Greetings…

Hey, I’m Ben. I point a camera at the world and try to catch it in the act—loud, messy, beautiful, slightly crumbling.

I’m an American filmmaker. A photographer. A Director of Photography. I'm a transplant from the Ohio rust belt to the foothills of the Alps… but I really live in the space between. My foundation is in broadcast journalism, which is just a formal way of saying I learned to eavesdrop for a living.

It’s a strange double-life. By day, I’m a "one-man band" for hire. I run my own production company, creating video and photo content for corporate clients, and for the last five years, I’ve also run full-stack production for the "Feli from Germany" YouTube channel. It’s a world of wrangling the whole circus—audio, lighting, cameras—for high-profile brands, sponsors and government agencies. You learn to be sharp. You learn to deliver. It's the craft.

But my hunger is for the art.

I’m into the good stuff: back alleys, busted neon, loud locals, and anywhere that smells faintly of cigarette smoke and ghost stories. My motto? Travel light, shoot fast, drink the coffee (preferably burnt). I’ve got a thing for places and people with history oozing out. The ones that feel like they’ve seen some shit.

All that technical skill is just the toolbox I carry. I’ve spent years mastering the craft, delivering sharp, clean work for brands and agencies.

But the art—the hunger for the places and people with history oozing out—that’s the eye.

I bring the documentary filmmaker’s eye to the corporate world, and the corporate world’s reliability to the film set. I’m here to find the story.

You, your brand, your film—it’s all got a story. And I’d be honored to be the one behind the camera to catch it in the act.

– Ben T. Shipp