Vinny talks about his career in cinematography, how he managed to get his name out when he started, sheds light onto key ingredients of good camera work, his work ethics and also draws a detailed picture of what he’s up to next.
His enthusiasm and high standards of quality reflect in his work and are important components of his success.
Vinny, you own a successful video production company. When did you found the company and what is the field you specialize in?
Imperial Production was founded by myself and Ivan Narez and was started in 2005. [...]
What is your advice to somebody who wants to choose a career in videography? Do they need to attend a school and have a degree in the field to get good jobs? How does one get a good videographer?
I don’t think you need to attend school to make a career in videography. Going to school can’t teach you creativity. The bottom line is if you really love it and have a passion for anything it will show in your work.
To make a career out of it you need to be a hustler and let people know who you are. You need to make people pay attention to you. Just like anything else in life, there are plenty of talented people out there but if you sit and don’t share your talent for the world to see your not going to go anywhere.
Just keep it moving and make people pay attention to what you’re doing and you will stay busy. [...]
Features skating from Austin Paz, Trevor Tylosky, Vinny Minton, Franco Cammayo, Quinn Feldman, Gonzo, Billy O’neil, Sneaky, Jon Schmidt, Winston Wardwell, Willie Trebach, Victor Arias, Jon Morciglio, Chris Farmer, Chaz Sands, Don Bambrick, Ivan Narez and more.
Deals On Wheels is a blade video that I filmed back in 2004 to 2005.
Profiles on Vinny Minton, Mike Lashore, Angelo Diaz, and Victor Arias. Also featured are the talents of Ivan Narez, Casey Bagozzi, Matt Murphy, Peter and Paul Drozdowski, Cameron Frazier, Ezra Gordon, Ross Farrar, Jeff Jackson, Erick Garcia and more.
After years of being released, I decided it was about time to get off my lazy ass and share it with the world, especially since there were very limited copies made. Enjoy.
Vinny Minton is someone who I consider a class act. I remember officially meeting him in 2004 at Tee’s house the day Ol’ Dirty Bastard from the Wu-Tang Clan died.
We were up late watching Mac Dre vids and talking and he told me about ODB after catching the info from a text I believe.
Even though we had just become friends I felt like I had known him for years. And with us being from 2 entirely different coasts I have to thank Vinny for introducing me to his Bay Area lingo…
It took me awhile to learn how use the word “Finna” in a sentence properly haha. Much love Vinny and here are his 5W’s!
You have inspired so many skaters with your style that the list would be far too long to print here. WHO were some of your inspirations when you were coming up in the blading game?
VM: Throughout my years of skating my inspiration always changed, but I would say my biggest inspiration came from Jon Julio. Seeing him skate when I was a youngster in my local skate park, I would try to emulate his tricks when he’d leave haha..
I also got a lot of motivation/inspiration from all the people that used to hate on me saying, all I knew how to do is flip and that I wouldn’t go anywhere from skating. It feels good to prove people wrong!! [...]
This week, let’s take a look at the Box Magazine Class of 2000 from the January 2000 issue.
It is interesting to look at the list of names featured and see the different paths their lives have taken.
Every skater on the list has left an impact on skating. Some of them continue to influence the blading universe with their skating or other talents, while others have moved on with their lives or faded into obscurity or infamy. — Ben Rogers
up: Vinny Minton and his daughter Faith. Photo: Johana Minton.
Vinny Minton is one of those guys that oozes swagger. I still remember the first time that I saw Vinny skating in person. We were in our mid teens at the ASA World Finals in Las Vegas and he was skating a pretty hairy down rail, crushing farfig switch-ups in some blue flats.
Vinny was a true professional and was never selfish or lazy in his prime. While he traveled the world and could have just skated and collected checks, he used his recognition to create a video series that highlighted both well-known and underground bladers.
Vinny has changed professions and become successful in another field but he still does more for blading than most. Vinny is now working with large production houses and penning deals with companies like RedBull and Glidecam, Vinny shows that “going out to screw around with your friends” can actually teach you a great trade. [...]