We recently connected with J.B. Yaskovich and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, J.B. thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

Everything I know has come from doing it, doing it wrong, or discovering alternate ways of doing it. And that’s for everything–especially filming, editing, and constructing sets, props, and D.I.Y. equipment needed for the shoot. I have found you can study as much as you want, you can watch movies or how-to’s or what have you, but because every situation is unique–even if it’s slightly different–you’re always going to get a different outcome. There are so many variables at play that it’s both daunting and exciting all at the same time to see what your film will actually end up being. The camera and its settings, the lens, the performance of your actors and visuals, your lights, the weather, your sound, your own capabilities, and even your own headspace and thinking–literally everything is at play constantly that even if it’s a familiar story or situation, it will still be unique. So knowing how to capture, convey, or present an idea is all really about knowing how to navigate the situation you are presented with, and that is true from whether it’s just you with a camera or you with a million dollars and 50 crew members. So with that said, the only way I can possibly answer “what could have sped all that up” is just by doing it more, just pumping out more ideas and projects, even if you’re not totally in control over it..

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

The way I got into filmmaking seems to be a story I think isn’t unfamiliar with most people my age. Being part of the Youtube boom, you grew up naturally already loving movies, and watching creators on YouTube or Newgrounds, and you slowly realized they’re all really one in the same. I remember it had to be some time in the early 2000s my cousin Tommy had gotten a simple early digital camera for Christmas. He had created a pseudo Brick film with his Legos called “The Island” that I was absolutely infatuated with, so much so that at school I had written a fan script as a sequel. Later we would make our own films, learning rudimentary ways of creating effects that we had thought no one else had ever thought of, only to realize they are the simple basics of filmmaking. Something I find fascinating watching my or other people’s first films is that we kind of experience those first few years of the history of film in our own careers, making imaginative stories with what we have onhand, making ripoffs or parodies of other famous work, or simply capturing the simple essence of life. Then from there I would get my own cameras and do my own, making Lego films, music videos to my own music, visual experiments, and so forth. I had really enjoyed it as a hobby because it had combined everything that I love: music, photography, animation, building things, and overall entertaining my friends and family. As I went on, I would try and make my stuff look and flow like that of the movies I was inspired by and get that “real” feel to them. But it wasn’t until I was in my health class of my second freshman year of high school. We were tasked with picking a drug to do a presentation. The drugs were all on cards, flipped over and in different colors. My friend Brittany naturally grabbed the green one thinking, it would be marjuana but instead was LSD, which we both had thought “even better”. I had convinced my teacher to let us do a video instead of a presentation, and being permitted, we used my friend’s DSLR camera which for the first time allowed me to play with depth of focus and interchangeable lenses, which changed my game forever. The topic allowed me to be creative and mess with some simple ideas of surrealism. Naturally thinking the video would get me in trouble, seeing how I had used projects like this before just as an excuse to film something, I was instead shocked when we received a standing ovation from both my teacher and class. It was then and there I knew it was something I wanted to do for the rest of my life. No matter what, I had finally received the validation that I was an artist that I had been looking for my entire life. The following years would prove to be some of my most tasking and important parts of my filmmaking career. I went to the Carroll County and Career Tech Center where I would be encouraged even more by my teacher and dear friend Tony Hooper. There I competed in SkillsUSA where I would place first in the Regionals, first in State, and ninth in Nationals. I would go from there to the now defunct Art Institute of Pittsburgh, but it really wasn’t until I left college and came home did my career really start. I began to work with local bands and musicians creating performance videos and music videos in the Westminster, Maryland area. From there I would arguably do the same thing I’m doing now: making films as a passion and doing gig work for money for said passion. In recent years this has created the opportunity to form a company, “Potential Strangers, LLC” with two colleagues of mine who I met due to the Tech Center, Brooks Vernon and Jenna Cipolloni. We are now currently working on a horror anthology based on Maryland folklore that we’ve been able to fund with art grants and gig work we’ve done in the area. The only things that have really changed in my career are that there’s more people, more money, more eyes on what we’re making, more responsibility, more friends, and more memories. Which comes with really anything you do, so in short, we’ve only become more successful.

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

I can really only answer this by quoting other people and phrases. I do what I do and struggle doing so because I wouldn’t want to suffer any other way. I think of the phrase “a bad day fishing is better than a good day at the office.” (But ironically, I love fishing.) I think of the scene from the film “Ed Wood” by Tim Burton where Ed Wood (played by Johnny Depp) storms off a set after having conflicts with the producers and ends up meeting Orson Welles at a bar, and though they come from very different backgrounds in making films they share the same problems. Orson tells Woods, “Visions are worth fighting for; don’t spend your life making other people’s dreams.” I think of the Bob Dylan lyric from “Buckets of Rain,” “Life is sad, life is a bust, all you can do is do what you must, you do what you must do and you do it well.”

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

It has to be making something. As simplistic as it sounds, the feeling of creating something of my own, creating some kind of window or way to perceive the mythology of my life or my thoughts or dreams, there’s nothing more satisfying than that.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.potentialstrangers.com
• Instagram: JBYaskovich
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@JBYaskovich

Image Credits
Jenna Lee Cipolloni for photo cred on all 8 photos