You Can't Figure It All Out Beforehand

Embracing the non-linear creative career...

Hey all, I hope you’re doing well.

I’m writing this week’s newsletter as I sit in a plane flying across the North Sea back to England from Finland. I was out there for the week visiting my friends at Kamerastore in Tampere.

If you’re unfamiliar with them, Kamerastore is Europe's largest retailer of used film cameras. They have quite the setup, a lot to explore, and endless film gear to nerd out about. We’d been talking about me visiting for a while now to get a tour and also to get out and shoot in Finland.

It was great to finally arrange something with them and spend the week somewhere new. I even managed to sneak in a short road trip while I was there. I’ll share my experience in a video on the channel later in September.

Exploring the repair room at Kamerastore

Today, though, I want to talk about the creative journey—its messiness, to be exact. I was inspired to write about this after digging through my archives recently and reminiscing about the early days of my career. I hope this is some food for thought.

So, let’s jump into it.

Twenty Years Full-Time

I recently was reflecting on the fact that I’ve been making a living as a self-employed creative in the video and photo industries for nearly twenty years.

Nowadays, my business consists primarily of running my YouTube channel and focusing on long-term projects and photobooks; out of everything I’ve done, this feels the most ‘right’, even though I know change (in some form) is always around the corner.

But, even though I’m happy with where I am, my work today looks very different from my goals and dreams from when I was early in my career.

I think about that often, and as I look back at the past, I’m constantly reminded that the creative ‘journey’ is vastly unpredictable. Also, it’s usually chaotic and messy, full of ups and downs, and requires work and action to understand where to go next.

As much as we want to figure it out beforehand, the process is non-linear. It’s all about making decisions, doing the work, and adjusting.

But do that enough, and there’s a good chance you’ll eventually end up in a very fulfilling place (often quite different from what you envisioned initially).

Filming in Alaska in 2010

Many Different Shoes

In a nutshell, my career so far has looked like this:

Film school → Freelance Cam Op → DOP/Editor for TV → Production Company Owner → Year Sabbatical → Production Company PT. 2 → Freelance Editor → Full-time YouTube + Photography (current)

I’ll go into a bit more detail below, but what’s most interesting when I look at that list is that throughout each of those phases, I was heading in a specific direction with goals and ideas, convinced that it was the one, only to discover unexpected things along the way which sent me down new paths which I could have never predicted.

I’ve experienced this not only in my overall journey as a creative but also in a number of the more minor individual things I do as a photographer, like photo projects, for example—always starting with an idea, only to have it evolve as the work is done.

But back to the beginning.

I graduated from film school in the early 2000s and, shortly after, started working as a freelance camera operator in the television industry. That quickly evolved into a larger role, and I spent the next five years as one of the DOPs and Lead Editors for two TV shows.

I was in my element, living the dream, and the goal was to keep learning, improving, and eventually doing more significant things.

I studied cinematography and documentary filmmaking, analysed other people’s directing and creative approaches, and constantly thought of ways to expand my process. This is to say, I was obsessed and never had thoughts of doing anything different.

That eventually led to me starting a production company with a partner, with the goal of doing bigger-budget work. I remember how excited I was then and eager to see where things went.

A few weeks into trailer life.

After about two years, I decided to leave the company for a few reasons, but one of them was that I was starting to lose some of my excitement for production work. I never imagined that happening after being immersed in and passionate about video for the past ten years.

From there, I took a year off to travel without a set plan. It was very much a ‘figure it out’ mentality while on the road. My wife and I bought a truck and travel trailer and set off across Canada and the US.

After a few months of not touching a camera, I decided, on a whim, to buy a film camera and get back to shooting film purely for fun. This was a major creative refresh and brought back much of the energy I’d lacked.

It also led to me starting a YouTube channel while on the road, purely to share what I was learning as I began to work with film (again) and as a way to get creative with video after some time off. I never had any thoughts of it becoming more significant than what it was.

An image from the first roll through my Yashica Mat 124G in 2017

Unpredictability

The next few years were by far the most unpredictable and challenging I’ve had as a creative. After travelling, I had a feeling of ‘what’s next?’

The problem was that I didn’t have a clear answer to that question. For the first time ever, I felt a bit lost. Also, everyone was a year further along in their careers, and I started questioning if I had made a mistake in taking time off.

I decided to start a new production company by myself, mostly because I needed to make money, and that’s what I knew. I invested in gear again, got an office, and started picking up clients and doing work.

Over the next year, I created some work I enjoyed, but I never felt the same as I did in the early years.

A move to England followed shortly after, and I continued to work on my YouTube channel for fun. It grew steady but slowly. After four years, it finally reached a point where it seemed like it might be possible to do it as a full-time job—again, something I’d never intended.

Since then, the past three (almost) years have been a huge learning experience for me—figuring out how to make a living as a photographer in the YouTube world, which has been a complete change from a business standpoint from anything I’ve done in the past.

There have been lows, highs, and major periods of self-doubt, but I’m finally starting to feel like I have it figured out enough to keep going.

The way it goes.

I wanted to share this with you not to bore you with my personal story (I tried to condense it as much as possible) but rather to give a snapshot of what it’s been like for me as a reminder that the creative journey can be chaotic and unpredictable at times.

It’ll look different for everyone, and this isn’t to say that everyone goes through as many stages as I have, but things will change and often not be as imagined. And that’s not a bad thing.

I’ve seen (and personally experienced) people get stuck and not take action as they try to figure it all out beforehand.

Will this work?

Is this the right decision?

Will I like this?

Some things can be figured out beforehand, but for the most part, the answer comes from the doing. I try to remind myself of that often.

Like I said at the start, what I do today, running a YouTube channel full-time and working on long-term photo projects, is so far from where I started, but it feels so incredibly right.

Looking back, it seems like a very convoluted and strange process to get here, but I like to think that each step influenced the next, and if you removed even one, I’d be in a much different place.

My freelance operating led to me running a show, which led to me starting a production company. The eventual burnout led to a sabbatical. That time off led to a rediscovery of film photography, which led to me starting a YouTube channel for fun. The next few years of experimenting and trying to make a living helped me confirm that I didn’t want to get back into video full-time. Yet, the skills I learned were instrumental in helping me with my YouTube channel, and after doing it for a few years, it eventually grew to a point where it was viable as a full-time option.

The entire process often felt messy, but looking back now, all the dots connected and were meant to be.

So my advice, especially if you’re new to your craft, is to be attentive, intentional, and thoughtful but keep things loose.

Don’t worry if it doesn’t seem like it’s working or even if it’s not. And don’t worry if you don’t know exactly where you’re going and what’s next. You’ll get there eventually if you stick with it.

Things don’t happen in a straight line, but if you try and embrace it all, there’s a good chance you’ll eventually end up in a place that you could have never imagined.

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That’s it for this one. I hope you enjoyed it. Thanks for reading, and I’ll talk to you next week!