It was spring of 2002. I was acting and working on a play entitled Words Words Words in Orange, Ca. A friend of mine had been trying to introduce me to his buddy, director / director of photography, Derek Dale, for quiet sometime. I was eager to meet him as he had worked on many of my favorite music videos (Mxpx, Strung Out, AFI, Etc etc). Derek came to the play to see his friend perform. After the show we were introduced, and very quickly began talking film. I gave him my email and land line (Cell calls were expensive back then. A week later he called me and asked me if I wanted to be the star of a Halo Friendlies music video, I of course said yes. My dreams had come true, I was the lead in a music video for band on my favorite record label, Tooth & Nail (A label I loved in High School and still do). I worked the set, doing a little bit of everything. After that shoot, I worked on everyone of Derek’s music videos. He even worked as director of photography on several of my projects at Chapman.
Over the course of the next year I had started a band called, Wiggum. We had decided that since I had access to lighting, a camera, and an amazing location that we could film in. Derek was behind the camera, I was in front of the camera as well as behind the camera. We were making a video. I am proud of the video we made, it was a lot of fun, and in some ways smoother than anything else I have ever done. We got to create something fun. I had never edited a music video and really had no clue what to do, but I did it anyway. I got very busy with school over the course of the next year, but managed to create another music video for Wiggum.
Derek and producer Ray Blanco had started, Generator, a music video production company. They asked me join their roster of directors, and of course I said yes. My first video with them was for Emery. So, there I was, directing my first professional music video for another Tooth & Nail artist. We spent two days filming the music video at Chain Reaction in Anaheim, it was a mixture of live performance and staged performance. The video premiered on MTV and played inside every single Target Store in America (I thought I had made it). Little did I know, this meant almost nothing. I spent the next 3 years working on and off and focusing my energy on a concert venue I was promoting. It was not until 2007, three years later, that I directed my next music video.
This career is tough, but it’s alot of fun.