We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Antone Nixon. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Antone below.

Alright, Antone thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s jump right into how you came up with the idea?

What started from daily walks and runs with my dog each morning on the beach, right at the sunrise, it then became “my thing”. For starters, my day doesn’t start without my dog needing her morning walks so she is the true creator behind “VB Sunrise”. I remember my friends would always laugh at my morning running videos every day and some thought I was crazy, but I felt something was right about it. I could feel the greatness each day. Each day it brought a new reaction or some sign of joy to others so I just kept pushing and pushing, eventually it went from my personal Instagram to me then creating one for my dog. I noticed a few hundred people actually started following it so that was a positive sign. Then I started to focus more and more on the sun rising, opposed to me running with the dog at the same time and BAM, I had a video reach over 500k views and a few thousand people followed my page, that’s when I new something was right. I kept IG going and never gave up. Now it has over 30k organic followers a few years later and it continues to grow.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

The first thing I always want to share about myself is that I am a dad first and everything else falls into place after that. My son Maddox is my right hand man and my best friend. For starters, I specialize in daily sunrise content for the city of Virginia Beach and sometimes capture sunsets, major events or maybe even content for a commercial or music video. I became FAA part 107 certified so I can legally monetize my drone work and also follow the rules as we live in a city with tons of airspace restrictions.

As a local living in Virginia Beach, we are a huge military city so people come and go and create tons of memories here. With that being said, my video’s and content fill that void for the people that no longer live here or maybe they just don’t feel like waking up to catch the sunrise because it is so early in the morning! I also know others may have other obligations that prevent them from being able to capture the sunrise so I have them covered and capture it for them.

I always tell people, what started as a hobby truly turned into a business for me but my love for doing this only gets stronger and stronger. There has never been a single day i don’t feel like capturing content. it even allowed me to create merchandise that people wear around the city. It’s always a GREAT feeling when i am out and about and i see someone wearing a VB Sunrise hoodie, it truly warms my heart and brings me pure joy.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

Consistency. Day after day, year after year, I continue to push myself no matter what and people always know they can count on my content every single day. Consistency is key in life with everything you do, its like taking a shower each day. I know people often times start a project, a social media page and then just a few weeks or a few months later, its done, they gave up. The mindset and vision they had didn’t instantly blow up so they just stopped. Not everything is an overnight success story so not staying consistent and keeping that same drive and energy will fail you every time. Never give up. You are never going to please everyone so don’t allow the critics to pull you down. I remember it felt like no one watched my content and I didn’t care, I knew deep down it would grow into what it is today.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

The joy and feedback I receive on a daily basis. It’s always amazing to hear what my photos and videos can do for others. Its their daily dose of medicine and knowing that i can bring that joy to them, makes me continue to keep it going. Their feedback pushes me so much.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://vbsunrise.smugmug.com
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/vb_sunrise_
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/VBsunrise757
• Twitter: https://x.com/vb_sunrise
• Other: vbsunrise.com; vbsunrise.myshopify.com

Image Credits

Steven Griffin
Griffinimagery.com
IG: griffinimagery