Portfolio PDF on which tablet.

[OutOfDate]

Hello, I'm going back to work after a break and am aware that my old paper porfolio is rather out of date!

I will be visiting potential employers/clients (all will be other designers and design managers) and think the best bet is to make a PDF portfolio and take that around with me on a tablet, along with hard examples of the area I specialise in. (It's not web related so hard copies are essential).

I'm not doing an online portfolio at the moment so I'll hand over the tablet for us to go through the PDF portfolio together, in the same way that some years ago we would have gone through my old A2 (so heavy!) paper portfolio.

Is this how others working mainly in print do it? And if so which tablet and size do you use?

Thanks

 

[willcapellaro]

I would recommend a full sized iPad, retina is best (I also recommend you wait a week to see what's announced). The mini is great and portable but a little more intimate for sharing, and many of your samples will be greatly reduced.

When you have the device, definitely test out what document sizes will yield a 100% view of your work. If you're showing a company business card you've designed, make sure that comes in at the exact right size. Newspaper spread, show the full view and then show a zoomed/cropped in view (at 100%) that shows you have a sense for type sizing.

Android and windows tablet options abound, all should have native pdf viewers or 3rd party apps like GoodReader. It's basically up to your preference.

However, if you have a laptop, I would not pooh-pooh an applicant using one. I see that more often. There are advantages to that route, much easier to prop up and control remotely.

Note, they may ask you to project if you are presenting to more than a few people. That you can achieve on a tablet as well with hmdi/vga adapters. Very good odds that someone will have to spend 20 minutes looking for their company's adapters for you to project, so not a bad idea to ask ahead of time and bring your own.

One final word of advice: make sure to show your print sensibilities. The iPad can only do that to a point. I recommend bringing at least one actual sample, full size, that allows them to understand how you create something that fits in your hands, is attractive to the eye. Maybe something that contrasts in size/format from the ipad. Win them over with that and let the ipad show more breadth and more projects.

It's always nice to taking high quality photos of your print work in context (menus at a table, hotel brochure at a concierge desk, instruction manual in someone's hands). Let those tell the story in the digital portfolio, show the document views to show how you work.

Best of luck to you, we need more excitement in the print world.

 

[OutOfDate]

I would recommend a full sized iPad, retina is best (I also recommend you wait a week to see what's announced). The mini is great and portable but a little more intimate for sharing, and many of your samples will be greatly reduced.

When you have the device, definitely test out what document sizes will yield a 100% view of your work. If you're showing a company business card you've designed, make sure that comes in at the exact right size. Newspaper spread, show the full view and then show a zoomed/cropped in view (at 100%) that shows you have a sense for type sizing.

Android and windows tablet options abound, all should have native pdf viewers or 3rd party apps like GoodReader. It's basically up to your preference.

However, if you have a laptop, I would not pooh-pooh an applicant using one. I see that more often. There are advantages to that route, much easier to prop up and control remotely.

Note, they may ask you to project if you are presenting to more than a few people. That you can achieve on a tablet as well with hmdi/vga adapters. Very good odds that someone will have to spend 20 minutes looking for their company's adapters for you to project, so not a bad idea to ask ahead of time and bring your own.

One final word of advice: make sure to show your print sensibilities. The iPad can only do that to a point. I recommend bringing at least one actual sample, full size, that allows them to understand how you create something that fits in your hands, is attractive to the eye. Maybe something that contrasts in size/format from the ipad. Win them over with that and let the ipad show more breadth and more projects.

It's always nice to taking high quality photos of your print work in context (menus at a table, hotel brochure at a concierge desk, instruction manual in someone's hands). Let those tell the story in the digital portfolio, show the document views to show how you work.

Best of luck to you, we need more excitement in the print world.

Thank you very much for your reply. I will mostly being showing one-to-one so can probably get away without the projection option at the moment, but will keep it in mind. And thanks for the tip on making sure there are examples at 100%. Do you know what % an image would need to be displayed in Indesign to later show 100% on pdf on Ipad, or am I just going to have to trial and error?

Thanks again

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I would recommend a full sized iPad, retina is best (I also recommend you wait a week to see what's announced). The mini is great and portable but a little more intimate for sharing, and many of your samples will be greatly reduced.

And yes I agree that a mini would be too small. I doubt very much I'll be able to afford the newest ipad (4 is just coming out isn't it?), so was considering an ipad3. Do you think that would be ok?

 

[willcapellaro]

Do you know what % an image would need to be displayed in Indesign to later show 100% on pdf on Ipad, or am I just going to have to trial and error?

Yup, trial and error.