David Smith

My name is David Smith. I am a video director and I'm in a little town called Market Harbour in Leicestershire.

So most of my time at work really depends on whereabouts I am in the process of what I'm doing.

So it could be anything from initial phase with a client. So we will be coming up with ideas, writing director's treatments.

I'll be coming up with mood boards of how I think things should look, and essentially just putting together the video concept.

And then if I'm on shoot, I'll be bringing that project to life.

So a typical day for me, depending on if I'm in the office or if I'm on shoot or location, I will be looking at looking at briefs from clients, looking at what they're trying to achieve and coming up with creative ways to solve that problem through video.

Most of my time I'll be coming up with creative ideas whether it's a script, whether it's an idea for a film, I'll then be looking at pulling in references, so I'll look at creating mood boards, basically anything I can do to try and get the idea that I've got in my head across to the client.

And then if they like that idea and they go for it, we'll move into production phase, which will be where I'll be on shoot or on location, and I'll be with a team of people around me bringing that idea to life.

So the main person I work with is called a producer and essentially it's their job to do all the logistics that bring that vision to life.

So they're in charge of organising crew, organising locations, props, whatever we need to get the job done. So I work very, very closely with them as we go through everything we need to make the film.

The best thing about my job is, I would say, the people that I get to work with in this industry, the nicest people you'll ever meet. They're all very lovely, highly creative, and everyone has a passion for what they do.

Second highlight, I would say, would be the travel and all the interesting locations that I get to go to.

The hardest part of my job, I would say, is working with the clients. It's also a very nice job, but yeah, I think in the creative field, you'll always have to work hard to get your ideas across.

It's one of those things where I think everybody's watched so much TV and film that everybody does think that they can do my job, which is often quite interesting.

But yeah, would say we have lovely clients we work with, but like anything, a collaborative process always has a bit of a back and forth.

My career path into my job was quite an interesting one.

I always made videos growing up and so I just ended up going to university and studying a general multimedia course which I really enjoyed. It kind of encompassed a little bit of everything and then following that I worked freelance for a few years, before I went back to university.

I went to film school in Bournemouth Arts University down in Bournemouth and I currently have a Masters in Cinematography. So my background is, although I'm a director, I came up through the camera department and shooting.

I then started working as a director of photography, alongside being a director. And then it got to the point where I was directing more than I was shooting.

So now I do both, which I enjoy. Often sometimes at the same time, butmostly, mostly I'm a director.

I'd say my school education helped me get to where I am.

I'd say to be honest with you, more than anything, it was a case of just opening my mind up to different things.

So my initial education was quite broad and then I went to university. The first course I did was again relatively broad but it was quite nice to see all the different things that go into making films, making videos, and from there, that kind of pointed me in the direction that I wanted to go, which was shooting, camera department, and directing.

So yeah, I'd say it sort of opened up my mind to the different kinds of jobs that were out there.

The film school I was at at Bournemouth, that was a very international, it was a very international course. I was actually the only British person on that course.

So it was quite nice because I got to make friends with people from Thailand, Colombia, China, all over the world. And again, just sort of in their kind of outlook on filmmaking, their outlook on the creative process was really inspiring and very interesting.

So my job does involve a lot of international travel, which is always the fun part of trying to balance your work life, your home life.

It was a lot easier when I was younger. So when I was younger and it was just me, it was a lot easier. I'm married now with two kids, so it does become a little bit trickier.

It's always a fun one saying to my wife that I'm going away for a month to Japan to do a shoot. But I think it's, yeah, it's manageable.

It's one of those things. I think with any job where you have to travel, I think there is a certain degree of trying to balance that work life home life. But yeah, I have a very understanding wife. So it's all good.

Ooh, a moment in my career I'll never forget. To be honest with you, I do have quite a few moments that I'll never forget.

I suppose the one that I always find hilarious looking back is we once had a shoot in Japan. We were working for a company that build trucks and different automotive vehicles. And we were doing quite a big video for them, promoting them.

And the video idea that we had was involving the staff and involving the people who worked there. And we planned this one scene at the end where we would have a drone and we'd have a camera and drone and it would go up and everybody who worked there would be on the floor looking up at this drone as it went up.

We had a very, very windy day. We didn't realise how windy it was gonna be where we were in this part of Tokyo. And I remember chatting to the drone operator and he was saying, I just don't know if it's gonna be able to fly.

Anyway, so he tried to put the drone up and just as it started going up into the air, a gust of wind came and just took it away.

So we're standing there thinking, what are we going to do? We've got over 100 people standing out here in the cold waiting for us to get this shot.

So we ended up going into one of the buildings nearby and we got up to the roof as quickly as we could and basically just pointed the Steadicam over the edge.

And Tim, who was the producer, he was there with a megaphone so he could address all these people. And the only words he knew or had been taught in Japanese was "motto waratte", which translates to "more smiles".

So I just will never forget this day standing on this rooftop next to the Steadicam operator who's leaning himself over the building to film this group of people, with the producer just next to me just shouting down a megaphone, "motto waratte!"

And that's something that will stick with me for a long time, a very surreal experience.

I'd probably say... try more things. I think that would be my advice to myself.

I think it's very easy these days to find yourself being pushed down a particular path, especially with the education system.

And I think something that would really help, well, it would really help me actually, it would really help a lot of other people, is if you just try more things.

Because you never know what skills you can learn doing other stuff that you can bring in, especially in creative jobs. You can pull from different inspiration, from different things, and you never know when it could be handy to know something that you'd never know unless you tried that particular thing.

So that would be my advice. Don't be afraid. Don't think you have to just go down one path. Feel free to explore things you're interested in. And I think that's a good bit of advice.