ABOUT SETH

Seth Ward, Digital Film-maker

My history in digital media…

I’m Seth Ward and I love creating and promoting digital media content and new media businesses.

Since 1984, aged 10, I have been consuming, creating and selling content for the internet (and the online services that preceded it). If you cut my veins you’ll be covered in zeroes and ones.

My first business was an amusement arcade which I opened up (in my parent’s garage) where the customers (kids from my primary school) could come to play Donkey Kong, Frogger and Space Invaders (instead of going to lessons). The profits were spent as soon as they came in and my friend Matthew Port and I lived like kings (eating all the sweets we could dream of and going to the cinema every day to watch E.T. – something I did almost every day of the school holidays in the summer of 1982, when I decided one day I would make films of my own)

Several ventures later I set up my first proper business, an internet consultancy. This was back in 1995, when it was obvious that it was going to revolutionise almost every aspect of life, education, entertainment and business. By 1999, having grown into a respected internet consultancy in the UK, I was yearning to do something more creative and decided to use my skills, experience and resources to create new internet-based ventures.

The first of these, Scout7, was inspired by a love of Aston Villa football club and a desire to help them improve their squad. Together with the founders, the late Johnny Haynes and the now Managing Director Lee Jamison, we designed and built a way to professionalise the scouting systems of football clubs by building a web application to store information about every footballer on the planet. I created the business plan, designed and programmed the website at the core of the business and raised £500,000 venture and loan capital. With Lee’s expert management the club has progressed from its first deal with West Bromwich Albion (with the help of TV’s Adrian Chiles) to having the majority of football’s major clubs across the UK and Europe as clients.

Next, in 2000, on the verge of moving to New York to attend film school, I built a mobile entertainment business, Mobee, and tested the market. The success was immediate and I brought in my old school-friend, Carl Venables, as Managing Director. 5 years later it had sold over $15 million of music, video and games content for mobile phones, from a startup ‘investment’ of only $750 – and we’d had a lot of fun along the way. We had offices and staff in Birmingham, London, Paris, Spain, Germany, Toronto and Sydney and were about to sell the business when a series of bad debts unfortunately brought the business – which had no financial backing – to its knees.

Since then I have returned to internet consultancy, providing services to charities and businesses large and small, while eagerly pursuing my dream of entering the world of film by studying and practicing in every available spare hour.

In 2009 I bought a Canon 7D after recognising how the new DSLR cameras were going to revolutionise and democratise filmmaking in a similar way the internet has done to broadcasting and the control of information. Within 12 months I had helped (produced / directed / directed photography) on 5 shorts, a music video and 3 feature films

I consider myself incredibly lucky to be fulfilling my dreams, and I’m now working on 3 features, 2 TV series and a transmedia project – in addition to an internet venture which will help other filmmakers to create and distribute a new type of interactive film for a global audience.

I’m a self-shooter, a producer, a writer/director, a cinematographer and an internet distribution specialist, as well as helping people to create new media-based businesses and promote themselves online. I’m always open to working on new, interesting, fun and challenging projects.