 Alright, ready? I'll clap. Alright, should be good. Hi guys, welcome to a collaboration episode of, I can call it the life of Sev and Alex. So you'll find the backdrop of Beautiful Perth with some bit of palm in the scene and also we're in the suburb of South Perth, is that right Alex? And today's efforts are really just about getting used to doing video stuff and working with the locals, helping their businesses out and going from there and just really getting confident and showing the world what we're doing and going from there. So Alex is behind the camera and he's got his lapel mark going and he's going to fire away some questions at me in regards to what I'm doing, what my business is and then we're going to swap it around and reverse roles and go from there. Go for it. So Sev, thanks for coming down mate. No worries. Great spot for it. Great day. And look, first question I have for you. Tell me a little bit about yourself, who you are and how you came to be. So about myself I was born in Russia, migrated here when I was seven and with the in between long story short I ended up being a high school teacher which I absolutely love teaching mathematics and during my time at uni I picked up a camera and started enjoying it a lot more and now that I'm a full time high school teacher I've got the stable income which is a bonus for me really because I love my job and I can go out after school, before school, on the weekends and on the holidays to just do the photography as full time as I possibly can and now here I am now doing an interview about myself and who knows where this can take me and us and everybody involved. Great mate. Could you tell me a little bit about your photography and specifically Sev's pics. Tell us how that came about. The whole Sev's pics thing, it was just a funny name that I thought I'd put up and straight to the point it's a bit different I didn't want to say Sev's photography it's still unique but I thought Sev's pics nice and fast and quick in relation to Aussie slang everything's quick but the photography side came about for the Instagram and Facebook and all of that I just started out with landscape enjoyed doing landscape and taking pictures of birds and now I'm touring around Perth the state and even sometimes overseas just taking photos and getting people to tag along and here we are and then all of a sudden all these people have come to I've come to know me and now we're hanging out doing things together enjoying the hobby together and creating content for each other's businesses Really mate? What are your favourite spots in Perth for landscapes or your favourite spots? Favourite spots would be anywhere there's a lot of people in particular Fremantle I love Fremantle I'm partnered with the the limelights and street photography and lots of dogs I love taking pictures of dogs but specific locations in Perth would be Claesbrook Cove very iconic and new landmarks that are dying to get their photos taken over and over again and then also the new this has got a lot of potential there a lot of people, a lot of shapes a lot of architecture and abstract stuff and then also just the beaches probably less now than before but the beaches are always a winner in Perth especially if you have real estate there Now some of your favourite pictures that you have taken that could appear on Steve's pics tell us about some of your personal favourites the ones that are candid of people the ones that are not as popular to the masses those are my favourites my classic response would be there are no favourites because I haven't taken them yet a new favourite is the latest one I take that's my favourite but the old time classics are my black and white stuff that's where I really thought about it a little bit more there's more of a narrative behind the photo in particular probably there's one in Amsterdam where I went there and I was under this bridge in a tunnel under the canal and there was a walkway and there was also a bike path and it's very contrast black and white before you even take the photo I took the photo and it looks like two images have been put together and it looks surreal but that's actually what it looks like in real life during the week a lot of people wouldn't know that you're actually a high school teacher tell us about that and how you find being a high school teacher how that relates to your life and where you can see that going it's a shock to me for where I am right now being just over a year out of uni and already having a full time permanent job as a maths teacher as well I didn't go through uni to teach maths it was all PE and science and then I did some relief at another school and they threw me into a maths class and I did very well and then I got my confidence up in it and now I'm full time maths teacher and I love it and it's not just about the maths it's about teaching kids how to problem solve anything and relating that back to maths and getting the young students who aren't at all the big fans of maths to really enjoy it and yeah, go from there it's so fulfilling and how do you wish to inspire people this one, I think about this one a lot I just want to set by example be a good person myself and show other people how to be a good person that's how I want to inspire them and you know go through and do my thing, share it with people share my successes but more importantly share my failures so that if you're in the same situation you can deal with it in a similar way or a different way maybe you can help me but more times than un so far I've helped other people and that's so fulfilling about a month ago, month and a half ago the balance wasn't quite right and I'm still trying to figure out and work out all the kinks but I feel like I'm getting there slowly nothing's perfect, there's always ups and downs and sacrifices that are needing to be made I feel like right now I can sacrifice more than later but I'm always keeping myself in check and my friends and family are always keeping me in check in the most supportive way so it's really more my family and friends that are keeping me saying hey you look like you're overdoing it maybe and I'm saying yeah you're right or saying no it's okay, it's okay but I always listen so right now I wish there were about 48 hours in a day instead of 24 I wish I could live off no sleep but at the same time I'm very very happy with the progress I'm making and it's only been the fifth month of the year and I've done so much already so lots more to do but a lot of relaxation is needed how do you see yourself in 5 years time? again another question that I've asked myself and I've changed the answer too many times so at the moment I see myself further down the track of portrait photography and getting more into my videography but also public speaking too I really like to stand in front of a crowd and just tell them how I feel about things based off of my experience and if people can resonate to that I can do that more and more and more that's where I see myself for kids and for people my age and for the older crowd too so finally do you have any advice for younger people that might be listening? this can resonate with anyone but if you're younger and you're still starting out you're not sure what you want to do just do it, just give it a go you can fail at 30 you can fail at 40 but the most amount of times you can fail is when you're younger because you've got more time that's the best advice I can give you have so much more time than someone who's 40 but even then if you're 40 you have so much more time than someone who's 80 so prepare to fail but also learn from your failure and why you failed because it's not really a failure, it's just a learning curve if you can channel that into a thought process all the time you won't fail, there's no such thing thank you do you have any other final words to say mate on this story Sunday? just be a good person if anything happens in your life that's negative, take it as a learning curve and carry on things will get better but at the same time when things are great keep yourself accountable and always always learn, always develop always keep growing because if you're standing still even if you're at the top there's always something that's higher awesome, thank you very much very good