7) Publication Folder and Development Strategies, Angus Fraser - 15/1/18

On Monday our second lecture back was with Angus for Professional Practice, focusing on development strategies for our brand and looking at portfolio examples.

He started off with a quote from Lucy Pritchard, who stated you need to create a brand which is "memorable, visible, consistent, reputable, alive and instill(s) confidence in the consumer". This really highlighted to me that you need to take yourself seriously as a brand, and I need to start getting opinions back on my website and other brand related documents etc from tutors and graphic design students.

Angus then went on to give us some tips about raising your profile, the first being SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). Use relevant keywords to locate your site on Google. Websites such as www.seomoz.org and Photoshelter can help you do this.

Another tip was to prepare the best portfolio you can. Avoid a box of loose prints, and buy a portfolio that doesn't look 'studenty'. It's also important to have 2 or 3 in circulation to avoid any chances of missing clients. Silverprint have readymade portfolios for £120 - DO NOT SPEND CHEAPLY, THIS IS AN INVESTMENT FOR COMMISSIONS!! I'm really glad Angus told us about this because it's better to start thinking about it now so I can start printing final work also with the purpose of putting it in my portfolio. For instance printing it a bigger size, and choosing a consistent paper type to print on - all things which will be cheaper if I start thinking about it now rather than later when I'll have to re-print everything.

He also gave us a list for bespoke portfolios, and photographers do not go anywhere other than these places so they're good to consider:

- Printspace

- Silverprint

- Brodies

- Wyvern Bindery

Other tips he gave us about portfolios:

- No smaller than 14" x 11" and no bigger than A2.

- Business cards in back.

- Between 16 and 50 images.

- Portrait OR landscape.

- List of recent clients you've worked with.

- Thumnails in back with captions for context for the client.

- Necessary details in the front about you.

Another tip he gave us was to do some 'go sees'. Make appointments with people to do portfolio talks, www.firefx.co.uk can help you do this. Try and set a certain number of appointments per month, and don't want your talks longer than 30min, also don't talk about each image. It's also good to do research before you meet a person, and always email them to thank them after meeting them for a first time. You can also adapt your folio depending on the meeting, and have a good balance of personal and assigned work.

Some final tips he gave us was to send out mailers (email one image with a link to your work), paying for ad space to get listed, network, exhibit, publish zines to get people interested in new project launches, enter competitions. All important steps in making people get to know your work and helping you find jobs.

He also went on to speak about development strategies for after uni, to succeed with your brand and your work. This can be better explained from the slideshow he put up, so I decided to just insert slides for this which you can see below.

After the end of the lecture Angus went on to speak about questions we had about the case study element of the module. I took down some notes about this which you can see on the final page of my notes above.

Overall I found the lecture really helpful in terms of prepping more things for my brand and tips for finding work, and it has motivated me more to keep working on finding assistant work, even if I have been unsuccessful so far.

#professionalpractice