Earlier this week, Ji Lee, communications designer at Facebook, create an Instagram account which serves as a free art portfolio. It’s pretty brilliant, and with its blessing, we’ve covered how to do the same – even if you’re a moderate Instagram user, it’s a straightforward, accessible, organizational hack to showcase your talent.
Step up an Instagram account
It’s simple! Set up an Instagram account to act as a hub for your portfolio site.
Upload an “About Me” image
Before you share your art, the first image in your account should serve as an introduction – think of it like an “about me” page. This is, of course, optional, but each portfolio should have a certain personality. Lee (seen below) is fairly straightforward; it includes his photo, his name and a caption which also serves as a curriculum vitae.
Describe what you want in your art portfolio
This is where the process gets a bit more detailed. You should have an idea of what you would like to include in your portfolio before you start uploading, so organize your thoughts accordingly. Do you want a section dedicated to brand projects? Editorial efforts? logos? Exhibitions ? Whatever your artistic skills, make sure you have an idea of what will require its own dedicated page (we’ll get to that in a minute) and what could be featured in a single Instagram post with multiple images.
Upload images to feature in a single Instagram post (with multiple slides)
Let’s say you want to feature a project in your Instagram portfolio that doesn’t require more than 10 images. You can do it in just one message! (Once you’ve passed the 10 images, you need to move on to the next step, which we’ve outlined below.) Upload the Project or Section images (as you would in any other post Instagram with multiple photographs), making sure the first one is tagged according to how you chose to title the subject. Lee’s example, above, for “Books,” uses the caption field to describe each image individually. You can choose to do the same.
Set up separate Instagram accounts for current or larger projects
Let’s say you want to showcase your drawing talent and don’t want to limit yourself to the ten images allocated in Instagram’s multiple photo feature, or plan to update your design portfolio on a regular basis. In this case, your best bet is to create a separate and dedicated Instagram account. Once you’ve done that and uploaded what best illustrates your talent, you’ll want to upload a few designs to your main wallet account, just like you did: the first tagged image, then a few examples. Tag the first tagged image, linking it to your dedicated Instagram design. Use the caption field to tell users to tap the image and click the tag to learn more.