When I came across this on swissmiss, my first thought was: what do maps have to do with portfolios? The creative cataloging site Heavy Backpack explains:
Using an application, like CASA’s Image Cutter or the Automatic Tile Cutter, you can create your own map tiles for Google Maps. This means that you can replace image map tiles with any image tiles you like including other maps, or more importantly for designers and artist, replace them with portfolio images!
This is a really interesting concept for portfolio design. It certainly speaks to the creativity that designers should have and it’s great to see “old” tools being used in new ways. But I wonder how users would react to this kind of portfolio design — if enough people are aware of how Google Maps functionality works, or even if they would realize what they need to do as a user. Only one of the featured portfolios made use of a help panel:
What do you think, is this a viable way to design portfolios? Or do usability concerns outweigh creativity?
Tags: portfolios, Technology, web design