I like your work. I don’t often see student work with this much sensitivity. Nice!
Steve makes some good points about the portfolio design, which I agree with. Dedicating so much front page, above-the-fold space to a contact link before you’ve even established what the site is about seems backwards. You did it on purpose, however, so I’m wondering about your reasoning.
About the individual pieces in the portfolio… I like how you’ve explained the work. I like how you’ve created variations of your logos with the realization that the complex and colorful logos won’t always be appropriate. I also like how you’ve focused your logo/branding efforts on the logo that will most often be used before creating simpler secondary choices. This violates the old rule of thumb about designing logos in black and white first before adding color and complexity, but in my opinion that rule has become obsolete for the very reason your work demonstrates.
I really like the version of your flora logo with the vines. The gradient version looks metallic (copper), which is nice contrasted with the black. However, I’m not so sure the way the gradients are working with the flora logotype itself looks convincingly metallic. Maybe that’s not what you intended anyway.
You must attend the same school as others who have visited the forum in the past. Your Smugglers logo and mention of Magnetic Island rang a bell, so I did a quick forum search. Do you know this person: Help with Wine Bar Project ?