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Portfolio Night

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So this past Thursday was Portfolio Night in Boston. It was basically a seminar that takes place simultaneously all over the world where designers get to meet with some of the top agencies around the area. The creative directors from roughly twenty or so of these companies critiques your portfolio. My friend convinced me to go months ago, so I got my tickets then sort of forgot about it up until last week. I managed to get everything online here and uploaded to their site the day before the event.

I wasn’t sure what I was in for. I made it there early because I didn’t want to miss anything. I was a bit worried because most everyone there had a portfolio, like the ones they used back in the day before the internet. Being the geek I am this printed portfolio thing never crossed my mind. Instead I borrowed my girlfriends laptop and was planning to simply show this website to the creative directors.

So this past Thursday was Portfolio Night in Boston. It was basically a seminar that takes place simultaneously all over the world where designers get to meet with some of the top agencies around the area.

The event itself was much more laid back than I would have ever expected. No khakis to be seen, and free drinks all around. In the beginning everyone kind of stood around. I met up with my friend and a couple other people from our college. After a few minutes they let everyone know how it was going to go. At the time on the back of our name badges, we’d have fifteen minutes to talk with each of the three creative directors listed below our designated time.

My time was 8:00p.m., and the event was running late. That meant I had about three and a half hours to kill. Then I realized that maybe the place did not have a wifi hotspot set up. I spent the next hour trying to track down the owner of the place to get a straight answer. There was wifi, but I had to stand in one small area to use it. About an hour before my time, I decided to download a local version of my site because I wasn’t trusting the spotty connection. I very carefully held up my girlfriends laptop in that one spot and luckily was able to download my work.

As it turned out, the internet at the side of the place with the creative directors was perfectly fine. My three interviewers were Mullen, One to One Interactive, and I forget what the third one was. Evidently the creative director there didn’t like me or my work too much either, so maybe that’s why I can’t remember where he was from.

My three interviewers were Mullen, One to One Interactive, and I forget what the third one was. Evidently the creative director there didn’t like me or my work too much either, so maybe that’s why I can’t remember where he was from.

Internet issues and waiting aside, I’m glad I went. To me it served as kind of practice for going on design interviews. I also met some very interesting people who were obviously passionate about what they do. Portfolio night reassured me that I’m going into the right field.