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Meet Bret Kalmbach

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Today we’d like to introduce you to Bret Kalmbach.

Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
The first time I really touched a camera was when I was in 10th grade. My older brother gave me a little handy cam with a fisheye lens on it; it was rad. Back then I was skateboarding with my friends almost every day and somehow just gravitated to filming skateboarding. I eventually saved up and bought a vx 1000, then vx 2100 with a modified “death lens” as it was called. At the same time, I was Racing motocross for a while and was doing that competitively. I remember it was January 1st probably around 05 or 06 and I had all brand new apparel and sponsor gear and I was practicing for a race and flew over a jump way too far and woke up on a helicopter flying me up to a hospital in Scottsdale. My mom always had a rule that if I ever broke a bone racing, I’d have to give it up. I didn’t break any bones but had a crazy concussion and was unconscious for a crazy long time, so that did it. Had to sell my bike, and took the money to buy an HD Sony camera. 1080i was like a thing of the future compared to the SD cameras I had used in the past. I went back to focusing on skateboarding, and I put out a skate video with my crew called “Let’s Get Physical.” We had a little skate crew around the east valley called Physics. Such a random name I couldn’t tell you when and I why I decided that. Most of us were sponsored by some local skate shop or another; those were quite the days.

I think I was randomly at a party one night when some guy, no clue who he was, told me about film school. I didn’t know this existed. I had never really thought about it I guess until then. I loved watching movies and my brothers, and I did little skits with our friends when we were little, but that was about it. Not a few days later I made a weird little short film with my friends an shortly after enrolled at Scottsdale Community College to pursue editing.

I started out focusing on post-production, but then I shifted to focus more on production which I think was essential to how I got to where I am now.

Like almost everyone I know I started working at some point during school and just rolled with it.

My oldest brother was getting into making little films and stuff in Colorado while I was still in AZ and I was like dude you should come out here, and we should start a business. Not a few months later he moved in, and we got going. We took out a loan to buy a Red One MX camera and started APAIRUS COMPANY.

We had a pretty rocky start at first with freelance, but then we both landed a salary job at what we would still consider our film boot camp. I was hired primarily as DP and my brother as editor. It was total chaos but also teaching us out to make something with no budget daily. We worked on so much content it was insane. Eventually, we both decided to leave thank god as it was just a total nightmare. Freelance picked up over the next year or two and then I shot my first feature Broken Leg which we kickstarted for $20k. Looking back I have no clue how we did that. A near 30-day feature shoot for 20k. I can’t even wrap my head around that. I shot and was hired to shoot all sorts of various projects after that. Shorts, web, doc content, music videos, sports, you name it.

After learning more and going through a few more cameras, I got asked to produce a 52 video series for golf digest. I remember the meeting. They had seen this modern dance film I created and said they wanted me to make golf that “sexy.” I was like you guys are nuts, but I’ll give it a try. Again this was a crazy low budget project, but it paid for me to make the totally unplanned abrupt move to NYC right after finishing filming the content. I knew if I had enough post work. It would hold me over till I got some work out there. My brother landed a full-time job working editing a doc so this seemed like a good time to explore a different path.

Things ramped up out in NYC working with VICE, Conde Nast, and other freelance work which was great. I had a relationship end out there with a girlfriend at the time and was not ready to pay for a two bedroom apartment for live work in NYC. I had been getting a lot of calls to come back out to AZ and work out west so I decided to look and see what real state looked like out in AZ

Ended up moving back and buying this crazy spaceship of a house and started to work in AZ again but on bigger projects this time around. It was like somehow having come from NYC made me seem more attractive to clients at that time which was super weird.

Since then a lot has changed, I started to get more involved with producing as well which I love. Bigger budgets, working with even more talented crew, learning, growing, its been great. I met my wife on a shoot in Brazil for the Olympics while I was producing and shooting a Job for ADOBE. She just immigrated here which has been crazy and exciting! Shot another feature that will be premiering at a festival this spring, loads of music videos, wrote/directed/shot a video with over 30million views, commercials, things have been crazy. Just moved into a cool historic neighborhood in downtown Phoenix, new puppy, new creations coming…All super exciting!

Way more than you asked for, I’m sure I missed a ton, but that should cover most of it 🙂

Please tell us about your art.
In the freelance world Im hired primarily as a DP/Cinematographer, but over the last few years Ive been able to write/direct/produce alongside shooting which has been pretty rewarding. Im looking forward to more of this path for sure.

Working solely as a DP you tend to hate a lot of what you shoot, even if you’re given all of the right tools. There’s always some excuse or something to tweak in the shot; you’ll never be satisfied. At least this is how I felt, and a lot of my DP friends feel when we talk or work together. It wasn’t until I started producing and directing more till I realized what battles really mattered on set. When you’re working as a DP, and the heat is on because you’re behind schedule, it’s still easy to push the schedule even further behind fighting with the AD to keep your vision intact. The problem with this is the ripple effect. Every minute taken from something effects something else…Especially on low budget shoots. Take five more minutes to light this scene, and you’re going to lose 5 mins worth of coverage on some other scene later in the day. When I started to mix in the producing and directing I started to appreciate this more. I realized that adding light to enhance some small part of the frame in the background would make me feel content about the current frame, but since we only have 15 minutes to film this scene, it was more important to make that sacrifice, so I had more time with talent.

Its a super weird relationship producing and shooting or producing and directing. Its a conflict of interest because part of you is holding onto the creative and the other side of you is trying to make sure you actually get what you need to tell the story. Ive been on shoots that have been planned months or weeks in advance, something always goes wrong or changes on the day. Shoots are always behind somehow from one department or another, and everyone needs to be ready to adapt to this. It’s easy to have a department like camera/ge put the set behind schedule and then have another department get pissed off and say well it’s their fault, so im still going to take my time and do my job at the speed I want which just makes the shoot fall apart even more. This frequently happens, and then DP/DIR say hey we were told we would have x about of time to film this scene and petition for it. It needs to be collaborative and thats what I learned the most about jumping into the producing role. You learn what you can get away with sacrificing that won’t harm the integrity of the product.

That being said I don’t think its the best idea to wear way too many hats on every shoot. You do something enough like producing and shooting together you can go back to focusing more on a singular role with the appreciation and knowledge you took from working the other role.

One of the big takeaways from producing is the dynamic you have with the crew which I love. Its really easy for everyone on set to come up after the shoot and say,” dude the shots looked so cool!” The thing you hear a lot less as a DP if ever is, ” Man that was a really fun, well put together shoot!” Those are the moments that make me love producing!

As far as specific work. Ive been doing a lot of music videos/different commercial content lately, love narrative work, I need to do more personal work. A friend of mine Dan Fusselman who I work a lot together with said we were going to try to do one small personal project per month for 2019. We shot our first one on the last day of January so, we will see if we keep up with it. I realized that I think it’s going to take me getting very lucky running into a director or writer who shares the exact same sensibilities as me to hire me to shoot a script that is dream content for me. I know I need to write and direct a narrative short at least of my own this year that is just totally my style, no excuses. I think thats what it will take for me to fully be content with visuals at the moment. I imagine it will be super humbling.

As far as my photography goes, I went from not being able to watch movies without picking the photography apart to almost solely appreciating story now. I know its a weird way to look at it but how many times do you hear people say, man the photography in that movie was amazing, too bad the story sucked. It’s rare you hear it the other way around. I’ve definitely taken a step back losing sleep over my photography and tried to really pay attention to making sure we get what we need for the story out of every shot. I’d rather be the invisible photographer than have the coolest looking portfolio/reel.

Right now Im just trying to embrace who I am where I am in my career and not get hung up on everything I see around me. Once you let go of the comparisons and just roll with who you are and what you create knowing you will grow and its all learning, it sure makes life a lot more happy 🙂

As an artist, how do you define success and what quality or characteristic do you feel is essential to success as an artist?
I think one of the main parts of success is just being content with where you are right now. I’m still learning this. Before social media and everything, I imagine creatives were a lot more content with their product because they were’nt being drowned in everyone else’s. I’ve learned that ill hate how something looks when it releases and then a month later I’m like, ah that looks great, or I’m at least content with it. It’s hard to step outside of the creative role and just look at your work objectively. Nobody will notice that thing you were fighting to light in the background or that something has maybe a little too much haze in a 30-second commercial spot that they will probably only see once. The goal is to be memorable and impact them. Sometimes you can do this with just photography, but most of the time you need the photography to be attached to some sort of story. That’s what I’m most interested in now.

I think I just want to feel content with a story I created and told. I want to watch something I made, and feel like I could have enjoyed it as if it was someone else’s. Those are the little goals.

Success is what you make of it. I’m sure the cream of the crop DP’s/Directors of the industry still think some of their work looks like crap. It’s all relative.

How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
Most of my work is on my Vimeo or website. Always posting stills and excerpts of work on one of my Instagrams. There are a ton that’s not on there. I have a feature that will premiere this April at the Phoenix Film Festival called Raising Buchanan.

Always love feedback from anyone/everyone whether you’re in the industry or just a general audience.

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Image Credit:
BTS photos from Jordan Mizrahi and Joey Jepson

Getting in touch: VoyagePhoenix is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.

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