>> Well, it was sort of an interesting evolution in that I come from an English background.
While I was in school, I worked with the yearbook.
That kind of got me into university communications right out of school.
I started working with USC's Office of University Publications part-time.
And then eventually graduated to a full-time position there, where I was doing, writing,
editing, Website work and photography, because I'd picked up photography
as a skill just working with the yearbook.
My minor was animations, so I've had visual and filmic [phonetic] interests.
And my boss came to me at one point about a year into my working there and said, "So, you know,
we want to start putting things on YouTube.
We want to be current with what students want to see, students want to hear.
What would that take?"
And so she gave me the opportunity to put together a wish list of equipment.
And we started building a video production pipeline
in our office, which I was spearheading.
And that turned out to be the most interesting part of my job.
And I got to hire a student assistant,
who was a cinematic art student who was close to graduating.
And so I worked for a couple years doing that for university publications.
And at some point, it occurred to me, as I was trying to figure
out what I wanted my career to be.
I looked a lot of different options and staying within USC,
within that kind of small office environment I was working in,
your only options for advancement are to be come administrative.
And that wasn't really the work I wanted to be doing.
I wanted to be at the computer doing the creative work behind the lens.
I wanted to be doing that work.
And I realized that the only people I saw that were really in charge of their own work
and in charge of their own lives and nonetheless were still doing the creative work were the
freelancers that we were hiring.
We had a designer named Rick Seminer [assumed spelling] that would work for us frequently,
and I loved the work that he did and the life he kind of got to lead.
We had a photographer, Phil Channing, who did similar work.
And it occurred to me that what Heather [assumed spelling], my student assistant and I were doing
for the office was something that was going to become more and more important going forward,
as more and more schools started to realize that this was a major part
of any communications toolbox, and they didn't have the resources to do it in-house.
And it seemed like an opportunity to do something that I loved doing.
To really hone those skills behind the camera.
Creating images.
Creating graphics.
And at the same time, hit the real vein.
Something that was emerging.
An emerging market that needed more people doing it.
And so, I left the university publications.
Heather [assumed spelling] graduated, and we started the company.
Started out reaching out to universities directly.
And we got some good responses.