My portfolio. What do?

[Piggler]

Guys....my junior year is three quarters over and I have yet to submit my portfolio for any kind of scholarship, college application, or even an apprenticeship. How do I get recognized for my work?

My friend's mom owns the only art studio in town and I took a class there and she was liek "WOAH THAS RELY GUD". I know there are places I can submit my portfolio, but I have yet to find any.

If ya'll could help me that'd be mighty fine.

here's a charcoal still life I did a month or two ago

[Piggler]

Is there nothing I can do? Woe is me.

oh well, here's another piece from my portfolololio

[monsterparty]

Most colleges, if applying to an art school, require that you submit a portfolio as a part of your application. Once you've applied, you're already competing and scholarships are awarded based on talent, grades, SAT scores, etc. Look now for schools that you may be interested in because there are a lot of competitions and scholarships that are only available to grade school students, a year and a half out of high school, that's something I learned a little too late. A lot of companies also organize competitions and award grants for the winners.

This being a neat one that I would've tried.

If you live in the states, attending something like National Portfolio Day is a really good opportunity to talk to a lot of different schools about what path you'd like to go down, where your portfolio could use work, and where you stand amongst your competition. The 2011-2012 tour is already over, but it looks like they start again around September. I went last year, and on top of getting to show my work to schools I was interested in, I got to talk with schools I've never even heard of. One of those "never even heard of" schools actually became my school of choice.

Just do your research, get in touch with a counselor, and ask them if they will check out your work for you before you submit your final product. If they're nice they'll help you pick pieces to put into your portfolio and let you know where you could use work.

Art schools are really rigorous though. If you're basing your decision to pursue art purely off of what your friend's mom said, you might want to think twice about it. It takes a lot of dedication.

As for the picture you put up (not that you were asking for critique or anything), it's pretty sloppy. All of your shading is just sort of scribbled in, and it's difficult to separate what's supposed to be value and what's supposed to be texture. If I'm to assume that everything is just straight up shading, it's pretty inconsistent. There are harsh shadows at the back of the skull, but everything else is sort of stuck on one plane. I can't say much about the contours because I don't know your reference, but it doesn't look like very much time was spent creating an accurate line drawing. Were you being timed when you did this? If not, I suggest just having more patience and really taking the time to draw exactly what you see and not settling for the gist of it.

I hope I was helpful.

[Piggler]

At 17 hours ago, monsterparty wrote: Art schools are really rigorous though. If you're basing your decision to pursue art purely off of what your friend's mom said, you might want to think twice about it. It takes a lot of dedication.

I know, I've been drawing for years and I'm in AP independent studio in school, so I have to create and turn in pieces relatively quickly.

As for the picture you put up (not that you were asking for critique or anything), it's pretty sloppy. All of your shading is just sort of scribbled in, and it's difficult to separate what's supposed to be value and what's supposed to be texture. If I'm to assume that everything is just straight up shading, it's pretty inconsistent. There are harsh shadows at the back of the skull, but everything else is sort of stuck on one plane. I can't say much about the contours because I don't know your reference, but it doesn't look like very much time was spent creating an accurate line drawing. Were you being timed when you did this? If not, I suggest just having more patience and really taking the time to draw exactly what you see and not settling for the gist of it.

I drew it in ten minutes, mang. I was just fucking around after I got the proportions in and I usually don't work in charcoal anyway.