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

Lindsey, appreciate you joining us today. When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

Creating has always been deeply important to me, but I have always struggled to acknowledge that I myself am an artist. I have had many people throughout my life see me as a creative or say that I had an artist’s eye, but I have always had such a difficult time seeing and believing that for myself.

All I knew was that creating felt super necessary for me to survive as a human, but I never felt like anything that I made or captured was important enough to share with the world. Which was an extremely sad and dark reality to live in.

Ever since I was a kid, I have loved the simplicity of capturing people and moments that feel special and important to me, but it felt so terrifying to pursue this dream for myself. I think I had so much fear surrounding my pursuit of photography because it was the most important thing to me and so much a part of me that failing at it felt scarier than anything else. I also have always wanted people to feel and be moved when they saw my work.

It felt like it would destroy me if my art didn’t matter to people, so I decided to hide it from the world instead. While I thought I was avoiding experiencing hurt and disappointment by not sharing my art or even allowing myself to create, my protection still led to hurt and disappointment. It felt easy to keep pushing it off because I wasn’t where I wanted to be yet.

However, my best friend Maggie and mentors (& friends) Jesse and Ross have been steady support for me since the beginning. They are some of my biggest supporters and consistently inspire me, guide me and provide me with endless opportunities. Something that Maggie taught me early on that I remind myself of most days is that my work right now is genuine and honest to me as an artist currently and that is equally as important as me creating in 10 years from now. Jesse has taught me a lot about not only photography, but also life. Something that he really helped me realize for myself is that there is so much beauty in the process. We honestly spend the majority of our lives in process and getting the opportunity to always be learning and growing is really beautiful. And Ross has taken the time to guide and teach me so much about the beauty and creativity surrounding studio lighting and allowed me to be in spaces and on sets with him that have felt like a dream. I would not be where I am now had it not been for the many people who wholeheartedly believed in me and have consistently supported me along the way. I have grown so much as a photographer, videographer and visual artist because of it.

The beauty of art is that everyone perceives the world differently therefore, no one can ever create exactly what you’re creating in the exact same way as you. We all have different perspectives and ways in which we create art for the world and that is so special.

Lindsey, 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?

I am a photographer, videographer, and visual creative based out of Nashville, TN. I have always wanted to be a photographer ever since I was a little kid. Documenting life throughout my childhood quickly made me want to become a professional photographer. I bought my first “official” camera in high school, a Canon 70D, which at the time felt like one of my biggest accomplishments. I have been buying camera gear with every spare dollar even when I haven’t always been actively shooting photos.

I grew up in very academic environments where the arts were not valued as career paths. Most of my high school was applying to Ivy League schools for medical programs. Creative hobbies were encouraged to make you well rounded, but they were just that– “hobbies” and we needed to score 9-5 jobs with a 401k, job security, insurance and benefits to be “successful”.

Anyone that I knew who didn’t go to college or pursued a creative path would always be told that they were throwing their life away. So I loosely held onto my creative dreams and went to college. I was told I was too smart not to get a college degree, so I tried just about every major and graduated with 165 credits. No part of me felt like I fit into this specific academic box. I had been told that the day I graduated college would be one of the best days of my life, but I felt so apathetic and lost. I decided to live across seas and work with a refugee organization to give myself some more time, but even my college program pushed all of us to go to grad school to be “successful”.

I ended up following the graduate school path when I got back because at the time it felt like my only option, which quickly left me feeling depleted and discouraged. I was pouring myself into being “successful” to the standards that I had grown up surrounded by and realized that nothing that I was pursuing with my life was actually what I had ever genuinely wanted for myself and it was sucking the life out of me.

If I went back to when I was a kid and the dream that I had always had was to become a photographer. I think it helped that I was being crushed from every side of life because it made me want to do something more meaningful with my life and not get to the end of my life full of regret. I realized that I would much rather spend my whole entire life happy and trying everything to pursue my dream and fail than never know and live with so many questions and regret.

Ever since deciding that for myself, I have put all of my extra time into learning photography and videography. My friend Maggie encouraged me to learn videography and it has become such a huge passion. My friend Hannah (artist name Zeta Rae) trusted me to shoot a music video about a year ago and I have been slowly growing and getting better at videography. I just got off of a tour that I was mainly doing video work for with an artist named Teddy at Night. I am about 2 years out since really trying to pursue this all career wise. I’ve grown a lot and cannot wait for the day I can fully pay my bills with photography & videography, but I also think there is so much beauty in each part of our journeys. Shooting studio style shoots out of my apartment without insane gear is one of my favorite ways to challenge myself because you don’t need the best gear to create genuine and worthwhile art with people. Obviously, I love cameras a lot and want to have most any camera and gear on this planet, but I think you grow so much as a creative when you do have limitations because you learn how to use everything to its full capacity.

There are a couple of photographers in town that let me assist them on shoots and mentor me and that has been a game changer because I have been able to learn about bigger studio setups from watching and assisting on various sets. I also follow some incredible photographers on social media who consistently inspire me.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

When I first moved to Nashville, I fell into a pretty deep depression. My days felt very aimless and dark. Nothing that I was doing with my life was what I actually wanted to be doing. I was in the midst of a graduate school program and working a service industry job, but I ended up meeting one of my very best friends at a Starbucks in Nashville. She just so happened to be a phenomenally talented musician and one day when we were sitting outside on our breaks. She could tell how sad I was and asked me what I enjoyed about life, which felt like a pretty tough question at the time. I ended up mentioning photography even though I hadn’t touched my camera in years. And she asked me if I’d ever want to shoot a show for her. I nervously agreed, but felt confused because she had never seen my photos and had no clue if I was good.

A couple weeks later, we went skateboarding and I ended up breaking my wrist and it altered everything. It gave me time to take a step back and reflect on my life and come to terms with how unhappy I was. Once my arm had healed I ended up shooting a show on 08/20/2022 in Atlanta for my friend. This was the first show that I ever shot for anyone.

She had told me that I could shoot this show if I wanted to, so I brought my camera just in case I got the courage to shoot, but I honestly didn’t know if I could do it because I was so terrified to fail and hadn’t taken pictures in years. I ended up standing in one spot for the entirety of the show, but I ended up getting some pretty special shots and wanted to do it again even though it felt terrifying.

I don’t know why I hadn’t ever thought about how my love for photography, people, and music could all go hand in hand. This felt like a dream that was beyond my wildest dreams for photography and it was only the beginning. Maggie ended up getting a tour offer for the fall of that year and brought me with her, which is crazy to think about now because I had only ever shot four shows before we hit the road. This tour propelled my career and helped me grow so quickly. Maggie believed in me from the beginning and is a huge reason why I was able to find the courage within myself to do all of this. She has given me opportunity after opportunity. I couldn’t tell you how many shows I have shot at this point, but I am beyond grateful to get to work with human beings like her. I think sometimes in life you need people to recognize things in you before you can see those same things for yourself.

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

I think just getting to do what I love with really incredible people who inspire me. I am surrounded by some very talented people that I not only get to be friends with, but also get to create with. One of my best friends is similar to me in having a lot of fear associated with creating and sharing art with the world, but she continuously encourages & inspires me to be courageous and have twenty seconds of insane courage over and over again. It’s also special because I feel like we are both getting to become the full embodiment of ourselves as creatives and artists alongside each other, but in our different crafts.

I also love getting to see my growth over time and getting opportunities with people in really organic ways. I will always cherish milestones like my first tour, first festival, first music video, etc. but honestly every bit of this all feels rewarding to me.

Obviously, there are growing pains, insecurity, and fear and I don’t know if those things will ever fully go away, but my love and need for this far outweigh any of the challenging parts and it is all part of the bigger story being weaved together over time.

I want to document life, so that people are moved whether that is in the form of video or photo. I am still growing in my style and really trying to grow with videography and studio portraiture. Both video and studio work feel like a challenge because you have so many aspects that you can control whereas when you’re shooting in a setting where you are adapting to the light around you then there is less flexibility. There is beauty and importance in all kinds, but it has been fun to push myself creatively in new ways.

I am so glad that I gave myself the courage and freedom to create again. My dream has been better than I ever could have imagined or dreamt for myself. It has taken a lot of encouragement and love from my friends and mentors. People are the most important part when it comes not only the art but also the journey.

There are certain people that help me see things for myself that would otherwise take me years and years to believe in myself. Sometimes we need others to hold onto the truth until we can see it for ourselves.

Although it took me a long time to pursue a lifelong dream of mine, I am thankful that I am now. Art will always be something that is spiritual and cathartic for humans. Which is why I desire for others to be able to deeply connect and feel moved by what I create.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://lindsfilm.my.canva.site
• Instagram: @LINDSFILM.JPEG

Image Credits
Photo of me was taken by Jesse Paul The rest of the the images were all taken by me