Animation job resumes can be a little tricky, especially when real demonstration of your skills and experience is included in your demo reel and portfolio. However, you should remember where you worked and what roles you played there, so it’s always good to have a standard resume handy. Here are some tips for putting together a good animation resume.
For a student or graduate student, focus on internships and academic achievement
If you don’t have work experience, rely more on your demo role and portfolio to market yourself as a viable job candidate—but don’t neglect to use your resume to demonstrate other skills. If you have done internships, be sure to list them and describe what you did there. If you have won school awards or other recognition for your work, list them as well. However, be sure to list your education before your experience (undergraduate and freshman students only) and include your cumulative grade point average if it’s higher than a 3.5. If you graduated cum laude or summa cum laude, state this.
For a more experienced presenter, focus on key achievements and projects
If you’ve worked as an animator on large-scale projects like feature films or hit video games, you should discuss those projects and your role in them. It’s usually a good idea to have under each job title a short paragraph describing your general responsibilities, then a bulleted list of the major projects you’ve been involved in, complete with a list of achievements detailing all your tenures Work Done Significant difference in improving internal processes, the success of a project, or the implementation of a new innovation.
For contractors/freelancers, focus on your biggest projects and biggest clients
As a full-time moderator, you should create a bulleted list to discuss high-visibility projects and your role in them. But you also want to have a list of your important customers, assuming you’re not violating confidentiality agreements.
To avoid overwhelming readers with individual job postings for each client you’ve worked for, instead create a single job posting that covers your freelance experience with a single job description that addresses general services you offer clients. For your project list, select only the most important projects that demonstrate the diversity of your skills and the scope of your responsibilities.
Always add a link to a website
There’s a limit to the amount of information you can put in your portfolio or demo reel, given that you’ll update it throughout your career and the person reading your resume may not have easy access to it either. However, you can easily access your website where you can combine all the different elements of your experience and skills into one presentation.
You can insert your CV and add other details that didn’t fit on the page; You can supplement your portfolio and online demo role with additional images and videos beyond those available in the examples. You can also give them access to interactive works that may not have worked in the demo reel format. It’s also a place where you can give a little more personal information about yourself, but without becoming unprofessional. You should respect the same taboos with your website as you did with your demo reel.
Overall, it should be well designed and convey a consistent image of you as a highly qualified professional. If you have a strong presence on sites like LinkedIn, you can include that link on your resume as well.
Don’t forget your skill list
Depending on whether you’re a traditional animator or a computer animator, this could be a list of areas you have skills in (cel painting, stop motion animation, keyframing, cleanup, etc.) or a list of techniques and software (Adobe Photoshop CS5, Adobe Flash 5.5, Maya, 3D Studio Max, bump mapping, inverse kinematics, etc.) Most animation jobs require very specific software skills or knowledge. To avoid being passed on to you, make sure your CV clearly shows that you have experience in these areas.
Use design elements and pattern graphics sparingly
It’s tempting to want to turn your resume into a piece of graphic design. While some people are fine with simple, elegant designs, most of the time it becomes a cluttered mess that detracts from the impact of your real-world experience and feels very unprofessional. This is not the place to give examples of projects covered in the CV. That’s what your sample sheet is for. And at this point…
Always include a sample sheet
Think of it as a lightweight portfolio. It’s just a one-page document with reasonably sized photos of the best work in your portfolio. You should label them with the project they relate to as it is best if they relate to the projects discussed in the resume so readers can see the end result of the work you have been talking about. The sample sheet must be the last page of the CV.
Never exceed two pages
The pattern sheet is not included – this is your third page. Ideally, a student’s resume should be one page, and a professional’s resume should be two pages. If you don’t fit your experience into this range, you’re either providing too much detail or focusing on things that aren’t important. Save something for maintenance. If you collect too much information, it won’t be read at all.