Kathryn’s Bed at Home, Brooklyn, NY ¬©Jane Tam

The next following weeks will culminate into full preparation for SPE National in Denver. I am still contemplating whether to include some work from Hong Kong into my portfolio and how it actually fits in conceptually with my Family series. When showing my work, it is all in how I explain the images.

You can tell when images don’t fit into a series of work and my portfolio is not exactly immune to that problem. My perfectionalist personality makes it hard for me to create new work as I constantly reshoot images over and over again. I am not the best technician when it comes to using a camera so reshooting is a must. So, I realize some images in my portfolio do seem to stick out like sore thumbs. Though with the whole series, you can certainly see the growth of how the project started.

Preparing my portfolio comes with a lot of finishing. Most photographers buy an archival portfolio box for prints, which usually comes in the grand old color of *drumroll* Black! When you’re in a conference with hundreds of other photographers all vying for attention, a black portfolio is not exactly what’s going to make you memorable. Seeing this problem from college reviews, I decided to make my own portfolio box. Notice the plaid. (please disregard the crappy digital photo)

A 16″x20″ plaid portfolio box; homemade by your’s truly. This certainly grabbed a lot of attention and I have some requests to make other’s. I have yet decided on a fabric for my next box but I plan to make it open in a “portrait” orientation rather than a “landscape” orientation. I also have to make a box to safe-guard my book.

If anybody wants to request a homemade portfolio box, just email me and I will give you a quote. (I’m trying to up money for my Senior Thesis show, coming this April, so any help is appreciated.)