Scott Bradshaw
Yes, I'm actually writing my own biography. Here it goes:
I always loved using cameras as a kid, from shooting home videos on our old VHS camcorder to taking photos of our dogs on 35mm film. Eventually it evolved into shooting me and my friends skateboarding and eventually actually just going out into nature and the world and capturing what I saw.
It wasn't until 2014 that I started to take the world of film and cinema seriously and landed a role as a camera attachment on Foxtel's "The Kettering Incident" under Director of Photography Ari Wegner. It was a hardcore experience, one that money can't buy and film school cannot teach. I had learned so much about the way film and television is made that it totally gave me a brand new direction in life.
However I wasn't satisfied with just being a camera assistant for years and years and working my way up the hierarchy, I wanted more and I wanted it now. During my time on T.K.I, I met two stills photographers, Ben King and Giovanni Lovisetto. Two legends of the industry who were more than happy to talk to me about their craft and teach me some valuable lessons about the way they work. I saw that the role of the stills photographer was one of the only actively creative jobs on a film set and so now I had found the next step forward.
I made the move to Melbourne and did some odd jobs as a camera assistant, but again knew it was not for me. I then realized that if I volunteered to shoot stills on a bunch of student short films, even if they were terrible films I could still make the photos look good and use them as a portfolio.
Fast forward a year later, I was shooting documentaries for a company called PLGRM and really enjoying refining my cinematography skills and I now had a semi-decent portfolio under my belt of both video and on-set stills. I was asked to operate the split monitor on Rosehaven (ABC) Season 1 back in Tasmania and took the opportunity. I spoke to the producers and told them what I had been up to, showed them my portfolio and said that I would like to shoot stills. They were impressed and allowed me to shoot photos but only on the days when there was no other stills photographer, and I still had to do my full time roll as split operator, much to the dismay of the camera department. But it wasn't the camera department I cared to impress.
After doing such a great job I was invited back for every season after that (5 seasons in total) as stills photographer, and would also assist Ben King with the gallery shoots.
I worked on a whole bunch of shows for a number of years after that for some big companies and with some big names in the Australian television industry, all of which can be found on my CV: https://tinyurl.com/scottbradshawphoto
After losing my father to cancer and having to deal with the toxicity of the film industry during that painful process, I basically gave up on the whole pursuit and put down my camera for years after that. It is only recently that I have picked the camera up and decided to shoot only for myself and to get back to the reason I started it in the first place - for fun.
Since then my main focus has been on making music, playing in bands and just enjoying life through my eyes instead of a lens.
I am making a triumphant return to film, but not in a way that people are expecting. My next move will be a big one, and I will continue to write about it here.
- Scott.
