We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Alan Ingalls a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alan, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s talk legacy – what sort of legacy do you hope to build?

My legacy is my marriage, my children, and my portfolio. My hope is that the husband I am to my amazing wife will be a sound example of what a husband could and should be, what teamwork and a healthy relationship looks like and what unwavering love can accomplish. I hope the parents my wife and I are inspire confidence, work ethic, and empathy in our children and that the foundation we’ve laid for our children provides them a solid base on which to begin building their own legacy. And I hope the portfolio of work I’ve had a hand in creating inspires others to create their own art, tell their own stories, and continue exploring the cultural importance and impact of art and storytelling. I hope I am remembered for creating art that made people feel something.

Alan, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My name is R. Alan Ingalls. I’m a filmmaker and photographer with a deep passion for music, macchiatos, and just about anything with a motor. I own and operate The Attention Company, a video production company officially established in 2020 (I did freelance work for over a decade before that) and headquartered in Newbern, Tennessee where my nights and weekends typically consist of filming and editing short films, music videos, and other commercial video projects. By day, I’m part of the media team that produces marketing videos and product photography for Rough Country, an industry leading manufacturer and distributor of automotive accessories that enable and enhance off-road adventures.

Since I joined the marketing team at Rough Country in 2015, my entire income (day job and side hustle) has come from making art. Something I never dreamed could be my reality when I was a kid making “movies” with the other kids in my neighborhood using my grandmothers massive VHS camcorder or taking pictures of flowers with my 1-megapixel point-and-shoot camera. But here I am. With decades of experience and having produced a portfolio of work I’m proud of… a portfolio of work that has made people laugh, cry, headband, spend their money, and run out of the room screaming (sorry kiddos). I play with camera gear like kids play with toys. I never lost that childlike curiosity. The toys just got more complex and expensive.

What else should we know about how you took your side hustle and scaled it up into what it is today?

I’ve been drawn to art my entire life. From music, graphic design, photography and filmmaking to cars, coffee, consumer electronics, and food. No matter the form, good art makes people feel something. It moves people. And I developed an appreciation for art at an early age. As I got older, I developed an understanding of how important art is to the human experience.

However, I also witnessed several artists in my family fail to achieve whatever definition of “making it” they had so I took a safer approach when it came to my career and got a degree in computer science. My career in Information Technology had many highlights: managing the technical aspect of opening new retail locations across the United States for Kirkland’s Home, building an Internet Service Provider to serve rural West Tennessee communities with high speed Internet Access, and building emergency call taking phone systems for 911 dispatch centers across West Tennessee. And I hated it all.

I was not passionate about IT. I was passionate about creating art… so when I was’t at work, I was editing video, designing logos, experimenting with photography, or tinkering with my website which housed a portfolio of my creative projects.

In late 2014, this portfolio caught the eye of a Marketing Director looking to fill a role on Rough Country’s marketing team and on January 2, 2015 I began my journey as a full time filmmaker making marketing videos for Rough Country’s website and YouTube channel. I had gone from watching YouTube videos about cameras and modified vehicles to using a camera to make YouTube videos about modified vehicles. By educating myself, working hard, and putting content out into the world to be discovered, I made my own luck.

Now, in addition to my day job at Rough Country, I own and operate my own video production company where I primarily film and edit music videos and short films. My side hustle became my day job, but I still side hustle too! My work at Rough Country pays the bills and is still fun and fulfilling. And my continued side hustle is a creative outlet with more freedom to experiment than the more structured projects I work on at Rough Country. I continue to grown and learn more about filmmaking and photographer doing both and maybe one day all that education and growth will continue to lead me to experiences and opportunities beyond what it already has. Here’s hoping.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

Making art can be a lonely experience. I’m very grateful the work I produce isn’t. Most of the art I create is a collaboration between myself and the subject. By the very nature of the collaborative projects I produce, not only am I not lonely, but I’ve actually built bonds with the people I regularly collaborate with. From collaborating with musicians to produce music videos, photography, and cover art design that helps promote that artists’ music to collaborating with writers, directors, and actors to produce narrative short films that highlight the talent and skills of everyone involved, I use my talent and skills to (often literately) shine a light on other artists. I make art to help promote other people’s art.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.ralaningalls.com
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/ralaningalls/
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/ralaningalls
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ralaningalls
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@ralaningalls