Natwerk Designs

WTF is wrong with my resume (employed graphic desiners please answer)?

for the last 6 damn years, i've been trying to gain employment in the graphics field, mainly in apparel/t-shirt design. for 7 years, i have worked as an assistant airbrush artist, while developing promotional items (business cards, flyers, etc) for that company. after i was dismissed once their business considerably slowed down, i was forced to work slamming for a fish for a fish cannery. i have extensive experience utilizing the likes of adobe photoshop and illustrator CS2&CS3 for t-shirt design, plus i have nearly 20 years of illustrations skills. no matter how creative my resume is, why do employers continue to look over my resume to hire flakes? my portfolio is very extensive. i have samples of my airbrush work, as well as samples of my skills in adobe photoshop, illustrator, indesign, even videos editng samples (the latter i stopped submitting). however, i'm never given the opportunity to show what i am capable of. i tailor my resume/portfolio for whatever the job calls for. even when i was "fresh out of school", employers still overlooked my resume. even people i helped in school were getting work, and all my career advisors had to say was "well, everyone else is getting hired, why can't you?"

Public Comments

1. You have a portfolio... right?
2. You may sound expensive. Tone it down. Leave more for them to ask you about.
3. show more variety with your work
4. you might be more than what they're looking for. many companies hire students fresh out of schools over experienced designers because it's a good opportunity for them to learn the ropes and the company doesn't have to pay too much for their work. you work might also be over the top, meaning the company wants very simple stuff and when they see your abilities, they think that you might not be able to do simple work for them.
5. You've only given us general information. There might be a tone or appearance to your resume that means it gets passed over. Sometimes the wording will put people off. Also be careful of making a resume that looks too designed: despite what you may get told about showing off your design abilities on your resume, a plain resume is often better than a fancy one. Just some ideas.