LO4 - Preparing content for a portfolio

Having studied the creative and digital media course, and through personal hobbies, I have accumulated plenty of material that I will be able to use in a portfolio.
Below is what I consider to be some of my best work to include.

Unit 14 - Magazine Production

For this unit I produced my own magazine publication from scratch, including the text that would be used, the images that were included and the layout of the publication. I spent a long time planning its appearance, and went on trips on location to get the photographs I planned to use. These places included the Farne Islands, Yorkshire Wildlife Trust reserve Potteric Carr, and the home of a contact who fostered a hedgehog.
I feel that this unit went very well, and I was pleased with the outcome. The good photographs made all the difference, and I was able to lay the magazine out in a way that I felt came across as organised, creative and professional. I will use this in my portfolio to showcase my creativity and the photographs I took for the publication.

Unit 17 - Producing an Audio-Visual Product

In this unit, I planned and produced an audio-visual media product from scratch. I went through different variations of the product, writing and later scrapping a potential script that I found didn't work in the production. I made use of a family holiday to document one of my favourite places: the Isle of Mull.

I feel that this unit went quite well, albeit not completely to plan. I changed my ideas to suit the situation, as my subject matter was fairly difficult to predict. After feedback from a university lecturer, I learned that an improvement I could have made was to include a variety of different shots, as the shots I use in this product are all visually very similar - there is very little variety between close-up, wide, medium shots etc. This is something I can mention in my portfolio as it displays the ability to reflect on my work and understand that there is always room for improvement.

Unit 32 - Graphic Design

For this unit, I had to design a range of graphics to advertise a real or fictional event. I picked a fictional Halloween event, dubbed "Fearfest". I designed an original logo, two billboards, a flyer and a ticket. I planned the designs from scratch, drawing out sketches and putting together mock-ups in Photoshop to plan out their appearance.

I feel that this unit went well, and I managed to work around setbacks that I experienced during my time working on this unit - I lost my progress when the Mac I had been working on died. However, I managed to adapt and the unit went as planned. I was pleased with the way the designs turned out. I will include these in my portfolio, although they aren't very closely related to my future aspirations. They will demonstrate my skills in Adobe software like Illustrator and Photoshop, and will display my creative skills.

Personal work and achievements

As well as studying the creative and digital media diploma, I enjoy experimenting with photography in my spare time. This has produced some photographs that I will be able to include in my portfolio. Below are just a few examples of these photographs:

Laying out the portfolio

Because of the variety of different media I want to include, I have decided I am going to use a website to display my portfolio. This will allow me to organise it into sections for easy navigation.