Shannon Alexander

Even at high school, Shannon Alexander harboured dreams of being a camera operator, before eventually picking up an 8mm video camera and casting family and friends in his home-made epic dramas. If only the stars of these shorts had taken them as seriously.

“I believed I was making serious drama,” he jokes, “but everyone I showed them to wound up laughing because they thought they were watching comedy.”

But familial jibes weren’t enough to put the budding director off, as Alexander’s recent spot for Panasonic shows. Set in a supermarket in Sydney, an employee on the night shift encounters an unusual can of cat food that persists in falling off the shelf. The bemused employee investigates further to find there is something very special about this cat food and luckily, he has his Panasonic digital camera to capture it.

It was a challenging shoot for the 24-year-old director, as it had to be done in just three hours, with shooting taking place while the store was open with customers walking in and out of shot.

“Initially, I was told by the store manager we had complete permission to set up and shoot there,” he recalls. “But just before we finished, the shop owner’s son turned up with some special instructions from his old man: he politely told us to pack up and fuck off.”

Thankfully, the last remaining shot was nailed in the first take but Alexander never lost his sense of humour.

“In that kind of situation, you just have to have a laugh,” he muses. “After completion, I gave a gift to the store manager and found out he wasn’t fired, which was a relief.”

Growing up in Perth, Western Australia, Alexander wasn’t short of inspiration from the beautiful and natural environment around him, but he was far more interested in the filmic gems at his local video store.

“I got my kicks by watching the darkest, most violent R-rated films I could get my hands on,” he explains. “As a kid I’d pick the titles from the video store and tell my obliging granddad to go and make the transaction.”

After moving to Sydney when he was 18 to pursue a career in filmmaking, he felt there was a lack of decent scripts around, so he took the initiative – and the pen – into his own hands.

“It became apparent that in order for me to direct someone else’s idea, I too had to learn how to write,” he says. “The screenwriting course I took at RMIT University offered me many great tools and practice in the craft of storytelling which has helped me grow as a director.

With this in mind, my main purpose and focus is to get out there and direct.”