Showreel, What to do

Presentation 
Presentation is key to selling yourself first things first think about who is viewing your portfolio, what sector are you aiming towards is it the game or Film industry very similar deepening on what your aim is, when you send out your portfolio to studios and companies various people may see your portfolio they can range from Human Resources to artist to even the producers and management so keep in mind who is viewing your portfolio, present yourself well don't clutter and keep clean and understandable as said before maybe someone who does not know the art will be viewing this portfolio.

Keep it simple 
Keep your show reel simple clean and precise, make sure each shot has slow and smooth camera movements this helps the viewer take in the detail, Make sure the shots are not cluttered the scene should have only what is needed to make the scene realistic and believable don't over complicate your shots.

Camera and time
Camera and timing plays a vital part of the showreel production, camera movments should be very precise when showing of portfolio work, when using fly throughs within the show reel I need to make sure that its very smooth and not sluggish this could really hinder my work, also the speed of the camera needs to be the perfect amount of time used to show of certain points of the chosen environemnt this allows the view to take in the extra detail, panning shots work very when needed to focus on certain details, If working with characters turn tables are pefrect for showing off the character in question, make sure that the character is posed in a realistic way and not just in standard T-pose this helps your character come to life and show personality.

Work in game engine
showing of work in a game engines does not only enhnace the quality of work but shows the viewer that you have the capabilites of working within game engines, this can really help their overall decision.

Style 
Personally the style choice is dependent on the designer I can't see there being a style which we should all pursue the style is our own, It boils down to how we indiviually present our style, it should represent us as whole and above all keep the style consistent across the show reel otherwise this can cause confussion towards the viewer.


Sound
Sound can be a massive issue, Do not make your show reel around the sound, you need to make sure your show reel works without sound, although it can bring life to your show reel, for example if you have a environment scene maybe atmospheric sounds will help define the environment but background music of actual sounds or something similar doesn't really work well and can come across over dramatic, when all you need to do is fully capture the scene as itself. Also if you create your show reel based around a song or music, the viewer may not be able to hear the music which makes it irrelevant and may make the show reel inadequate.

Work within show reel
All the work depicted within the show reel should be own developed work, unless stated otherwise this may be for example someone who has woked in the industary and worked on a game which other artists have worked on, make sure the work is rendered with the best light to show of the assets and the detail. Do not just show models without textures this can be used but make sure you should textures, as an artist we have to produce both 3D assets and the textures relevent to those assets, Some people would argue that any one could learn to model 3D assets but to texture takes that little bit extra skill and is why we are known as game artists, so make sure eveything is textured.