What is a professional vfx reel?

[IndyRiot]

Hey, I've contacted a company who does visual effects for tv commercials to see what I would need to do to get a job with them. Anyways, they looked at some of my stuff and showed interest. One of the guys at the company said I needed to make a "professional vfx reel." Now, I know what a VFX reel means, but what would a professional one entail? A few suggestions he gave me were to show the "before" and "after" footage, but he didn't give me any more details.

If anyone here has had to do a professional vfx reel, do you have any advice and tips? Thanks!

[gebo]

These look good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pG0UC...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcFzI...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjgSm...endscreen&NR=1

I think breakdowns are essential to explain what you did.

[IndyRiot]

Thank you! These are some great examples!

[neuro]

Breakdown videos - those are fine if you did a personal job where you have access to your source material, but it's pretty ridiculous if they demand this. Most VFX companies prohibit taking any material that didn't actually make the movie cut - if you can't get it off the blu-ray, it doesn't exist. In other words, don't feel obligated to do breakdowns for everything unless you can - just be prepared to explain what you did specifically and show a good variety of representative work of the specific part of the vfx production you're interested in.