How to Ask for Help
If you're a junior designer, I want to share a few things that will help you ask for help more effectively, be it wanting a portfolio review, introductions, advice, or anything really.
1. Be direct.
Most of the people you want help from are busy people. It is *greatly* preferred when you are upfront and direct about what you want. There are only so many hours in the day, and I'd rather know exactly what you want and how I can help.
2. Be specific
There are very few people in the world who ever want to 'catch up' or 'get their brain picked' when you don't know someone and it's ambiguous what they want.
If you want feedback on your portfolio, ask for that. If you want ideas on how to reposition yourself, ask for that.
If you aren't specific, you'll either get no response, or get generic response. My general feedback on every portfolio will always be: show your work upfront; remove half the words then remove more again, and spend 10x the time refining the work shown vs the design of the portfolio itself.
3. Be concise
Everyone is busy, so be respectful of their time and be as concise as possible with your ask.
4. Follow up
If you don't hear back from someone, the most likely answer is they either missed your message or forgot. Platforms like X have, somehow still, terrible DM's that always seem to be buggy, so just follow up respectfully. I don't find it annoying; rather I appreciate the persistence and reminder.
5. Follow through
If someone takes the time to help you, and gives you advice or suggestions, you should follow through on them. I love hearing about how things went or the updates someone made, but I'd guess less than 3% of the time I hear back from someone. Want to know an easy way to start to build a relationship? Follow through. Those who follow up I am more likely to want to continue helping and building into.
So what does this look like in practice?
Instead of "Here's my portfolio, let me know if you have thoughts!" say "I'm updating my portfolio as I look for a full time role at a startup. Would you mind letting me know 1) if this would pass your first 5 second screen, and 2) do you think the work examples I have selected seem credible to an early stage founder?"
Instead of "I'd love to meet if you're ever down", say "I have a few first round interviews coming up in a few weeks. Would you be open to doing a 30m practice portfolio presentation with me? I'll show up at any time that works for you this week or next."
I have generally found our industry is full of people who want to help others, so I hope this is helps you better ask for help!
micro interactions are what separate a site people remember from one they close.
these are where I get mine: 👇
https://t.co/Lqo2Cg9oGd - the animation library itself
https://t.co/XAlKv8HrS2 - copy-paste UI transitions
https://t.co/hn4o3cfcL7 - animated components, ready to go
https://t.co/jDgKQKkEVV - bold, memorable pieces
https://t.co/b3hjsMpDnb - the small delights in real apps
https://t.co/3IzKaPjwwr - interaction ideas worth stealing
https://t.co/jkwcuJpIg3 - craft-level interaction work
https://t.co/2TAry6HZBs - clean animated components
https://t.co/lCcmTzShnM - motion pieces for iOS
I post stuff like this often. follow @ImranUxi.
Always wanted to play with my physical Pokémon cards in AR, so I unleashed Astra + CLAD on it… they did not disappoint!
⚡️🥽
Basically a fully playable proto with all 151 mons from SV 151.
@specs@specsfordevs
Introducing React Bits: Micro
A brand new category for micro-interactions, launching with 30 free, customizable components.
Smooth motion, subtle details, and playful interactions designed to make your UI feel alive.
Live now. Try it out:
https://t.co/9I9GxL3D9N
it's kinda wild, the depths of the internet that an llm will take you to
was gathering refs for this grenade design and somehow ended up on a scanned 1968 US Marine Corps weapons manual
One nice subtle benefit of using Base UI over Radix is that the animations are interruptible since Base uses CSS transitions instead of keyframes.
This is me spamming on both dropdowns, notice the glitchiness in the one on the left.
reminder: ease your gradients ✨
crisper details, softer fades
adds a subtle bit of polish to overlays, masks, etc.
same endpoints, extra eased stops in between 🧑🍳
Design Engineering Tip:
If your UI has a draggable split view, don’t make users land on perfect proportions by hand. Add sensible snap points—25 / 50 / 75—and let the handle gently settle on release. Users get precision when they need it, and a calmer interface when they don’t.
Motion 13.4 introduces <AnimateView />
A lightweight view transitions component built on React's new ViewTransition API. Adds spring support, dynamic targets, animation controls, and a simple props API - no more wrangling pseudo selectors!
You probably need a bit more rhythm in your life.
My quick pro tip for improving your web designs is to choose one major and minor spacing unit for vertical rhythm, and align everything to it by default.*
*this is also how you teach agents to design productively
Built this morphing dialog for giving the Interfere agent feedback.
It follows a lot of the principles from an Interfaces issue I wrote a while back about how to build a dialog like this.
design engineering is the best seat in tech right now. you design it and you ship it.
if you're learning, start here:
https://t.co/o8BdMgoZ8T - a library on designing with care
https://t.co/LTypy4ODHc - UI patterns reference
https://t.co/66ZrH1OFeu - the best essay on the craft
https://t.co/iGcTvpPB5a - design skills your agent installs
https://t.co/20tdz8ROdm - the details most people miss
https://t.co/YoUn0vYRxK - everything SVG, explained
https://t.co/DBt6rfUUXW - design principles, applied
I post stuff like this often. follow @ImranUxi.