We were lucky to catch up with Austen Paul recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Austen thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

This company is a start up that might change the world, they invented a device that allows firefighters to see through smoke in burning buildings and maps and outlines their surroundings. I have a great working relationship with the owner because when I first started out and wanted to become a filmmaker he hired me to help edit a documentary of him and his crew diving into active volcanoes. At the time I had no business being apart of his post production team but he saw something in me. Over the next few years we worked on different projects together and told me about the launching of this new device. I helped film a few different marketing videos for them. Any start up no matter how great the idea is can face major obstacles and their company was no different, at a key point in their business the owner came to me and said they were running out of funding and pretty much had one last chance to pitch to a fire district to be the first in the world to fully commit to buying the product and slowly turning the large ship that is the fire fighting community.

He asked if I could take all the footage that I shot for them and create one short marketing video for their meeting as it needed to be visual to help convince the board of directors. After grinding and re editing for about a week I delivered him the final video, he was super gracious and I didn’t think much of it as Im always happy to help out a friend especially when they are chasing their dreams. A few months went by and I was busy at work yet again and I get a long message from the owner stating that the meeting went through and they have officially been picked up to sell their product because of the help of my video. Its moments like this that make me extremely happy because along the way working on mutiple projects I met a lot of the team behind the product and with the product being picked up they would all keep their jobs and be able to keep chasing their passion and dream of making their product a reality. And who knows one day that device will be put into use and will help save someones life.

Things like this make me wonder how many little decisions in all of our lives affect big outcomes, all the small tiny moments that have to happen to lead to this.

Austen, 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?

Since I was young I have been into filmmaking, making at-home movies with friends and family. As I got older I was told it was impossible to succeed in the film industry unless you knew people or had connections. So I went to college thinking that my dream of filmmaking wasn’t possible.

After college, I landed a job on a small budget feature film as a PA (Production assistant) From there I learned a lot on set and was bumped up to a production manager. I realized then no matter how well I did on these films I would never be a director or a creative on the current path I was heading.

So after the film finished I sold all of my valuables and bought my first camera. I had no clue on how to use it but started to film everything I could of my Hometown Santa Cruz Ca. For two months I would wake up at sunrise and film to sunset all the beautiful locations of my town.

I published the video on youtube and shared it on Facebook, within a day everyone in the city had shared the video and slowly climbed to 60,000 views on youtube. At that moment I thought I had made it and it would be easy cruising from there.

Different companies and people would reach out to me and offer me jobs but nothing ever came to fruition. It wasn’t until a year later that I landed my first paid gig. At that time I realized that a lot of people loved my first video “Welcome to Santa Cruz” That I could use that to leverage really awesome experiences and build my portfolio.

A near-death accident that I experienced when I was in 6th grade made me realize that I wanted to live my life to the fullest and I created a bucket list with all of the dreams and adventures. I started to reach out to companies that offered different adventure experiences and offered to film content for them in trade for the experiences.

This process led me to film and experience amazing adventures all over the world. From Filming eagle hunter in the Kazach mountains, hot air ballooning in Napa, Formula racing in laguna seca, riding motorcycles across Ireland, Rally racing in Washington, Ice climbing in Iceland, flying Gravity Industries Jet Suit in England. While creating these trades opened up the doors to a bunch of paid offers. Which built my career.

Fast forward a year later and in a different country each month of was getting burnt out from traveling on planes all the time. I would see these beautiful airport ads of perfumes and thought to myself why not do something like that? So I started teaching myself how to create product videos. After a few months of training myself, I decided to make a tutorial and teach others how to make videos like myself and posted it on youtube.

Two months later covid happened and everything locked down and my at-home tutorials of how to make product videos started to catch a lot of attention. A bunch of companies started reaching out wanting to work with me and from there I just kept creating and growing.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

I want to be the best filmmaker and content creator that I can possibly be and along the way help as many people achieve their dreams of becoming a filmmaker as well. I believe if you help others in your field become successful your raise the entire bar and standard for the industry.

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

When newer filmmakers reachout to me and say because of you and your tutorials I have a career and an making money at my dream job.

That to me is beyond amazing because Im truly excited to see that positive effect spread and grow in my industry and what those creators come up with.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.austenpaul.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/austen_paul/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/AustenPaul
• Other: My product video course where you can learn to create videos just like me: https://www.productvideocourse.com/

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