Meet Ryan Frazee

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ryan Frazee.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Ryan. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
Growing up in a tiny town in southeast Colorado called Swink on a farm down a dirt road there wasn’t much to do growing up aside from sports and skateboarding and I became fascinated with all forms of creative arts but especially music. Around middle school I began writing music, learning guitar and teaching myself how to record songs and would get lost in that for hours. There was just something about the feeling of creating, refining and working on a project that started as just an idea and eventually would evolve into something physical or at least digital. I had grown up with a bunch of super creative friends who were all artists, photographers, writers you name it, and I loved that environment of being around creative, fun and free-minded people.

As my passion for creative arts grew and I went off to college, I entered into film school, where I was getting some editing and shooting opportunities around town. That also gave me the ability to create some short films and broadcast work. I started to fall in love with film and photo work and by the time I graduated I had decided to go full time with it. I started shooting weddings, portraits, really anything that I could get my hands on and then I was introduced into the world of concert photography for local bands. I started shooting more and more shows for local artists and getting my name out there. I was also shooting music videos and concert documentaries and realized I had found a way to marry these two creative loves of mine, music, and film.

I began working closely with a band from Fort Collins named Shatterproof and was introduced to other local bands like Redlands, Slow Caves, and Racing on the Sun. I was also finding opportunities to shoot My Body Sings Electric and In The Whale who were both artists that I had been following and listening to in college. I was also shooting for some publications around town and nationally and I had access shoot huge artists like Blink-182, A Day To Remember, Warped Tour, Slayer and more. So it was a fun few years getting to meet all of the people who were making the music and get to follow them around venues and studios and learning more about them individually. After shooting bands in local clubs I began touring with a few of the local bands and documenting there tours. It’s some of the most fun I’ve ever had and some of the best memories I keep is being out on the road with creatives and capturing the day to day as well as the shows in a new city every day. At the same time, I was creating music videos as well, tour promos and studio documentaries.

After being in Fort Collins for a few years I decided I wanted to move out of weddings and into corporate and commercial video and landed a job with a production company as an editor and director of photography. It gave me a ton of resources to learn and grow and those years were a huge growth spurt for me creatively and I could tell I was starting to gain a better understanding of this type of work.

As I was growing there I started to dive into Directing and creating music videos and writing stories with a much higher degree of intention and story-driven projects than I had before. I’ve learned a lot watching musicians write songs in a studio and hearing all of the little elements and textures that they come up with and add that really take a song to a different level and that has pushed me to create work that is more intentional as well as diving deeper into each project, music or commercial, and take the time to develop and find those layers to make my work look and feel professional and at the same time tells each story the way it deserves. On top of that, I have also been focusing on getting my music video work into film festivals and onto the big screen and just had a music video I directed for the band Redlands selected to show at the Horsetooth International Film Festival this September. It is an incredible experience to see your work projected on a big screen in a room full of people and seeing if they’ll vibe with it the way I do. I can’t wait to enter into more festivals and start to put my work out to a bigger stage.

So I decided it was time to start my own video and photo production company that launched this June and it has been a really exciting experience. I’ve been fortunate to work with a lot of really great clients from the Fort Collins and Denver area and have gotten to tell some amazing stories for them. Day to day I’m focusing on creating work for corporate and commercial clients that ranges from social media content to full-on branding commercials and taking on music projects that feel right. It’s been off to a great start so far and I’m looking forward to the next few chapters of creating bigger and better work and meeting more and more people who are excited about video and photo production that have a story that they need to tell.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
It’s probably been the windiest, bumpy mountain road there is, to be honest. I’ve had great jobs and opportunities come and go left and right and have to sacrifice a lot more than just going to bed early every night or weekend plans time and time again just to get where I am now. I’d say the biggest struggle is that you have to be on your A-game at all times because you never know when the next great opportunity will come from or what project that next potential client might watch and if you start to slack off and going 50% because you think a project doesn’t matter, you could be missing out on something you didn’t even know could exist.

A lot of times, however, when you’re really deep in the day to day grind, it can get insanely exhausting and it can feel like nothing is moving and nothing is happening and that you’re putting in all this work and effort and getting nothing out of it, and that can really burn you out super quick. So you have to keep your head up and stick it through because when things do start to click, it’s the best feeling ever.

Tell us about your work – what should we know?
At its core, my company is a video and photo production company based in Fort Collins and my main focus is music and commercial video and photo work and there is sort of two halves of what I do. One side of the business is corporate and commercial video and photo and I work with local and national companies creating a wide range of work from social content to branding commercials. I love working with companies of all sizes creating content that helps them launch a new product, sending a message to their own clients or helps define or refine their branding.

The other half is a music video and photo production company. I cover anything from concert photos, tour photos, and documentaries, promotional photos for bands all the way to full-on music videos. In the same vein as commercial work, I get to work along with side artists and help them craft a visual image that pairs well with their music. I focus on not just creating something visual, but also telling their story and portraying that through the work. It’s not just a photo of a band or artist, its a photo of a human who has something to say, and I want to help give them a way to get that message out. The same goes for music videos, I focus more on creating high-quality visual music videos that also tell a high-quality story that allows the artists and opportunity to tell the story of the song in a visual medium.

What role has luck (good luck or bad luck) played in your life and business?
I feel like being lucky or unlucky is more based on our proactive actions and how we react to things when we have too vs just getting lucky or unlucky. However, I will say I’ve felt lucky when I get hired for those great jobs that I really wanted and sometimes I feel unlucky when those jobs don’t work out and ultimately I feel extremely lucky to be able to do what I do every day. I feel lucky that I get to work with all of the great people that I do and I feel lucky that they allow me to create work that represents them and their own companies and that they trust me with that process. It’s not something I like to take lightly. So I think I’ll keep doing what I can to keep the luck alive and continue trying my best to keep making as much luck happen as I can.

Contact Info:

• Website: ryanfrazee.net
• Phone: 719-468-9781
• Email: ryan@ryanfrazee.net
• Instagram: @rfrazee
• Facebook: @ryanfrazeemedia
• Twitter: @ryanfrazee

Image Credit:
Justin Urban – Urbanimpression
@justinurban03

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