Working in the entertainment industry means having a lot of dedication, mental and physical endurance, being passionate about your craft, and being flexible and able to adapt to and research each project you work on.
People come to filmmaking from all walks of life. Everyone has their own path, that’s why there’s not a single key to success or finding your place in the industry.
Nikolay Velikanov started his career as an actor in Moscow, Russia, appearing in local TV shows and commercials. He quickly realized that this was something he wanted to do, to be part of stories and films that can inspire, motivate, and ultimately change people’s lives for the better.
Every position in film is very important in order to tell a story. The writer creates a story, the director tells it, the cinematographer creates the look a director wants, the gaffer works with the cinematographer to create the lighting, the key grip shapes the light, and production and set designers create the atmosphere a story requires, with editors putting all the pieces together.
Nikolay Velikanov has experience in many of these departments, and has worked in other capacities too, including assistant director and editor. Armed with his strong knowledge of all that creating a film entails, he aims for ambitious goals and consistently achieves them in the stories he brings to the screen. A truly dedicated filmmaker, he has worked on commercials, films, documentaries, TV shows, and music videos. His passion to make a difference and find new solutions to various challenges help each production he has worked on be done safe and on schedule. He believes that having a strong and professional work ethic, combined with a knowledge of all the departments on a set, have largely been responsible for him becoming a successful filmmaker.
He has served as writer, director, producer, and occasionally cinematographer and editor on numerous projects, including Tall Ships: Privateer Lynx, Mission Control: A Point of No Return, No Turning Back: The Russian Heat of West Sacramento, Divine Intervention, Temptation and Synthetic Identity. He has worked with many talented artists such as five-time Emmy winner actor Jonathan Jackson, Grammy Award-winning record producer and film producer Robert Margouleff, the rapper RZA, and basketball players Shaquille O’Neal and Lebron James. He currently has a feature film about Native American Indians in pre-production.
