Hey Kherree,
Sorry for the delay, been quite busy! Happy to answer your questions however.
1) I never really had a starting point as such, I actually just went into full-time work at age 16 for a job I didn’t enjoy to earn money. Once I had enough money to buy a camera I simple just had fun learning how to use it and studying how to get better in my own time. Over the years I had built myself a portfolio of online videos which I created for fun, and eventually got noticed by someone who asked me to film their street show performance as a paid job. More paid jobs starting coming in as a result and my portfolio started to grow. I always found it important however to find a balance between personal creative freedom and actual work, whether that be retail work (which paid my way mostly) or camera jobs that weren’t too fun. And so I would always push myself to pursue some kind of personal project to keep me going and get better for it. Which in turn would again attract attention for the camera jobs that I actually wanted to do, such as music videos, performance shows, timelapse work & photography, ect.
2) The main thing I strive for and want to communicate to my audience is inspiration and excitement, a feeling. Whenever I find something that inspires me it pushes me to want to create something, and I want nothing more then to try and capture that inspirational feeling with whatever I create, so others will hopefully be inspired to do something.
3) My biggest influences come from a range of different things and people. My first biggest influences were films, ones that would make me feel something and really think outside the box such as Donnie Darko, The Machinist and American Beauty. Then I got addicted to beautiful cinematography, which pushed me to try and create very visually appealing videos. The people who had the biggest influence on me are actually some of the people I got to work with, but to single out a few people who were particularly inspiring for me are Michael Shainblum (who got me deeply into timelapse & astrophotography), Will Sutton (who I also got to work with on occasion and learnt a lot by bouncing ideas back and forth for creativity), Mark Gee (another great astrophotographer), Joel Schat (also got me hooked on timelapse). Then there’s some great directors such as David Fincher, Nicolas Winding Refn, Wes Anderson, Quentin Tarantino, Edgar Wright, Christopher Nolan, Paul Thomas Anderson, Park Chan-Wook to name but a few, who have all made incredible films that have hugely inspired me along the way. I find it very important to have strong inspiration and follow particular people’s work to be able to learn from it, that way you’ll always be influenced and be able to push yourself more.
4) In this current time is certainly is. Pretty much any of my success in whatever I do is down to how people interact with social media, so advertising plays a part in that as well. While I think advertising can certainly work in your favour I don’t actually use it a whole lot at all for my own work, I find that being able to let people know who you are plays a bigger part in communicating with people, so in that sense networking and storytelling has always favoured me. Going out of your way to support the people who really inspire you, as well as people in a similar position or even just starting out. Just the fact of you being active on social media and posting things regularly will keep people engaged, but being able to share your experiences through storytelling and networking will favour you and you’ll also gain confidence in what you do.
5) Don’t give up and don’t think of it as work. Make sure you are pursuing something that really inspires you and that you really enjoy, so you always have something to push towards, always set goals. It will no doubt get really tough at times and you will probably want to give up or put something off until another day, but if you don’t try it you’ll never know it’s worth, because the result is always worth it in the end.
Not sure if these were the answers you were after but I hope they help you! Good luck with whatever you chose to chase!
Cheers
Brook Wassall, started working at 16 in a job he did not really enjoy but he then saved enough money to buy his own camera. Self taught how to use the camera and researched how he could improve. He always has a personal project to keep him busy and to keep his portfolio up to date with new and exciting works. He tries to communicate a feeling of inspiration and excitement for his audience. His main influences and inspirations happen to be some of the people he works with. I feel as though I can relate to this more because for example the fact he has to work in a normal 9-5 job and balances his personal creative freedom alongside is the kind of career I am looking for myself.
Kherree 