The Evolution of the Showreel

In this piece I’m exploring the short history of the filmmaker’s portfolio – otherwise known as a showreel. The evolution of the showreel has been fuelled by advances in technology and changes in the video production industry. Knowing the reasons behind their initial creation, their success, and their development will give you the understanding of how to take advantage of the innumerable opportunities filmmakers have to express themselves in 2020. Essentially, it's a bit of film history that might make you think about how you work as a filmmaker and creator. Enjoy.

Does any one remember the item in the photograph below? It's a U-matic video recorder. This thing, and the ridiculously large tapes it ingested, were a large part of my life in my early 20's when I was introduced to the concept of showreels.

A Brief History of Showreels

In 1970 Sony released the U-matic videotape format, originally planned as a consumer item the cost of it’s manufacture made that idea prohibitive, but it did find a market in the industrial, professional and educational sectors. With the release of a portable model in 1974 this ushered in a new era of electronic news gathering (ENG) as U-matics replaced the 16mm film cameras normally used for on-location television news gathering. Film required developing, whereas video tape could be played back instantly – allowing news to break faster, ergo making it better.

As the years passed I'm guessing the combination of older models making their way onto the 2nd hand market, the emergence of better videotape formats, and the growth of the advertising industry, particularly in London, meant that U-matics became the cost effective videotape format for general use.

Showreels Were My Life!

In 2001, when I started working for a production company that made TV commercials, U-matic tapes were the format used for nearly all the Director’s showreels. Master copies of the Director’s work would be archived on a better quality tape, usually a Betacam or Digital Betacam, from which you would linear edit a compilation of the Director’s work to create a Master Showreel tape. Duplicate copies would then be made on U-matic or VHS in real time. 

Making showreels was a fulltime production line. With the ‘House Showreel’, containing the work of 10+ directors, and often being 20 minutes long, it meant that if you only had one U-matic recorder then only 3 copies could be made an hour. And this was my primary job: to make sure there were always enough reels on the shelves because every day hundreds of them would be sent out to advertising agencies around the world to promote the production services and the Directors repped by the production company.

Like many of the jobs I’ve had in the industry that role no longer exists.

However, with the benefit of hindsight, I would argue that those showreels I was making back in 2001 were far more effective resources than a large proportion of what we have now because of the value they gave to the client and the work they generated for the production company. The majority of the digital showreels that exist today cannot come anywhere near those types of returns. 

The Showreel as a Marketing Tool

Back in 2001 a Producer would talk with their contact at an agency about their upcoming projects and want to know the following info: 

“What’s the product?”

“What sort of budget are you working with?”

“Is the client looking for a fresh, unique style or something more established?”

Etc, etc.

With that info the Producer would then be able to compile a list of solutions for their agency contact: “Take a look at this new guy’s work, he’s got a unique vision that would work perfectly with your client’s brand”, or “This Director’s got huge pedigree making award-winning work for similar brands...”  

The Producer would then compile bespoke showreels for the agency, offering possible solutions to their creative challenges. By doing this the Producer was offering value to their client, plus it worked very well for the Producer and the production company as a marketing strategy too. The company I worked for was ultimately voted the No.1 Production Company in the world, won tonnes of industry awards, worked with the top brands, opened offices around the world, and must have had a very healthy turnover. The growth of the company could be attributed to a number of things, but the aggressive marketing of the showreels was undoubtedly a contributing factor, especially in the early days before word-of-mouth and reputation took over.

Now, providing relevant content to potential clients is just common sense. The question today is: when and how do you provide that value?

Advances in technology (internet speeds, rise of non-linear editing platforms, etc). changed the industry resulting in more people creating video and therefore more people marketing these services. Hence, far more showreels in the marketplace.

And the format of the showreel changed in response.

What in 2001 was a portfolio of film projects in their entirety tailored to a small niche audience became a one-size-fits-all-generic-tick-box-exercise. A bite-sized overview of a creator's skills designed to capture the viewer's attention with an emphasis on the visual aspect.

Here's the formula: 60-180 seconds long. Compilation of shots. Cut to a music track. Company logo. Like my own showreel, above, from 2018.

When this format came out it was ground-breaking. It was fresh. It was new. And to make a good one you had to have a large, diverse collection of work. I actually spent a large part of my early career trying to create the volume of quality content required to make a good showreel in this format! 

Additionally, to make a good one you have to be able to edit. Well. Making a decent compilation reel takes time and creativity. Anyone can compile a number of shots and lay a music track under them, but no one is going to watch that reel. Today, your reel has to have that extra something...

But this is where the problems with the compilation showreel format start. Because the best showreels take time and skill to create you don’t want to be doing it over and over again to create bespoke versions for specific audiences, otherwise you wouldn’t have much time for anything else. Therefore, once your reel is cut, you want it to last for at least a year. It’s a one-shot, all my eggs in one basket, piece of marketing activity.

In 2020 that isn’t going to work, for reasons too numerous to discuss here. What you need in 2020 is to have a continuous dialogue with your potential audience. And that dialogue needs to offer value to your audience, which in this case are your potential clients. And this is where the the compilation of shots showreel FAILS massively.

60-120 seconds of pretty shots from a diverse number of projects may have an entertainment value, but not if it looks like everyone else’s showreel. When the format first emerged, it was new and fresh – a bitesize overview of a filmmaker’s range and talents, amazing! But when you over dilute the format then the uniqueness, the impact, and the engagement are all lost. And ultimately the format stops being an effective marketing tool.

Secondly, other than a visual snapshot of past projects what other value are you giving your audience with a 'compilation of shots' showreel? 

There’s no context to these shots. How were they created? What were they created for? What resources did you have to create them? What was the outcome? In fact, when it comes right down to it – who even filmed these shots?

So, what is the answer for showreels moving forward?

Well, I’m personally going to focus on offering value and doing so on a regular basis. I’ll be touching on this strategy in future posts, but until then I want to point you in the direction of a film I’ve made about showreels for my YouTube channel that introduces how I’m personally changing the way I create a ‘showreel’:

I’d be really interested to hear your thoughts on the subject matter, so leave a comment or send me a message. 

Thanks for your time.