For my professional practice, I had to design a coverletter and a CV, as well as edit together a showreel of my animation work.
Cover Letter
While writing the cover letter, I asked myself a couple of questions. I gave myself a number of criteria.
Why am I interested in a placement in this company?
What are the values of this company?
What sort of work does this company focus on?
Who are their main clients?
What position in this company would I like?
What do I have to offer this company and why would I be good in this company?
Before completing the cover letter, I first made a template where I could include more info later. I did this as a way to help me with coming up with what I could write about with the animation studios. I wrote about the animation studio, Lighthouse Studios, known for their work on the Cuphead Show and the Bob’s Burgers movie. I chose this studio in particular because of their style of work which focuses on a more cartoon-y style of animation, which is the style I go for in my animations.
I start off by explaining my current studies and how I would like to apply for a job at the company. Next I introduced the reason why I would like a place at the studio, by bringing up one of the projects that the studio worked on, to show that I have knowledge of the company and their current work. Afterwards, I specified which programs and techniques I have used to create my animations, with me starting off with doing animation using paper, then moving onto Krita and currently using Maya. I am aware that Lighthouse mainly uses 2d, but I wanted to demonstrate my versality as I think many animation companies appreciate an understanding of both 2d and 3d animation. To give an example of one of my recent animations, I talked about a fight scene that I animated in Krita. I used it as an example of my body mechanics animation skills. I also talked about what I excel at in my skills, specifically character animation and direction. I mention how I animate characters’ actions to show off their personalities and how I use stylized flourishes in certain scenes I animated to make scenes more visually interesting.
After that, I finish off by thanking the HR manager for reading my cover letter and telling them I hope to hear from them in the near future with regards to future career opportunities.
CV
The CV design first started off with the logo, which is a design of my initials, made in Photoshop. We were tasked with creating a logo using only basic shapes, so to create my initials, I used 2 triangles and 2 circles with parts cut out using the respective shapes. I also used a white and blue color scheme. The actual letters were colored and the outline was a white drop shadow. The color of the lettering against the colored background made the letters look transparent.
The design I used for the CV had the logo along with my name at the top of the border on the left side which also has information on my skills. On the other side, I had a general profile of myself and information on my hobbies & my work and education history. I included my name at the side and stylized to go along with the logo by having my first name on top of my last name with an underline beneath my first name. Underneath that is my email and my soft/hard skills listed. The font that I used was Agency FB. The headings were centered and in all caps with the rest of the text aligning left.
For my soft skills, I listed my social skills and for my hard skills, I listed my artistic skills as well as the various programs that I’ve worked with such as animation programs like Krita and Maya. I had also written a short profile about myself describing my interests, my passions, my aspirations and what I am studying. Underneath that, I wrote down my education and work history, from latest to earliest. I also did a small section about my hobbies. To finish it off, I included a link to my showreel.
This is what it looks like finished. It came out great. My favorite aspect of the CV is the aesthetic choices I made. The placement of the text, the font choice and the use of contrasting colors makes it look very appealing and the way that the CV is structured is very readable.
Showreel
I created a showreel of animation I’ve done over the years to show off my animation skills. It features 2d traditional animation, 2d digital animation and 3d animation.
The clips that I chose for my showcase are the ones that I either thought had the best movements that I animated, or ones that I felt were the most visually appealing through direction and composition. I also included an unfinished animation that I was doing over the summer just to have some variety of the clips I used. I started and ended the showreel with clips from my witch group animation project, as I felt that was some of my best work, both through movement and aesthetically. I also included the most recent animation that I had done while I was working on the showreel, which featured a scene from Dragons Forever that I animated, a fight scene that showcased my body mechanics animation skills. I was happy to include that one too, as I feel that has some of the best movement that I have animated. I did a previous version of the showreel that didn’t include that animation with a different song, but I changed the song when I imported that animation into the reel.
For the audio of the showreel, I used the instrumental of a song called “No Tomorrow” by Non Phixion. I originally had the animation start off as soon as the song starts, but I edited it so that there is a title card for my showreel to start the video off and as soon as the song hits its first beat after the intro, a movement that I’ve animated went along with the beat. That made the video go along with beats of the song. I started the showreel off with no audio, but the song fit so well when I included it. I also included an ending title card to give information about the animation programs and techniques used and the music in the video.
A problem I had with the showreel is the issue with the framerate shown in my animations. While the animation is shown in the preview, there is always a problem with the speed of the animation and there are always missing frames unless I give the animations a lower framerate than the ones they actually have. I usually render the animations at 12fps, but when I set them at 12fps in Premiere Pro, the animation is always too fast and has missing frames. Fortunately, I found through the sequence settings, the framerate had been set to only 4fps. Afterwards I set it to 24fps and the animations’ speed was normal. It also helped with trimming the runtime, which improved the pacing of the showreel while keeping all of the same clips in.
I am happy with how the showreel came out. Not only was the showreel a great way to show off my animation skills and how they progressed over the years, I also believe it shows off my editing skills.
The creation of these really helped with how to present myself and my work in an appealing way. With the finished versions of my CV, cover letter and showreel, I feel more confident with showcasing my skills to studios.