Enjoy the Journey
I have officially been in the film industry for three years, but I have been doing creative-gig-jobs for as long as I can remember. When I was a freshman in High School I made custom Harry Potter and Twilight shirts on Zazzle (I actually made a little over $200 and with only 10% commission that’s not bad) - back then you couldn’t make fan tees without licensing the way that you can with Etsy now, so I had to shut down my shop. With my low-budget Photoshop Elements, I learned how to graphic design.
Graphic design then led me to photography. Photography led me to creative directing. creative directing led me to Los Angeles. When I initially moved to Los Angeles I thought I would become a brand and marketing person for musical artists. In fact, I would say that was my tentative plan. I had friends who were aspiring musicians who I had come up with, and so naturally I think I gravitated to the thing closest to me. Ironically, the first few gigs I had on set were music videos, and I hated it. I very quickly began reassessing what I wanted.
From music videos I moved into commercials, and from set production assisting I moved into office production assisting. All the sudden I found myself on track to be a Producer. Producing taught me so much about how to protect myself as a filmmaker: it taught me about logistics, good-planning vs. bad-planning, it taught me the value of the written word (aka contracts) and getting them signed before you ever start working with someone. It taught me the value of balancing the creative with the pragmatic. In some ways, I always had an interest in the logistics - even for being so completely, chaotically creative - but my experience going from office PA to Production Coordinator to now, Associate Producing has given me a unique opportunity to strengthen those natural interests into actionable skills.
Even now, I’m slowly moving from Associate Producing to into Development Producer. This is not even including all of the things I’m doing to serve my own personal projects on the side (writing scripts, networking, etc). You know what’s crazy? I never actually asked for any of this.
In 2006, I dedicated my life to the Lord and I was heavily pursuing youth ministry and was making plans to get into a program that would allow me to become a Pastor (yes, me, a woman pastor). However, in the natural flow of life (and for me, as a believer following the inclination of the Holy Spirit) I found doors opened for me that I never asked for. All the doors I mentioned above opened for me without me banging on them. It was hard work, I never forced the doors open. I never intended to become a graphic designer, photographer, creative director… or any of this.
All I did was give my “yes” when I felt the prompting to do so. There is so much power in your yes. There are things twenty years from now you will look back on and realize: oh my gosh, that “yes” completely changed the trajectory of my life. Hopefully for good. I am infinitely grateful to have first and foremost given my yes to Jesus, and secondly, to the wild ride of following His prompting which led me here: to filmmaking, to writing, to creating really amazing things with amazingly talented people.
I pray your yeses open up doors that lead you to your purpose.
Stevie