Meet Olav Carter

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Olav Carter. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Olav, so excited to have you with us today. So much we can chat about, but one of the questions we are most interested in is how you have managed to keep your creativity alive.

Keeping creativity alive is one of the most difficult things there is to do, considering it is an instinct that needs to be both trained, fed, and nurtured in order to thrive. Personally, my best methods of maintaining creativity in my daily life are as follows:

1. I surround myself with inspiring people
– By doing so, I am constantly pushed to grow and evolve as a person, and thus evolve how my brain processes the world around me. This keeps my brain regularly active, but even more so it means I can riff with my friends and colleagues, bouncing hot-off-the-presses ideas and run them either into the ground or into the sky with new projects and collaborations.

2. I am a sponge for inspiration
– By continuously keeping an open ear, eye, and mind, I am able to constructively consider anything I ingest from the media I watch, the situations I get involved in, the characters I meet and stories I hear about in real life, and more to inspire new ways of approaching creative projects.

3. Asking questions and creating the answers
– Though I am unable to answer many questions in my life (why did this person purchase this bizarre combination of items at the grocery store; why is this person’s car so utterly destroyed and yet still driving on the road like any other car; why did this group of people get involved in not one, not two, but three pyramid scheme recruitment programs?), I find that creating my own answers to the questions — in a sense, creating my own reality with the understanding that it is purely fictional and for my own entertainment, even if the thought is just passing. This practice has inspired numerous concepts or stories that I’ve written or conceived.

All together, these various methods allow me to keep my creativity alive and thriving, even when I’m tired or not actively creating a story. Creativity is not just a tool for storytelling; it is a state of mind that allows you to process the rest of the world.

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 am a Director of Photography, a Video Editor, and a Screenwriter; in short, though – a storyteller. Whether visually through the positioning and styling of a camera set-up, rhythmically through the timing of an edit, or narratively through the structure, action, and dialogue of a script, I am always finding ways to tell intriguing stories through my work.

Of these processes, my favorite – and the most exciting – part is being able to discover stories. A lot of folks think that crafting a story is building it from scratch, but really each story is more like a LEGO set, where you have to find all of the right bags to assemble the right pieces. By the end, you have something similar to what the set was supposed to be, but at the same time you misplaced some pieces along the way, found some new extra ones, and ultimately created something both better and entirely unique.

My most recent chapter in storytelling is that I’ve found intrigue in providing script coverage and feedback for aspiring and working writers — a passion I intend to provide as a service to those who might need the assistance, be they in school or actively in the industry. Approaching feedback with the perspective that my corrections might not be right, but my experience in reading a story is undeniable and wholly unique has proven especially helpful. This way, writers can adjust based on the experience their story provides others. It allows the writer to find the writer’s solution, not the reader’s.

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

Looking back, three qualities I think that proved really helpful to me so far have been operational flexibility, genuine aim to assist, and life experience diversity.
In terms of operational flexibility, I’d recommend having back-up plans for your back-up plans; things rarely go right the first time, no matter how to-the-minute you plan them. Then, with a genuine aim to assist people, you approach life and any circumstance with the ability to be of value to someone else’s life, not the other way around; through this, one is able to level themselves in life and approach the rest of the world knowing you still have more to contribute. Finally, on the note of life experience diversity — do things you would not ordinarily, and experience random, crazy moments. Stepping outside of your comfort zone contextualizes the rest of your life, so the more you are able to explore, the more interesting and informed the rest of your life can be, particularly in the context of the wackiness of the rest of the world.

Before we go, maybe you can tell us a bit about your parents and what you feel was the most impactful thing they did for you?

The most impactful thing my parents ever did for me was prepare me to work with people who are smarter or more talented than I. Beginning in my creative career, one of the things that my parents instilled in me was that I should aim to be in a room full of people smarter or better than I, because all they could do was lift me up. I have found this is an endlessly true statement, and it helps to prepare me to work in the film industry, as I am constantly surrounded by film icons and veterans, and I still have yet to be professionally intimidated by anyone. Rather, every opportunity to work with amazing people feels like the great opportunity to grow and build myself by genuinely connecting with or learning from these incredible influences. Thanks for the tip, Mom and Dad!

Contact Info:

Image Credits

Emily Bauer, Lisa Carter

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