How to write a Film CV

Called a resume in the US and a CV almost everywhere else — the same document, and these are the rules it gets judged by.

The conventions below are the ones this field actually uses. They are what the builder applies when you pick Film / Animation / VFX, and what the rating checks a finished CV against.

What it must contain

Leave any of these out and the CV reads as incomplete to someone who hires in this field:

Work experience
Credits — Title, year, studio and your exact credit. Ambiguity about your role reads badly here.
Software & Techniques — Name the packages and versions - Maya, Houdini, Nuke, Unreal.

The order to put them in

Order is not cosmetic. What sits at the top is what gets read before someone decides whether to keep reading.

Professional summary
Work experience
Credits
Software & Techniques
Education
Achievements
Certifications
Languages

What to put numbers on

The single most common reason a CV in this field reads as weak is that nothing in it is measured. These are the figures that mean something here:

shot count · runtime delivered · crew size · turnaround

Verbs that carry weight

Openers like “responsible for” and “worked on” describe a job description rather than a person. In this field these do the work instead:

Animated · Composited · Modelled · Rigged · Lit · Edited

What gets one rejected

A showreel link is mandatory. No reel, no callback.

Length

1 to 2 pages is normal for this field.

Build a Film CV See a worked example

Free, no account, and nothing is uploaded — the builder runs in your browser and the CV never leaves it.

Common questions

What should a film CV include?

A film CV has to carry work experience, credits and software & techniques. The order this field expects is professional summary, work experience, credits and software & techniques.

What goes first on a film CV?

The professional summary. That is where this field's convention puts it, and it is what the builder applies when you pick Film.

How long should a film CV be?

1 to 2 pages is normal for this field. Going longer does not add weight; it moves the thing being looked for further down.

Is a film CV the same as a film resume?

For applying to a job, yes - the same document under two names. Resume is the usual word in North America and CV almost everywhere else. The one real exception is the academic CV, which is long-form and lists publications.

Is there a free film CV template?

Yes. ihatejob builds one to this field’s convention for free, with no account and no upload: the section order, the section names and the rating all come from the film pack described on this page. It exports to PDF, Word and plain text.

Related fields

Content · Design · Journalism