Today: Darren Millar

Darren Millar’s portfolio is one of those portfolios that slowly reveals how much thought went into it.

At first glance, it actually feels fairly restrained. The visual language is clean, minimal, and somewhat familiar. But once you start interacting with it, you realize Darren is experimenting with navigation, structure, and interaction patterns in ways that most portfolios simply don’t.

And more importantly, he’s doing it well.

Darren is currently studying design and business at Waterloo and is looking for opportunities for Fall 2026. Based on the quality of this portfolio and the thinking behind it, I’d honestly be surprised if he struggles to find them.

What stands out most is that he clearly understands something many designers early in their career don’t yet fully grasp: novelty by itself is useless. What matters is whether something new still feels intuitive.

And that’s exactly where this portfolio succeeds.

The Good

A portfolio structure that feels fresh without sacrificing usability

The strongest part of Darren’s portfolio is the portfolio itself.

He took interaction and navigation patterns that usually belong to SaaS products or desktop applications and adapted them into a portfolio experience that somehow feels both unusual and immediately understandable.

The structure is built around a side navigation and a main content pane. On paper, that sounds simple. But the execution is what makes it special.

The homepage itself already nudges you toward interaction. There’s a central intro section showing where Darren studies and works, and when you hover, additional details appear. Previous experiences cycle in, the content shifts slightly, and you start realizing the page is inviting exploration instead of simply presenting information.

The hover interaction itself works very well. I do think the content shown there could become more personal or more representative of his work rather than listing tools like Figma or Framer, but the interaction design itself is strong.

The really interesting part begins once you interact with the sidebar.

Hovering over projects dynamically previews them in the main pane, and clicking opens the work directly within the same interface structure. It’s a very application-like way of navigating a portfolio, and I genuinely haven’t seen this executed this elegantly before.

What impressed me most is how intuitive it still feels despite deviating from the typical “homepage grid → click → case study → back button” flow most portfolios follow.

Darren clearly thought carefully about the transitions, the feedback, and the movement throughout the interface. Small things like how the layout reacts to clicks or how the case studies animate in make the entire experience feel crafted rather than assembled.

And this matters.

Because hiring managers who deeply care about interaction design will absolutely notice when someone can take a familiar pattern and reinterpret it in a way that still feels natural. That’s a difficult skill to develop, and Darren already shows strong instincts for it.

Carefully crafted case studies with strong motion and visual pacing

The second major strength is how Darren presents work inside the case studies themselves.

The motion work throughout the portfolio is excellent. Everything feels smooth, subtle, and intentional. Small interactions, like the slight movement inside the speech bubble elements within the problem statement, immediately make the work feel more alive without becoming distracting.

There’s a level of care here that comes through constantly.

Darren also does a good job balancing visuals and text. The case studies lean heavily on visuals, which is the right direction for the type of work he’s showing. The screens feel curated, the layouts feel considered, and the pacing of the content works very well overall.

Even the unfinished projects are surprisingly compelling.

Most “coming soon” portfolio sections end up feeling like placeholders that add very little value. Darren somehow manages to make these previews feel exciting anyway. The visuals are strong enough that you genuinely want to see more.

The Vitalis project is a great example. Even without a fully written case study yet, the presentation already communicates quality and makes you curious about the product behind it.

And honestly, that’s valuable.

If I were hiring for a consumer-facing product team, especially in the mobile space, I would absolutely want to hear more about several of these projects based on the previews alone.

That’s a very strong position to be in as a student designer.

The Potential

Replacing GIFs with videos would dramatically improve the experience

This is a somewhat technical recommendation, but in Darren’s case it genuinely matters because the portfolio experience itself is such a central part of the work.

Right now, many of the project previews and motion showcases rely on GIFs. The issue is that GIFs become extremely heavy once they are:

• fairly long,

• visually detailed,

• and displayed at larger sizes.

As a result, the first-time loading experience suffers quite a bit.

When you first hover a project, there can be a long period where nothing appears while the GIF loads in the background. Darren already tries to mitigate this by showing a disclaimer explaining that previews may take time to load, which is good UX thinking.

But realistically, once someone hovers and sees a blank screen for several seconds, you risk losing them.

This is especially noticeable on larger displays where the GIF quality also begins to break down visually.

The solution here is relatively straightforward: use video instead.

Formats like MP4 or WebM would reduce the file sizes dramatically while also improving playback quality and loading speed. Since these previews don’t require sound, they could autoplay and loop seamlessly without visible controls, meaning the user experience would remain almost identical while becoming significantly smoother.

And because Darren’s portfolio relies so heavily on first impressions and interaction quality, this optimization would have a very large impact.

I’d also love to see a tiny bit more contextual information inside these previews themselves. Even a small line of text underneath the preview saying what the project was or what impact it had would make these hover states feel even more meaningful.

The headings should carry more of the storytelling weight

Darren’s case studies are already strong, but there’s one adjustment that could elevate them significantly further.

Right now, many headings are still fairly descriptive instead of narrative-driven.

There are moments where he already does this really well. For example:

That’s an excellent heading because it immediately communicates the actual problem. I already understand the core issue before reading any supporting text.

But then later sections fall back into labels like:

• “Part One: Reservation Flow”

• “Part Two: Reservation Queue”

• “Key UX Decisions”

These headings describe categories rather than insights.

And that matters because headings are what keep readers engaged while scrolling.

The strongest case studies use headings almost like mini-story beats. They surface the important insight immediately, then use the body text as supporting context rather than the primary source of meaning.

Darren already has the underlying thinking. You can see it in the work itself. I just think he could push more of that thinking upward into the headings and cut the body text even further as a result.

The case studies are already visually strong enough to support that shift.

I’d also remove a few more redundant visuals, especially some of the prototyping blueprint-style diagrams toward the end. At that point, the story has already landed and those artifacts don’t add much additional value.

But overall, this is already a strong storytelling foundation. It mostly needs refinement, not restructuring.

The Verdict

Darren Millar’s portfolio stands out because it experiments in the right places.

It takes familiar interaction patterns and subtly reshapes them into something that feels fresh without becoming confusing. That balance is incredibly difficult to achieve.

On top of that, the motion work, visual pacing, and overall level of craft throughout the portfolio already feel unusually mature for someone still early in their career.

The strongest signal here is not any single visual or case study. It’s the fact that Darren clearly thinks deeply about how digital experiences feel to navigate and interact with.

That instinct will take him very far.

The remaining opportunities are mostly refinement: improving media performance, sharpening storytelling through headings, and finishing more of the already promising projects.

But the core is already extremely strong.

If you’d like to craft a similarly impressive portfolio Framer is likely your best choice.

Still struggling to get your portfolio off the ground?

Don’t want to spend weeks learning yet another tool? Framer is my top recommendation for building your portfolio — fast, clean, and without the usual headaches.

If you’re just starting out (or even if you’re not), I think Framer is a perfect fit. Here’s why:

• Flat learning curve: The interface feels familiar if you’ve used Figma — plus, there’s a plugin to bring your designs straight in.

• Plenty of learning support: Framer Academy is packed with free tutorials, videos, and guides to help you go from zero to published.

• A huge template library: Tons of high-quality (often free) templates in the marketplace to help you launch quickly without starting from scratch.

• Free if you are a student: Although Framer already offers a generous free plan for everyone, if you are an enrolled student you can get Framer Pro completely for free!

And that’s just scratching the surface. I wrote more about why I recommend Framer here—but honestly, the best way is to try it for yourself.

Affiliate disclaimer: I only recommend tools I personally believe in. Some links in this post are affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission if you choose to purchase — at no extra cost to you.

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