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

Corey, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.

After attending and graduating The Los Angeles Film School from 2015 to 2019 I knew I wanted to take Videography and Filmmaking as my professional career. I started applying for work right after graduating and finally landed my first full time job in LA in 2019 as a Videographer/Photographer for a women’s athletic brand which then led me to working for The Academy (AKA The Oscars) as a Media Production Coordinator and now my fulltime job as a Videographer/Photographer for a giant E-Commerce company. I am definitely thankful for all the work and jobs I’ve been able to attain.

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.

Growing up as a child, I always had my dads old school camcorder in my hand and filming anything and everything I could in which today we now call it vlogging. I’d film my family outings, stop motion videos with cars and myself singing and dancing as a child. Eventually growing up, there camera was no longer a thing for me and totally forgot about it. Fast forward to finishing high school in 2006, I eventually picked up my first DSLR camera which was also able to film 720p videos. From that point, I pretty much taught myself how to shoot videos and use editing software since there wasn’t much on YouTube during that time.

During this time, I would shoot short films featuring myself awhile using Adobe After Effects to add some flavor to my shorts. Music has always been in my blood and eventually I wanted to use that love for music but make visuals, so I reached out to local artists in my city and hometown of Seattle to offer music video services. I knew I wanted to take Filmmaking and Videography seriously so I eventually in 2013, I enrolled The Art Institute Of Seattle in Digital Filmmaking. During my time going to film school, I was shooting various music videos with artists in the Seattle area and also had my try and photography. Photography was something I did not intend to get into but since I already had a camera in my hand, I figured why not?

After using family and friends I decided to start offering free photoshoots to people in Seattle and probably had shot with nearly 150+ people doing so. This got my name around the city of Seattle and eventually built a good list of clientele with even more people inquiring about my services. In 2015 I decided The Art Institute was not for me and found out about The Los Angeles Film School based her in LA in the heart of Hollywood. My four years there, I still was grinding it out shooting music videos and photography and started networking with people in the Los Angeles area as I was planning my move here. In 2019, I finally graduated from Film School and made my move out here to LA as I landed my first Videography job in the industry. My four years being here in LA, I’ve networked with so many talented artists that have also pushed me in my craft of Filmmaking and Photography and so excited to see what’s next for me in the future.

One thing I’m definitely proud of are the people that believe and have trust in my work. Without those people, I feel like I would not be where I’m at right now with my artistry in Filmmaking and Photography. It’s been a long road with trial and errors but I feel we are all still students and I’m always learning something new that I can add to my arsenal of knowledge.

I think it’s also great for other artists to share how they’ve become successful which is why me and John started our Podcast called “The Artistry Drop” where we bring on various upcoming artists that share their stories and how they got to where they are. So far we’ve had many amazing guests such as Andreao “Fanatic” Heard who has produced for many of the amazing artists we know today from Michael Jackson to The Notorious B.I.G. and many more. We’ve also had American Idol contestants William Casanova & Dennis Lorenzo, Music Video Director Matt Alonzo who’s directed music videos for Lil’ Wayne, Chris Brown, The Game & Justin Bieber.

Me and John are definitely both very appreciative for these amazing artists to come on our Podcast and drop some knowledge for the upcoming generation of artists but also at the same time, it inspires both me and John because we hear about all the trials and tribulations people go through but still end up pushing through to gain success.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

When I discovered Instagram in 2013, I had no idea what it was or even how to work it. I would post random photos here and there and would get very little engagement. I continued doing that for awhile and eventually got to know Instagram and how to work within it. When I started shooting music videos, majority of my content was going strictly on YouTube but at that moment, I decided to upload that content on to Instagram and that’s where my love for social media began.

I continued to upload music video content on to my Instagram and was slowly building a following but at a slow rate (I don’t think video content was popular at that time on Instagram). Obviously, Instagram was known more as a photo platform and thankfully I decided to take up Photography after some of the artists I was shooting music videos for moved to different states.

After uploading portraits to Instagram, I immediately starting seeing growth and engagement which made me push my self harder to shoot more portraits and understand Photography. I felt the need I wanted to grow on Instagram and tried looking up helpful tips on growing an Instagram page on YouTube. One tip I came across was the “Follow for follow” method where you follow a bunch of people and hope they follow you back. I saw a lot of success with this method and that’s how I gained a majority of my following. Now a days, I don’t see this method working anymore and have abandoned it years ago, now I just believe in consistency. Consistency is important and coming up with a niche for your page is something that will help catch eyes and possibly lead to a follow.

For YouTube, my one recommendation is coming up with a niche and what content you wanna provide and staying consistent. I remember filming more vlog content for YouTube and my subscribers would slowly grow but the one thing I found success in was tutorials. I wanted to help people out that weren’t familiar with videography and photography so I decided that was my niche. Eventually after staying consistent, I was seeing great growth on YouTube. So for those looking to grow a channel in 2024, find your niche, and upload, upload, upload!

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

I think the one most rewarding aspect of being an artist or creative is you’re able to express yourself through your own art and inspire others to do so. There’s been multiple times people have messaged me and told me how much my work is an inspiration to them and have helped them pursue their career in videography/photography. I think it’s rewarding just knowing my work or YouTube video’s help and inspire others.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/corey.saldana/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/coreysaldana
• Other: TikTok: corey.saldana

Image Credits
Antonio Breez – Gang Gang (Visualizer) Andre Jay – The Come Down Antonio Breez – Cigarette Antonio Breez – Ride Annie Nancy Rachelle Cheyenne