Your Dream Portfolio!
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Hello, everyone! I thought it'd be cool to start a thread where we can share the "dream portfolios" we've put together based on @Lee-White's style seminar.
My dream portfolio is heavily influenced by a lot of traditional, Golden Age illustrators, but there are a few contemporaries in there as well
https://www.pinterest.com/missmarck/dream-portfolio/
What I really admire is economical use of shape and line. Not minimal, per se, but very precisely place marks. For the most part, very clean, neat work with some texture. I learned a lot from who I put in the portfolio, and who I left out... Pretty cool mental exercise already!Who made it into your portfolio and why?
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Great idea! I'd love to see what you guys are looking at.
This is truly a transformative project if you put the work in. Remember, the dream portfolio is just the starting point. Then comes careful analysis, master copies of the work, and applying the things you learned to your work. This is the one hurdle I've seen with students doing this project. Many times they stop with just the inspiration, put it doesn't help much without the work at the end. So be careful not to fall into that trap.
So let's see what you guys come up with! : )
SVS Faculty Instructor
www.leewhiteillustration.com -
@missmarck Great idea cant wait to see everyones influences.
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Great idea, i've been compiling images on pintrest I just need to narrow them down now.
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Nice mix. That was really interesting to see. It feels cohesive even with the different styles. I started one a few weeks ago. It's really hard to curate and I just kind of threw in a whole bunch of things. https://www.pinterest.com/tesapie/dream-portfolio/
Website: www.tessawrathall.com
Instagram: www.instagram.com/tessawrathall_art/
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@tessw Thank you! I definitely narrowed it down from all of my other boards on Pinterest. Before I started I actually made a short list of things I'd like to be "known" for. In other words, my Dream Portfolio keywords ha ha! Blocky/bold colors, clean lines, expressive characters, narrative/story, vintage texture/feel, economic marks: if a piece didn't match most of those keywords, it didn't make the list!
I like your collection so far! Lots of beautiful work to study! -
@lee-white - Thanks for the reminder about following through! As a newer artist I am struggling a ton with overcoming resistance. So much easier to just dream and look at pieces I love. It is almost as if I feel a sense of accomplishment just looking at the inspiration and imagining that I could do it. Way more frustrating to try it and find out that I can't make it look the way I want and am not happy with it. Does it ever get easier to overcome this trap as you progress? Thanks!
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@pamm It does get easier. You start to realize the difference between just liking something and liking something for the reason we are talking about here (which is driving your work forward).
That's the reason I say limit this portfolio to 20 pieces max. It gets too easy with pinterest to put hundreds of images in there. Once it gets to be too many, this project loses it's power. So once your reach your limit of 20, that's all you get. If you want to put something new in, you need to take something else out.
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@tessw see my last response. You need to chop this group down to around 20 images. This group has 61 pins which can start to become overwhelming very quick. Keep this grouping for inspiration, but narrow down to 20 for this project.
Only the very best of the best make it into this exclusive grouping.
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I have a question for @Lee-White ! For the master copies, do you think it's preferable to work in the medium the original piece was created in OR in the medium we want to work with. For example, most pieces in my dream portfolio so far are digital. I do work digitally, but really my favorite medium is soft pastels, and eventually I would like to work more in soft pastels and less digital. Should I try to "convert" the pieces I admire in soft pastels, or stick to their original medium? (or maybe I should do both...)
noemiegionetlandry.squarespace.com
noemie_illustration on Instagram -
I don't see the common threads in mine, but I don't see bits that I've taken from each one. http://pin.it/8nal4FF
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@missmarck That's a good idea to make a short list. I might have to do that to pare down my choices.
@Lee-White Ok, that makes sense. I'll work on paring it down.
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@nowayme I think doing it in the medium that you are trying to get better at is key. It doens't matter if you learn to do it in their medium if you don't really want to use it long term. The goal is to make it part of your workflow. That said, I like experimenting with media. I think there are some things that happen with that that are hard to put a price on.
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Got mine narrowed down. My Dream Portfolio
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I put together this file for myself a while ago - I planned to print it as a poster but never did: maybe now that I found it again I will!
If anyone is interested, I can try to find a way to make it available - it is an Adobe Illustrator file though. And yes, it has 24 slots and not 20, but it was also not done for this exercise. The idea was to have it in my studio so as to know what I am aiming for....
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@smceccarelli That's an awesome idea! Do you think you could make a template? I would love to make one for this project as an inspiration poster.
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@missmarck I really liked your dream portfolio. I thought it was interesting that you had suchdifferent pieces in there. Especially the very cartoon styled kind. Working on my own pinterest Dream Portfolio as well
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@smceccarelli Wow, love that idea! It's cool how you've gone as far as a color coding systen on what you want to take from each of your inspirations.
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@smceccarelli - Such a great idea and inspiration to display that way! If you put out a template I'd love to get one too. Thanks:)
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@smceccarelli Cool! What a great idea!
