When you sign up to the Employability Points Scheme, you never know where it may take you. For Dan Bird, he has gained a range of videography rewards with organisations such as the Historic Dockyard Chatham and Landmark London, leading to an amazing opportunity to work with Beats by Dr Dre in their LA office. This opportunity arose from a chance meeting at a summer camp as part of their year in industry, where Dan and his friend Joe, met Beats Head of the Marketing. From this meeting, both Dan and Joe were invited out to LA to do promotional filming.
Dan and Joe, took their personal videoing equipment out to LA to film educational unboxing videos designed to give an in depth detailed review and educate the selling points of the product. These videos are stored on the company iPad App, which all staff have access to and can use to help enhance and develop productivity. Unfortunately the videos are not available to the wider public, but Dan was able to log the experience on his Employability Points portfolio.
Dan started to collect Employability Points in his first year after meeting the team and talking about the scheme, activities that could be logged and potential rewards that could be gained such as internships.
Dan has logged points for his freelance videography and photography. He has worked for a furniture company and hotels in London, recording promotional videos. One of Dan’s most memorable events was filming a Bar Mitzvah in American, which was obtained through contacts he met at summer camp. His work at Beats by Dr Dre has earnt him 50 points, which has pushed Dan’s points to over 500, which can be converted into rewards, such as internships and work experience, over the summer.
When asked what skills the Employability Points Scheme has enabled him with, Dan answered that it has improved his networking skills and helped him to develop a contact list which has led to continuous offers of film work. It has also helped him gain real-world experiences working with businesses.
Dan’s next challenge is an upcoming project in association with Chatham Dockyard, secured through the EP Scheme. The project is to record a promotional video for Dockyard highlighting activities for children and adults and the experiences they can gain visiting. The original brief was for a video aimed towards volunteers, however, Dan was requested to make this additional video. Look out for Dan’s film on the Chatham Dockyards website and social media channels later this year.
Dan’s ambition is to continue with his photography and video production, and to continue his part time work teaching film at the Pauline Quirk Academy.