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Building a Portfolio for a Job in Television

Published on Tuesday February 2nd , 2010

So many colleges are now offering excellent television production programs as the popularity of this profession continues to grow. There are more television stations and production houses than ever before with the advent of cable, and now with television shows being produced for viewing on the internet. It is a highly competitive field to enter upon graduating from college. With that in mind, you need to work on developing a portfolio that you can show prospective employers when it comes time to actually interview for television jobs. Regardless of whether you want to be in front of or behind the camera, you need to have something tangible you can show employers that highlights your work in television production.

If you are interested in being an on-air personality, you need to put together what is called a "reel." A reel is comprised of your clips that you have compiled during your college years. If you are serious about getting into this field, you will have an array of clips from actual television shows broadcast over your college's television station and/or from assignments you have completed for a class. This is your audition tape so you want to only include clips that truly show your professionalism. Try to keep your reel to less than three minutes as television executives are inundated with these tapes. They often only check out the first 30 seconds or minute of these tapes, so make frontload it with your best stuff.

Similarly, if you are looking for a job in producing programming, you should come up with a reel. However, based on your career path, your reel will look much different than someone wanting to appear in front of the camera. If you are interested in sound engineering, you will put together clips of your best work involving sound effects. If you are a camera man, you will make a tape of your best shots. If you are an editor, you will produce a reel with some of your cleanest work.

Be prepared to start out at the bottom. Very few individuals land their dream job right out of college. You are probably going to get your first job in a part of the country you've never envisioned living. You won't make decent money right out of the gates either. However, if you worked really hard in college and your reel reflects this effort, you will have a better chance of shooting up the ladder than the person who realizes someday after graduation that they'd make a great play-by-play man or newscaster. It all starts with hard work!

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