Where are you now? With YBY Alumni, Andrew Hallenberg
How were you involved with Your Big Year?
I was chosen to be the filmmaker for the 2018 Your Big Year travel competition in the summer of 2018 which was a 4 week road trip across the United States of America. I did the trip with 4 travelers and Rachel Head, who was the tour manager. Simultaneously I was working on getting media out from the trip we were doing.
it was so much work, but it was fun! It was good! It was insane!
How has the experience of being involved with Your Big Year influenced your filmmaker career so far?
I think I came when your year was finished and we were done with that month of insane traveling. I definitely came back a different person with different experiences. And that only elevated, you know, I was in film school at the time and I was learning about the technical side of film.
I never really went abroad properly, but I consider this summer and abroad experience for me because of everything I was able to latch on to all the technical stuff I was learning in film school.I think I started growing with a voice after that, just going to so many places and meeting so many people.
So what organization are you currently working with?
Today I am working remotely. Full-time for vice news, I'm working on a new show that they have. I think it's going to be on, I think they were just renewed for a second season of their new show on Showtime. So I believe it will be on Showtime, but I'm an assistant editor on a show called The Source, which is an hour long documentary new style show from vice news.
And it's crazy fast paced, busier than anything I've ever done in a post-vector field before, but I'm learning so much every day and constantly calling back on skills that I learned a long time ago and a lot of skills that I learned doing Your Big Year. It's so exciting.
So how did you even get that gig?
I went to Ithaca college and I was able to get an active invite. Through alumni connections at college where I was working for the college production company and alumnus who would also work at the same production company.
So I was able to get in contact with them early, before I graduated. And then when I was a senior, I got to be a PA on one of their sets, which was super exciting. So I met a few people and actually liked them. Experience a little bit that was pre pandemic. This was fall of 2020. And then, and I always know, and I was interested in Vice because of the way they mix creative nonfiction and news-documentary style media.
It was silent for a lot of the time after I graduated because of the pandemic and there was not much work. It was mostly just weird freelancing, but there was an opening and I just happened to shout at the right time. And then I did want to interview and I did not get it the first time because it was a different show I was interviewing for.
I was really upset the next day. I was probably more depressed than I'd been in the past few months. And then I got an email the next day saying it was another show. Can we interview you again? And I came to that next interview, way more prepared. And I got it the second time.
What challenges have you faced so far as a filmmaker?
One of the biggest, I think, challenges - it's definitely self doubt. A lot of people who are creatives and filmmakers will tell you the same thing.
There's so much self doubt that you have to get past when you're trying to make something you know is worth making. I felt that when I was making my senior thesis film in college, I've felt it on projects that I’ve been involved in when it starts getting scary. That's what it means.
That's something you're truly meant to make and getting past that is probably one of the hardest things I've ever had to try to attempt to do. I don't even think I've ever properly done it yet, but self doubt is a huge challenge for creatives and filmmakers.
What are resources or tactics or methods that you've used to help you get past those self-doubt moments?
Building a community is huge. Who you can talk to, but not always agree with is what I want to say. I think the best community of people are people who share your fears, share some of your values enough for you to bond with them and kind of realize that you're not alone in this, but not enough for it to be too easy.
You can have real conversations. And disagreements with people is important, especially now. I absolutely love that. You said that I learned a lot of that in Your Big Year when we were traveling and we were in these areas where I had so many preconceived notions about people and then those were all challenged as we were traveling.
That was a huge hurdle I see myself calling back on.
What inspired you to get into film in the first place?
t's the only thing I know how to do, but in reality, it's like I can do a lot of things, but I think film, especially the process of editing or just what I really like to do is the only thing that I'm trying to figure out.. It feels like it's something I can do.
And if I try hard enough, I won't fail. Like I actually feel like it's something, I love it so much. I can't fail because I will try too hard to fail. I don't know whatever that means, but it's Filmmaking and editing as a profession is the only thing that makes me feel like I want to try hard enough to not fail everything else.
If I fail that's okay. And that's just like a consequence of life, but this is something I don't want to fail out actively. And so it must be the career for me. And I think from that answer, what I did get, as well as like through film, that's how you feel like you can make an impact.
What impact do you want to make in your film career?
I don’t know if I have one massive impact and one huge thing that I'm working towards, but I think I'm trying to consistently remind myself it's all good. I'm constantly trying to remind myself of little things to influence me, make me better.
I don't have one big impact. I'm trying to make lots of little meaningful impacts in every job that I have and in every project. There's some really important stories that we're telling in this Vice show. And so I'm putting my all into that because I know that it's only gonna be as good as the work I put into it.
The whole series is only going to be as good as the effort we all put into it. And so I believe in those stories that, you know, they're trying to tell, so I'm trying my absolute hardest to make sure.
I'm learning a lot. As an assistant editor, I'm learning a lot. And I think it's a good path for me right now. I like this track that I'm on and I think it's healthy for people to realize that sometimes they're in a good place and you can stay there for a while and just learn and grow and absorb.
And that's what I'm trying to do until I eventually move on to something else.
Tell us about graduating during a pandemic.
Oh yeah. Graduating in the midst of the pandemic was crazy. Especially now that it's been almost a year since the end of that semester, it's crazy to look back on it.
It’s almost nostalgic. I was a different person. We were all different people when the pandemic started and we've all now had a significant amount of growth from then till now. And I just think back on it as a really surreal time, trying to wrap up one part of your life and having absolutely no clue what's on the other end of graduation.
Like what's on the other side, but to throw this in there, made it a whirlwind of the unknown and it was absolutely terrifying.
