RISD students have created an abundance of unique Web sites to showcase their work. Most of the sites include resumes for potential employers or internship opportunities, but many students keep a weblog or a daily journal online, alongside their art.
The RISD's Daily Jolt Web site posted links to 24 of these sites last month, allowing students to find each others' work, which includes furniture, animation, ceramics and illustrations in all mediums.
Jim O'Neill RISD '05 is the manager of RISD's Daily Jolt and also maintains his own Web site for design and writing. The idea to link student Web sites to the Jolt "came from people asking about them and other student sites that already had links to their friends' sites, other RISD students," he said.
Jacqui Alexander RISD '05 said her site had 50 visits last week, up from its average of 10 before the link appeared on the Daily Jolt.
Jesse Lefkowitz RISD '05 said, "It is called 'my little RISD site,' so lots of freshmen and applicants find it looking for RISD online. Sometimes I get emails from them, and I met Tom (Deslongchamp RISD '07, who also has a site) that way."
Lefkowitz has been designing for the Web since middle school. He continues to build a site hosted by father's design firm, Lefkowitz Design. He employs Adobe GoLive for design and uses the site to show family and friends at home what he has been doing as a junior in the illustration department.
"The home page is old and needs to change. I'm planning to build a business site this summer," said Lefkowitz.
In high school, when he used to promote the site on forums, computer gaming companies would contact him, he said, although he's more interested in illustration.
O'Neill played around with Macromedia Dreamweaver in high school, but when he came to RISD, he took advantage of the free Web space the school offers and learned HTML code.
"I'm considering Web design as a focus, away from the regular academic curriculum. I think there are still a lot of exciting possibilities still there," he said.
During wintersession in 2003, Alexander began teaching herself HTML code. She picks apart codes on other sites that work well and displays her work in illustration for anyone who wants to see, especially family and friends at home.
"It's interesting because I hate math, but this is the kind of problem solving I am able to do," said Alexander.
Alexander's site is mostly a personal site not necessarily meant for professional contacts, but members of a biotechnology interest group at Brown have asked Alexander to build a site for them.
As far as the downsides of displaying art work on the web, Alexander acknowledged that it can be difficult.
"It's tricky, especially for paintings, because you can change them completely online. Sometimes they look better, but not always. It's a hit or miss," she said.
Most of O'Neill's regular readers are his friends, but he gets feedback from potential employers, too.
"The main criticism from companies is they would like to see more content, more sketchbook work. It is difficult to translate a sketchbook online - it is too clean to convey process," he said.
O'Neill took the suggestions of the company he applied to for an internship, adding shots of his rough sketches to the finished products already displayed on the site.
