MY STORY
GROWING UP
Being an only child to a single parent, I had a lot of spare time to observe the world around me.
Naturally, I was a daydreamer.
The range of my imagination and would manifest itself through art mediums. My attention to detail allowed me to draw portraits not long after first learning to write. I would move on to tracing comic book heroes and popular Japanese mangas. Eventually, I started illustrating my own short one to two page comics, including my friends as characters. I got a lot of practice with framing subjects, using depth/perspective in backgrounds, dialogue, and story beats. After a while, my interests transitioned into playing music. And, It was during that time with my high school bandmates, that I was introduced to a video camera.
With that camera, I documented our band practices and things we did to for entertainment.
It was when I showed videos of our skits to my homeroom teacher, Jemmie Godwin (now Smith), that my path began to materialize. It turned out that Jemmie was the theater teacher, who then, encouraged me to nurture my story telling with the camera. She loaned me her personal handycam, which I proceeded to take with me everywhere. I documented my social life and got comfortable behind the lens.
I ended up making a couple of holiday themed films for the theater club, and through unrelenting peer pressure from Jemmie, I entered a private high school film festival my senior year.
The theme was documentaries involving U.S. History. I decided to make a documentary about my family fleeing the Khmer genocide, and the geopolitical landscape America was experiencing at the time with the Vietnam war. I had barely met the deadline, as I was mourning the death of my grandmother, who was the focal point of the documentary. (It was a tear jerker)
Being from one of only two public school students attending at the time, I watched others with a great amount of talent and greater amount resources than I had, take most of the final prizes. After not hearing my film mentioned the entire night, I had accepted defeat.
I was so discouraged that I didn’t even hear my film or my name when I was called for 1st place. I broke my gaze from the floor because in my peripheral, Jemmie was freaking out and screaming “YOU WON!”. I slowly realized what was going on and got up to receive the prize.
A year later, I was asked if my film could be included in the Young Filmmakers Showcase at the Nashville Film Festival. Jemmie attended the screening and pulled me aside afterwards to tell me what one of the judges from the festival I won told her:
“When the judges saw your entry, he said it was clear that you were the winner.”
I didn’t put much stock into my creativity, but that convinced me that maybe, this was a path worth pursuing.
*To this day, I periodically check-in with Jemmie and her husband Andy Smith.
To Jemmie: Without you, I wouldn’t where I am. I can’t thank you enough for believing in me.
FILM SCHOOL
Before being absorbed into Belmont University, Watkins College of Art, Design, & Film in Nashville, TN was where I decided to earn a degree in film. (Although I technically never graduated.)
I attended from 2009 to approx. 2015. Initially, I started as a major in Directing, but changed to editing so I didn’t have make as many required student films. Not that it matters now.
I cut my teeth early by working on higher level student productions while I was fresh, to learn as much as I could. By the time I got around to making my first student film (which was MOS by curriculum), I was already operating from abundant experience.
You can make fun of film school students, but the education was actually quite useful. Knowing the entire process from concept to distribution and all the intricacies in between, really allows one to be flexible. Quite often, I’ll work with actors who want to write/direct their own projects, but couldn’t preproduction their way out of an upside-down cup. I’ve had to teach them how to be filmmakers.
Having an education on the entire production pipeline has added incredible value to many projects. I’ve currently found myself in more of a producer role in addition to directing and cinematography. Because, someone has to wear those hats.
As many smart film students do: I studied DVD extras, behind the scenes content, and VFX breakdowns to learn how Hollywood filmmakers solved problems and achieved their images. I threw all of that knowledge into creative problem solving on/off set.
By chance, I worked on many action based student films. I did them well, and so often that I was typecast as the action guy. It bugged me to the point that for my third student film, I wrote a rom-com. Because, my love for film spans more than just the action genre, and I had to prove to everyone that I was a well rounded filmmaker. Aside from action, I enjoyed doing sound. Since I had some music background, sound was easy to pick up. I would often be asked to do sound on set.
For most of my time in film school, I worked 3rd shift loading trucks at UPS. I could often be found napping in the mixing studio before leaving for work.
Towards the end of my time at school, I slowly transitioned from school to working full-time. Eventually freelancing full-time.
Fast-forward to now, I co-own a production company, BAER Cine, and often work with the local stunt team creating action shorts.
