“A compact, innovative navigation clearly indicates the content. And the multiple technological applications cohesively integrated on this self-promotional site effectively convey his skills.”—juror Deb Koch
“Information overload in a good way. This site’s chock full of fun little UI gimmicks; there’s a lot to see here and finding it is half the fun.”—juror Grace Stanat
Overview: Creativity, technology and vision combine in this portfolio site where showing the work and talking about it fuse to form a holistic picture of talent. This site is as much fun as playing an online game.
• A collection of smaller projects built in Director, Flash and Java
• 2-frame layout separates navigation from content
• 1 month, 1 person
Comments by Marc Lin:
“The idea of creating a site showcasing my design projects came to me after I graduated from school and fell into the ‘real-world’ job slump that was going on in the design community. Threatened by practicality and necessity, I had to dream up an efficient and exciting way to sell my ideas (and myself) to compete with other graduates/ job seekers in a bad economy.
“Inspiration always strikes in the strangest places. In the middle of completing a project, I went to Chinatown to buy materials. Looking around at all the street vendors, I was inspired by their straightforward approach to selling—although their products ran the gamut from bags to DVDs, all were contained in one small suitcase. Expanding on the idea of encapsulating my ideas into a single, manageable digital suitcase, I began to imagine what would-be-employers would want to see—the full scope of my design projects and skill set.
“There are no hidden links and information is viewed and organized by the user; by applying the criteria visitors can easily understand the essence of the interface. Navigation and content are contained in a single window (many portfolio sites utilize pop-up windows—a technique that distracts the viewer’s attention), which allows viewers to also be the creators. From the standpoint of information architecture, work is presented at once and can be filtered by category or skillset. Icons are assigned importance by size, and experience is sorted in a linear timeline.
“The result is a great display of information that enhances the viewer’s encounter through smart and playful interactive design.”