Bold Journey - Meet Stefon Whitaker
We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Stefon Whitaker. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Stefon below.
Hi Stefon, thank you so much for opening up with us about some important, but sometimes personal topics. One that really matters to us is overcoming Imposter Syndrome because we’ve seen how so many people are held back in life because of this and so we’d really appreciate hearing about how you overcame Imposter Syndrome.
Imposter Syndrome has creeped up on me a lot in the last year. I don’t think I have fully overcame it but one of the biggest break throughs for me to repeatedly pull me out of that thought is finding one of my first cameras I ever had when I was 10 years old. I sat back and watched the first videos I recorded at that age, which was just me going around talking about movies I wanted to make and annoying my family. Looking back at 17 years in the past to see my younger self say out loud “I’m gonna be in the movie business”, brought me so many tears and so much joy. I was reminded why I do it and how I’ve done it. I was truly born for this career path I chose. It chose me. I called my mother up a few days after I watched those videos and cried to her on the phone. Tears of gratitude. My parents knew what they were doing when they got me all those cameras for Christmas. Looking back at that young kid who wanted to be in the movie business is what has pushed me to overcome imposter syndrome, more and more each day.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
I am a film director, producer, screenwriter and entrepreneur based in northern California. I own and operate a production company called SW Films and work freelance in the professional film industry.
I’ve been working professionally for 7 years and running SW Films for almost 6 years. It’s been a pleasure providing amazing cinematic visuals for films, commercials, music videos and more.
My career is shifting more focus into investing in my films and the overall brand of SW Films and with that I’m slowly trying to find full time film work to have more leverage over my opportunities financially.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
My top 3 qualities or skills that have made an impact for me is Energy, Authenticity & Cinematic Excellence. The energy i’ve shown in my work, on set and my career overall has been unmatched and other around me have felt it. The authenticity has came from keeping true to the projects I’ve created. Creating things that are special and meaningful to me and putting detail into every visual. And lastly Cinematic Excellence, which I have coined for my company to be the only visual medium I push to add to all of my projects. Narrative and visuals that you won’t forget and leave you provoked by many different emotions. Each of these qualities has helped take my work to the next level.
My advice for someone looking to find skills or improve on them to help them in their journey is to just truly be authentic through it all. Don’t do your work to please anyone else. Work to please yourself by staying true to yourself. Your skills/qualities will get better as long as you be yourself.
One of our goals is to help like-minded folks with similar goals connect and so before we go we want to ask if you are looking to partner or collab with others – and if so, what would make the ideal collaborator or partner?
