We recently connected with Chance Johnson and have shared our conversation below.

Chance, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

I think whats been most helpful for me is learning by listening and practicing, intentionally and openly. I was pretty deliberate about collecting technical information. Understanding how a camera works and how to measure light, how to understand a scene/conversation. I try to only let it accentuate things though. It’s been helpful to avoid letting numbers or terminology or rules distract me from the feelings/thoughts. What I’m really looking for is for those things to help me figure out emotions and thoughts that feel more important.

Artists who affect me emotionally and intellectually have said some of the most insightful things I’ve ever heard during moments that felt very calm and candid. I’m often in my own head, mostly in an investigative way.

Situations and people are interesting, and I try to investigate the process of telling a story in a similar way. It feels conversational, technical decisions stem from curiosity, if nothing else, and I react to that emotion with questions. It always seems to lead somewhere, no matter the medium. I tend to tinker a solid amount.
I’ve spent alot of time lighting and filming with Ezekiel, and use whatever I can to make an image if something makes my brain light up. It’s my phone more often than not. I try to look at things with my eyes before I move a camera in between myself and whatevers happening on the other side, or without photographing at all. I wanna understand what’s going on. What the light is doing in that moment, how a person is moving or what it is they’ve said and how they’ve said it. Why and how is important to me.

I think addressing my own fears more proactively could’ve sped up the learning process. I try to learn as much as I can when I’m on a set, or actively writing, or doing anything, but when I’m doing nothing it’s all in my head. The thoughts could be productive for me, but they’re confined until I do something with them. I think that’s the biggest obstacle I’ve faced as well, though I’ve also worked with people who have made it difficult to create with more openness and intention. But I notice those things seem to transcend the medium/moment.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I was interested in reading and writing before anything else. I remember being 4 and being misgendered for the first time. I remember being 4 and seeing people say things that seemed calming, passive aggressive, hopeful, angry, surprising. I had no idea what reading and writing was yet, but I listened alot. I watched films and listened to music alone a solid amount around that time. It felt close to listening to conversations or seeing people do things in real life, but also different. Some films and songs felt closer than others. Once I got to elementary school I started to spend time writing stories for the days where we’d share with the class, and would read/exchange books with friends.

I didn’t see film as a thing that I could actually do until highschool. I had seen a reaaally early film that Zeke made. We went to the same highschool. As the years went by and senior year came I’d seen more of his film and honestly just gushed my ass off to him. I’d never seen a black person my age making films everrrr, and not in the way that he did. It felt elsewhere and close at the same time and I was interested in figuring that out.

We went to the same college for a year before I left, but I got really close to him and some of the other Filmmakers he was close to. I hadn’t majored in film (I majored in playwriting and screenwriting after switching from literature prior to the semester starting) but enough people, professors included, welcomed me to sit in some classes and work on set. I wanted to create as a cinematographer primarily. I still tend to feel that way. Communicating with images feels close to writing, but instead of saying someone said or did something, I can show someone how/why, and interpret the feeling of those things with movement n all. I feel very connected to that.

I worked with Zeke and learned enough to be able to shoot his last 2 thesis films during his time in college, and through working with him I met more people who were interested in bringing me onto their projects as a cinematographer. I think that’s continued, the cycle of meeting people through people and developing a friendship that we indulge in through filmmaking. I don’t think it’s been any different with anything I’ve done creatively. I like to feel close to the people and material I’m working with. I don’t think I could do without that.

Zeke and I are apart of a oddbatcollective, and we try to use that as a means to connect with people and create through openness, effort, and understanding. I like to feel the sentiments/observations of a person in a piece, and if I’m there to help create it, I like to bring that out and give my own feelings and thoughts to it. Whether it’s as a cinematographer, a writer or director or photographer etc. I just want to figure out what should be said, and why/how it can be said in a way that makes the most sense. I like for it to take as much of whatever it needs to effectively tell the story. So along with technique and emotions there may be lots of technical decision-making, but I love thoroughness when it makes sense, so whatevers needed is what I like to be capable of giving. I want to learn as much as possible so that I may offer that as much as possible.

Thinking back to my own experiences, it’s of particular interest to me to communicate to people around my age. I’m 22, and though I feel comfortable with talking to just about anyone, I want to show more people who aren’t accustomed to having certain privileges, due to how them and their ancestors look/exist, or who simply don’t know, that theres more to know, and that they’re capable of figuring those things out alone and together.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

I think spreading awareness is important, but there should also be an awareness of how to use that awareness.

I think we tend to learn things and forget that we’re still human, that our own egos or fear or even a desire for happiness can make us forget that we should still try to understand and value eachother without the condescension. I think teaching eachother how to ingest needs to be noted. There’s alot of untapped potential within the different media that allows us to interact so quickly and effortlessly. In some places that potential is acknowledged and strides are happening, but we need more.

So maybe that could exist within more programs, but it can’t be about the program anymore than it should be about the experiences the programs are helping create. So maybe less symbolism, or less symbolism at the expense of thoroughness could be helpful as well.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

Making friends is rewarding. Not necessarily the kind of friend who I can always agree with or who makes me feel comfortable all the time, though i understand the comfort of that.

Ezekiel is my closest friend and I think we bode as well as we do because we don’t always agree, and regardless of whether we do or don’t, we always ask questions. We want to understand where we’re coming from and what that becomes when it’s pushed outward. He’s helped me become more proactive by understanding that I have to ultimately make the decisions to do things on my own, and we try to maintain that understanding and openness. I’m not into settling unless something is actually figured out. I can feel when there’s more and if I ever fail to notice I have someone who likely will, and that is reciprocated. I want more of that all the time for myself and others; to just spread awareness and consideration as much as possible. That’s what friendship feels like at its best for me. It feels lovely.

Contact Info:

• Website: Oddbatcollective.com
• Instagram: @folc.j

Image Credits
Dante Crichlow, Mariel Cipriaso, Ezekiel Clare, Chance Johnson