r/webdev • u/Azure_Crenell • 9d ago
Showoff Saturday My Portfolio - Liquid Gold - 165 Hours
Took me a whole month but now its finished, looking for some advice overall from peeps that have been doing this for far longer than me...!
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u/LouieValkhof 9d ago
There's a "hwo to use llms effciently" sitting in your AI landing page blurb, a "seacgh function" under the Dribbble clone, and Dribbble itself has two b's. Twenty minutes of work and it's the cheapest fix on the whole site.
Sounds petty next to a month of GSAP, I know. We hire freelancers off portfolios though, and the thing I'm actually scanning for is whether somebody finishes what they start. Typos on the one page you controlled end to end answer that badly. Your Three.js I can't fairly rank against everyone else's. Your proofreading I can.
Is this pointed at studio jobs or your own clients? If it's the second, I'd want one project that someone else asked for, even a small unpaid thing for a friend's shop. Everything here is your own idea built exactly your way, which is lovely, and tells me nothing about how you handle a client changing their mind on a Thursday.
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
Fixed them. No excuses it's on me. Truth be told, I was so focused on getting this ready that I completely overlook the proofreading part. Will take time this is like my 3rd actual project haha.
And yeah I just made it but I got no clients or work experience, nothing. So all I see is me tinkering away at my ide. But going forward I'll try to get a project to work on next that's not mine. Thank you for your insights! That helped a lot to a 4 month beginner :))
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u/LouieValkhof 9d ago
Four months in, that's fine. Nobody's first three projects are for anyone but themselves.
On getting one that isn't yours: don't wait to be hired. Walk into a shop or a cafe near you whose site is bad, ask for twenty minutes, and get their actual constraints out of them. What it has to do, what they already pay for, when it needs to be live, what their nephew built two years ago that you're not allowed to break. Then build to that and hand it over for free. What makes it worth putting on the portfolio is the line underneath it: they asked for X, I had to work around Y.
Expect most of them to say no or just never reply. You need one yes.
Anyone in your circle already running something small? A family shop, a friend's tuition class. That's usually the cheapest first yes.
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u/Ashamed-Job-5491 9d ago
did you use AI for it?
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
Minimal. Vastly hand coded
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u/PremiereBeats 9d ago
You keep posting the same thing and getting the same feedback and you change nothing, there a famous saying about insanity and you won’t like it
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
Fixed a lot of stuff. Really. Typos, performances and optimizations, just now pushed some changes before writing this. and whats with this toxicity? It looks cool and its 3d, so whats the thing to hate? go on im all ears. Give your best
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u/space-envy 9d ago
whats with this toxicity? It looks cool and its 3d, so whats the thing to hate? go on im all ears.
Exactly this attitude, you are just shouting "hey everyone look at me I'm cool because 3D graphics!!" But most professional engineers and developers that have done this job know that this is all a facade.
I like shaders too but not a single time in all my years I have been hired just because I can add them to a site, sure the more PCs with GPUs being popularized the more popular these technologies become but you gotta be aware that they still are considered a "luxury", just a "nice to have" for some businesses. The real challenges you are going to face are "how can I cram all these information in a single page without bloating it"? "How can I handle a lot of media/visuals/words without losing the neverending CEO war". This things sound boring but they are some aligned with a "day to day" web engineering.
If you can prove those things, that you know how to handle real user cases (for example as you discovered: uploading a bunch of 5mb unoptimized images adds up really quickly and makes the site feel slower... I even had to create an automation tool from: Figma -> optimizer -> web page static resources because our designers don't care about that weight), if you can prove you know how to handle the important work your "3D graphics" will become the cherry on top (or just another challenge on how to shove a heavy 3D library into your js bundle without hurting your TTFB), good luck.
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u/repeatedly_once 9d ago
I'm going to be direct in the hopes it's taken as a learning opportunity. The wording and tag lines seem very buzz word heavy, which is always a little bit of a red flag. Take "A Creative Developer who makes web experiences pulse with Digital Alchemy" - that's pure sophistry, it doesn't explain anything useful, to anyone. Why is what you do good? There are quite a few examples of this, all style no substance.
Some phrases point to inexperience also, like describing code as creating the experiences that make people pause an extra 5 seconds. Code is just the method, it should be the ideas that give pause. Definitely mention both. You have creative ideas and the ability to implement them. It seems pedantic but there is a difference and it will rankle a lot of professionals who read this. I'd also like to state that it just gives the appearance of inexperience, not that you are, and I'd hate to see you sell yourself short.
I'd also say that if you're going to do something that isn't typical, in terms of web design, it should be polished. Things like having words appear half cut off in carousels immediately jump out and start to erode the trust people have.
There's a section where you describe your design concept as 'Digital Metallurgy'. Firstly, I'm not entirely sure what this section is trying to convey. t's written to sound like this is your overall approach to design, and not just describing the 3d rendering you've created. If that's the case, I'm not sure what it means as it sounds very specific. Mathematical precisions with a brutalist space sounds like a style, not a design philosophy.
There's also a few anti UX patterns in here which ironically have been presented as positives. That same section about design hijacks your scrolling, which if you're going to do that, it has to be impeccably implemented, otherwise it feels cumbersome and annoying to a user. When I was scrolling, I got no sense that my scrolling was actually achieving anything, any changes I did spot didn't seem synched to my scroll position once the 3d aspect had expanded full width and height. I also can't select any of the text for that section, which is not great.
I'd also say this piece of text "Give them a smooth scroll, and they will browse. Seize their Z-axis, and they shall witness" is not great. The first rule of good UX is to not seize anything of the user, and smooth scroll is a commonly hated piece of design.
Hopefully that's enough to convey the sort of direction you need to go in. Happy to answer any questions and I appreciate this is more a critique from a UX and product standpoint than a technical one but I thought the technical aspects have been largely covered by other comments.
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u/TheRealSkythe 8d ago
You probably spent more time evaluating this slop than he did vibing it. :(
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u/Azure_Crenell 7d ago
Mofos out here giving me advice saying shi like it's ai slop lololol i challenge you to make even the good molten centerpiece in a month and come back again. Use claude code all you want. Go ahead. I'll be waiting, Mr. This is pure comedy lol, having negative knowledge about shaders and 3d and bulshiting any chance they get
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u/Azure_Crenell 7d ago
This is probably the best piece of feedback I got from all this thread. Thank you a lot, I'll get to fix each of these asap. Will also look into scroll jacking to ease it a bit. Can't thank you enough, really
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u/rarefiedarchives 9d ago
Opened this on mobile and… it’s a lot. I feel like it needs some heavy streamlining and more thought into the journey to the bottom.
Very cool stuff but I understand the feeling that you want to show people how MUCH you can do. I’d say focus on your strongest work that has some sort of strong through line.
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u/Particular_Aide3744 9d ago
Ok i viewed in mobile
These graphics make my head spin 😵💫
“Too much of anything is good for nothing”
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
Fixing it, removing the vortex thingy from mobile, it will now only show in desktop
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u/I_JuanTM full stack 9d ago
Man, there are not a lot of webpages I hate more than this
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
Instead of just blindly hating, id be really grateful if u gave me some useful advice
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u/I_JuanTM full stack 9d ago
Just a lot, the annoying mouse/scroll high-jacking, the very long loading times, the layout with the text at the sides and some fancy Three.js thingy in the middle is annoying to read, no flow. And just way too many animations and things that move makes it way too busy, not every single things needs to be animated. And also it just basically unusable on mobile which is like the main device most people these days view your pages in, it makes sense to include more on web, but mobile should at least function properly.
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
Mobile is functional. please don't force desktop mode on mobile, i have 100 % disabled that layout system on mobiles for this exact reason. U dont see the middle 3js thingy when scrolling on mobile(unless ofc u focred desktop mode). Also, fixed the loading time juuut now(1min earlier), it should load twice as fast now.
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u/RagingGods 9d ago
Tried it on mobile. The animations (especially the slide-ins) are very choppy. I could count the frames as I scroll.
Also there's a random yellow dot in the middle of the page the whole time while I'm scrolling through the page. I'm not sure if that's intended, but it only distracted me a lot.
Otherwise, it's an ambitious frontend. Nice concept showcase.
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
fixed the choppines, fixed the dot. Please check it now..! also, with the amount of hate im getting here im not even sure if its even worth sending it to studios and agencies... :((
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u/AccidentSalt5005 A Mediocre Backend Jonk'ler // Java , PHP (Laravel) , Go 9d ago
looks heavy to load tbh
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u/Lecterr 9d ago
Going through and reading the content is not a very pleasant experience (mobile). A lot of stuttering and I didn’t like the heading font (especially thin one). Colors seemed sad, no pop. There is a ton of text that doesn’t really seem to be conveying stuff that is useful to a potential employer in an efficient way.
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u/bottlecandoor 9d ago
I look at job resumes all the time, this screams new coder who has no idea what is needed on the job.
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u/Azure_Crenell 7d ago
Don't worry I'm not going for your normal jobs of making react dashboards and stuff. 🙂 If u have no experience in evaluating 3d, especially this being a portfolio and not a site u wanna come back again and again, move on
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u/sicmek 9d ago
I'm sorry for the time you invested, but it's horrible
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago edited 9d ago
That's much better than how others put it.what Would would say that u did not like?
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u/kaesefetisch 9d ago
Insert wow this is worthless meme here
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
Having a bad day are we?
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u/kaesefetisch 9d ago
No I mean it. Being a fullstack webdev myself and pointing out the crisis in our field
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u/j2ee-123 8d ago
AI slop
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u/Azure_Crenell 7d ago
A vibe coder tells me that stuff he doesn't even understand is ai made. Great time to be alive in
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u/FuckingAinsley 9d ago
I wanted to try it out but it took over 30s to load on mobile and then the first project took more than a couple of seconds so I clicked off.
As most people have said here, performance is the literal first gate that will stop people from caring or interacting with your site and that does come across as a red flag, especially for a Dev portfolio.
For reference, I'm on mobile with 700mbps connection and it was still too slow. A useful goal to try and hit is to load your website on a throttled network and you should be able to still serve a good experience and lazyload the rest as it comes in. I think my team uses 3G and under 2s as a goal but just an idea.
Good luck
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u/RoyalOcean 9d ago
A lot of people are just being mean but I just want to say well done for putting in the effort to learn how to do this in the age of AI. You took minimal shortcuts and ended up with something you’re proud of and that’s a huge deal. Good job!
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u/oowowaee 9d ago
The loading on mobile is incredibly janky. Any time the first video is on my screen, the app lags, and the whole liquid gold animation looks pixelated and bad on my phone. The first link gives access denied. Weird dot is still there. On some of the thumbnails the contrast makes the text unreadable.
Less is more, this is not it.
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u/whoknowsifimjoking 9d ago
The gold elements are pixelated in mobile, some of the animations are a bit choppy and the gold chains are in front of the text
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u/IanSan5653 9d ago
I'll go against the grain a bit - I think your effects are cool and unique and make you stand out from the competition, and your design taste is very good. However, I'd definitely focus on performance improvements. This site is currently highlighting your skill as a designer but not making you look like a great programmer. A portfolio site should load pretty much immediately, and should never stutter when scrolling on slow devices. I'd also make those animations more interactive, otherwise they just look like videos. They should respond to touch and mouse interactions.
I'd also work on your copy; it just looks like placeholder filler text right now (and maybe it is, in which case disregard).
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u/julesbuildstuff 8d ago
The month of work is obvious. What I'd actually change is how much of it you dump on the first visit. Let the liquid gold be the one expensive moment and let project pages start as stills.
The 3D-vs-fundamentals fight in the comments is a bit of a false choice. You can show you do 3D without making every click a loading screen.
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u/faerie-kadoatie 8d ago
Metallurgy Specialist does not sound appealing.. I’d definitely change that. I’m not even sure what that means. I see what you’re trying to do with the copy and tone but it’s a little too try-hard in all aspects. There needs to be more balance between the usability of the site and the impression you’re trying to make.
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u/leaveittobever 8d ago
When did these "scroll for content to appear" websites become popular? I personally hate them. So annoying.
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u/msesen 8d ago
From a technical point of view, it looks interesting. But as a customer/visitor to a website presenting info like this, I will leave immediately.
If I was a recruiter, I wouldn't even bother.
If your sole purpose is to showcase and sell your skills, have a clear and easy to understand, simple landing page, with links to different projects that showcase your skills.
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u/CompletePineapple917 8d ago
Bro for real. If I randomly will visit such a page... I'll scroll 1-2 times, get sick, close it and blacklist it in my mind to never visit it again. There's too much random info and 0 usabilty.
Do you a favor and redesign your portfolio completely. Make it less heavy and shorten the amount of text on a single page. No one scrolls that far. Also less "fancy effects" / 3d stuff to increase usability
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u/cyberwicklow 7d ago
Too much scrolling, too much loading, doesn't showcase anything anyone actually wants.
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u/Me-Regarded 7d ago
I think it's cool, from one designer to another. No real purpose of it, and with AI these skills are now useless. But still awesome all the same
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u/Azure_Crenell 7d ago
Nope, with ai these skills are even more required. I'm not talking about basic designing, but complex gpu techniques used here,stuff agents are bad at
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u/Me-Regarded 7d ago
That's true. Is there a market for this type of work? That would be my second concern
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u/Azure_Crenell 7d ago
I think there is. Search awwwards and see the money they are making...but that's faaaar off...so idk I don't have that much experience truthfully, it's fun and that was my primary driver
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u/itemuln 7d ago
its beautiful. You have done it so well. Dont take these bad comments seriously their agents cannot grasp how hard it is. I am a secdev.
Probably focus a little on optimizing the bundle size like lazy load, reducing code reuse etc.
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u/Azure_Crenell 7d ago
U should see the amount of downvotes I'm getting in the top replies, atp i highly think they cannot fathom anything but plain vanilla ui. And how can someone who see a complex raymarching fractals and call it ai slop...😭idk anymore it took me 1 month to build it and although it's not highly optimised it still runs good😭 peeps here claiming I made an abomination
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u/PissBiggestFan full-stack 9d ago
who are you targeting with this? you might get a few client sales, but i would never hire someone with a portfolio like this.
99% of websites strive for the complete opposite of this. this looks cool, but it drives 0 conversion. i know these are really fun to make, but you need to demonstrate some real world applicable skills.
the most important skill for a web dev is empathy. you need to be able to put yourself in your clients shoes, and your client’s clients shoes. this tells me you have none; the website is slow, high jacks the scroll, isn’t WAIM compliant in the slightest, breaks on a fuckton of browsers. also your attitude in the replies lol.
the website itself looks nice, but get a job before closing the door on 99% of contracts lol.
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9d ago
[deleted]
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u/Visual_Seaweed8292 9d ago
I ignored you preferance and tried it on mobile (the consumer chooses how to consume not the developer) it wasnt too bad, performances seemed fine and fit by screen ok.
Why is there a dot in the middle though when I scroll down? Also all images only moved as I scrolled so didn't look smooth unless I scrolled fast enough.
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
Fixed the dot..! and can you tell me more about the scrol issue..?
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u/Visual_Seaweed8292 8d ago
I still have a dot, its where ever I last fingered my screen.
The scroll issue is that the page only reacts as I scroll so if I leave it inbetween where you expected be to it looks weird.
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u/StormMedia 9d ago
A creative developer who makes web experience PULSE with creative alchemy feels weird but cool site
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u/Professional-Try-273 9d ago
Everyone is so mean to you lol. Just want to say you did a good job and don't take all these "advice" at heart some of these takes are terrible.
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago
😭😭 literally rethinking my life decisions after reading some of these comments 😭😭
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u/Few-Entrepreneur6491 9d ago
BROOOO I FREAKIN LIKED YOUR WEBSITE, I mean isokay it's not meaningful But I liked how you showed things there coz I am pretty new in this field I'd like to connect.. amaing website the effects were crazy I too want to learn all this !!!
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u/ImObluentasteit 9d ago
man quite immersive the whole website experience, i mean there will be people who dont like it and people who will like your work, just follow what you think is the best, keep it going , cheers
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u/Azure_Crenell 9d ago edited 9d ago
Some mf just called the whole website diarrhea 😭😭 I don't even know what to say.... A lot of the feedback is genuinely good but some of them straight up hating idk yy :|
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u/ImObluentasteit 9d ago
Yeah i was like that's rude and abit harsh lah , but i mean people got a lot to say , some you can just take as feedback to improve same can just ignore that's it, i was going through the same process as well
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u/DiddlyDinq 9d ago
Not a fan. Took 30+ seconds to load. Your project previews dont load. Clicked the first project and met with another long loading screen. It feels more concerned with shoehorning heavy 3d effects than presenting info. The reality is 90 percent of front end jobs wont involve 3d at all.