Senior highschool student portfolio

Hello everybody,

I’m Robrecht Vanhauwere, 17 years old and currently in my senior year of highschool. The last two years, I’ve spend a big part of my spare time on making small design projects.
As the school year is coming to an end, I’ll have to go to college next year where I want to study industrial product design, so these small design projects were a way of preparing myself for studying ID.

I want to know if these projects were a good preparation for college, what you think of them and what could be improved.
I do know that sketching is very important when you’re active in the ID field, so I was thinking about posting the sketches I made in school later in this thread (because I’m currently doing my final year Architecture in highschool and right now we have Easter holidays, and all my sketches are located in school.)

You can find these projects here: ATTENTION: Projects or http://rvanhauwere.blogspot.com

I’m looking forward to your reply
Kind regards,
Robrecht Vanhauwere.


Edit 16/11/2014: Hi! I’ve had it very busy the past few months but I am finally in my first year Industrial Product Design (at Howest) and in the meantime, I have switched to squarespace for blogging which enables me to post a lot more than in the past and have published 1-2 new projects (also switched to a much easier to remember url name: http://robrechtv.com.
I’m trying to post every week the sketches I’ve made in school on here to see the progress I am making.

Besides that we’re also working in school on something I am really excited about and as part of that assignment we need to keep a blog running to post our progress.
I do have to say that it is in dutch, the URL is really clumsy and it uses a standard Blogger theme but that’s required for our assignment.
There are a lot of sketches I am posting on this site so that the teacher can track our progress and I thought that you’d might like to have a look http://vanhauwererobrechtswing.blogspot.com

Robrecht,

Came out of lurk mode to respond to this.
Once in a while it seems people come through who just, “get it.”
The work you’re showing here feels like it came from an astute first or second year and I’m hearing you say you’re still in high school. Seeing your process (sketching, notes, prototypes, etc) would help a lot in rounding things out, but you’re translating a compelling story through clean visuals and most everything is easy to understand.

This, as an application portfolio to design school should work, no problem. Again, I’d make some additions in terms of your process and especially your sketches, but shoot, you’re well on your way…Not all work needs to be super polished. Taking your audience through your journey is just as important as telling the overall story.

It’s also clear you’re inspired by Andrew Kim, over at http://www.minimallyminimal.com. Potentially some other designers as well who share a similar style. You have a very simular blog execution as well as overall presentation. Not a bad thing at all, but I might challenge you, as you develop, to come up with your own unique voice. In the beginning, it’s great to emulate. It helps mold your skills in an arena you know works well. Just something to keep in mind as you progress.

I don’t really see a need to get anymore “critical” than that, especially since you’re not even in design school yet. Keep the kind of focus you’re showing here and you’ll do great.

Thanks for sharing! A fun thing to stumble on through my morning readings.

I have to agree with the previous poster.
It is a very strong showing for someone with little to no experience.

Obviously, your projects lack a bit of depth but that will come as you progress through education and work experience.

I also noticed the striking resemblance to a few other portfolios that are being lauded as the industry standard. Jacob makes a very good point in urging you to find your own voice and style. Eventually you will get there but it is a good thing to keep in mind as you develop.

First of all, thank you for replying!
I’ll surely try in the future to experiment more to form my own style, as well as design- as blog-wise, and was already considering this sometimes, but never really tried to take the chance as I was first trying to get my portfolio complete and wanted to sufficiently develop my visual communication skills.

But before I’m heading to college I’ll definitely try to develop my own style, include more sketches, giving my projects more depth and improve my presentation skills as well as my english (because I’m from Belgium and my native language is dutch)!

I am with JBallard and Bepster, this is awesome stuff considering you haven’t gotten to school yet (it is pretty neat your high school has an architecture course or program). Just communication your ideas is half the battle sometimes, so this will go great for critiques.

I think you could definitely show more iterations of each concept before it is finalized, both sketches, renderings (AI/PS, it seems you have the Adobe skill so far), and CAD. JBallard is right that it is very early, I more think you can keep these things in the back of your mind as you start your next four years. It is cool that the watch and amp projects are very pure forms, but they could use some more detailed treatments that make them seem a little more real, like breaking or filleting the edges on the interior cutout of the amp and purchase modules (this is very nit-picky).

Even if your final designs are simpler forms, you can use the iterations to say, “yes, I thought about A, B, and C as other solutions, but then went with Z.” In a work or even school environment, you might look at the amp port cutout area and sketch/render a bunch of variations over the main form.

Great work and keep us updated on how the school process goes! Looking forward to seeing the rest as you get a chance to post that too.

Agreed, some fantastic thinking. I hope you post frequently as you get into design school so we can see your progress!

Very good portfolio Robrecht!

I would explain a bit more of the interaction process in the Braun smartwatch, but the presentation and storytelling is very good. In the OLED Lamp project I’d like to see more of how it works, how are they attached to each other, Would it be possible to have different colors? How do I control the light? What about synchronization with music?

I’m sure you’ll have no problems getting into the school you want. What schools do you have on mind? Any 3D modelling skills this far? It looks to me like you’ve done most of the stuff with illustrator and photoshop, probably in some of them would have been easier to just do a rough 3D model and a quick rendering.

Anyway, very good work! Specially knowing that you are still in high school. Any designers or architects in the family?

Keep posting!

Cheers

I’m planning to go study Industrial Product Design next year at the Howest, one of the few colleges in Belgium who offer this course (though I would really love to go to the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena).
As far as 3D modelling goes, I know the basics of Solidworks (used it to make the nLight and AMP model), I’m pretty experienced when it comes to ArchiCAD (the program we use in school for making plans, 3D models and renders) and I know my way a little bit in Google SketchUp, which I mostly used back when I was 15-16 when I made basic smartphone mockups.

Unfortunately there are no architects or designers in my family, but my grandmother used to paint in her free time, my father is pretty good at drawing and wanted to be architect when he was in middle school but couldn’t.


As soon as I can get my hands on my sketchbook in school, I’ll scan my sketches, because some pages are filled with sketches as of how I came to the design of the amp.

I’ll surely do! I’ll post some of my sketches I made in school next week along with some rough doodles/drawings I made during class.

I’ve heard of Howest before, seemed like a good school but I know nobody who studied there. I would keep practicing SW and probably take a look to Rhino, not sure which one they’ll teach you at Howest, but maybe you can ask them. Most design departments work with SW, Alias or Rhino. I’ll also start playing with Keyshot for renderings and animations, it’s quite easy and intuitive. ArchiCAD and SketchUp are more appropiate for architecture or exhibition design.



Hi! I’ve had it very busy the past few months but I am finally in my first year Industrial Product Design (at Howest) and in the meantime, I have switched to squarespace for blogging which enables me to post a lot more than in the past and have published 1-2 new projects (also switched to a much easier to remember url name: http://robrechtv.com.
I’m trying to post every week the sketches I’ve made in school on here to see the progress I am making.

Besides that we’re also working in school on something I am really excited about and as part of that assignment we need to keep a blog running to post our progress.
I do have to say that it is in dutch, the URL is really clumsy and it uses a standard Blogger theme but that’s required for our assignment.
There are a lot of sketches I am posting on this site so that the teacher can track our progress and I thought that you’d might like to have a look http://vanhauwererobrechtswing.blogspot.com