Looking back at my life, and what brought me to where I am today, I can’t really say that I ever had one of those holy cinematic moments that made me drop everything and think, “Heck, I’m going to become a filmmaker”.

It was a bit more organic than that.

I grew up in Canberra, playing guitar and dabbling in drama in high school. I never really viewed myself as an “artist” in any sense, but I loved the feeling of making people laugh. Who doesn’t.

It wasn’t until Year 11 when my band broke up that I had to find a new creative outlet (sounds more dramatic than it was). At this point I had always loved watching films, so it was a relatively easy transition to enrol in a Media class. I was lucky enough to have a teacher with a passion for film, who also taught us to shoot on Super 8mm.

And that was that. The spark was lit.

Editing 8mm film by hand was a dream and a nightmare combined.

I don’t think it was an accident however: I think it happened at a time when I was ready to explore everything I loved – but on an entirely different platform. Film had always amazed me: though at the time, I probably couldn’t articulate why. It was seemingly the perfect combination of visuals and music – and how together they could create a completely immersive experience. For two hours at a time, I could suddenly fall in love, be in the other side of the world, or I could travel 70 years into the past. I’d like to think I might’ve always just had a small void inside me that could only be filled or expressed through cinema. There was a wordless catharsis that spoke to me – and I suppose it just felt right to want to learn the language.

My love for film continues to blossom: what might’ve started as instinctual, has developed into the very fibres of my DNA. It literally changed my life. Nowadays, as soon as someone even mentions the word “movie”, my eyes light up like it’s Christmas day. Scrolling through imDb until 4am in the morning, I see the power film has to shape both society, and human consciousness in general.

It’s the closest thing we have to space-time travel: I can’t imagine doing anything else.