JMCDesigner

my portfolio

...Seems to be getting no job interviews, is this design(or its content) to blame? And I use it to apply for job postings, not gain freelance work.

Helen

Design wise seems fine... I like it.

My money would be on the content... not to keen on the third person take, did you write it yourself, or did you hire someone to write it for you?

JMCDesigner

I actually had someone else mention the same thing, but I got input from a lot of cv writing companies saying writing in the third person is better? Maybe I should just have my cv in the third person and the rest of the content speaking for myself. I wrote the cv myself but taking a lot of input and advice from the professionals. I may just have to employ their services though if that's really the meat of the problem :s

Green Sheep Design

Like Helen said I think the design is fine, it's a nice looking site. However, I did find some of the text difficult to read because it was too small; It looks like there is too much anti aliasing on it as it's really fuzzy. Also some of the text didn't stand out enough from the backgrounds, namely on the Recommendation, Web and Print pages.

You have got some really nice work in your portfolio but I cant click on them to make them bigger, maybe incorporating a light box or similar would help?

Other than that I like the animation it's a great looking site.

JMCDesigner

No worries, great feedback. I'll get to work on those things. I've tried incorporating the lightbox into flash before but it's pretty complicated getting them to communicate with each other. I'll give it a shot tho. Love your website interface by the way!

Green Sheep Design

Opening a lightbox from flash may not be as difficult as you might think, depending on which lightbox you use you can write a javascript fuction to open your content which can then be called from flash.

Hope this helps!

JohnRoss

I don't think there's much wrong with the design or the content, quite the contrary, looks great to me. But when a job is advertised, these days, there's usually a recruitment / selection process involved, which mostly works by progressive filtration and elimination of applications. If you aren't getting results yet, it'll be because they are looking for someone older or younger or a different gender or more qualified or less experienced or whatever. I doubt whether your portfolio site has even been taken into consideration.

A very minor thing, but seeing as others have brought it up: I don't think it matters much if you use 1st or 3rd person, but I'd be consistent - 3rd person in the body of the text conflicts with the "About Me" in the menu. And FWIW, I think if I were you I'd make it clearer what the purpose of the site is, just in case someone relevant came across it. I mean, there are lots of reasons for having a portfolio apart from looking for a job, so I think I'd say in so many words and in very large letters, "I am available for work." I haven't found out what your surname is, either, and it's definitely not a good idea to make people work hard to extract information from a site like that.

I worked summers in Blackpool Tower when I was about what I imagine your age to be, so I really enjoyed the animation.

JMCDesigner

I guess I just wanted to make sure I've not gone down the wrong road design-wise. My self-esteem has taken a beating lately, I need to accept that it is partly a numbers game when they consider applicants.

Thanks for your comments, it will tie up some loose ends. However I'm against putting my full details (such as my surname) in full view of the entire web. I usually email my cv as well as provide the link to my portfolio, most vacancies ask me to supply my cv as an attachment anyway. My full details are on the attachment cv.

I think the best part of the Blackpool Tower is the ability to keep blowing it up. And I'm probably a few years older than you think I am lol

Helen

I can blow up the tower!!! cool *runs off to blow it up*