Experienced film producer Victoria Ijeh decided to use her film-making experience to create a course that would help young people not in work or education get started in the industry. She created Iconic Steps in 2011, and has been working hard to give young people the experience and networks they need to forge a successful career in creative industries.
As well as running short courses, Iconic Steps provides people with real experience of working on creative projects. They have worked with a number of companies and artists to produce visual content on a high-quality scale. The students help produce the content too, enabling them to build up their portfolios while receiving an income, as well as enabling companies to support the growth of young, independent film-makers.
Here at Good News Shared we have been lucky enough to have Iconic Steps students produce an advert for us. The students were on a five day course run by Iconic Steps at the BFI in Southbank, London. In this time the students learnt techniques, pitched their ideas, and then applied everything they had learnt by making an advert.
Amadeus Tamakloe, the director of the Good News Shared advert said, “I thoroughly enjoyed directing the promo for Good News Shared. I think what you’re doing is great and frankly the internet and media could do with a page from your book and not be so depressing.“
“Creating a professional advert within such a time constraint was difficult. It was an experience that forced me to grow, and it allowed me to learn about new forms of art and their structures. This has led me to research further into directing and advertising.”
The experience of directing the advert was a new one for Amadeus, “This was my first time handling a directing role, or for that matter, any team leader role within a creative field.“
Thinking to the future, Amadeus said, “Now that the Iconic Steps course is over I’m continuing to pursue a career in the more animated side of the media industry but have now opened my eyes to possibilities within animation for advertising. I still feel I have a lot more to learn and would like to follow up with more group oriented projects.“
Watch the advert produced by Amadeus and his fellow course students below:
Good News Shared from Iconic Steps on Vimeo.
