Meet Andy Wenstrand

We recently connected with Andy Wenstrand and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Andy, thanks for sharing your insights with our community today. Part of your success, no doubt, is due to your work ethic and so we’d love if you could open up about where you got your work ethic from?

My first job was detasseling corn when I was 12 years old. For nearly every day over four weeks, I walked up and down quarter-mile long rows of corn, pulling the tops of the corn stalk. I was dropped off at the bus a little before 4am and would get back from the fields between noon and 2pm. I came home with cuts everywhere, and even lost a shoe in a mud hole, having to finish about an hour of work with no shoe. The job paid farm-worker minimum wage, $2.15 per hour, and the hour drive to and from the fields wasn’t on the clock. Mornings were 60 degrees and often wet and raining, giving way to 90+ degree heat. Frankly, it was miserable.

Before the gig started, my dad told me that if I worked every day, he would add $150 to my total. What I later found out was that I got a 50 cent per hour pay bump ($2.65) from the company for working every day, too. I took that money and purchased a 27 inch TV and a VHS+ machine. I had the biggest television in the house, and it was all mine.

At the time, I felt like I was swimming on easy street. I felt like nothing was going to be has hard-earned as that entertainment center. To an extent, I was right. Over the years, I’ve had some wonderful jobs, but the hustle has always been the same. I’ve always seen the work as part of a process to find the joy of what I want in life. Whether it be scrubbing penguin poop and coming home each day smelling of dead fish, or being on the road away from my kids for up to 20 weeks a year as a team photographer – I’ve been able to serve some really amazing people while being able to bring joy to an audience.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

I capture moments in time that will never happen again, in a way that evokes emotion.

When I state that I want my work to evoke emotion, I don’t require that to be my emotion. What I want is to make the audience feel an authentic feeling.

I often use the analogy of looking at an image of an athlete post game crying. He just lost the championship game and the feelings of being almost a champion come over him, and that could make someone empathize with that situation. However, if you root for the team that won, perhaps that brings you a true joy – not joy in his misery, but in the thrill of having your team standing at the top of the podium.

One image, unlimited ways to interpret. A good image will make people look. A great image will make people feel.

I’ve had the good fortune to cover a lot of athletes and musicians in my career. I’ve been able to document championship games, record-setting performances, entire festivals and tours, and even cover the 2024 Paris Olympics. I’ve always aimed to find the humanity within the athletes and the rockstars. Find a way to connect people with people. This is where I feel my calling is, and I’m so excited to be immersed in a career that allows me the opportunity to raise a family in this industry.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

Tenacity – The barrier of entry to the creative industry is easier than ever. There are more creatives than ever before, fighting for the same amount of work. The amount of people willing to do really good work just to be tagged on social media makes this job harder to sustain a career than ever. But the cream will always rise to the top, and those that fall in love with the process and the journey will always learn to find a way to stay inspired.

Willingness to Fail – Failure doesn’t mean worst case scenario, but it’s okay not to bat 1.000! We learn through failure. The more we fail, the more information we have to problem solve and prevent future failures. Failure, when taken in stride, often leads to successes.

Celebrate Wins – Winning is extremely hard. Not just winning a championship, or even a game. Celebrate all your wins. Celebrate booking a credential. Celebrate being published. It’s okay to be proud of what you’ve worked to accomplish. Celebrate peers and friends as they achieve wins. Winning is fun, and life should be joyous.

All the wisdom you’ve shared today is sincerely appreciated. Before we go, can you tell us about the main challenge you are currently facing?

The landscape of collegiate sports is changing. So much so that my family and I are in the midst of creating action plans for shifting how we live and how we create our revenue streams. I’ve seen the world of staff content creators moving from production houses to full-staffed in-house teams now shifting towards scaling back dramatically.

The changing model of how college athletics works, programs are beginning to scale back services deemed non-essential to the student-athlete experience, and with the ability of students to produce high level content, there will be a lot more investment into labor of student volunteers.

Where I feel there will be a large gap with this model is any sense of cohesion in voice and storytelling for these programs. I see the need for quality creative directors that can strategically outline the program’s needs while being a teacher to this next generation of creatives being a high value role, but I’m not optimistic that role will survive as universities continue to find ways find capital for the new revenue sharing models.

I am currently exploring shifting my focus from sport to music, but also looking to move from staff positions to full-time freelance, supporting athletes, artists and brands directly.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://andywenstrand.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andywenstrand/