IT ALL STARTED WHEN…

After graduating from Oxford with a degree in Applied Mathematics I decided to move to the French Alps to make ski films. Undeterred by the fact I had absolutely no experience, I opened my one-man production company, ‘Mogul Movies’, and immediately fell in love with all aspects of filmmaking.

From producing and directing, to shooting and editing, I was having so much fun as a punk kid running my own business that at the end of the ski season instead of taking the banking job JP Morgan had waiting for me - I opted to keep going along this exciting new career path. The next stop was top VFX shop MPC in Los Angeles, where my instincts for problem-solving quickly helped me build an impressive body of work as a VFX director. It wasn’t long before I found myself working effects magic on high-end commercials and music videos with artists including Michael Jackson, Lenny Kravitz and Madonna. I even made a guest appearance on the NBC explaining how I created the effects for Pepsi’s Adbowl winning spot, which also earned me a Gold Lion. 

But as much as I loved working on spots with mind-bending visual tricks, I saw how much ideas depended on authentic emotional performances. So I immersed myself in the human side of storytelling and quickly developed a skill for finding the comedy in everyday reality by combining natural human emotion with entertaining visuals. A couple of hundred projects later and I’ve directed ads for a host of high profile brands like Pepsi, Google, Goodyear, Coors, and Johnson & Johnson as well as a fleet of automobiles including Cadillac, Ford, Hyundai, Chevy, GMC, Nissan and Toyota. 

What ties all of this diverse work together? Simply put, I like to think I bring the same meticulous preparation, fresh point of view, and kid-on-a-ski-slope enthusiasm to everything I direct. Whether it’s a quirky visual effect, an unexpected plot twist, or a heartwarming human moment, the excitement I feel when I’m on set collaborating with cast, crew and creatives is just as strong as when I first skied backwards down an Alpine mountain with the  wind on my face and a camera in hand.