the Nine8 years

i started a fake music blog just to get into shows. it worked. nobody checked if you were legit back then, you just needed a wordpress site and some confidence. that got me in the room and the room taught me everything.

i was running on grime shoots with Skepta, Wiley, Giggs. carrying gear, making tea, watching how people worked. that's where i learned the energy of a set. not from film school but from standing next to people who were actually doing it.

then i found Nine8 Collective. met Biig Piig (Jess) in a smoking area and everything changed. we made 24K for about two hundred quid with borrowed Danny Boyle equipment. no budget, no crew list, just mates who believed in the thing.

the Colors feature came after that. then A World Without Snooze, a short film that felt like the first real statement. Sunny came through after the RCA/Sony deal and suddenly there was actual money involved but the spirit was the same. we were still just making stuff with our people.

the From Then Till Now documentary was the full circle moment. looking back at everything the collective had built. community-driven filmmaking. no gatekeepers. just people who showed up and made things together.

those years shaped everything i do now. every project since has been trying to recreate that feeling of making something from nothing with people you love.