Living Your Bucket List… Discovering Life & Photography Through Facing Fears with Anthony Do

I am so thrilled to welcome photographer and documentary filmmaker Anthony Do to the podcast. I’ve had the pleasure of working with Anthony several years ago and I can’t emphasize enough how wonderfully talented he is. His perspective of living life fully inspires me endlessly.

In this episode Anthony shares about his journey to finding his path and passion through photography - and by living life to the fullest through checking off his bucket list. A nomadic traveler raised in rural Alberta, he has been living on the road for the last six years with an ambitious mission to collect life's greatest stories through creating art and human connection.

Over the years, Anthony’s brand has narrowed the focus into luxury tourism. His specialization and passion is working with boutique hotels, luxury resorts and yachting companies.

I hope you enjoy this conversation with photographer and documentary filmmaker Anthony Do.

Transcription

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:00:03

This is the Creative Alchemy podcast, and I'm your host, Monique Pantel. Here we explore creativity and life through story, synchronicity and tales of possibilities. This is a place for artists and dreamers to share wisdom, inspiration, and empower you to explore your own creative life. Together, we hold space to speak dreams into reality and share transformative ways of creating and living life. Let's dream alchemize and create. Thank you for being here. Welcome to Creative Alchemy.

Anthony do has been traveling as a storyteller for over six years and doesn't intend to slow down anytime soon. He is a self taught filmmaker and photographer raised in rural Alberta. Today you can find Anthony chasing and documenting the best stories in every corner of the planet. He is aligned with some of the most influential people and brands today, and you can find his work published in renowned travel magazines. Anthony believes if you can tell a good story, you can change the world. I love that. Welcome, Anthony.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:01:20

Thank you. This is so exciting. Thank you for having me.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:01:23

It's so exciting for me because, well, we worked together, I think, three or four years ago on a wedding in wine country. It was in Kelowna, and as wedding days go, they're really fast. And you and I never had the chance to really sit down and talk. And I remember finding your work after the fact and being like, oh, my gosh, I wish I could have cornered you in the wedding and just, like, peppered you with questions. You're so talented and it's been such a pleasure, I guess, to have worked with you years ago and followed your journey over the past three or four years. So where are you joining us in the world from today?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:02:02

I am joining from Iceland, which is where I was living when I met you in September of 2019. I remember the exact day I met you.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:02:09

Really? Wait, it was the long weekend of September 2019.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:02:15

Exactly.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:02:16

Well, and what's Iceland like today?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:02:18

I love this season, so we're currently in midnight sun season, so the sun never sets.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:02:22

So cool. I have a friend that lives in Finland that I recently met. He came over to Panama last month and he was sharing some of those midnight sun photos, and they're just incredible. We think we get long days in Canada because you're from rural Alberta, so I think those long summers, we think we get it, but it's something else. What time do you go to bed?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:02:46

That kind of has nothing to do with the sun, actually. It's nice because I'm a night owl, but it's not really night owl here. It just feels like you're working during sunset for the whole night forever.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:02:57

Weird.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:02:58

It's an interesting thing for my creativity because when you're acting as a photographer out here in Iceland during the season, you have this patient relationship with golden hour because you know how in regular golden hour is like, oh, we have 15 minutes to get the light, shoot it in an hour or 2 hours from now. It sticks around all night.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:03:17

Weird. I never would have thought that. It really shifts the way you interact with light and the environment as a photographer, as a creative.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:03:27

Yeah, you're just not rushing like the sky is pink and purple for like 5 hours.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:03:32

Wild.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:03:33

Yeah, it's paradise.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:03:35

Oh, I can't wait to go one day. The woman that photographed that wedding with me, actually you had the pleasure of meeting her. Do you remember Karin Pedersen?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:03:44

Yeah, of course.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:03:45

Okay. She's amazing and she's an angel. She's also a photographer, she's also a nurse, but also a very talented photographer. And her and I originally before meeting up and her shooting that wedding in Kelowna with me, we were supposed to go to Iceland together and it never happened. So maybe one day in the future it will still happen. But the landscape is incredible. And what I think is so amazing about your work, Anthony, is that you can identify that it's your work. Like you can be scrolling on the Internet, scrolling on Instagram, and you stop and I say immediately I'm like, oh, that's Anthony's for sure. And you can kind of dive in and yeah, you're such a beautiful storyteller. And recently you created a YouTube video or a few YouTube videos now and it's sort of like the story of how you came to find this incredible career because you have really found your footing and found a really beautiful rhythm of success in a lot of areas of success. I think you feel really connected to the work that you do. You have a flow. You can do this as your job, which is incredible. And you started out feeling really lost is how your first video goes. Remind me of the title of your video.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:05:06

Video, like the one that was most recent. That one?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:05:09

No, the very first one where you take us to New Zealand and you take us on a whole. It's like how do you find your purpose?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:05:16

Yeah, it was titled The Story of My Life, but it was really the storytelling of how I felt very lost in the beginning and then I kind of just left to New Zealand on a whim and that just kick started everything. I found my passions, I found everything and then it would eventually somehow turn into a career six years later.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:05:36

Yeah, it's so neat. Watching that video is so incredible because you pull sort of old footage from your life and we get to see you as a nerdy little dude and you've got all these growing pains and you're kind of trying to find your place in life as we all do, but it's really sweet how you've laced that film together. And then we get to see you go from rural Alberta where you were really kind of struggling to find your confidence. What made you decide to just leave on a whim. I remember you'd walked into some sort of bar in rural Alberta, and you had tried so many different things, which is really similar to me. Like, around that age, I would walk into bookstores, and I would read Wayne Dyer, Dr. Wayne Dyer. One of my favorite books was inspiration, and so I'd read it, and some of the things they would really resonate, but I just wasn't sure which way to turn. And as life does, it takes you on this journey, and all of your experiences, good and bad, they sort of contribute to where the road takes you next. So I'm so curious. What made you decide to just leave, like, alone? That's kind of a big deal.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:06:46

Yeah, I wish that it was a conscious decision. I think it just that point in my life without telling a 50 hours story, I was just sitting in the environment where I felt most comfortable. I think we all kind of have this environment where it's a familiar place with familiar faces, and we just know that it's that comfort zone. And from 1 second to another, that comfort zone just terrified me. I just remember zoning out, snapping back to it, and it's not against the people that I was with. It was just something happened inside my mind in an instant. And I Looked around this room, and I think I felt like I just didn't want to be in that room anymore in a much bigger sense than physically. So I just got up and I left. And I felt like that was the only window in my life where I needed to do something. And if I didn't, then I probably never would have left. So I just leaned into that for The First time in my life as someone who's very fearful of everything growing up, I just had a moment of clarity, and I decided to Run with it.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:07:46

That's incredible, because I think being complacent also was a fear for me, but I didn't know how to sort of, like, move around that. And I had a lot of fear even just saying, I'm a photographer. That was such a big deal for me, even though my dad is A photographer, and he was, like, a role model. But I think I had all of these stories in my head of, like, what will people think? And that's my dad's thing. It's not really mine who might have stepped out and start showing my work. It's not even that good compared to all of these other people. I had so much fear around all of that stuff. But okay, so that's so interesting, because when you started telling that part of you look around you and everything's comfortable and you're in your comfort zone, I was like, yeah, that Sounds great. And then you were like, and I left. I needed to leave. I didn't Want To be there I was like, oh, right. Okay, good. So you jump on a plane and you go to New Zealand and I don't know if you, like, have a name that you've called this incredible 30 days, but essentially you signed up for a Kontiki tour or something to the effect of, like, a youth adventure, like one month long. Let's do this thing. And it's almost like this 30 days of saying yes to every single thing. So what were you doing?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:09:02

So, yeah, I spent about four weeks in New Zealand. And that first week I didn't have anything planned. And I'm so glad I did it that way, but that was simply because I didn't know how to travel. It sounds silly, but up until 2016, I had never been outside my small little town in Canada. So I didn't even know what a hostel was. I didn't know what to do out in the world or how to do it. So it's funny. I landed in January, new Zealand. I thought it was going to be winter because that's what was going on in Canada. It was ridiculous. And that's just how experienced I was in the world. And I titled this chapter the Fear Facing Chapter because I had a lot of physical fears, but all my demons were internal. And I spent that first week just seeing what life was about. And I was lucky to hit the ground running. I met these two people right out of the gate the second I stepped into my first hospital. I was lucky to find two guys that were very assertive socially, and they're just like, you're coming drinking with us. And I was like, okay. That first week was very social. It's the first time I met people from different parts of the world. The first time I've heard accents. It's the first time I heard stories of everything. Things that we all know now as the world is more normalized to travel. That was the first time I've ever experienced anything like that. And then the next three weeks was the craziness because I realized I didn't travel across all the entire world. Teachers drink with different people. I wanted to do something. So I went down to a travel agency and this wonderful girl named Gaby from the Netherlands helped me. She basically asked me, what do you want in the loveliest way? I said I want to see all of New Zealand. And she put me on this tour that she thought was a good fit. And it's kind of like a contingency tour. You're right, they kind of take care of the logistics for you, but it can be as aggressive or passive as you want. So not everyone was living like they had a death sentence kind of thing. It was just me on that bus fully. That was just like, give me all of it. Because I saw myself in a really dark way. So I was like, this is the test. I'm going to see what I'm made of. So give me all the scary stuff, and if I survive, then maybe you got a couple more stories.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:11:13

Were you doing, like, sky jumping? Is that what you call it? Skydiving sky jumping.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:11:21

I did everything you can possibly imagine. Skydiving bungee jumping, whitewater after blackwater rafting. Do you know what blackwater rafting is?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:11:29

No, but I've done whitewater rafting, black water rafting. Sounds terrible.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:11:33

Yeah. Imagine you repel down into a cave, a beautiful cave. And inside of there, there's just rapid waterfalls and it's dark, but the cave is illuminated by glowworms. So it's beautiful.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:11:46

Really cool. Could you do a relaxed version of this?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:11:50

Yeah. There are three tiers, and I chose the most intense one. So you're kind of doing all these things, but there's ones where you can kind of just, like, float down the river on the tube and just kind of take it in.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:12:01

That would be more my taste these days, I think, as an enclosed tunnel? Yes, an enclosed cave of water rafting of three out of three intensity. That's wild. Well, you survived. Okay. When did you pick up a camera and when did you start feeling like, a shift? You're like, I could maybe charge money for this, and this could be like, what was your first paid gig? I'm so excited. So on this podcast, I've had only one other photographer. Well, no, two other photographers, but we didn't really get into sort of, like, the business and how it all really kind of started. And for some reason, I don't know, like you and I, there's a weird parallels with certain things with your story that it just really resonates with me. So I'm curious. When you picked up a camera for fun and then you started getting really good, I would imagine that people started telling you that you're good, and that would have done wonders for your little rural Alberta boy confidence.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:13:04

I'm going to break it into the milestones, and then you can kind of ask me to expand if you want, just to kind of move this six year storyline as fast as possible. Well, during this whole New Zealand time, I had a DSLR in my backpack. I just never knew how to use it. It was my friend's camera. I took it. It was collecting dust. And I didn't use it because DSLRs are super intimidating when you don't know how to use them.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:13:26

Classic. That's why I created photo 101. Shout out to my photo 101 course. That's exactly it.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:13:34

Until you know what ISO and shutter speed is. It's like, what is this rocket science thing?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:13:39

And the aperture of a lens. Did you know that's the game changer? Cool.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:13:44

Exactly. And that's exactly why I never used my DSLR. It wasn't until that probably the last week of my New Zealand trip, where I was titled this part maybe my first photograph. I've taken other photographs on it. They weren't good, they weren't sharp. But this was a particular night where I took a photograph, where it clicked in my mind. I'm just like, wow. Okay, I get it now. And so this is the setting. Imagine you're on South Island, New Zealand, and you're in a place where it's famous for the night sky. You can see the Milky Way. Like, it looks like a screensaver on the computer. So this place is called Lake Tekapo, and it is one of the most beautiful places I've been still to this day after six years. And at night time, the sky lights up. It's a dark sky conservatory, I think is what they call it. Right? So I'm on the beach, two in the morning, on just like, this blanket by myself, fumbling around with my DSLR Canon T one I rebel.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:14:35

Amazing. Yes.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:14:37

It's with a kit lens, right?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:14:38

Yes. Amazing.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:14:40

I've quickly Googled how to take astrophotographs with the stars. And I thought, being this beginner photographer, that I was like, oh, I'll just memorize the steps. And then I'll just go in and try. It the worst decision you can make. It's just like, take notes and then practice maybe before when it comes time to shoot. So I go out there. I have no idea how to do the settings. I don't know the first thing. It's a mess. I'm very disheartened and I don't know, call it what you want, but the two people that walked by next were just designed to be there in that moment, because they walked by, they saw my face illuminated by the back screen of my camera in the pitch black, possibly cross eyed. Yeah, honestly. And they walked by like, Are you getting any good photos? I was like, no, I actually really sucked. And they started laughing and they're like, well, the one guy was a graphic designer and he was just like, I kind of know how to use cameras. Maybe I can show you what I know. They both sit down on my blanket and he fumbles around with some settings and then he's just like, all right, you can click the shutter and let's see what we get. He takes a photo and we can actually see something. Now, it's not sharp because when you take your first photo at night time, it's all blurry. You have to find the focus point. So he takes it, but you can see the milk away, but it's blurry. I'm just, like, amazed at this point. And then I was like, how did you do that? So now this couple that was on their romantic midnight walk is sitting down with a stranger and a camera, and they are taking photos with me. And we're just kind of figuring out together, but they know a lot more than me. Ten minutes in, we're getting a sharp photo of the Milky Way. And then once I figure out some settings, they continue on with their night. And then the next photo I took was kind of like my first photograph, where I played with the settings. I found the focus point. I put it on the rock, propped it up with a couple more rocks as, like, my rock tripod. Yeah, me, too. I love it. And I just ran in front of the camera, put on 10 seconds of time, and you run over there like a goofball trying to find yourself in frame. And then you come back to the camera, look at the button with the triangle on it, and just like, Whoa, there it is. I'm in a photo of the Milky Way. And it was, like, my first raw photograph that looked it wasn't that sharp, but it was beautiful. It's actually way back on Instagram. Like, it's, like, probably the 6th photo I've ever posted on my Instagram.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:16:51

I'll go back. That's worth it.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:16:52

I would love to go see 400 posts. You have to scroll.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:16:56

I felt, like, 2000 something. So it's fine.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:17:00

I think in that moment, I felt what we all feel that first time, where we're like, wow, I created this. This is beautiful. It's not perfect, but it's mine. And that's magic that you can never really forget. So after that moment, it became obsessive. I just wanted to photograph everything and anything. Literally anything.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:17:20

Isn't it so interesting that your first photograph that you consider is like a self portrait with you and the universe?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:17:27

Yeah, I never thought about it like that.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:17:29

That's very magical.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:17:30

Wow. No one's ever framed it like that, ever.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:17:33

It's like a self portrait of you with endless possibilities.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:17:37

Yeah. And it's not sharp, which actually makes it better for me, imperfect.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:17:41

It is.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:17:42

I like this. I'm going to have to completely unpack this now for the next four weeks. Thanks.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:17:48

And then from there, you are obsessed.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:17:51

So from there, I was obsessed. And I, like most people with DSLRs, carried around everywhere when you first started out, and I was photographing plants, animals, landscapes, you name it, I would snap it and I would just share it to Instagram. And at this point, it was 2016, so Instagram existed, but it was definitely not what it is today. Not everyone trying to monetize their life and brand themselves and have aesthetics and filters and crop ratios and all this stuff. Everyone's posting it. It was the good old days. Yeah.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:18:20

The good old days. Yeah.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:18:21

And so I remember posting it and people just started following along, which is the weirdest thing, because, again, I'm from a small town. I have, like, 100 people in my life at most at that point. And for peep strangers to start following along my journey, I'm just like, what's going on here? And that went on for a little while, and I started to get you know, it's strange. I got recognized for my photography work, but I saw the world in a filmmaking way. I've always seen the world in films and videos, but when opportunity was kind of knocking on my door, I was getting recognized for my photography, but I was getting hired from my filmmaking. So photography always acted almost as, like, my marketing revenue. Because as Instagram was a few years ago, that's what people saw first, photography. And then it leads us into My first Paid Client, which was the story of Aspen Martin, the car company, the James Bond car, basically.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:19:12

How crazy is it? Your first paid client is Aston Martin.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:19:17

I feel like sometimes life is the movie where I was wrongly casted into the lottery thing.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:19:24

Beautiful way to put that. Okay, wait, how did you even know how to quote Aston Martin? Are you like, what do you want to pay me?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:19:34

The equivalent of what happened in that meeting was it's like if you ask a kid, how much money do you want to make when you're older? And they say, like an absurd number, like $100 million. That's basically what I did in that moment. But I spit out a number that was like what most people would consider a very high amount. If you do an hourly rate, say something that's very good, that's much higher than minimum wage, like $40 an hour. $50 an hour or something like that. I was saving $600, $600 an hour?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:20:06

Yeah.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:20:07

For minimum wage. Like a normal sorry.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:20:10

For a normal job. Yeah. Okay.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:20:18

Yeah. Somewhere in there. On their best day, if they work 10 hours, I mean, a good days. $400, $800 somewhere in there. So I think I said a number around two or $3,000. But at the time, I was just some backpacker kit. I didn't know.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:20:31

But I work anything over a few hundred bucks. You're just like, I'm pushing it.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:20:37

I had enough sense to be like, this is asking if I say, like, $200 or I'll do it for free. They're not going to take me seriously.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:20:42

Totally. They might not even hire you. They'll be like, what you talk about?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:20:46

So I said what I said. And then the second I stopped saying my number, he's like, okay, great. And then I'm just like, oh, wow.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:20:55

It wasn't even part of the conversation.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:20:58

Yeah, he might as well reach into his pocket and just give me a cat, because there's, like, nothing for him.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:21:02

Do you think they knew that they were hiring? Like someone new?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:21:07

Well, not amateur, but I myself less than an amateur at that point. I had no paid work. I didn't have a website, a body of reference work at all to kind of give them bone. I think the reason why Greg gave me a chance is because he saw a couple of videos that I did, and it showed potential. It wasn't good, but it showed potential. But I think he saw something in me that he saw when he was my age. He saw something similar.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:21:31

Yeah, he were mirrored to each other.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:21:34

Yeah. And I could kind of get the sense that he was taking a bet on me and kind of gambling on me. So I think when people do that, you just never want to let that person down. Nothing is more empowering when someone's just like, I don't know what it is, but I've got instinct about you.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:21:48

I don't know what it is about you, kid, but there's something about you.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:21:52

That I just basically kind of figured it out in the deep end. Yeah.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:22:01

Amazing. Sink or swim, baby. Sink or swim, that's it.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:22:05

So that was my first paid opportunity after that.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:22:08

Wow, how cool. I remember with my career, I shoot, let's say, like, luxury, wellness and love. Those are kind of my two spaces. And then if I have extra time and energy for it, then I love involving myself in things with social change and social justice. Those are, like, my sort of areas. And it's been so interesting. I'll never forget the first and only time that I've been on a private jet. But my career has been really incredible. And I think I don't know about you, but it sort of allowed me to get glimpses in all of these all of people's stories. That's the reason that we get hired for things. Whether it's a brand or people's own stories of their lives, we get brought into that world. And sometimes that world is I've worked in rural Kenya and IDP and refugee camps. That's a world. And then I've also been brought into, like, I got to ride in a private jet and I remember packing my little carry on and bottling my liquids, just so making sure everything was tickety boo. And I take out my liquids right before we board and they look at me like I'm nuts. You don't have to do that. And we get on board and everyone's popping champagne and I didn't care. But it was just funny to me that there's a bathroom on board, but there's an extra seat of where the bathroom is on a private jet. And that was my seat. And it was still very cozy. It was leather seating and it was the whole thing. But it was just such a crazy experience. As a girl from little old Winnipeg, never imagined myself to be having that sort of life experience. And I would imagine that you're very similar coming from rural Alberta and now you're working with the Aston Martin and then life brings you on a wild tour.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:24:00

Yeah, it's not a philosophy, but it's definitely my mindset with life. I see it as like this game where I'm just like, how absurd can we do this thing? You know what I mean? Like, how far can we reality? Because it's like everything else less than that is just not fun to me. I don't think everyone needs an Aston Martin to kind of get into that fun state of life, but to just have that curiosity and imagination to be like, how far can this go? And for people that start from humble beginnings, it's like, well, if I can go this far, you can do it too. Why don't you want to play this game with me? You know what I mean? It makes life so much more enjoyable.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:24:36

It's so fun. And I love that you're sharing that philosophy with kids. You recently did a talk which was like a dream of yours, right?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:24:44

Yeah, it was.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:24:45

You got to share your story with kids.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:24:49

It was on the bucket list, and it's a dream, but it wasn't specific enough to be like, oh, I aspire to inspire the young generation. I don't know anything about kids. I'm not, like, a kid person, I think is what the hesitancy should tell everybody. Just kidding.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:25:05

That's the best because I watched your video about talking to the kids, and you can tell not that you're not a kid person, but you kind of, like, talk to them like people, which is, I think, the best sort of approach because kids are sort of caught off guard. You're like? Why aren't you like abcdefb I-N-G oing me? Like, why are you talking to me like a real person? I think that's incredible. So cool. Wait, can we talk about the bucket list?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:25:41

Oh, yes. You inspired that. I have to thank you for that. That's all you have to say?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:25:47

Tell me everything.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:25:48

Tell you everything?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:25:49

Yeah. What's happened?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:25:51

In what context are we talking about?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:25:53

Okay.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:25:54

In life.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:25:55

Okay, so let me back up. Years ago, I came up with this sort of ECT activity, and it's turned into a workshop called the 50. And essentially it's intentional goal setting, really rooted in experience and less material things. And you had caught wind of this practice or whatever, and you've kind of put your own spin on it. And my favorite thing to hear from people who have interacted with that idea or concept of what is called I call it the 50, is hearing what has come to fruition after sitting down and writing these things that you want to create in your life. Because I also sort of agree with you that life is really interesting and it can kind of be this cool game of creation. And I've got projects that just sort of come to me. There's this book called Big Magic written by Elizabeth Gilbert, and it talks about how ideas kind of float around, and if you're ready for them, you can grasp them and kind of, like, bring them into reality. So I just bought land in Panama, and I want to do an art exhibition because I'm not ready to build. Everything has to be done in cash, and I don't have the money for it. But what I can do is still use the land. I can do cool things on it still. So, yeah, I want to do. An art exhibition there with the women in my town. But I'm so curious, what has transpired for you?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:27:16

So I've always been a fan of the Bucket List ever since life started changing in 2016. After I set out after New Zealand. I was like. There is power in writing down what you want. But even more so. Saying it out loud and just putting until it clicks. It just people might not see it or understand it. But like. If there's one thing you should do. You should put down what you want to do with your life in view. Somewhere you can see every day. And don't bring it down something safe.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:27:45

Tell people. Tell people and make it scary or make it feel like, oh, that's a wall.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:27:52

Yeah, almost make it like I don't like to use the word dumb or stupid, but it's like, make it stupid big. You know what I mean? I don't know. I think that we just have to rewire mine sometimes. But to answer your question, do you want me to talk about the things that have crossed off or the things that are still on there?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:28:08

For sure, I want to hear what you've crossed off, because that's so cool. That's something that you put on your list. At one point, they were like, I would love for XYZ to happen, and then they freaking did happen. And then. Of course. I want to hear a couple of things that you would like to see happen in the future. What you're kind of shooting for. Because it'll be so fun in a year or two. Or whatever the timeline is. To look back and be like. Oh. Remember on the podcast.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:28:35

In the beginning. I think my Bucket List was just filled with a bunch of destinations. And then as more years went on, I was just like, maybe that's not enough, because not anyone, but a lot of people can maybe just buy a ticket and then just go to that place and cross it off. But I wanted to find stories and purpose or projects or people in these different destinations. So I started to build almost my business around reverse engineering my Bucket List. It's just like, for example, a few years ago, maybe in 2017, 2018, I really wanted to go to Iceland. That was like the top travel destination, but going there excited me. But not enough just to be there. I wanted to make art there. I wanted to have a life there. What excites me about travel is the idea of maybe living somewhere and getting to walk and talk as the locals do. I want to stay long enough to kind of immerse myself. So when Iceland was on my trip, I'm trying to figure out ways how I can get there to create and make films, because that's what makes me happy, seeing new places and meeting new people. So how I approach that was I found an opportunity and I started working with half the actor from Game of Thrones and stuff like that. So I started looking at my bucket list as the destination. Yes, but then finding a project in there and then that would kind of cross off two things at once on a bucket list, you know what I mean? And I connect because all these bucket list items break into different categories, whether the destinational, professional, creative, personal, health, all these different things. So the ones that I crossed off, it's crazy to think that Iceland was on the bucket list at one point because now I associate with being home because totally, yes, a dozen times. And I have a basement.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:30:09

I love that. Something that was so wild for you before that is now like, home. That's actually exactly what Panama is for me. Because in 2019, on the cusp of New Year's Eve, instead of going out and having drinks, I loved to do New Year's just alone, light some incense and do vision boarding. And my vision board is literally except for being on Super Soul Sunday with Oprah, it's exactly my life, even to the point of having like a jungle SUV vehicle. It's not black on my vision board, it's white in real life. And maybe it's not having Super Soul Sunday podcast, but now I have my own podcast. And maybe Oprah is like, down the line, I don't know. But that's so cool because I remember thinking the same thing. Like, Panama is like, so wild. Imagine maybe down the road and now Panama is home. And same for you. You consider Iceland to be home now. That's so cool.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:31:05

There's a few other locations that kind of share that same pattern. It was always my dream to go to French Polynesia because we all see that photo or Bore tahiti or whatever, and the Canadian, where we endure cold winters, it's like, oh, I want to go somewhere like that. And it just seems so absurd to me coming from Farmland, Alberta, to be like, I can't find a situation in those kind of tropics that's wild. So when I started working with the ocean conservation company coral Gardeners out there back in 2019, that was my first time stepping foot there. And this year I spent three months living there. And now I can say with confidence, it's like a different home with a family, and I have a team and people there. So call it an addiction to turning these wild, obscure bucket list items into something normalish, like something that is a part of my life now. So those are two examples of things I've crossed off. I also wanted to have photo photographs published in major magazines. I wanted to travel to Rajanpad, which, if you don't know that, is the richest part of the ocean.

Speaker 3 00:32:07

Basically.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:32:08

It's the most protected and most beautiful part. It's not really an opinion. It's just like what you would imagine what the ocean should look like if you were to close your eyes and see the ocean. It's beautiful. Every piece of wildlife and marine life is basically situated there to some extent. At the time, I wanted to make a film that reached a million views, which sounds kind of like a silly goal because it's analytical and numerical, but it happened. And now that I did, I did.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:32:34

What video was that?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:32:36

I was telling a story for a friend and he lifted the most amount of weight on this planet, basically. And it was a good narrative, but I had some ideas on how to tell the story. And I don't know how many views have today, but it's on YouTube with over a million views now. But there was a goal that I wanted to write down because I felt like I was only going to make videos that were going to be seen by small amounts of people. I don't know. At that point, I really wanted to see how widely viewed I could make a video, but now that it's crossed off, I know it's not really about that. You know what I mean?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:33:08

Totally.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:33:09

Yeah. So, I mean, I could go down the list. It's kind of cool to review with you just what's happened because I don't take enough time to do this, but for everything that gets crossed off, there's like ten more that jump on the list.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:33:19

Okay, so what's something that you're aspiring for right now? Like, what do you want to make or see happen? Obviously, come to Panama.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:33:28

Yes, absolutely. Number one. Took the words right out of my mouth.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:33:31

Amazing.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:33:32

I have leaned heavily into more storytelling projects, and that sounds vague, but I meant more so in this form of documentary. I've done the marketing stuff, I've done the social media commercial stuff. I have a love for a little bit of everything. But documentary filmmaking is like a very intimate process, and it's immersive.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:33:53

It's like something that you become obsessed with and then you kind of black out and you really get into it, and everything else becomes sort of you're in the what is it? Black diamond water rafting of life? Of filmmaking.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:34:10

I like your choices better.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:34:14

Sky jumping. Oh, God.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:34:18

On the topic of sky jumping, that is also on my bucket list. Not to do it because I've done it three times, but to get my license, because the thing that used to scare me the most is now the thing that I love dearly. So I actually want to get my license and possibly be the person that gives people that experience. So that's a personal goal and a professional goal. But funny enough, maybe we'll talk about at the end, like, almost the day you asked me to be on your podcast about the call to the documentary of a lifetime for a new client. And it'll be ESPN.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:34:53

Come on.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:34:54

Yeah. So this is a big thing.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:34:56

Did you sign an NDA? Can you say anything?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:34:58

I can't say anything else, but shoot. I just got to say that the opportunity came the same time you asked me to come on your podcast. So, again, thank you for being my lucky charm.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:35:09

Wait. Can we play hot cold? Am I dribbling an orange ball? Am I very fast on a motorized vehicle?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:35:27

Nope. Cold.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:35:30

Well, it's ESPN and blades on my feet. Cold, cold. Okay. Not hockey, not basketball, not Formula One. I'm like, what other sports are there?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:35:45

There's only those sports and nothing else.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:35:49

Okay. Am I a soccer player?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:35:56

No.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:35:57

This is so fun. Oh, my gosh. Well, I can't wait to see how this process goes with your documentary, and I'm not sure what your connections are in the documentary sort of world, but I have an amazing friend who will hopefully be on well, he'll be on the podcast for sure, but he's just one of the most brilliant people that I think I've ever met. He's really, like, academic, but he's an incredible filmmaker as well. We worked last year on a film together. It was an animated short film, and it qualified for the long list for the Oscars. So he's, like, very talented and really story focused. So I'd love to connect you to just as, like, a sounding board or if you needed somebody else to chat with.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:36:35

Very much so. Appreciate that.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:36:37

Wow. I'm so excited for you. OOH E-S-P-N. Wow. Fun.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:36:43

I will say the last thing on my list that I want to do that kind of goes hand in hand with what we're talking about is I had aspirations to build a creative agency, and I've been able to get mine off the ground in the last three weeks. And it's actually what will be kind of powering this documentary because I realized somewhere along the journey that I can't do everything by myself.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:37:05

Isn't that I brought up an assistant in 2018, and it changes the game.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:37:12

I'm one month into that game, and I'm in love. Why didn't I do this earlier?

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:37:17

Wow. But there's a sweet spot right where you're like, can I make this happen? And then you do it, and then you're like, oh, okay. I can breathe or I can sleep or I can eat. Definitely you have the time to do things. Wow. How cool. Well, I'm so excited for you. I was going to say, what are you shooting on right now? But I'm sure you've got so much gear at this point. But what is your go to if you have to grab one body, one lens for any project? You have one lens, one body to shoot with. What are you doing?

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:37:50

That's a very good question. I like these questions with strong, strict boundaries. My kids are very small because I have to live nomadically, so I have to live with everything that I own, basically. But that doesn't change my answer. I think I'm going to grab a camera that most people probably wouldn't expect. I would grab my Black Magic Pocket Cinema camera, which is different because that's a filmmaking answer, but it actually plays into photography as well. I said in the beginning of this podcast, I see the world in a filmmaking way. Everything is in motion for me. But I've fallen in love with grabbing stills from my films because the Cinema camera produces amazing quality stuff. But something about grabbing is still at that frame rate with the motion blur and like that super 35 look. It just looks like there's a story naturally in this photograph. And there's something also very beautiful about not being able to have too much control over, like you're shooting a video to get the scene and stuff like that. But the still you pull from it is quite beautiful. And I mean, you could argue if that's photography or not, but I don't know. It's made me look at photography differently just from being able to film like that with this particular camera. This camera respect my creativity and the lens. I would choose I'm going to have to go with the classic 50. I choose the 50 because it motivates the look of a human eye, as you know. So that says everything about probably my personality. I'm trying to give people an insight into what I see when I tell stories and I use that focal, I want them to feel like they're in their room with me.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:39:20

Yeah.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:39:21

Too wide. It feels ethereal. If you use two telephoto, it feels too distant. I really like the motivation of a 50.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:39:27

Oh, I would have not guessed a 50 for you. And that's a really great answer. And you've reinspired me to pick up my 50 when I have it in my kit again. Because I like, you have to live sort of nomadically, and I have to pick and choose the gear that I travel with. And that was something that I used to really pride myself on. Like now, after the Pandemic, I've had a baby, and so I won't be whizzing the world around for at least a little while. So I've sort of stayed put between Panama and Canada. But before, it was like I was so nerdy about packing. I had so much pride. Like, when I would walk onto an airplane, I'd be like, what is up? Do you see this off Craig backpack? Do you know the ways in which I've packed this thing so good with my packing cubes and how minimally I'm traveling? I had one fancy going out outfit, especially, like, traveling to Europe. I had this black jumper. And then never travel with heels because what's the point? But if I was shooting a wedding, I would bring this one pair of heels that were really and they'd pack really nice. I just was such a nerd about packing and packing cubes and weight limits. And doing carry on only. Yeah, I still love it.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:40:53

Oh, my goodness. I love how much you just kicked out over packing. And I relate 1000%. I have packed down to the science. I could literally move my life in five minutes if I needed to at any given moment.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:41:04

So cool.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:41:05

I quickly want to know your answer, though I'm sure you've talked about before, the one camera, one lens.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:41:10

So I'm in a sort of interesting spot right now because, well, the pandemic happened and I was living in Panama, and I was sort of expecting my photography career to sort of it paused, and I needed a pause because my life was so busy with work, I didn't even have the time to share the beautiful work that I was creating. Like, it was just so busy. And everything happened. I landed in Panama. I had a really nice break from work, and it allowed me to fall in love with photography again. So I'm still using the gear that I was using in 2019. So I've got my five DS and my big old lenses. But I'm at an interesting spot where I'm like, do I move to mirrorless now? So I just bought, at the beginning of the year, water housing because my dream as a prairie girl coming from small town Canada, I grew up watching the movie Blue Crush, and I thought when I was in high school, roxy and Billabong were the brands to wear. And that whole lifestyle really resonated with me. My room was painted baby pink and I had surf magazine cut outs all over my walls. It's so funny to me now that that's like my life. Talk about vision boarding and yeah, so I bought a water housing. And when you buy a water housing, you have to buy it for the camera that you have, as you know. And water housing are equally as expensive as actual cameras. So I said, okay, well, I'm going to hang on to at least this camera set up that I have to accommodate the water housing. And if it's a real go and things are really moving with it in terms of shooting a lot and that sort of thing, maybe I'll grow that forward. But I would just shoot with what I have, and that's my five D. And, well, I have quite a few lenses, but my favorite is a 35. I love the Sigma art. That's why I take in the water. It's heavy, it's a workout, but I'm also not shooting massive waves. So when I started my love affair of surfing and the whole lifestyle, I was like, oh, I'm going to surf like bigger waves. I'm going to be this shredding girl in the water on my surfboard. And, well, let me tell you, if you've ever been pummeled by a wave, it's not pleasant. And so, that being said, I love baby waves. I love chill, I love longboarding, I like not feeling like I'm going to die. When the wave rolls over me, I just really enjoy the sweet. Like, I like sitting on my board and watching the butterflies float over me. I like enjoying the landscape. I can look away from the ocean for half a second and not get slammed by wave. That's the surfing that I enjoy.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:43:48

Surfing. I think we both embarked on this water photography journey this year because it was really intense. What is the biggest thing that you've learned from starting this journey? Because there's so many things when you start shooting in the water.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:44:03

Well, okay, so I bought the wrong water housing for sure because shooting surf with 35 is, like, not fun. You have to be actually where the other surfer is and it can be really dangerous because you've got a surfboard coming right for your head. So I would probably start shooting maybe with like an 85, something like that and then go mirrorless, so it's lighter. But that's in the future. That's fine. But works actually really picked up for me despite living in a really small town. It's seasonal for sure, because it's dependent on tourists, but it's really nice. It's almost like work has flipped for me where before it was me traveling to everywhere else and shooting and telling people's stories. Now I get to live in the most magical place and people from all over the world come to visit me. Well, they're visiting the town, they're not visiting me, but they find me as a photographer and they hire me. So I get to meet people from all over the world and say, oh, yeah, I've been to Switzerland. Oh, I love this place. Oh, yes. Have you been there? Cool. Yeah, it's so neat. So I get that sort of international energy without leaving 500 meters from my house. It's so cool.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:45:11

I love it. They bring the travel to you.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:45:12

Yeah, it's really great. Anthony, you're amazing. And we need to do this once a month because I feel like we haven't even scratched the surface. You are so talented and I could just talk photography with you and adventure and travel and storytelling with you all day. This is great.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:45:35

I can't believe how fast time has gone.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:45:36

Oh, my gosh. I know. Well, let's just say part two coming soon. Thank you for coming and meeting and sharing your energy and your stories. You are such a great storyteller. And yeah, I'm just really grateful to have met you and worked with you so briefly. And, yes, I'm so excited to watch your journey as you move forward and shoot this exciting documentary that is not basketball, hockey, football, or F. One.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:46:06

You've got one other major sport, but you'll find I just want to say that I'm really grateful for you spending time with me and allowing me to be on your podcast. I think you are exactly where you need to be. You are such a strong communicator and you have this thing about you where you make people just want to open up and you just have a light. So thank you for sharing that.

Monique Pantel (Host) 00:46:29

Thanks Anthony. Your best. Have an amazing day.

Anthony Do (Guest) 00:46:33

Thanks, you too.

LINKS

Creative Alchemy’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/creativealchemypodcast/?hl=en

Anthony’s Website: https://www.anthonykdo.com/

Anthony’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/anthonykdo/

Monique’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/monique_pantel/?hl=en

Monique’s Website: https://www.pantelphoto.com/