down and dirty design review
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- maliah
give me the low down of everything that you think about my work but normally wouldn't say. I crave the honest and unrefined reviews. please just give me your professional opinions.
- fibonacci0
*licks his chops*
- Ruffian0
Why flash?
- fibonacci0
Ok, I looked through all your work. It's all very average. Lots of mistakes, lots of unpolished ideas or design choices.
It would be a lot of effort to actually do a project-by-project breakdown of those mistakes. So instead, some more general advice.
The Malbec, Wyland Wines, and Industry Open House (save that horrid pixel effect you used) are your strongest pieces. Open with one of those (instead of the Ooples logo). I would almost consider dropping the Ooples logo completely, I think it's crude.
Get your layout for the site fixed. The left-edge of the box where all your images appear should be beyond the right-most-edge of the ".com" in
That will also give you room to make the navigation at least 0.5pt bigger, but hopefully a full 1pt bigger.
- fibonacci0
Get rid of that "Sleeping giant music" project too. It's really lame looking. Won't help you much in the scheme of things. It's a bad looking piece of art direction that was never used.
I'd consider redoing the Wyland Foundation flyer. It's a really, really weak piece of work (Drop shadows?? Gradients? 10 different fonts? wtf is going on? It's a disaster). However, it's a good project (by that I mean it's a non-profit and a feel-good, positive project) and the type of thing you want to have in your portfolio, only done correctly.
- Kiggen0
I don't say this often but i'm really curious for your work 'fibby'.
I'm not saying you're wrong, but the sheer arrogance that drips of words. I want to see if its justified.
- fibonacci0
Don't worry about it.
- baseline_shift0
im not a huge fan of how the spacing changes when you click the nav to the left. if you want them to move, id think about indenting them to the right, as apposed to shifting down.
I also think you can lose the http://maliahcoolidge.com/ in the header. Seems like a redundancy
- acrossthesea0
I think you have some great concepts, but there's a few things here and there that just kinda make you go "Hmm...". I'll do my best to point out what sticks out to me and offer suggestions.
Ooples - Feels like that drop shadow used to present the cards is just overwhelming and too heavy handed. Same with the drop shadow behind the yellow ribbon. Be wary of overusing these effects, especially in print design, because they appear to be a crutch you can use to make something appear interesting or a lazy way to create contrast and separation. Seems like that yellow ribbon would contrast well enough on it's own against the blue. Also, maybe try not to center align all your design elements. Or if things are going to be center aligned, try to match widths (like the 2 things on the bottom of the dark side of the card). I like the color bars on the far right.
Industry - The drop shadow sticks out again to me. Looks like the cover to the program is really nice (the one inside the box). I'd try and focus on that more and show that off.
Rockabuy - I like the b/w logo a lot more than the colored one. I'd like it even more if you replaced the lined pattern with a solid fill. Then I'd like to see the logo reversed out of black. The color one throws me off because of the outlines used in the yellow banner make it feel clip-artish or more cartoonish than I think you intended. Kerning seems a little weird in the CK and the A. Trajan wouldn't be my final choice, but clients sure do love it so I understand how that goes. I think the style guide below could be more elegant with smaller type,
Kawasaki - This seems like some interesting stuff. Are we looking at two separate sites? This is the kind of project where the assets can really take center stage and you just need to get out of their way. Kawasaki is a great brand to have in your book. Show the bike larger.
Crazy shirts - I like these. I'd also show the flat vector artwork too so I don't focus solely on the photography. The turtles one is cool. That could be a beautiful wall print.
Wyland Foundation - I'm not sure I would show all these pieces in your portfolio. Feels like a lot of ideas trying to work together and that's just hard to pull off. Too many fonts, illustrator effects, and iffy typography solutions. Doesn't feel like the rest of your work. Feels like marketing department was bored and revised this stuff to death.
Wines - Looks classy! I like this family shot, but I'd want to see the details on select labels. Show off the sexiness of the glass. I'd even go for a dark background. Try it without the reflection even.
Stampede - I like this a lot. The strands coming off the "d" is where you start to lose me. I'd just make it solid and not have those individual strands. I personally don't get why there's a leaf coming off of one the strands but I guess it's ok.
Malbec - Very cool concept. I'd like to see some of these a lot closer. I'd tone down the drop shadows overall too. It doesn't make them feel more like a part of the room. I don't think that's necessary to get the concept across. Seems like you have good assets here, so I'd show them off more. Allow the nice photography to work for you and make you look good.
BBB - I think I'd show the logo on it's own only in black. There's some nice stuff happening on the card that I'd show off more too. The back seems elegant, with the environmental stuff. The amateur photography distracts me from the design though.
PFTP - The table photo is fine, but I wouldn't make that the main focus. You seem pretty intent in showing the finished printed pieces in your portfolio and I think that's not showcasing your design in the best way. I don't care if something actually was printed and ended up on display on the table. It doesn't have to be something tangible. I care more about your ideas, solutions and design sensibilities. The collaged photo on the right feels pretty thrown together and the drop shadows and reflections aren't helping, just distracting. Show the work. Show what's inside the booklet. Show off the typography and those swashes.
Beatnick - This looks cool and has lots of energy. The red/purple type with the dropshadow on the green/yellow background doesn't work for me. Try making the type white and ditching the drop shadow completely. I think the thick black rounded outlines you have around the different images is distracting.
Mexico - I don't think I'd show this one unless it was absolutely necessary. Feels like your earlier work?
LCAD - The folder looking thing in the bottom right seems like the strongest out of the bunch. I'd try focusing on that.
Discreet - I think the logo itself is bizarre, but I really like some of the patterns and ideas going into the packaging. I wouldn't show the logo on it's own and I'd try to get a better photo of the packaging.
Overall suggestions:
- You don't have to always show the finalized work (that the client has probably tweaked to death). Show what you think is the absolute best version of any project. Even rework it after it's all said and done to get it to where you want it to be. It's about your vision.
- A lot of this comes down to how you are presenting your work. If it's a digital photo of a shirt that you whipped up, people are going to focus on the photo skills or the wrinkles in the shirt when they should be focusing on the design. If you don't have the photo chops, find a local photographer and do some trade work for him. Match his time with your design time. Whatever it takes to make your stuff look as good as possible.
- Familiarize yourself with how the design industry typically displays their work. Pick up the CommArts annuals and use that as a reference. Ditch the heavy drop shadows.
- I'd recommend that you do some more "concept" work. Choose 5 brands in different industries that you really like and do style frames for them. Just call them concepts and make sure it's 100% what you want it to be. There's no client to screw this stuff up. Work in your portfolio doesn't have to be real. Blow people away.
- I'd try and do more interactive stuff.
- Try your hand at some infographics
- Regarding the actual site, I think it functions just fine, but it needs lots of polish. The top left area is a mess. I'd redesign that whole area. I'd ditch that weird arrow in the bottom left. I bet people click on that expecting something to happen. I think you should find a way to have multiple images for a certain project. This way you can really show off the work without any compromises. For the descriptions, why don't you mention what was involved (branding, production, motion design, custom typeface, etc). Introduce a simple previous/next navigation so I can just cycle through all of your work. The navigation on the far left feels really crowded. The "feel" of the site is very AS2.0 keyframe-based "states". If you're going to go the flash route, I'd make it worth it. If not, this could easily be an elegant HTML site (and you could have individual pages for your work so you can send someone to a certain page). I'd also ditch the black border around all of your work images.
- When reviewing your work, ask yourself if you really need this design element/dropshadow/reflection and if it's really improving the communication of the piece.
- Really familiarize yourself with typographic sensibilities and the use of grids as a foundation for design. If I were to looking to bring a designer to my team, I'd want to see that they could elegantly lay out a 100pg annual report with a mix of text heavy pages, charts/graphs/data tables, and photo spreads. I don't see that kind of polish in your work yet so I'd really focus on that. To get there, I'd even recommend copying/recreating a printed piece that is really nice (just for your own education, not for your portfolio). Then you can start to see how and why they aligned things a certain way and you start to see the solutions.
I'd check out these books:
- http://www.amazon.com/Thinking-T…
- http://www.amazon.com/Making-Bre…
- http://www.amazon.com/Layout-Wor…
- http://www.amazon.com/Elements-T…- good god!! I agree mostly but damn!!Projectile
- :)acrossthesea
- maliah0
WOW- just remembered that I posted this after clicking on my account. Thanks everyone for your feedback.
@ Ruffian + akrokdesign + fibonacci + baseline_shift:
I know my site itself it horrid, html was not used because I don't know it - I just know some bare bones flash... So I used what was in my immediate knowledge to just get something up to refer people to. So for now it's better than nothing, but you're all spot on with that one. And the type/ branding mess is currently being addressed as well- thanks baseline_shift for pointing out the redundancy of my email addy!@ Kiggen
I don't know what you're referring to? My work 'fibby'? the arrogance that drips? Are you referring to my copywriting skills/ lack there of as sounding arrogant?@ acrossthesea:
You're the man! I'm very thankful you took the time to look at my work and give me such detailed feedback on my designs. Your assumptions about certain pieces being older or touched by the marketing depart were even spot on- in fact, they were weirdly spot on... I will be revising my works. I know I'm in need of a design "mentor", to help me hone my skills and your suggestions were much appreciated. I liked the links to books and the idea of recreating a printed piece, thank you!- RE: Kiggen, he was speaking to "fibonacci". Just thought I'd clear that up.DoTheMacarena
- I think 'fibby' is for fibonacci, not directed @ you.jfletcher
- yeh...hahaha, I got that now- but i was very confused at first.maliah
- duckofrubber0
Damn, that logo for the Discrete tampons looks PAINFUL.
- ukit0
acrossthesea - Longest feedback for a portfolio ever?
- Once you start, you can't stop.acrossthesea
- Damn that is long.acrossthesea