Look What I Can Do! Why We Don’t Use Reels
In the production industry a reel is like a resume. Often when trying to hook a client, reels are sent to show off past work and capabilities. But we don’t really like reels. Which is something that tends to set us apart in our field. What makes us different is our core belief that:
Great content is not made through capabilities, it is made through collaboration.
We really believe in this, it’s right there on our website. While we do have the occasional reel when it is necessary (we can’t completely back out of industry norms), we try to avoid these for the most part.
Part of the issue with reels is, just like a resume, they are pretty easy to fake. Anyone can pull something cool from YouTube and stick it in their reel. While this is not as common the higher up and more professional you get there is still the issue that most videos are not created by just one person. An example being: someone who just did a simple edit on a shot can use it in their reel and take full credit. This can be misleading if the beauty of that shot was in the cinematography or lighting, and by putting it on their reel this editor looks like they did some amazing editing magic.
Reels also tend to limit you to your capabilities of the past. By only focusing on previous work, it limits the imagination and creativity that could be achieved through a brainstorming session with a client. Having conversations, and really getting to know our clients is what really allows us to expand our projects into areas we may have never done before. Maybe we haven’t done X, Y and Z. But that doesn’t mean we can’t, and it doesn’t mean we don’t want to. When starting with a blank slate, the creativity and possibilities flow much easier, than if they get trapped by past templates.
Besides the practical reasons we prefer not to use reels, there is an important aspect of this avoidance right in our core values. Collaboration.
The relationship with a client, and that collaboration is often the most important piece to the success of a project. Sure, we have a lot of capabilities, we can create a visually awesome video for you. But it’s when there is collaboration with the client that the creativity comes out, and a video is produced that fits each client effortlessly. The intricacies of that relationship, and how it results in the final product, can’t be easily shown on a reel.
So rather than sending off a bunch of reels showing off the cool stuff we can do, let’s have lunch. Let’s have a real conversation about what you need, and how we can match that need. That way we can create something so much more fitting for you than just a recreation of something from the past.