Star Wars fan, techie, successful editor and maker of sawdust, Chris Fenwick, has some great advice for those who wish to get into the “biz.” This one time record-holder for the fastest Rubik Cube solution was raised by a fine-artist mother and engineer father. How do you decide what you want to do in life if you are good at just about everything? Fenwick says it is by learning how to do many things and loving what you do Curious about the creative psyche? Listen in as he talks with host, Cirina Catania on OWC RADiO’s “Creative Club.”

In This Episode

0:00 - Cirina introduces Chris Fenwick for an impromptu interview. Chris is a visual creative editor with more than 25 years experience.7:26 - Chris talks about how he stumbled upon a lucrative part of his business by mistake.13:26 - Chris reminisces about a childhood story of how his parents molded his knowledge in arts and technology.20:07 - Chris shares how he felt when his dad drew a Xenon light drawing over his moon car drawing.22:11 - Chris explains why he makes creative solutions to technical problems and technical solutions to creative problems. 30:32 - Chris describes the changes in video production over the past few years and how it has shifted the way people are producing today.35:34 - Chris explains why it is essential to adapt when a tectonic shift happens in your industry.40:46 - Chris advises the younger generation on what they should look forward to in the future and what to do to succeed in their endeavors.49:11 - Chris shares some funny stories and experiences of when the Internet first came to be.53:28 - Chris encourages listeners to check out his website, ChrisFenwick.com, or follow him on Twitter at Chris Fenwick.

Jump to Links and Resources

Transcript

This is Cirina Catania with OWC RADiO’s “Creative Club,” and I have Chris Fenwick on the line. This is an impromptu interview. Because I wrangled Chris, he's just such an interesting person. And I want to know more about him. And I think you guys will, too. So Chris, tell everybody listening what you do for a living?

It's kind of a loaded question. Primarily what I do seven to five or so every day because I'm an editor, I sit at a Mac and I push pixels around. Editing in the 21st century, it changes quite a bit depending on who you're working for. I may be just what I like to call a “hired wrist.” Somebody who does not actually know how to use the computer will say, “Can you put that in front of that, and that after that?” Sometimes I'm given cards of data from the field and say, “Tell the story about these two sales associates.” Sometimes, I get more into the motion graphics world, and it will be creative visual metaphor for this complex financial transaction. And sometimes, I am actually dealing with large companies at a very kind of high-level, brand identity level. One of my clients, as a matter of fact, has hired me for the last four or five years, I think now, I've been working very closely with them in terms of building a visual language that is easy to share with other content providers, so that all of the video content providers, everything looks the same. So I'm actually building templates and things that they can distribute among all of their contractors. So there's a lot of different things that editor in my world mean. And who knows, maybe I'm just jack-of-all-trades, master of none. But that's kind of in a nutshell, what I do on a day-to-day basis, one of those hats.

That's probably why you're still working, though, don't you think that in this day and age, we need to be able to wear more than one hat? I mean, I think that's why I'm still working after all these years.

Oh, absolutely. I think a Norm Holland, there's a soundbite of him from one of the editor’s lounges where he said, very poignantly, “The Hollywood system is dead. They just don't know it yet.” And so, in today's day and age, in the post-production world, you have to be willing to adapt,