some not so wise) people have suggested to me along the way that, especially where personal portfolios are concerned, to give credit where credit is due. When you’re showing a book in person, you can always talk about who was involved. If you’re showing a book online, unless mention is made otherwise, I think the implication is that you concepted, directed and designed all of it all by yourself. You were good to mention in your post that others were involved, but I might suggest that you bite the bullet and credit the others involved on a piece-by-piece basis.

Lastly, I must say that I think the Rubik’s Cube intro is inspired. Anymore, it’s pretty hard to pull off “the cube” in any way that isn’t trite, obvious, or overused, but I think you’ve done it. The subtlety of movement and message is very nice. I love the fact that when it’s “finished” moving, the first thing your brain thinks is that it’s not solved correctly, because there’s these white squares showing. Then you think “and there’s not even anything on the sides that’s meaningful.” And then (if you’re Drew) you think: Aha! “B. H.” That’s brilliant. Nicely done.

I’ve been through the PDF vs. website debate myself recently. I’ve had a downloadable PDF for the past several years and that has worked fine for agency freelance work. A prospective Creative Director can pop on to the site, download the PDF, and pass it around the office to see if there is any interest in working with me.

Now, I’m in the process of trying to shift my business focus to winning my own clients. That requires, in my opinion, a more informative site and the ability to see the work “on the fly”. I’m intending the new site to be up within a week, so I’ll post a link then and accept the same risk of critique as Bennett.

My vote is for moving the work onto the web pages rather than in the PDFs (although still having the PDFs available for download would be even better, although I’d probably put all four sections into one PDF).

Great work, by the way.

Jonathan

Awesome work! Certainly you won’t have a problem if you are in need of finding work again…or just decide you need a change.

Personally, I’m usually very annoyed by PDFs. I feel that having your work on actual HTML pages is more user friendly, and opens up your portfolio to people searching for specific design work. If you’re a print designer without alot of interactive experience, I think it’s perfectly acceptable to throw everything on a blogger page. Your audience might not understand, though. My extreme Movable Type hack of a portfolio works wonderfully for me, and gets a great deal of traffic from search engines. No cold contacts from it yet, for what it’s worth.

Ditto on giving credit. You aren’t there to present your work, so its best to do whatever you can to avoid misunderstanding.

As I now am on my own, I’m interested in the credit debate as well. My intention is, for work done with an agency, to say it was done “in collaboration with X Studios”. I don’t think that’s misleading.

I wouldn’t delve into crediting individuals unless I felt it was seriously confusing. Blatant misrepresentation (and actual project credit theft) simply opens up a world of bad karma. What comes around goes around. There’s no way to enforce a guideline on crediting, so we have to rely on personal ethics and others’ willingness to call out those who would step over those lines.

“No designer is an island.” -BH

correction: “No art director is an island.”

first, i think the majority of work is very nice, but i think you could do without the Big Vinny stuff. i personally think flash is extremely over-used and if every animated aspect of a site is not totally practical, it is simply annoying and distracting. your site looks good, but may be just a little little bit stagnant, check out this site, as it is a good execution of a static page without looking monotonous. www.serialcut.com you can also check out mine, www.wbuchinadesign.com even though it is in desperate need of a re-design. good luck.

Offer both.

I agree with JonSel, it is just a teaser. You’ll never be able to convey all of the aspects of your work on a PDF or Webpage. For my personal site, I opted to show the work on standard web pages, with a “click to enlarge” which brings up a pop-up window showing a larger image if they so desire. The PDFs are nice to email directly to people, but keep them under 2MB, or you risk them being turned back by the recipients’ email program.

I had good response by simply using a creative hotlist portfolio to show a small sampling of my work from my school portfolio to find work right after school. For a nominal fee I received great response from a ton of reputable firms/in-house departments.

Take a look if you like: creativehotlist.com/wkerr

I am in the process of building a personal blog/portfolio site… but I didn’t have time to do that given the time put into my book.

Sorry for the late comments but I think I have some advice.

Obviously you have great work and your focus is print which explains the simplicity of the web site. The PDF thing has been discussed adequatly enough. I would prefer to see the work online as its faster and easier but I understand why they exist.

But the pop-ups have to go! Seriously they are an impediment to smoothly using the site and not least of all annoying and without real purpose. What they immediatly say to me is lazy. That you couldn’t figure out how to get the information communicated through one design/layout so you relied on multiple layouts. I am sure that is not what you intended just letting you know what its communicating.

I think getting all the info to exist within one browser window would help immensly and makes the PDF thing even more forgiveable.