Responses by Guillaume Colombel, interactive developer.
Background: I recently moved to Montréal, Canada, and after four years without updating my portfolio, I felt the need to create a new version. The idea behind this redesign was to present my projects in a simple, uncluttered way—thanks to Maxence Henric’s design—while highlighting my skills as an interactive developer. The main objective was to create a site that reflects my personality with a clean yet impactful design, letting users dive straight into my work without being overwhelmed with unnecessary elements.
Design core: The site’s concept is built around the aesthetics of cinematic titles, credit rolls and film reels. Maxence crafted the design with a focus on typography and motion design. The central element of the homepage is based on this concept, featuring a rotating cylindrical slider that evokes a film reel in motion with project information displayed over it in a cinematic title–inspired art direction. Additionally, the microinteractions and animations scattered throughout the site subtly reinforce this idea, bringing visual and narrative coherence to the whole experience.
Challenges: I think the biggest challenge was similar to what many developers and creatives face when redoing their portfolio: actually getting it published. We tend to fall into a cycle of endless iterations, constantly trying to improve every little detail. It’s rare to be completely satisfied with your work, which often leads to delays. To avoid this, Maxence and I decided to set a strict deadline and stick to it. This allowed me to release a finished version while giving me the freedom to improve it gradually afterward. It also taught me the importance of balancing perfectionism with pragmatism—a key lesson in this project.
Technology: On the technical side, I went with a stack I’m more familiar with and that made sense for this project: Vue and Nuxt, which provided a solid framework for the site’s front-end structure. For animations, I naturally used GSAP to bring everything to life. As for WebGL, I used three.js as the engine. WebGL played a key role in achieving the result we wanted for the homepage with Maxence, ensuring the smoothest experience possible and delivering a unique outcome in line with the artistic direction of the portfolio. Lastly, I used Lenis to add some smoothness to the scrolling.