A demo reel is a motion designer's resume. It should include their best work & demonstrate capabilities.
This is a breakdown of how I developed my latest reel, showcasing 3D modeling, 2D Animation, Music, Videos, concert & livestream visuals, logo design, music composition, and Sound Design. My demo reel contains a mixture of client work & personal projects I feel best represent my skills.
The following VIDEO is THE LATEST SHOW REEL UPDATED Feb 2023
The Breakdown Below is for MY previous reel-
Some elements are the same, but much has changed!
New reel is done, still in process with updating the breakdown, so there's a mismatch in the info below and the reel above!
The next shot puts the viewer in a position I've been in recently, outside looking in. I've been a freelancer for several years trying to get my foot in the door with bigger studios or record labels to elevate the level of my work, work on larger scale projects, and be a permanent part of a more robust organization. I tried to metaphorically capture the feeling in the opening seconds.
In the scene are 3d models I created of several pieces of studio gear I actually own; Mackie HR824s, Yamaha HS-50ms, & a Native Instruments Maschine Mikro 3, along with one of my favorite instruments of all time, the legendary Roland Tr-808. Bass Traps plus screens displaying additional animations I've done adorn the walls under the glow of cinematically colored lighting. The animated visuals on the wall foreshadow things to come later in the reel.
Everything is powered up waiting for someone to man the controls. Showing up and doing the work is the way I've gotten better over time. the camera movement flies the viewer from the outside into the drivers seat at the already running work station. Time to get to work!
Transition frame tracking the camera movement into the studio
Transition frame showing a 3D modeled Roland TR-808, Native Instruments Maschine Mikro, and a pair of Yamaha HS-50Ms on a desk with a Mac
Closing in on the Mac monitor where the 2D portion of the reel is already in progress
Wide view of Shaded 3D models
Zoomed in view of Shaded 3D models
Wide shot of wireframes
Zoomed in shot of wireframes
Top 3/4 view of wireframes
Top 3/4 view of shaded models
Top 3/4 view of fully rendered models
To broaden my capabilities, realizing that 3D needs to be a tool in my arsenal, I've been learning Blender recently . "show the work you want to be hired for" is a motto I live by, so including this segment in the reel was a no-brainer. The remainder of the reel is playing on-screen as we zoom into the monitor.
As we land on the monitor, the animation shows stage visuals I made for House Music producer JTJ's Blood OVerheating EP released on Spoonfed Records,
I took a note from Ryan Summers, and made sure to include what I do, and the kind of work I want to do rather than just putting "2022 demo reel" as the video caption.
You can see additional work I did for Spoonfed Records here.
Beginning of Alpha Matte Transition
Half-way point
Finishing as next frame animates on
The next transition 'bleeds' off using an alpha matte to reveal the next spot. a concept I'd been entertaining was Nike entering the motorsports world. Nike has connections with all sorts of non-traditional sports, so the idea was to create an interstitial for a street racing team. The goal was to capture the feel of following the racers route on a track, and pay homage to shifting a manual transmission.
I created a match cut transition here where the movement and shape of the Nike swoosh is mimicked by the position of the dancer in the following frames.
Match cut of the dancer in a pose mimicking the Nike swoosh.
Rotoscoped and motion tracked breakdancer. These frames are from a music video I crated for Snake Bones.
Adidas is one of my favorite brands, I've worn their shoes & attire most of my life. I'd come up with a concept for a winter sports line during the olympics in 2021, and animated a commercial spot for it. The animation came out pretty slick, so I included it in the reel.
I shot, produced, & directed several music videos for Akua in 2021. The next several frames highlight some of the most interesting shots from those videos. I created a series of transitions to cut various sections from these videos together. Full music videos and more information about the work I've done for Akua can be seen here.
Frame from 'God Division' Music Video
Frame from 'Bow Down' video
Transition frame from Bow Down music video
Frame from 'Bow Down' music video
Frame from Akua stage visuals
The next segment consists of some of the stage visuals I've created for various artists. I composed them by creating a large comp, then inserting it into the main timeline and animating the movement of the large comp, timing the transitions so the movement of each sub-component was featured briefly as the transitions happen.
Next, we move into frames from a piece I produced for The Lyons Group to accompany their "Send it to lansdowne" ad campaign. This is a 20-second looping video that was displayed on the Boston University hockey rink Jumbotron. The full animation & breakdown of this piece are available here.
the curtains are drawn on the 'Send it to Lansdowne" video & reopen to reveal Times Square. Five of the screens in this video were replaced with Mocha to display the Snake Bones logo. The Times Square video fades out as Snake Bones visuals animate on. These circuit-like visuals are often used on-stage or in nightclubs when the artist is playing Tech House & Techno music.
Bringing the reel to a close, the lens logo animates back into the frame, magnifying the segments of the screen beneath it. As the Snake Bones visuals animate off, the bezel of the lens rotates while sparks pulse and flicker from behind it. The sparks were created with Stardust, and a heavy application of Deep Glow to make them feel electric and vibrant.
The lens emits glowing audio waveforms, illustrating my focus on music, as it transitions from the 3D animation to its 2D counterpart and the sparks subside. The final frame animates on my name, specializations, contact info, and thanks the viewer for watching.
The reel was going to be about one minute long, so given my production skills, I opted to produce the soundtrack myself.
I rendered the rough cut and imported the video into Logic Pro to compose the music to fit with the action. Once I had the soundtrack complete, I bounced the audio so that I could synch the timing up with the animation within After Effects, and rendered it out again.
The piece was ready for final render, and showing off to potential clients!
I hope you enjoyed this breakdown and it gave you some insight to my process. Various components contained in this reel can be seen in more detail in the portfolio section of this website. If you'd like to know more about the person behind the work, there's a short bio about me at that link.
If you're interested in working with me on your projects, head over to the Contact Section and get in touch!
I hope you enjoyed this breakdown and it gave you some insight to my process. Various components contained in this reel can be seen in more detail in the portfolio section of this website. If you'd like to know more about the person behind the work, there's a short bio about me at that link.
If you're interested in working with me on your projects, head over to the Contact Section and get in touch!
