Make It Yours, Images and Five Challenges

Search a few portfolios from any popular tutorial and you find dozens of carbon copies, right down to the layout, the colours, and the placeholder bio that still says "I am a passionate developer".

This is where you take the portfolio and make it yours.

First, the one-minute move

The single change that does more than any challenge below. Put your photo and your project screenshots into the images folder, then let Claude sort out where each one goes.

I just added some images to the images folder. Look at each one and put it where it belongs on the site. Keep everything working in both light and dark mode.

You do not need to name the files carefully. Claude opens each image and actually looks at it, the same way you would. On the real run it matched a portrait to the about section, a fintech app screen to the budgeting project, a healthcare booking screen to the clinic project, and the one image sized like a link preview became exactly that, closing the missing share image from the deploy.

It also refused to force a wrong image onto the two cards that had no matching screenshot, and said so.

Then, because everything you just changed lives only on your machine:

Commit and push.

Because Vercel is watching the repository, the live site updates on its own.

If you do not have project screenshots yet, use a clean placeholder for now and swap in the real one the moment you ship something.

Then pick two of five challenges

Each one extends the portfolio in a different direction. There is no single correct answer, and the goal is to practise the conversation patterns on something you actually want.

If a challenge is simple, ask for it in one clear sentence. If it is bigger, build it in small steps and check each one before asking for the next. And if you already know exactly what you want, put all of it into the prompt up front.

Footer with social links and an availability badge

I want people who land on this site to be able to reach me, so add a footer with links to my GitHub, LinkedIn, and email, either plain text labels or small icons, whichever fits the site better. Match it to the rest of the styling, and check it in both light and dark mode.

While you are in there, add a small "Available for work" badge near the top of the page, with a soft colored dot next to the text. I might want to switch that off later when I am busy, so keep it easy to toggle.

Testimonials section

I would like a testimonials section with 3 quotes from people I have worked with, rotating automatically every 5 seconds or so, with a gentle fade between them. Each one shows the quote, the person's name, and their role. Here are the quotes: [paste your 3 testimonials].

Skills visualization

Add a skills section that shows my technical skills as animated progress bars. Here are my skills with rough levels: [list 6 or more, like "JavaScript 85%, CSS 75%"]. I would like the bars to grow from zero to their level when they scroll into view.

Complete colour scheme change

I want to change the whole personality of this site. Take the color palette to [describe what you want, like "warm earth tones" or "deep blues with a mint accent"] and carry it through everything consistently, including dark mode. Tell me first if any of my choices will cause a contrast problem.

Resume download

Add a resume section with a clean preview of the key information, my experience, education, and skills, plus a download button that links to a PDF version. I will drop the PDF into the project folder, just tell me what to name it.

One last move before you close the lid

Everything you changed lives only on your machine until you push it.

Commit everything and push it up, so the live site picks up my changes.

Give the live link a minute, reload it, and the internet version catches up with your machine.

When you are done, your portfolio will not look like anyone else's. That is the whole point of doing this work yourself.

This resource is part of

Claude Code: From Beginner to Pro Agentic AI Engineer

by Arun Nagarathanam

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