Business Cards, Stickers, Showreel, Website and Social Media
Self-promotion is an area I struggle with quite significantly. Whilst I find conversation and communication simple, things that require regular planning and attention, I find doesn’t come easily.
From both visiting lecturers and from events at Cardiff, I really found just how important it is to have strong promotional materials but also to maintain a consistent and effective presence online. Every single person who I have met working in the industry has expressed this, and not only that but whenever I see someone who’s work I admire, the first thing I do is look them up on social media. After taking part in the Skwigly animators brunch at CAF, people came up to me after the fact and asked where they could follow the film or my work and I felt immediately that the content and resources I had to offer were not up to par.
Currently in my arsenal I have business cards, stickers that we made for Disparate Threads, to hand out at Cardiff, a LinkedIn page that I made at the beginning of the LIAF project and a dedicated art Instagram that I do not post regularly on.
By the time the showcase comes about I have a five point plan I want to implement:
- Seasilk specific business cards to display
- Seasilk specific stickers to display – in conjunction with Isobel and Eleonora
- An effective showreel of approximately 25-30secs, focussing on character performance and movement
- An updated LinkedIn page, containing the showreel as well as an updated CV
- An instragram presence with far more animation work on, rather than just illustrations from over a year ago.
The most important of these undoubtedly being the showreel, as this will form the basis for any work I am able to get in the future. I have never made a showreel before, but feel like the editing skills I have been developing, especially over the course of making Sea Silk will really benefit this process. I also had a short tutorial with Rory about selecting certain shots from my previous films that would help support my initial handshake with the industry.
I was initially worried that my work would not have enough substance or variety in order to make an effective reel, but even in just collating clips for the presentation, I feel more confident at the shots I have at my disposal. I’ve been investigating music options that will help sell the work and hope to ask, Olivia Underwood, the composer I collaborated with both for the final film and for my writers project, if she has any music that I could use.
Once this has been made, I plan on building my LinkedIn Page around it, along with some skills and career information, transferring my relevant experience from theatre. I hope to make the page for more indicative of my current skillset and use that as a primary reference page for potential employers.