Follow That Passion (Part 3 of 7)
This is the third of seven retrospective blogs exploring how recognizing and honoring one’s passion often creates a rich, satisfying life. Continuing from Part 2, another question often asked has been:
What college classes did you take to prepare for your career, and how did you start your business?
Only a handful of college classes prepared me for the entertainment design and production career I was heading toward. At the top of the college course list was Cosmology, because the professor opened my imagination to astrophysics, radio astronomy, and how Earth physics don’t necessarily function in the same manner across distant space. I experienced what it was like to think into areas I had never before fathomed - such as light photons rendered incapable of escaping the gravitational pull of a black hole, which is why the hole appears black. Light from a brilliant star can’t actually reach the Earth, regardless of time. Wow.
My exposure to live theater design and production at San Diego State University was also beneficial as I was able to participate in real stage productions to gain a technical understanding of drawing, projection, lighting, scenic construction, rigging, and the organizational system of producing a complex show with actors and technicians. It was the hands-on experiences I learned the most from - thinking, planning, constructing, then making things happen for live audiences. This is where I first felt the energy of a live performance - and I wanted more.
I found college to be better training for personal relationships, social systems, and hierarchical structures. For the inner-driven individual who inherently knows dimensional design is in their future, the best education is making things for real, in situations where real risk is involved. Online classes and book-learning introduce concepts in a distanced, often flat, two-dimensional visual format. If you seek to shape and make physical things, I believe one must actively participate in the three-dimensional world with real people who operate with actual risks.
With identical costumes based on a Disney Haunted Mansion graveyard character, a good friend and I entered and won cash at Halloween contests in the mid-1970s. (I’m on the right in both photos)
Concoct, design and build Halloween costumes, apprentice at a scenic shop, or intern at an exhibit fabrication company. Volunteer at a business doing something fascinating, with an eye toward your career target. Identify industries and sub-industries engaged in the things you want to learn. Find a mentor who introduces you to new technologies, processes, and ways of thinking, together with helping you grow your talent through playful exploration and serious work with meaningful deadlines.
Fun is just as important as work - something higher education can forget to teach. When passion seasoned with joyous moments is fueling your journey, time stops -- and work transforms into boundless excitement. I'm not kidding. The experience is incredible - a combination of perception, magic, and realization all at once. Missing a meal because you’re so engaged is common.
Before and during college, get in the midst of physical situations where you apply passion to learn from projects with actual clients. (See my complete seven-part Follow That Passion blog series). A major advantage of doing this is meeting adults who let you ‘work the ropes’ in some way. Learning by doing is powerful in that the experience psychologically empowers a learner to work within a process and approach tasks from many angles while asking questions throughout the experience.
These steps to the KGTV television studios in San Diego were the beginning of my personal Yellow Brick Road journey. Present day photo by Amanda Brandeis
Prior to entering a dramatic arts degree program at San Diego State University, I interned at San Diego’s KGTV studios, at the time a local NBC-affiliate television station producing live news shows each day along with local and national commercials, and public service productions. It was as close to big-time Los Angeles as I could get at that point in my life and superb college prep.
One morning I passed by Captain Kirk, the original Star Trek’s William Shatner, as he worked on a stealth project on a closed set within the larger of several studios at the station. Shatner was the first celebrity I encountered in my career, and since I’d been a fan of Lost In Space in the late 1960s, I wasn’t a trekkie, so saw Shatner as a recognizable, though normal guy walking down the hallway toward his dressing room. No autograph, no photo, however a realization celebrities are people making a living just like everyone else as they follow their own passion.
Working under the guidance of KGTV graphic designer and mentor, Gil Jimenez, my perspective of a creative professional future was forged. This was pre-digital, where on-air graphics were made with physical photographs, hand-cut colored paper, and hand-set lead type in a “hot press” - a large drill press-like appliance which heated up the type to transfer color from a strip of plastic film to the art board via heat. By today’s computerized standard, the process for making promotional graphics was primal.
Completed graphic art cards were placed on an illuminated studio easel and broadcast live at their specific time slot, generally straight, sometimes slightly crooked. A technician referencing a schedule clipboard would change cards throughout each hour. As an intern, I was exposed to a wide variety of graphic design and production techniques including font identification, letter spacing, and visual composition.
On the left, physical graphic art card images illuminated by overhead lights were captured by massive 1970s-era studio cameras, long before Adobe Illustrator/Photoshop and computer graphics. On the right is the first on-air graphic I created at KGTV channel 10 in 1973. The soldier profile was cut entirely by hand with an X-Acto knife from colored papers.
One morning at the TV station, something unexpected occurred as a layoff of others around me suddenly ripped through the station, including the graphic art department. This shock is forever emblazoned in my memory as normally stoic adults became emotionally fragile within seconds of receiving the news. Several members of the graphics department soon emptied out, with the remainder of the day being the most awkward social situation I had been exposed to as a teenager. Take a note: schools don’t teach situations like this.
On a lighter note at the station, I also experienced a sportscaster slipping behind the news desk moments before the camera went live. He was dressed in a button down shirt, tie, and dress jacket – while wearing Bermuda shorts and sandals below the set desk where the camera couldn’t see. This was business casual long before it became a trend!
Reasoning, analysis and planning are often counterproductive while pursuing passion.
Once you’re on your individual path, likely heading in an alternate direction from friends and family members, be prepared to hear naysayers doubt your envisioned success. Within your world, actions odd to others will make more and more sense to you. You’ll be judged with reasoning and analysis without an understanding of your passion and drive. This is normal, along with others attempting to project their own concerns of failure on you. Once you feel within yourself what it is you want to pursue, and you take action toward that pursuit, doubters will fade into the background to become static.
Painting hand-sculpted planet models for a special event in the early 1980s, and having some photo-documenting fun afterward.
As you proceed along your path, take photos of your creations, and some of the steps you take along the way. What you’re learning from this blog series and make happen in the world will someday be your responsibility to share in your own way as others, and a few naysayers, explore how you did what you did.
Go to Part 4
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