Hey and welcome back to a new week!

In this issue:

• Video Killed The Mockup Dump: Are you still showing grids of static screens to show off a flow you designed? Stop and read this.

• The Open Doors x Framer Student Challenge: The theme has been revealed, the challenge is LIVE and you can join me for a free session learning how to build interactions in Framer!

• Beverly’s Portfolio: A great example of how a traditional structure can still shine and stand out.

Thank you for reading!

👀 THE THEME FOR THE CHALLENGE HAS BEEN REVEALED

The theme for the Open Doors x Framer Student Challenge is: Moments.

Your task is to design and build one memorable interaction in Framer inspired by the theme.

The challenge is open to enrolled university students worldwide (we recommend using your university email address when submitting). Submissions are open throughout June, and you’ll have one month to craft your entry.

The top submissions will win prizes from Framer, including one of their new Chrome mugs and other goodies.

A few important rules:

• One submission per participant

• Submissions must be built in Framer

• The theme is part of the judging criteria

• Student eligibility may be verified before winners are announced

Ready to get started? Visit the challenge page for the full brief, rules, and submission details.

How to Show Off Your Work Better With Video 📹

A lot of designers still present their work as if digital products were static.

A homepage gets one screenshot.

A feature gets four more.

A flow gets dumped into a grid of eight screens.

And then the whole thing just kind of sits there.

That no longer makes much sense.

Not because images are bad. They still have their place. But because digital work is not experienced statically. Products move. They react. They transition. They contain interactions, sequences, and flows. So in many cases, video is simply the better format to show what you actually did.

This article is about why that matters, where to use video in your portfolio, and which tools can help you get there without spending a fortune.

Why video matters

The first reason is simple: engagement.

Something that moves gets more attention than something static. That is just how our brains work. It also often feels more premium. When something is shown in motion, especially if it is done cleanly, it usually feels a bit more polished and deliberate than a flat screenshot.

That does not mean you should replace every image in your portfolio with video. That would be overkill very quickly. But it does mean that in a lot of places, video gives you a much stronger opportunity to direct attention where you want it.

And that matters because your portfolio is always trying to get people to do something next.

Usually that means:

• click into a case study

• stay a bit longer on the page

• understand your work faster

• remember something about it afterwards

Video helps with all of that when used well.

It is also a curation tool.

This is a big one.

A lot of portfolios suffer from what I’d call screen dumps. Grids or collections of four, eight, sometimes even more screens that are all trying to show one flow or one part of a product at once. These are exhausting to look at. They do the opposite of what you want. Instead of pulling people in, they create fatigue.

Video is one of the easiest ways to fix that.

Instead of showing eight screens, you show one short clip. Instead of asking someone to study a grid, you guide them through the sequence naturally. You are showing more and less at the same time, which is exactly what good curation often looks like.

And beyond that, video is simply a more truthful format for digital work. Most products are not used as a sequence of still frames. Even if the interactions are basic, they are still more than flat images. Video lets you show the work closer to how it is actually experienced.

Where to use video in your portfolio

There are two main places where video is especially valuable.

1. In your case study previews on the homepage

This is probably the biggest opportunity.

Your homepage project cards are prime real estate. They are where you try to get someone into the case study in the first place. And video can help with that a lot, because it lets you show the product much more clearly than a static image often can.

That said, a lot of people already lose the battle here before video even enters the picture. Sometimes the preview barely shows the product at all. Sometimes the work is so tiny inside a mockup that you mostly end up seeing the device frame. And sometimes the image is simply too generic to make anyone curious.

Video gives you the chance to show a highlight.

That could be:

• one key interaction

• one small flow

• a few strong moments in sequence

• even a lightweight animated slideshow of important screens

The point is not that it has to be complicated. The point is that it should give people a better sense of the work than one static image could.

One warning though: if you have a classic grid of projects and every preview is autoplaying at once, things can get overwhelming quickly. Especially if each one contains a lot of motion or fast cuts.

There are a few ways around that:

• let only one play by default

• make the others play on hover

• pause one when another gets hovered

• or structure the layout so only one project is visually in focus at a time

Video on the homepage works best when it adds focus, not chaos.

2. Inside the case study itself

This is the second major use case.

Any place where you are showing final work, feature highlights, or flows is a strong opportunity for video.

Instead of:

• a static close-up of a feature

• a four-screen grid showing one flow

• a stack of interface states

You can use:

• a short recording of that flow

• a zoomed-in video showing the detail in motion

• a clip that replaces the whole screen dump

This is especially powerful in the places where portfolios usually get weakest.

If you previously would have used a screen dump, there is a very good chance video is the better choice.

It can also be useful in the more secondary parts of the case study. For example, when you introduce the product, or when you want to highlight a particular feature in more detail. I would use it most aggressively where it replaces clutter.

3. Playground or extra work sections

If your portfolio has a playground, fun section, or a place where you show other kinds of work, video is strong there too.

This is especially useful when you want to show:

• interaction experiments

• side projects

• branding or graphic design highlights

• small studies that are not big enough for a full case study

For example, if you have branding work in your portfolio but do not want to dedicate a lot of space to it because the main portfolio is still about product design, a short video reel can let you show more of that work in the same amount of real estate.

That is a very good trade.

How video should feel

If you are going to use video, you have to treat it properly.

Otherwise it can easily feel tacked on, cheap, or more annoying than helpful.

The first rule is: do not make it feel like a media player.

In most cases:

• no visible controls

• no obvious video border

• no clunky player chrome

• no feeling that you embedded a YouTube video into the page

It should feel organic. Like it belongs there. Like it was made for that exact space.

Framer supports video natively and offers all of this. If you are vibecoding you are your own master anyway.

The second rule is: you usually do not need sound.

Unless sound is genuinely part of the experience you are trying to show, I would avoid it. Background music is especially risky. It is much more likely to annoy than to elevate. If there is no sound, then the video should autoplay cleanly and quietly.

The third rule is: keep it short.

No one is watching a one-minute portfolio clip inside a case study. If you want to show a flow, aim for something like:

• around 20 seconds: very good

• around 30 seconds: still fine

• beyond 30 seconds: probably too long in most cases

If a video starts getting longer than that, usually one of two things needs to happen:

• split it into two clips

• or cut it down harder

Most of the time, it is a curation problem.

When video is not the best format

Sometimes you want to show motion, but video still is not the best choice.

For example, if you are only trying to show one tiny interaction on one component, a GIF or a Lottie can sometimes be easier to place and easier to integrate into the layout. They can feel lighter and more flexible than a full video block.

That said, this is already a bit more advanced.

In most cases, video is still the main choice. But it is worth knowing that not every moving thing needs to be a video file.

What tools to use

This depends a bit on what you already have.

If you only have static designs, then your situation is different. You first need a prototype. There is no real way around that. If nothing moves yet, you cannot magically show motion. In those cases, if the designs already live in Figma, I would consider Figma Make as one option, because it will probably get you the most visually accurate output quickly. Lovable, Codex or Claude Design / Code are also viable choices here based on what you already have.

Yes, you can also manually animate things in tools like Lottielab or similar, but that gets time-consuming very fast and is only really worth it for specific highlights.

So realistically, I think this article applies most strongly if you either:

• shipped a real product

• have a working prototype

• or have something in between

Once you have that, the tooling depends on what kind of thing you need to capture.

For recording web-based work

A really strong option is Cursorful.

It is a Chrome extension that lets you record what is happening in the browser and then present it beautifully with a browser frame, background, zoom effects, and things like that. It is especially good when you want to show a full flow or a broader screen context.

It’s completely free to personal use which is definitely the case here.

For recording specific parts of the screen

Sometimes you do not want the whole browser or app frame. Sometimes you only want to show one detail.

For that, it is often better to use a regular screen recorder that lets you capture exactly what you need.

A very good free and open-source option here is Recordly. It works across platforms, records anything on your screen, and gives you a proper editor as well. It can do more than you need for a portfolio, but that is fine. The important part is that it makes clean screen capture easy.

For mobile apps

This one is simple. If you shipped a real app, simply use the native screen recording of your phone to capture details. You can use tools like Recordly to post-edit these with zoom etc or simply get them into a mockup.

For highlight reels

If you want to create those short sequences where several images show one after the other, there is a very simple tool called Sequence.video.

It is limited, but for this exact purpose it is great. You can drop in images, define how long each one should stay on screen, and export the result as a video. That makes it perfect for little highlight reels where you want to show several deliverables without placing them all side by side.

For mockups

Now to the annoying part.

If you want to place videos inside polished device mockups, most of the good dedicated tools are paid.

For example:

• Rotato

• Shots.so

They both do this well, but exporting video generally sits behind a paid plan.

That is the frustrating bit right now: there is no perfect all-in-one free tool that handles everything beautifully, especially once mockups come into play. Some tools like Jitter can do pieces of it too, but often you run into watermarks or export limitations.

Also, one reminder here: you do not always need mockups.

Mockups can look elegant, especially on the homepage or when introducing a product, but in many cases it is actually better to zoom into the work itself and let it stand on its own. That is often easier, cleaner, and less likely to look awkward.

I’m also currently working on a small free tool for this myself, something that would let you place video into at least a couple of mockups and set the scene around it a bit more easily. I do not want to overpromise on timing yet, but that is something I’m building toward.

On a personal note

As a consequence of writing this article, I also expanded the tools section on Open Doors and added the tools I’m mentioning here there as well. So if you want more useful tools in this general area, or discounts for some of the paid ones, go check that out too.

The main thing to take away

Video is not automatically better because it moves.

It is better when it helps you:

• show the work more truthfully

• reduce clutter

• guide attention better

• replace weak screen dumps

• and make the portfolio feel more alive

That is the real opportunity.

Not video everywhere.

Not motion for the sake of motion.

Not turning your portfolio into a showreel.

Just using the right format in the right places.

🖼️ ART IS THE NEW STOCK

Someone just spent $236,000,000 on a painting. Here’s why it matters for your wallet.

Late last year, a Klimt sold for the highest price ever paid for modern art at auction.

An outlier sure, but it wasn't a fluke. U.S. auction sales grew 23.1% in 2025. The $1-5mm segment even grew 40.8% YoY.

Meanwhile, Apollo’s chief economist Torsten Slok said to expect ‘zero in return in the S&P 500 over the coming decade.’

So, that's where it gets interesting.

Each environment is unique, but after dot-com, post war and contemporary art grew about 24% annually for a decade. After 2008, about 11% for 12 years.

It’s also had near-zero correlation with the S&P 500 since ‘95.*

Now, Masterworks lets you invest in shares of artworks featuring legends like Banksy, Basquiat, and Picasso.

• $1.3 billion invested across over 500 artworks.

• 28 sales to date. 

• Net annualized returns on sold works held 12 months+ like 14.6%, 17.6%, and 17.8%.

Shares can sell quickly, but my subscribers can skip the waitlist:

Skip the waitlist

^{*Investing involves risk. Past performance is not indicative of future returns. See important Reg A disclosures at masterworks.com/cd.}

👀 Portfolio Showcase

Today: Beverly Yip

Beverly Yip’s portfolio has a fairly traditional structure at first glance.

A clean intro, a small personal touch, and then straight into the work. No huge theatrical hero. No complicated navigation concept. No attempt to reinvent the entire portfolio format.

And that works perfectly fine here because the work itself carries enough weight.

There’s a tiny interactive cat in the intro, which adds a sweet personal touch without getting in the way. From there, the portfolio moves quickly into the projects, and that’s the right call. Beverly doesn’t need to overbuild the entrance because the depth starts showing once you open the work and especially once you reach the play section.

What becomes clear fairly quickly is that Beverly has an unusual mix: product design fundamentals, engineering literacy, creative coding curiosity, and enough visual sensitivity to make these things feel expressive instead of technical for the sake of being technical.

That combination gives her portfolio a lot of range.

That’s it for this week—thanks so much for the support! ♥️

Do you want your own portfolio reviewed in-depth with a 30-minute advice-packed video review? Or do you require mentoring to figure out a proper strategy for your job search?

I got you!

• Book an in-depth portfolio or resume review with me

• Book a mentoring session with me

• Book a quick 15 min chat to ask a question and see if we vibe

Keep kicking doors open and see you next week!
- Florian