About me

I am an experienced senior cross-discipline producer with more than 12 years production, management and public relations experience predominantly in the video industry. An insatiable curiosity has taken be down many exciting paths over the years. I studied and qualified as a mechanical engineering draughtsman and rose to the position of senior design draughtsman at an industrial company in South Africa. Being passionate about photography and video production I spent a long time planning starting my own production company. With money saved and a plan in place I quit my "day job" and started my dream job. I mastered the wide range of skills necessary for producing quality videos from client pitches and briefings; quotations and scheduling; scripting, lighting, shooting and directing; editing, grading and final mix. However, my most important skill was sourcing and managing talented people to take on these varied roles in order to increase project productivity and the overall quality.

Over the past 12 years I have produced large numbers of both broadcast and corporate videos, with briefs as varied as stock exchange listings, internal and external communications, occupational health and safety, training and informational, environmental conservation videos and even the discovery and polishing of the largest round white diamond ever. I have developed the strong communication skills that are vital when dealing with clients, internal staff and external freelance contractors. I'm comfortable working within or leading both large and small project teams. I have acted on my client's behalf as technical consultant for live events; worked with PR companies to ensure integrated messaging across digital and print platforms; I've lobbied for and set up a "broadcaster raw footage archive" for my more news worthy clients; run and presented media skills training sessions; done pro bono work for NGO's; carried out music licensing negotiations with third party record labels in order to produce a compilation album as well as other recording artist contract negotiations.

Most recently I was the managing director of a video production company in South Africa, a position I held for 6 years before moving to the UK. Whilst in this role, and in addition to my full time producer duties, I created and implemented new company growth strategies, networked with potential new clients, tracked future projects and projected income, planned capital expenditure, and reported back to internal company stakeholders. I developed close relationships with existing clients enabling me to analyse their media spend and recommend changes to refocus future spending in more beneficial areas and better leverage archive content. This improved both the effectiveness of their communication and allowed me to increase our sales at the same time.

I have a unique set of skills and experience spanning various industries and disciplines such as creative, technical and managerial. Having taken some time off work I'm keen to get into producing again and I am looking for and exciting and stimulating role that will allow me to draw on various aspects of my experience while at the same time learning new skills and adding as much value as possible to the business.