Archive for December, 2009

Zoic Studios recruiter Adam Mutchler hunts heads for the Culver City, California-based visual effects and digital production company, for both staff employee positions and for freelance jobs on specific projects. He recruits compositors, character animators, concept & character designers, LightWave & Maya generalists, and Maya dynamics and lighting pros.

Each week he reviews dozens, sometimes hundreds of demo reels from both up-and-coming and veteran VFX artists. As a result, Mutchler knows a good VFX reel when he sees it. If you’re looking for work in the industry, you would be wise to take heed — here is his advice to IDYE readers:

Edit and publish your reel.

You may have great clips of your work, but you need to edit your demo properly. Throw it in a timeline, and export and upload it to something like Vimeo with password protection. Sometimes a recruiter just needs something new to show the hiring manager, to grease the wheels for that last-minute freelance position.

Use a decent video player or video sharing service.

Use a video player that can be rewound or clicked through. Large QuickTimes can take forever to load on a computer. Using an annoying player that doesn’t work in all browsers? You might be losing jobs. If they can’t see the reel, a recruiter or hiring manager will just move on to the next applicant. They may only have a day or two to consider applicants for a looming job; and clunky video players and slow load times aren’t helping.

Vimeo embed is better than most players. It allows password protection, plus downloadable original files if you get the annual Vimeo Plus service. And YouTube’s HD is better than many people’s players on their sites.

Terribly compressed files aren’t great for compositing reels. Try to get the best quality you can, so we can actually see the work you do. DVDs are fine, but they tend to get lost or misplaced on hiring manager’s desks. Web sites and emails don’t go away, and they’re always a forwarded email or an email search away from being found again.

I want to know specific projects and companies. Extended periods of employment at well-regarded companies bode well for work ethic and quality of work.

Just say “no” to Facespace.

Don’t use MySpace or Facebook for anything. These aren’t professional sites, and you’ll look less professional by using them as a server for your reel. Also, some companies block Facebook or MySpace at work, so recruiters can’t actually see your reel while at the office. That won’t help get your work seen.

Use LinkedIn for career networking. It’s what it’s for.

Keep your reel brief and to the point.

Keep it short and sweet — although if you’re a veteran, a super- thin reel can be worrisome, especially if there is very little variation in the types of shots, or if the work is very old. Nine shots of roto is a roto reel. If you’re compositing, have a separate comp reel, even if it’s thin.
Keep your reel and resume updated.

If you’re a veteran artist and haven’t updated your reel in awhile, at least update your resume with the various freelance jobs you’ve worked on. If you don’t have a web site on which to display your latest resume, use a LinkedIn account.

I want to know you’re not rusty. I’m not a big fan of skill-set-based resumes that don’t list dates at various companies and specific projects worked-on. Being the VFX sup/owner of your own LLC doesn’t really help me figure out what you’ve been up to day-to-day. Include what you’ve done, even if you are billing as a company.

Really old work and an old resume can be worrisome. Has the artist been off the box? Supervising only? If you don’t have time to get your new work into a reel, at least update your resume. “Freelance for three years” isn’t an updated resume. I want to know specific projects and companies. Extended periods of employment at well-regarded companies bode well for work ethic and quality of work.

The type of work is important too. Commercial and episodic turnarounds tend to be fast. I like to know that someone is used to the pace and has done it before. If you’re a CG artist or compositor, but also work as a supervisor on many jobs, you may want to have two resumes. Your long-term career growth may make you want to push your supervisory skills; but if you’re applying for freelance artist jobs, that supervisor resume may actually hurt you. If I need a workhorse, I’m not going to hire a manager who doesn’t work on the box anymore. Your resume can give the wrong impression in terms of what you’re capable of.

…if you’re applying for freelance artist jobs, that supervisor resume may actually hurt you… I’m not going to hire a manager who doesn’t work on the box anymore.

Flame artists that also use desktop compositing software might want to use the two-resume approach. If you consistently work off the Flame in After Effects or Nuke and are applying for non-Flame jobs , highlight specific work that is non-Flame. A reel filled with color correction finishing work or all-Flame composites doesn’t help me hire an AE or Nuke artist. The last thing I want is someone who knows a little AE or Nuke but needs their primary package, i.e. Flame, to actually get the work done. That luxury doesn’t exist — so despite a highly-skilled insanely senior Flame artist saying they “know” another package, a resume that spells out work done in that package quells many of the fears about how comfortable they actually are in these packages.

Break down shots – but don’t overdo it.

Breaking down a composite or a model into the various layers, etc., is fine and great… but do it quickly. I can always press pause or rewind, but I’ll never get the minute or two of my life back that’s spent going around the same model 15 times. I’ve hired model/texture people off a handful of JPEGs. It’s the quality of the work that counts, not the turntables and the music you picked for your demo.

Explain to me what I’m seeing.

Lower-third text on a reel is a fantastic way to break down your reel, even if you can’t do a before-and-after. Lots of studios won’t give you the “before” of a shot, and sometimes great VFX work is invisible. I can’t give you the credit you deserve for a great shot if I can’t figure out what you did! You have to tell me or show me. Or do both.

Also be prepared to talk through what difficulties arose with a given shot. This conversational breakdown of your work over the phone or in person can be what shows a recruiter or hiring manager the way you think, and can reveal your level of knowledge and experience in a way that can’t possibly be known by viewing the finished shot alone.

Tell me what software you used.

Break down what software you used for each project. Many compositors claim all software packages are more or less the same with different buttons; and while there is some truth to that, knowing an artist has been in the trenches on a production using our choice of software eases the worry under a tight turnaround. When companies balloon up and take a chance on a new artist, a deadline is usually looming, or they feel like they’re falling behind schedule. They want to make the safe bet.

Your work history, and your contacts amongst other freelancers at the given studio who might vouch for you, all can help assuage that fear of picking the wrong person when facing a deadline.

It’s the quality of the work that counts, not the music you picked for your demo.

Keep adding new work to your reel; and remove old work that isn’t up to par.

Spend time on new work between jobs. If you’re just starting off, work on a VFX shot, an animation, a model catered to the kind of work for which a specific company is known. Apply for that job, and then move on to the second studio on your list and do the same.

During your job hunt, continue to work on expanding your reel. As you get better, take some of your old, less professional work off your reel. Remember, people may judge your work by the best examples — but most times they’ll judge your artistry, or at the very least your taste and eye, by the worst work on the reel.

Don’t pad your reel with work that doesn’t make you proud. And if you’d like to keep your old art for its sentimental value, hide it in an Old Stuff or Student Stuff archive section on your website. If it’s the first thing people see on your site, they may not watch your new reel with the new work… they’ll just look at your second-semester model/texture work and skip to the next applicant.

And finally, about your website:

There’s nothing more annoying than a website that’s “under construction.” I realize a cool site takes time and effort to design, but don’t send people to a site that doesn’t have your reel on it.

Flash sites can also be super-annoying. I’d avoid Flash, since technical issues with your site can prevent people from seeing your work. Please think about why you’re over-engineering your website. Are you a flash web designer? If not, you may want to keep it to a simpler design. I’ve hired people with a simple free blog with some JPEGs, and an embed from Vimeo for their reel.

If you’re working on your website, but it’ll be awhile before it’s ready to launch because you’re a perfectionist, stop what you’re doing right now and register for a blog. Upload a handful of sample JPEGs of your work and an embed from Vimeo or YouTube. You should be done within an hour or two. Use it as your temporary website. It doesn’t need to be perfect — it’s just a blog, and you can link to it from your official website later on. Down the road it will become the perfect place for Works in Progress or random news tidbits about where you’re working and links to things you contributed. You can update it easily, before any time-consuming overhaul of your regular website.

Have any additional advice for someone putting together a VFX reel? Let us know in the comments!