Professional practice evaluation

As part of developing my knowledge in the media sector as a whole and applying the knowledge I have learnt over the last few months to the real working world, researching professional jobs has been crucial along with viewing opportunities out there. Getting into the industry can be done in many different ways, reflecting on these through statistics has been insightful, along with viewing annual incomes to places of work in the industry that interest me. To build up and showcase our work, a collection of pieces were created, including a CV, cover letter and website.

CV -
Creating a CV in the media, art or creative industry can be different to creating another CV in a different industry, for example applying to a retail shop. This is because the CV can reflect on the role, for example a graphic designer or illustrator would have a professional CV applied with edited designs making them stand out from others and instantly showing of their skills. To make my CV, I had used a sight called Canva. The site has visually aesthetic templates to strike creative hiring managers. I made a CV because it introduces me as a person to the employer and initially allows me to express the experiences and explain why I may be good for the job. The document I had initially created however included a distracting background as my CV is based around photography. After given feedback, I had changed the background from my photography to a simple colour, this being creative yet still professional. The feedback I received included the idea that if the CV were to be printed out, the text would not be successfully seen and would not look appealing in other things e.g black and white. When editing the CV in the future if required, I will take into consideration the idea of being professional and not distracting, along with being able to showcase my work on my website, created after.
Strengths I had when making my CV included knowing what to write in a formal manner along with adding the correct subtitles navigating the hiring person around who I am and my experiences in a clear written way, along with technically saving the CV as a PDF file, as a Word document may interfere if an employer was to open up the document on their phone. However, my weakness when creating the CV was the visuals, which I have now learnt from - do not make the piece too distracting and consider all aspects. 

Cover letter -
Once applying for a job, the cover letter may come next from the employer and requires the individual to express why they are good for that particular job. In my cover letter, I have used language that fits the jobs requirement and explained why the skills I have fits the creative job. The job I had chosen, say I had gotten accepted, is based around being a filmmaker / videographer and acquired skills such as being knowledgeable in Adobe Premiere Pro, use of Canon cameras, etc. I had written the cover letter using formal language embedding experiences I have had, such as mentioning sound equipment practice when at BBC Radio 1, along with being in an editing masterclass with an editor, Ben Mallaby, improving my skills in Premiere Pro. 
I wrote the cover letter because / in regards to learning more about getting into the industry and how to respond when actually getting a job. Writing a cover letter in regards to a creative job is good practice for the future as I feel I now know what a cover letter is and have a template to write one, with any given feedback I can then embark on. I am therefore informed on cover letters and can apply this further knowledge to my understanding on the industry as a whole. 
The length of the letter could be expanded as part of improving. 

Website - 
Finalising the professional practice unit, my website, made on Wix.com portrays all work I have completed under the film and photography form with links of contact and testimonials. Aspects in which I class as strengths on my website include the layout of the work, including my photography and cinematic videos. Both are easy to view and initially show the audience the style of work I practice, mostly consisting of landscape and travel. The website is full of colour also portraying this with my photography set as most backgrounds and bold fonts. I had decided to use Wix over the other sites I conducted research on including Tumblr and Wordpress due to its creative templates and ability to be as visually expressive as desired. The templates vary for different career paths. This compares to sites such as Tumblr, where the website aspect isn't as popular or facilitated due to the fact that the website is more a social, networking platform. 
It is an important aspect that the work shown on the website is at its best, as the website may be the main point of interest and place to formally access most of an individual's work. Other parts on my website in which I feel are successful include the testimonial page, where I have placed good comments made about me as a individual filmmaker. However, as testimonials may be for businesses I could get customer reviews or people who have initially viewed my work to look.