Hello Steemit, I'm Ben. Writer, Filmmaker, Content Creator, Traveler. Chicago native living in Thailand

Drones, motorcycles, camping, trekking, adventure, travel, spearfishing, and random musings, that's the general scope of what I hope to share here.

Hi everyone, I'm Ben. I'm 33 years old from Chicago (city born and bred, grew up in Logan Square). I've lived in Thailand for about 4.5 of the last 7 years, basing myself here and visiting home twice a year for around 6 weeks. I'm what people like to call a digital nomad, and although I don't really like that word, it's accurate. I do advertising work and content creation over the internet from wherever I happen to be. I've created TV commercials, web videos, social media content, and a whole lot more for companies like Heineken, OPPO, Carlsberg, Tuborg, Visa, and others.

I don't actually live anywhere, as in I have no place to call home. I'm not exactly a minimalist, I do like having toys, I just try not to have too much. I keep a few boxes of gear with friends. I travel with my laptop and all my camera gear in a backpack (the reason I love my foldable DJI Mavic Pro drone), plus a small suitcase of clothes. I keep my beach toys (mask, snorkel, fins, speargun and spearing accessories) at a friend's house near the sea in Krabi. I keep my camping gear at a friend's house in Pai up in Northern Thailand. When I need those things elsewhere, I either pick them up, or ask the friends to mail them to me.

A big part of what keeps me inspired to keep traveling is a travel brand I created with my friend Henry - @freelancestories . On our website It's better in Thailand, and on Facebook/IG/YT we post stories, photos, and mainly videos of our Thailand travel adventures. Facebook is where we're most active, with just over 40k followers right now.

My big push right now is to up my filmmaking skills. I do this through YouTube tutorials, and by just editing and seeing what works. I don't think I'll ever be doing TV commercials for major brands, but I'd like to get to the point where I can do web videos for them, and I think I'm close.

Upcoming trips include Phuket where I'll be cashing in on some ultra-luxury resort stays I have. I'll be doing some boat trips there, likely including a yacht party. I may also learn to surf, something I've wanted to do for a long time now. After that I think I'll move over to Krabi to do some rock climbing at the stunning limestone karsts that jut out of the tropical sea there. Then I'll be heading home for some late summer Chi Town weather, and as many BBQs as I can go to. The rest is TBD but my annual Indonesian volcano trek will fit in there somewhere.

So yeah, that's me. If you're into any of this I'd love to have you follow along. If you write about any of the above topics, please let me know in a comment and I'll definitely follow along. Also if you have recommendations of others to follow, that'd be very helpful. I'm reading lots of posts trying to find like-minded folk, but any help would be appreciated. I guess I'll leave it there, and drop some photos below.

if you read my post on how I started my freelance career, you've seen most of these photos