Solving problem of no magazine design for portfolio

[AnotherMe]

I would like some seasoned print professionals thoughts on my plan.

I have hardly any print or magazine work for my portfolio. In order to solve this problem I am thinking about creating several magazine designs using Adobe InDesign. The problems that arise are:

• I obviously am not going to send these to a printer because I can't afford it
• The "magazine layouts" are going to have to be very short, 3 to 5 pages

My solution would be to export the Adobe InDesign as

• EPUB
• Publish Online

I can create these Adobe InDesign for my current freelance client or for my own portfolio. Desinging it for my current client would obviously look better on my resume, so I will probably do both.

[BobLevine]

Not a good plan, IMO. I'd do them as static PDFs and put them on a portfolio page on your website.

Now, if you want to promote interactive work, then yes, Publish Online or EPUB would be a good route to take.

Just my $0.02. Others will undoubtedly disagree with me.

Finally, you do have a website, right?

[jane-e]

Hi

I agree with Bob, generally. In addition, you might want to upload your designs to Bēhance.

Jane

[Randy Hagan]

Not to say knocking out some spec magazine spreads is a good or bad call, but I think there may be some questions you want to ask yourself before you delve into this, like:

1. What kind of work do you want to do? Who do you want to do it for?
2. How do you want to present yourself, and your work?
3. What do you have in your portfolio right now?
4. Why do you think it's necessary to develop spec print pieces in your portfolio? And why, in particular, spec magazine spreads?

If you asked me, specifically, I'd ask you why magazine spreads? There are all kinds of cool design products — logos, postcards/flyers, small space ads, full page ads, illustrations, brochures and other sales collaterals, publication art — that I'd want to see executed well before I'd want to look at some sample magazine spreads. Even if I was hiring someone to produce magazine layouts. And for a long time in my life, I was hiring people to produce magazine and newspaper layouts.

Not to mention that, unless I was hiring you for a one- or two-person magazine production staff, you wouldn't be doing that kind of print work once you got in the door. There are lots of things you'd be doing — media kits and sales collaterals, spec ad design for the sales staff, small space, (then larger) ads for the publication(s), columns, jump page layouts and front of book/back of book departments — before you'd ever get a shot at designing feature spreads and covers.

Plus, if you're a digital artist comfortable with web design and multimedia, you'd probably find a faster track to top designer status from the digital side than you'd ever get being an ink-stained wretch laboring in the bowels of the print side of the house. Jus' sayin'

Please don't take this negative. I certainly don't intend it that way. It's just that from the sounds of your original post that you're jumping into the middle of the process without a plan for where you want to be, or a specific idea of how to get there. If you're game to giving us detail of what you want to do, there are a lot of smart folks around here willing to help you get there.

Hope this helps,

Randy

[Laubender]

Hi AnotherMe,

why did you tag your question with the word "Scripting" ?

Thanks,
Uwe Laubender
( ACP )