Every six months, Behance as the leading design-centric platform chooses companies to hold Portfolio Review Week. Such meetups take place simultaneously in more than 200 cities around the world.
During this week, event participants have an opportunity to connect with each other, increase knowledge, share experience, improve skills, and get feedback on their creative works from various groups curators. Such networking allows behancers to move beyond professional limits. Moreover, some participants can even move to another area after the event!
Another zest of these meetups is branded awards from Behance, which are handed to the event participants.
Ukraine is no exception. Our country has a local Behance Community and hosts Portfolio Reviews twice annually.
Companies, Speakers, and Topics
We want to share the list of Ukrainian companies and professional organizations which hosted Portfolio Reviews in autumn 2017. Let’s see how they did it, who were the speakers, and what topics sounded. Read on.
Rivne (Behance Rivne and AAgency)
- Oleksandra Korchevska: “Design: How to Start, Who to Follow, How to Understand”.
Lviv (Behance Lviv)
- Andy Lurs: “A Story About 1000 & 1 Calorie”.
- Slava Shestopalov: “Hipsteria Playing Cards: the Making Of”.
- Daria Ermolova: “How to Create a Character Everyone Will Remember”.
Dnipro (Behance Reviews Dnipro)
- Andrew Veles: “Freelance Strategies, Successful Portfolio, and Time Management”.
- Sasha Kagor: “Case for a Specific Product, Promotion, Creative Process Customizing”.
- Andy Lurs: “Mobile App Case for a Specific Target Audience”.
Vinnytsia (Artinov Creative Space and Behance Reviews Vinnytsia)
- Ekateryna Barbalat: “Pricing Algorithms in Design and Creative Services”.
- Denys Voloshchuk: “Scientific Illustration, Visual Design, Creating Memorable Materials”.
- Valentyna Bezdushna: “Nuances of Work in the Stock Industry”.
- Svitlana Zozulia: “How to Create an Attractive and Unforgettable Character, and Speed up Drawing Technique”.
- Mykola Kovalchuk: “Modern Fonts Technology”.
Kyiv (UNIT.City, Behance Ukraine, and the Youth Association “VARTO”)
- Oleg Gubar: “How Versatile Experience Helps to Build a Career”.
- Sasha Bevko: “Video Projects and Working Within the Film Production Company”.
- Paul Onopriychuk: “Combining Creativity and Business, Team Work, and Projects”.
- Yevhenia Haidamaka: “Studying and Working in the USA and Ukraine. Illustrator Profession and Works Creating”.
Zaporizhia (Behance Portfolio Reviews Zaporizhia)
- Alex Nikiforov: “How a Beginner Designer Can Join a Strong Team. What Skills One Needs to Pump Up”.
- Dmitry Bulanov: “Identity vs Logo”.
- Anatoly Popel: “How to Put Together and Develop a Creative Portfolio”.
S-PRO Experience
The world practice shows that usually the right to host Portfolio Review Week is given to design teams. S-PRO was chosen despite the fact that it’s a development company.
It was then that we realized we were on the right track—to choose a full cycle development and to found a full design department was the right decision. We have small victories—our works have been featured nine times and got in five Behance supervised galleries.
As organizers, we thought where to host the event—to rent some area or use our office. Since it was the first time we held such meetup, we didn’t know how the participants and visitors would take it. When the first Behance Portfolio Reviews Zaporizhia was a great success, we understood that we shouldn’t have been afraid! S-PRO considers hosting this event again in half a year and to expand its format.
Besides the speeches from experts, five portfolios were chosen to be reviewed. Every review was tet-a-tet, in parallel with speakers’ reports. There were also coffee breaks and answers to the audience’s questions between speeches.
Conclusion
Portfolio Review Week is a cool place for knowledge and experience exchange for designers. We hope that after our event Portfolio Reviews will be held regularly in Zaporizhia, and design community will grow. It’s great to understand that you are a part of something global. Behance community members meetings don’t end at official events. We’ll develop ourselves and help others to grow professionally.
