We recently connected with Cooper Knight and have shared our conversation below.

Cooper, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Do you wish you had waited to pursue your creative career or do you wish you had started sooner?

Simply put, I’ve been drawing for as long as I can remember and find creative arts therapeutic. The moment I figured out I could earn a living doing creative and performing arts, I was a freshman at Longmont’s Silver Creek High School. Starting sooner would have meant being able to sell art at my high school for a competitive price, while still keeping up my grades. Now, fair enough, my mind found it best to work on one thing at a time, but with a little dedication and practice, I might have been able to pull it off. That’s what would have changed about my experience. Looking back, I wish I had started a career in creative arts sooner because getting good grades and selling copies of my art would have given me that necessary head start.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

For those of you who are just starting to get to know me, I first got into the creative and fine arts industry as part of my college degree at the University of Colorado Denver. That university has degrees in art, animation, and film and TV production, and is also getting its toes wet in virtual production with Unreal Engine. Ergo, those of you who live in Colorado don’t have to go live in Los Angeles to get a college degree in film and tv production.

As you’ve probably seen, I provide services in social media marketing, creative writing, illustration, graphic design using Canvas and Affinity Photo, film editing using Davinci Resolve, basic sound design, storyboard art, and scriptwriting. Problems I solve for clients include grammar, continuity, transitions between movie scenes, critical thinking, and using heightened empathy to help clients work through hard things.

I’m most proud of helping Leaky Skylight Pictures raise funds for an upcoming half-hour short film. One of my clients, Breanne Nicole Wilson, talks about this short film on Instagram and Facebook.

Put this all together, and it’s clear why my friends and clients sometimes call me a Jack of All trades. You don’t see that often in creative and fine arts.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

In a perfect world, the middle class would use their numbers to encourage local, and national governments to make rich people pay a special tax. This tax would stand out from the crowd, simply because they go to a thriving creative ecosystem where you’re guaranteed to make money by making a movie, and/or a drawing.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative?

In my opinion, an audience of non-creatives has difficulty figuring out the notion of perseverance and using imaginative skills. Granted, these skills come naturally to me. But if you’re one of those people, write in a creative journal and handbook, and do this for an hour or two for thirty days. Who knows. Maybe you’ll exercise the creative half of the brain so much, that it can work with the mechanical half of your brain to make masterpieces.

Notice how I call it the mechanical half of the brain because that’s the half that encourages schedules and routines.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://cooperknight.wixsite.com/cooperkfilms
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cooperknight5175/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cooper.knight1
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cooper-k-9b614bb4/

Image Credits

I give Breanne Nicole Wilson credit for these pictures, and Ali Knight, as they sometimes have an eye for taking photos.