Lotta people talking about portfolio building tips. Here's a few for storyboarding, in no particular order:
If you're applying for a story position, make a story portfolio. Save those beautiful background paintings for you vis-dev portfolio. A little character/concept exploration is okay, but keep it focused.
Are you applying for feature? Show you can board in film aspect ratio. No square panels! Pay attention to the format of wherever your applying and show you know how to work within in.
What should you put in a story portfolio? Storyboards! Preferably in a format that's easy to click through panel by panel, or something like a quicktime.
In my experience, it's FAR easier to click through a sequence then to look at panels in a grid. But if you must use a grid, PLEASE make sure your panels read horizontally in rows, not vertically in columns. Make sure your panels are big enough to read.
If you're putting panels in a grid, feel free to edit a little. Subtle camera shifts or micro expression changes won't read as well as they will in a reel, and they can make it more of a slog to scroll through.
A similar note: if you tend to heavily pose out your boards (for character acting), ask yourself if you need ALL those poses to sell the idea. This is a good thing to keep in mind for boarding in general.
How many sequences should you put in a portfolio? At least one. No more than three? If you have more than one, make sure each one showcases a different skill (comedy, action, dramatic acting, etc). If you've got one strong comedy sequence in there, you don't need two.
If you're not that good at, say, action? Don't include an action scene. Only include work that best represents the skills you have. Don't pad a portfolio with work you know isn't your best.
Gesture drawing/observational/coffee shop sketches > long anatomical studies in a story portfolio. Understanding how to draw a figure is important, but we'd rather see your ability to convey life, personality & ideas. Don't need more than a couple pages of this.
Been working on a personal project? Showing thought process is great! Character exploration, research, stuff that tells us how you approach storytelling is really informative. Thought process and individual sensibility are things we always try to suss out of a portfolio.
Really, storytelling sensibility, unique and nuanced character performance, an eye for entertainment... these are the things we look for. Technical skills can be taught, but this is where we see the most potential.
Lastly, i guess, don't expect a portfolio review to lead to a job offer? Sorry to end on kind of a bummer, but in my experience most portfolio reviews aren't primarily recruiting events. Approach it as an opportunity to get advice that will make your work even stronger.
As always, i feel the need to caveat: this is based on my own experience reviewing story portfolios at Disney Feature Animation. Other places might look for different formats or content, and of course different disciplines will require different things. But this is what i know!
Oh! I thought of another thing. Please include complete sequences in a portfolio. An incomplete scene can make your story-telling skills impossible to gauge. Make sure each board sample represents a complete idea.
Related: are your board samples from your high concept personal passion project? That's totally fine, just make sure it's clear to an outsider what's happening in a scene. If it needs a lot of backstory to be understood, maybe pick a different board sample.
