For years, I’ve called myself a videographer. It’s an easy answer when people ask what I do. But the truth is, it has never really described me.
Yes, I make films. I shoot, direct and tell stories. I’ve worked on national television, commercials and documentaries. But filmmaking is only one part of what drives me.
At heart, I’m a creative. An entrepreneur. A sports marketer. A community builder. And probably most importantly, I’m someone who likes to get shit done.
Sport has always been a huge part of my world. I understand the passion, the culture and the slightly crazy mentality that makes someone get up at 5 AM to run through a dark forest, spend years chasing a fraction of a second, or keep going when every part of the body says stop.
That fascination with people and sport has taken me to some interesting places. I’ve created TV commercials for international brands including HOKA and Cotopaxi. I created Codan Touren på Tour, a national television concept that generated more than 3 million impressions. I created a Viaplay Original about Danish MMA fighter Mads Burnell, and I worked behind the camera on the DR1 documentary “Fighterfamilien fra Falster.” I’ve also been part of Salomon Trail Tour, combining sport, brands, events and community.
But some of the projects I’m most proud of didn’t begin with a client brief at all. I created one of Denmark’s largest freestyle communities, eventually building a platform connected with 540 shops. Later, I founded Trailman Denmark, which grew into a community of more than 30,000 people and is still a big part of my life today.
My filmmaking was recognized early in my career when I received an award for Best Debut in 2014.
Looking at all of those projects, there isn’t necessarily an obvious straight line. And that’s exactly the point. I’ve never been very good at staying in one box.
Give me a brief for a film and I’ll probably start thinking about an event. Give me an event and I’ll start thinking about a community. Give me a product and I’ll start wondering what kind of story we could build around it.
My brain is constantly asking the same question: What could this become?
Sometimes the answer is a film. Sometimes it’s a campaign, a documentary, an event, a community or an idea that initially sounds completely unrealistic. I like those ideas.
I’ve always felt slightly ahead of my time, and I’ve never been particularly interested in doing something simply because that’s how it has always been done.
But there’s another side to that. Ideas are worthless if nobody makes them happen.
I don’t want to spend six months sitting in meetings discussing what we could do. I want to find the idea, work out how to do it and start moving.
That’s probably the best description of how I work. I think big, but I execute.
I can develop the concept, understand the audience, build the story, direct the production, pick up the camera and take responsibility for getting the project across the finish line.
In that sense, I sometimes think of myself as a one-man army in sports marketing. Part Creative Director. Part filmmaker. Part marketer. Part entrepreneur. Part community builder. But 100% driven by a passion for sport and creating things that people actually care about.
I know what it’s like to work for a brand, but I also know what it’s like to build a community from zero and have 30,000 people decide they want to be part of it. That changes how you think about marketing.
People don’t want more content thrown at them. They want stories they feel something about. Experiences they remember. Communities they identify with. Ideas they want to share and be part of. That’s what interests me.
So when you hire me, you’re not simply hiring someone to turn up with a camera and execute a shot list. You’re hiring my brain as much as my camera.
You’re hiring someone who will ask questions, challenge the brief, throw ideas on the table and probably suggest something that makes you think: “That might be a little too much.”
Perfect. Because sometimes “too much” is where the interesting stuff starts.
The camera will always be an important part of what I do. But it’s just one of my tools. What I really do is find ideas, create stories, build things and make them happen.
I think big. I love sport. And I get shit done