Professionals selling portfolio reviews

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@Solomon-Designs Hi Solomon!
It's clear you've worked very hard to create your portfolio! And I can see some great moments there, you definitely have a big potential.
As other said before me, I'm afraid some of your illustrations would need more clarity - in value and shapes and general composition.
for example: I love the textures in the bird story, but overall, the characters are lost in the background.

Which is easily said but hard to do.
My advice, rather then trying to improve these existing pieces would be - create new ones, more simple and less busy and think about composition first. Maybe I am wrong, but I see a lot of very complicated scenes and complex images in your portfolio. Which is a good thing, but when you are just figuring out the rules of good composition, learning your values and shapes and lighting, you can be easily overwhelmed with all of this, the drawing it self eats up a lot of your time, so you spent less time in sketch and thumbnail phase.
It might be better to start with a simpler images and move towards the complex ones?
(Something like the fox and bird illustration you have on your portfolio - no BG, so you can focus on your figures and the shape of your props more. When you are supper happy with your characters and props, add a simple background and really focus and value grouping, colors and shapes, maintaining strong focus. once you are super confident there, try complicated scene with more characters and busy BG...)

For example. I love your illustrations with the Yeti or Big Foot family, I see you put a lot of effort in that piece. However, it lacks a clear focus and the characters are a bit wonky. I saw your Monkey character sheet (Oskar, I believe?) and I loved that execution! There are some confident lines and shapes. I think it might be because it was easier task overall, so you could spent more time on the drawing it self and really think it through?

Hope it helps a bit! I would love to see more of your stuff, if you'd like to share your progress with us!

Kim Rosenlof

@Solomon-Designs Giuseppe Castellano also does an hour-long portfolio review or an emailed portfolio review. He was an art director at Penguin at one point, I think, but now he does The Illustration Department which does classes and a podcast. I have never done a review with him, but if you search it in the forums, I think there are some that have done mentorships and other things with him.

Mia Clarke

@Kim-Rosenlof I did an emailed portfolio review with Guiseppe, and it was really, really good. He gave tangible, actionable feedback, he didn’t hold back, and after I implemented the changes he suggested I started getting offers of representation from agents (after two months of all rejections). I really recommend it!

AngelinaKizz

@Lee-White this is very exciting. Can't wait to hear more about this

Julia Hegetusch

@Mia-Clarke Hi Mia. Could you tell me how many pieces he reviews or does he look at all of your portfolio pieces? It doesnt say on his Website. Thanks so much!

Mia Clarke

@Julia-Hegetusch In my review I sent him my online portfolio, and I think he probably touched on half of the pieces in it, going into detail in like two or three. I had specifically told him I needed to understand why I was getting rejected by agents, and so instead of focusing on specific pieces so much, he spoke more about general problems he was seeing throughout my work. Before the review you get an email where you can tell him more about what you want him to look at, and I’m sure you could tell him which pieces you would like him to focus on. The review itself was 25 minutes, which at first I thought was not enough, but because the feedback was so concrete, I found it super useful.

If you’re thinking of getting a review, I suggest you take some time and think through what you want yo achieve by getting it. Do you want feedback on your technique and advise on what to study or practice to improve, do you want to know which pieces are your strongest, do you simply want to know if you are good enough to get work, or is it something else you’re after? I found that because I was able to ask for quite a precise thing, I got an answer that was helpful to me.

Julia Hegetusch

@Mia-Clarke ok thanks for your in dept reply. That is very helpful. Yes 25mins sounds short so it makes sense to think about what you want from it bevor hand.
Wish you all the best going forward

Jeremy Ross

Hi @Lee-White, that’s great news!

Few questions for you, please.

Is the price of $225 for everyone, including members?
Do current students (say 1 or more years enrolled) get a loyalty discount, say $100?
Are follow-ups included? For example, “I fixed these pieces as discussed, am I on right track?” For clarity, I understand this can be tricky and time consuming; however, I’m thinking bulk upload single review, similar to what an instructor would do at Uni.

Cheers!

Lee White

Hi everyone, Sorry for the lack of response about the portfolio reviews, we have been crazy busy around here! Here's a little more details about them.

We have upgraded what we were originally going to do so now the review will consist of two parts, a very specific video crit of your portfolio that will last around 30 min. Then there will be a follow up one on one zoom with your instructor that lasts another 30 min.

The total cost will be $325 for this in depth review. That is the absolute lowest we could make it and still pay the pros who are doing the crit and also pay our admin and costs here at svs. They will be rolling out slowly over the next few months and seating will be extremely limited in the beginning.

The teachers on board so far are:

Me! (for a short time)
David Hohn
Yas Imamura
Shane Hunt
Vesper Stamper

Possible:

Anna Daviscourt and others to be announced soon.

@Jeremy-Ross I would LOVE to offer an in depth portfolio crit for $100! But the truth is, for that cost we would never be able to give the feedback that will truly change your work and plans. SCBWI offers those kinds of crits. 10 min of someone barely glancing at your work and giving an quick opinion never actually works. This is what we wanted to avoid. So we are priced for professional illustrators to spend the time looking at your work and helping you come up with a plan.

@Katherine yes! Once the link is live you can schedule as far out as that teacher has made available. : )

Jeremy Ross

Completely understand @Lee-White, thanks for the follow up!