Thom Neal
“My mother is a school librarian which she’s been doing since she was 16, my father is a Paramedic. They both left high school young and I guess they both never really figured out what they loved. They are from a different generation that sort of just went with the flow. My dad has always been a jack of all trades, he could have been a amazing photographer, there are some stills in our house from the 80’s of landscapes that are quite profound. He also can whip up a table top in a few days from some native red gum that looks pretty amazing. My mum is a practicing Buddhist in some aspects now, she trains herself in mindfulness. It’s funny that I look at them now and they have just passed 'middle age' but they are so full of energy and enthusiasm, it’s pretty impressive.”
“Mum and Dad are very easy going, they would have had my back in anything I endeavored to do. They always enforced to me that money should never be a deciding factor on what you do, you should always do what you like to do because you’ll be doing that the most, and if you make a living from it then that’s a bonus. They were probably the ones that suggested I go to school to study something to do with the visual image as I had always had a camera in my hand from the age of about 14 onwards. Whether that be filming skateboarding, surfing or trying to get out of doing oral presentations at school by making a little film beforehand so I could just press play and not stand up in front of people and talk.”
“I went to high school at a local school called Padua College. It was actually a religious school, but I’ve never practiced religion. They mainly cared about everyone having their tie done up and shirt tucked in more than anything. It was easy going for me, I had a great group of mates, that’s why I went there."
"I went to university at a place in Melbourne called Swinburne University of Technology, it was a very hands on place. I studied a Bachelor of Film and Television specialising in Cinematography at the Swinburne Film and TV School.”
“At the time I was going through university, the school had some really talented young cinematographers going through or just graduating so I reached out to them and asked if I could come down and help them out on set. I started helping out more and more through out my time at uni, and started getting AC’ing jobs with other people outside in commercials and films. Pretty much the standard route for any young film maker, you seem to just start by helping out others. Creatively I’m not sure I have taken much from any of them but I’ve definitely learnt bits and pieces along the way.”
“As I came to the end of my studies, I was offered a job on a bigger Australian feature film that was shooting for about 12 weeks. I took that job and about after one week of AC’ing on some very big action sequences and multi camera set-ups I realized that I didn’t want to do it anymore and that no matter the money that was offered my gut just didn’t feel right AC’ing. Again, those DOP’s that were above me were out there doing really well and they encouraged me to just commit to shooting whatever I could and they would refer work to me, so I started building up a network which continues to grow in the same manner now.”
“Nowdays I’m shooting as much as I can on projects that interest me and challenge me to think a little differently and alter my approach to film making. I like the idea of staying fresh and trying something new if given the chance. I would say that most of my work is commercial at this stage, although I still prioritize my narrative work over anything and will also shoot music videos and the occasional doc or experimental project. I just enjoy being on set and collaborating with different filmmakers, each person has a unique perspective about a given scene or moment so it really interests me to see that come to fruition through visual images.”
"In the future I’d like to be able to keep doing what I’m doing! Meeting new and interesting director’s and filmmakers along with reading new scripts that offer me the chance to bring an idea to life through composition, light and movement, it really is an exciting thought. I’m incredibly fortunate to be living in Melbourne and traveling out of here with the ability to make films and tell stories. I’m starting to get more and more feature scripts to read, so I’m just waiting for the right one that has the legs to get some funding and investment behind it. Feature films are the bench mark for me and although that’s quite a hard part of our industry here in Australia it also makes it that much more of an achievement if you get one off the ground. I don’t like to think to far ahead because really anything can happen!"