Portfolio

You cannot use Treefrog work in a personal portfolio. You cannot use work from previous companies you have worked for as examples in a Treefrog portfolio.

Although this may seem Draconian, there are a number of reasons why personal work cannot be used on its own in a portfolio.

Imagine you buy a car from someone, and the owner of the car refuses to transfer it to your name. Would you be comfortable with that? Of course not! You would want complete ownership of the vehicle since you are the one paying for it.

Now picture the same scenario between you (the designer) and your client. The client pays you hundreds of dollars to create a unique and professional logo that he or she can use to brand its business. Should the client be concerned of the rightful ownership of the logo? Of course not! As long as the client is paying you your hard-earned fee, there is no reason why the client should not be getting legal ownership to the logo. No wonder the love-hate relationship between designers and clients has been running rampant since time immemorial!

Since our work is crucial for business, brand, and more, we believe that our work should be the property of the client once it has been passed on to the client by the designer and the monetary transactions have been settled.

Examples:

1. We once had a client threaten to sue us because an ex-Frog used the design he or she did, with help from other Frogs, as part of his or her portfolio. The design came up second on Google for the client’s company name. Not only did it undermine our work for the client (Treefrog was accused of outsourcing and “ripping the client off”), but the client
2. We once had a Frog post something to his or her portfolio in which he or she had only been slightly involved. The Frog who did the majority of the work was extraordinarily insulted. His or her relationship with the first designer was permanently damaged. From thereon in, the two designers refused to work as a team.
3. We once had a Frog use client code in an external project. When the client discovered this, Treefrog received a cease-and-desist. We claimed that it was not the client’s code, had it taken down, and let the developer go for moonlighting with a COI.

Sharing Work on Portfolios

Rationale

• We have been sued before when someone posted client work on his or her own personal site.
• Work that you do at Treefrog should be work that has alternate Frogs working with you to make it excellent. Therefore, it is rare that work that you have done is exclusively yours.
• All projects should be executed on Treefrog’s equipment and would then be considered to be solely owned by Treefrog. If the project is contractually articulated, the client for whom it has been developed would be the sole owner.
• This work may not be shared or used externally from Treefrog. This includes any work completed for a Frog’s personal use, such as, a portfolio.

If a Frog’s employment is terminated or the Frog resigns, all work created while employed by Treefrog must be returned to Treefrog, and all remnants must be deleted from the individual’s personal device. No information may be forwarded or shared with any third-party operation.

Using work created at Treefrog outside of the Treefrog environment will lead to legal action.