A teacher of mine once told me “nothing matters except your book” –referring of course, to my portfolio. Photographers use portfolios for self-promotion, to share a story or point of view, to help create a body of work, or to establish or reinforce professional identity.
The range of options in portfolio design and presentation makes for a number of choices—format, size, paper type, books, boxes, albums, printing processes and more. Other considerations: Budget? How much time to invest? Can new work be added, or can old work easily deleted? How do I pitch my work to different audiences?
In this article I’ll discuss a presentation option I’ve been working with lately and it’s one that I like quite a bit. Simple and inexpensive with straightforward construction, it’s changeable, elegant and a bit different.
- Pre-cut folio with prints
The ready-made folio itself is made from a precision- cut sheet of heavy paper, folded to create a recloseable envelope or pocket that holds 10–15 prints. I’m currently using this design to showcase a dozen of my images printed on 310gsm Ilford Gold Silk inkjet paper. Each image is imprinted with my name, the title of the body of work and my web address.
I created my own simple Photoshop templates (vertical and horizontal) that photo technique readers can download for free to create their own folio pages with a minimum of stress. (See resources).
Please follow the link to download the templates: Custom Folio Templates
