A great film maker once told me that the “biggest challenge a film maker faces is creating the film they want with the resources they don’t have.”

This is the biggest asset I can bring to a film production. As a producer and a cinematographer, I love finding creative ways to make lower budget films look elegant and sophisticated and working within constraints, to achieve the best possible outcome. To me, that is the thrill of film making.

I have a bachelor in Screen Production, at AFTRS, where I was trained as a generalist. All the disciplines fed into each other.  My cinematography classes taught me the technical skills I needed to work with cameras and lights, my screen business classes taught me how to market my talents, and find my audience and so on. Here, I figured out how the proverbial film making machines ran. AFTRS provided an amazing base knowledge for what was to happen next.

I was in Mumbai when I truly found my love for cinematography and for the thrifty art of film making. I was thrown into the unfamiliar world of Bollywood,  where the chaos of the film industry was amplified by the divine unpredictability of India. Working with budgets in the millions and with enormous stars, the stakes were high, but I learned that even with all the pre-production in the world, challenges will always arise. I worked around the set, from clapper loading and lighting assistant jobs, to filling in for a second AD when he injured himself on set. What amazed and inspired me the most, was that while it seemed they spared no expense (with actors being thrown through breakaway walls or falling off balconies attached to harnesses) there were moments where they had to come up with on the spot solutions to save money and time on the production. I saw people covering themselves in garbage bags to avoid reflections and iPhone torches being used when they just needed a glimpse of catch light in a subjects eyes. I loved it.

Coming back to Australia, I held this to heart and I’ve made it my mission to not only work with constraints, but to make the unfeasible feasible. Even through the COVID lock down, I’ve worked within the constraints of my bedroom, to create a film that has seen international success, selected as a showreel piece for the isolation film festival. And more recently, I took home another award for a podcast that I recorded in my wardrobe. After all, for me, creativity is born from constraints.

Mid way through the pandemic, I found a role, as one of the two camera operators working for at Prime7 in Canberra. Working in the 24 hour news cycle during the pandemic was hugely character building. But I’ve left that life behind now to continue my career in Sydney – now working in a corporate space. Some of my clients include Cisco, Pfizer, Lenovo, Kia and Wattyl.