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

Serge, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?

There was a point in my life many years ago where I was making a move to Los Angeles and this event crossed over with my rapidly growing dislike for employment. Management at my last employment job were reasonable but there was no potential growth and when I started to notice that my solutions for executive decisions would be more practical, would save time and effort I thought it’s time to call it a day. On top of that the industry I was in did not interest me. When it came to the point of me booking a ticket to Los Angeles I told myself I’ll do whatever I can in my power to make sure I would never work for anyone else other than myself from now on. I vaguely knew what I was getting myself in to and largely had no idea what king of effort it would take. But I had my tenacity and hunger for whatever accomplishment stood in front of me.
Waying through numerous Los Angeles distractions I figured out that I wished to stay in creative field until I will find out what really will feel like a right fit. I went through most of the film crew jobs, in front of camera gigs, background work until I got to model for an artist who’s husband is one of the top editors in Hollywood. It all came down to one night when I jokingly agreed to show my edit of one of the short films I created with my acting group at that time. Jokes aside, he advised me to pursue it and with additional nod of his lovely wife who is my dear friend to this day and I followed through with it.
Long story short – It took me 4 years to the first point where I was fully booked and getting more calls for projects without putting any direct effort in to marketing. To get to that point it was a combination of a lot of learning of craft, industry business and self development and creating of network of people I would love to work with. Of course it all came with huge amount of mistakes to learn from, stress levels to learn how to manage and first time decisions that scared the crap out of me but I had to do it to get things done.
Could I have sped up this process? Yes, definitely. In my case it was a challenge of getting over my insecurities and trust in to process and trust in others. If I could come in knowing all this things will go much faster for sure. But I do not regret my path at all. I am feeling grateful because I know there are people out there who are dreaming to get to this realization and be able to do their dream job and they can’t for various reason and maybe will never have a chance to do it. I am feeling very lucky to have that chance and I am thankful for it every waking day.

Of course, non of it was done without supportive team around me. My family and my partner who stuck with me during all the career changes and adjustments I went through, and also friends and long time colleagues who were there when the time was right.

Serge, 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?

It took me years of experience and learning to get to get to the point to understand for myself what is the value that I am bringing to others. And once I understood it diferent doors started to open for me and my professional atmosphere changed in general. Let me paint you a picture. Film goes in to production either on location or in virtual studio. When I get that footage with script on hands I have the ultimate power to tell the story envisioned by an amazing minds of writers and directors. I have a choice to create a much defined story from what they both envisioned in a first place and if I have enough freedom to manipulate I can tell a story from my own perspective by manipulating actors’ choices of portraying emotions and manipulating speed and tempo of everything combined. If I’ll take it further I can add traits and backstory to characters that was not there and create additional lore that will explains why characters do some things certain way. And, if I will take it even further, I can warp or change the timeline how the events progress if I’ll see a need to benefit to more engaging storytelling. I find a lot of value in all this.
I carry this kind of approach to all my work whether it’s a narrative, unscripted documentary, music video, trailer or reel, commercial or anything other media that is open to creative storytelling.
I love to work with creative people, and I think I am mostly proud of my circle or the network I built because I choose my clients and business partners carefully. This is very personal business, at least that’s how it works for me. Whoever work with me I tend to care about and take care of beyond the work I do for them whether I need to connect them with someone to help out or meet up and talk about something more personal on a genuine level.
I do not offer service because I do not present myself in that way, I am not a brand because I am dealing with intelligent and emotional people with different creative needs. I think what I offer is a product in a shape of myself and my skill and that’s what works for my clients who are staying in touch with me for many years now.
At the same time, I solve their expansive problems in a much shorter timeframe because of the skill I acquired. I guess if I would have a slogan that would be the one.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

This is a hard one because this is rooted in my upbringing and this might resonate with certain percentages of people out there . Growing up your parents and your peers are the ones you mostly look up to. They are your mentor, your guide, your suppressor, your bully, people who love you and hate you. All those things form your opinion of the world you step in to when you are on your own. It could be a correct one for you but it also could be a wrong one just because of the environment you grew up in. In my case I was growing up feeling powerless. I was forced to drop scholarship in music college because my parents told me it won’t get me anywhere in life. I listened, and in result I started and failed two universities I was forced in to. One for financial management and another one in transport logistics because I hated both. The pivotal point was when I left the country and find myself somewhere else on my own with my true thoughts without anybody else telling me what should I be or supposed to be.
You have no idea how this might really impact your thinking and decision-making until you start to think about it outside of the “comfort” box. Learning to listen to yourself and unlearning to taking in what is said by others.

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

Certainly,

Everything else aside I would say as a first thing everyone should take a self-development class/course to improve attitude, social engagement, critical thinking, stress management, improvisation for business an so on.
I supplement my education with combination of reads, podcasts and videos but I will only list some to start with:
– I would highly recommend as first readings and lectures of Alan Watts. He is great on teaching overall mindset fundamentals.
– Books to start with: “Creative Careers” by B. Jeffrey Madoff, “Built To Sell” by John Warrillow, “Building Trust” by Darryl Stickel.
– I listen to Lex Fridman podcasts on emerging AI and new age engineering because it is getting absorbed by my industry and I wish to be informed and up to date on this.
– I watch Alex Hormozi videos speaking about modern business models

Contact Info:

• Website: https://werebearpost.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/serge_martinenko/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sergej.martinenko/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sergemartinenko/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIBkC0uglNvayG4_KrTZWWQ
• Other: imdb.me/sergemartinenko

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