We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Steven Wong Jr a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Steven, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s jump to the end – what do you want to be remembered for?

Legacy has always been important to me. What I feel strongly about is what things I have done to have made my peers and community better. I think many people get steered away from following their dreams. My legacy, I hope, is to be the one that helps to push those people forward and someday have them achieve their dreams, in turn, having them assist other artists in the future to achieve their dreams as well.

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

Born and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii, I first discovered video production during High School at Kamehameha Schools when I was 15 years old. I was immediately hooked, staying evenings and weekends in the lab. I found that I loved making short-form videos and just enjoyed creating in general. I traveled to Oregon for college and graduated with both a Film and a Marketing degree. I’m currently ’20 years into my professional career creating short-form videos for television, feature film animation and currently, the video game industry,

When I was younger and trying to break into the industry, I didn’t have the support, knowledge and exposure I wished I had during that time. It was difficult to get that first big break, as they say, “it’s all about who you know”. I had many friends and colleagues who decided not to follow their dreams because of the difficult journey. I wanted to start a social media channel that gave a platform for artists to not only showcase their work but to build a community that artists can be comfortable sharing and learning together.

My process involves filming/photographing on-site with the artist and editing together vignettes of the artist’s works. On occasion, I also utilize video content that is provided and I’ll edit new creative from the content.

I’ve been creating on my social media channel for the last 7 years and I’ve had the absolute joy of meeting and working with artists over the years, while aiming to inspire other artists across the world with behind the scenes content.

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

I think the most rewarding aspect is really just being able to express yourself through a medium. For myself, it’s video. There’s numerous ways of editing a piece together and I think that freedom gives me the ability to explore, cause there really isn’t one right way of editing a piece, and through experience, you’ll find ways to narrow down those options. In addition, I believe an artist’s passion is contagious, seeing others passionate about their work, really feeds other artists drive as well.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

Most of my social media is done through experimenting. The best thing to do is consistently create, you’ll get better and better by just sheer experience, and you’ll discover what works and what doesn’t. I was fortunate enough to create social media content for both a Feature Film Animation studio as well as my current job at a major Video Game company. My personal social media content gave me an outlet to focus on new ways of creating, without focusing on a particular brand. I found the biggest thing that gave my content legs is creating work that catches peoples attention in the first 3 seconds and has a payoff at the end, promoting rewatchability. I also focused on providing a personal and supporting voice in the comments, that anyone could feel comfortable asking me or asking the featured artist a question. I’m a firm believer that if you, as the creator of the video, can watch the video over and over again and still be entertained, it will be entertaining to your viewers on their first watch. At the end of the day, making an impact on people is what I focus on, if I can make an impact on one person, I think a post is successful.

Contact Info:

• Website: stevenwongjr.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stevenwongjr
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevenwongjr

Image Credits
Photos shot by Steven Wong Jr of artists Brooke Duckart, Song Kang, Mike Bennett and Yoo Lee.