Hi there! My name is Fei Lu and I'm the director of Winged Canvas.
Today I want to talk about 12 things that you can do to make an
outstanding art portfolio.
The first tip I have for you is to start
with a bang and end with a bang. Typically people
remember the first thing they see and the last thing they
see. When an adjudicator looks at your art portfolio,
you want to make a really good first impression
and you also want to make a really good last impression.
Look at your pieces as a whole, evaluate them and put the strongest piece first,
the second strongest piece last and then you can put
the other pieces throughout your book. Treat your art portfolio as if it's a
picture book. You want to showcase personality,
you want to show a story and if you compare your portfolio with a
good picture book, you'll get the ultimate engagement. The
second tip I have for you is to make sure that your portfolio
contains a variety of different mediums and subject matter. You want to
be able to show somebody that you've tried all different types of
materials and different themes to communicate what you're passionate
about. Keep in mind that although you want to showcase variety,
you also want to make very specific portfolios if you are applying to
different schools, Tip number three! Make sure that you
spend time writing thoughtful descriptions about
all of your pieces. Adjudicators are looking at
hundreds of books and you want to be able to make it easy for them to
appreciate all the thought that you put into your
work. One of the common mistakes that I see
in a lot of portfolios is descriptions that state the obvious.
For example, if you submit a still life please don't say "this is a still life". I
can see that! Tell me more about your still life -- tell
me why you chose the object, tell me about your process and tell me
about the reasons why you compose the picture
in this way. This makes it very easy for adjudicators
to understand and evaluate your work. Tip number four is less is more.
This is a design principle that guides my everyday life.
Basically we think that the more artwork we put into our
portfolios, the better. BUT in actuality, you appear
only as strong as your weakest piece so you have to be a very ruthless editor
and make sure that you have other people who you trust -- like it could
be an art teacher or a friend somebody who has a good eye for design
to help you look at your pieces objectively and
let you know which one are the strongest. When I'm reviewing portfolios
students will often point out their favorite piece in their book
and a lot of the times their favorite piece is not their strongest piece.
Sometimes your favorite piece could be because you had a really good experience
with the piece or you drew a portrait of your favorite
celebrity and in that sense it means a lot to you.
What adjudicators are looking for are not your favorite pieces,
but they're actually looking for the most meaningful pieces and the most
standout pieces. Find somebody you trust to lend you an
objective eye and help you make those decisions. Tip
number five is to showcase your versatility. If i'm
looking at a hundred portfolios and I see
one person who has a very distinctive style that's
memorable or honest or funny, these are things that make it stand out.
Many visual art portfolios will require a self-portrait. I can't tell you how
many self-portraits I've seen of pencil drawings of bored faces.
If I see 80 pencil drawings of bored faces,
and I see one piece that's made differently, that will stand out
Tip number six is to make it flawless. To quote Rihanna, "You should shine like a
diamond." Make sure that you've edited and
selected only the best pieces to showcase.
You need to take the extra effort in making sure
that your descriptions are formatted, you have a nice presentation,
you don't have any typos -- make sure that there's no spelling mistakes, no
grammatical errors and nothing that will mar the experience
of your art portfolio. It's 2020 -- We have spell check -- there are no excuses
for this one. We've had spell check for at least 30
years now. A lot of the times we're up really late
at night, putting the finishing touches on our
portfolio and if it's three in the morning and you're super tired,
then you haven't left yourself enough time. Make sure you leave yourself a
couple of days to sleep on it to really take a step
back and look objectively at your portfolio
before submitting it. To avoid being disqualified, you want to
make sure that you read the instructions carefully. It's a good idea
to keep all of that information organized
in a spreadsheet. This tip may seem obvious but many
people get disqualified simply for not following instructions. If
you're going to spend so much time and energy creating a
art portfolio for school, let's start by reading the instructions and making sure
that if you are applying for more than one school,
that you are following that school's specific requirements
and that major specific portfolio requirements.
If you are applying for multiple schools, don't just make one portfolio and send
it to all of them. What are the school's
requirements? What are they looking for? How do they
want you to submit your sketchbook? Some schools will say submit a video.
Some schools will say submit a PDF. Some schools will give you a choice.
Sketchbooks are meant to be messy and incomplete
but they should also show that you are experimenting, that you're trying new
materials. So I've looked at hundreds of art
portfolios -- both professionals and from students, and here's what I
think about sketchbooks. A sketchbook isn't meant to be perfect
drawings on every single page. This is what you might think is a good
sketchbook but from a creative professional your
sketchbook is the beginning of your creative process. It's a place
where you put down all of your thoughts, all of your ideas -- they may not even make
sense at this point but it should be a lot of
writing, a lot of lists, a lot of life drawing,
a lot of doodles, composition sketches, all of the things that you need to do
before you work on your final piece should go in your sketchbook. When I'm
reviewing portfolios, this is how much time I spend looking at
your sketchbook. I might pick it up and
flip through it and I'll stop at certain pages
and that's about how much time I would spend looking at that.
So what I'm really looking for in this flip through
is your thought process. Do you take the time
and energy to think about your pieces before
you work on them? Are you a planner? Do you
experiment in your sketchbook? Do you try out
new materials? Do you cut things out that you
enjoy? It's really a sneak peek into your creative process and who you are!
Sometimes it's nice to get a treat where I'm sent
a video flip through. And so you saw me flip through my
sketchbook, if you're sending a video flip through, I
would flip through some of the pages that will quickly
showcase what is in there without being super
specific and then you can stop at some of the key
pages or the pages that you are the most proud of. So if you're a design student,
you might want to put lots of topography inside your book -- handwriting, note making,
things on notes on design, things that inspire you..
Whereas if you are applying as an animator or an
illustrator, I would love to see lots of life drawings.
So you can take your sketchbook, you could go to the mall, put on some shades
and just draw and make a goal for yourself to
fill up the page every week until it's at least 80%
full. So the next few tips I have for you are all
things that you should avoid doing. Don't include low quality images!
When you are taking a photograph of your work,
you can use your cell phone but make sure that you have good lighting.
You can do this by taking pictures outside
during the day so that your photos are lit
with natural sunlight -- don't use flash photography
and you can also scan your pieces but taking photographs
during natural daylight is probably your best bet.
Make sure that there are no awkward shadows in the middle of your picture -
like a shadowy figure in front of a lot of images.
It just shows me that if you take the care
and the effort to shoot good photographs, then I feel that you would take the same
care and effort with your studies of being a future art
student. The next tip I have for you is to not do
the bare minimum. To always go above and beyond what the
portfolio expectations are. For example,
if a portfolio requires eight to ten pieces,
it's probably better to submit nine to ten pieces rather than eight.
If you're submitting eight, I assume you either don't
have more pieces or that they're not good enough to include in your book.
So don't do the bare minimum because it doesn't reflect
as well on your character as if you go above and beyond.
The next tip I have for you is to not be late! Some schools require you to attend
an interview or a workshop in person and this is your
opportunity to really showcase your passion and your desire to
be in the program. For your workshop or interview, I
recommend getting there super early -- like I'm talking an hour
early. This will allow time for getting stuck
in a traffic jam or missing your bus, this gives you the
time to get to your interview, sit down, have a
breather, review all of the things that you want
to say and not feel rushed or anxious. The last tip I have
for you is to not rush this process.
If you are in panic mode right now and you're thinking
"this book is due in three weeks and I haven't even started",
forget about it. Take a gap year, take the time
to make meaningful artwork that is not rushed. Rushing the process will
only result in mistakes, stress and probably
not your best work. So take the time and really work on building those skills
and even if it takes an extra year, you won't regret it.
If you found value in this video, please share it with a fellow art nerd that you
know. Best of luck with your portfolio and
I'll see you next time! :)