We had the good fortune of connecting with Ryan “Kodak” Brown and we’ve shared our conversation below.
Hi Ryan “Kodak”, other than deciding to work for yourself, what else do you think played a pivotal role in your story?
The single most important decision I EVER made in life was selling my possessions – the ones that did not fit in the panniers of my bicycle – and setting off on a journey to cycle around the world! It was this decision that provided the confidence, knowledge, and framework to start freelancing and form my own company.
I was a very shy and anxious youth. Bike touring, and travel in general, forced me out of “comfortable isolation” and into new experiences and cultures. After years of this, I’ve become comfortable with discomfort; with risks and the unknown. It’s also provided perspective on what truly matters in life and what does not. After years of living out of tent along a road or a remote mountain pass, I appreciate the “little” things in life. Running water that doesn’t need filtering, flushable toilets that don’t need to be dug, sturdy walls that don’t flap in wind, and the security of lockable doors. I’ve learned what true survival requires and, because of these survival situations, I acquired the confidence to pursue and persist through any endeavor.
I carried a camera on every adventure to document my experiences. Photography quickly became a passion that’s become a career. After my first journey, I began studying and consumed every book and video I could find on the subject. I learned from the likes of Joel Sartore, a National Geographic photographer famous for his Photo Ark, a mission to “document the worlds animals,” and Galen Rowel, considered by many the grandfather of adventure photography. Then, out on adventures of my own, I practiced and honed my craft.
In order to travel nearly full-time, I was forced to whittle bills to nothing and expenses to well below poverty lines. I slept in a tent and ate the most basic foods cooked on a camp stove. My only expense was a cell phone and, between adventures while saving for the next, I’d sleep anywhere anyone would let me. This meant friends and families couches, equipment trailers on job sites, a yurt on weed farm for a season, and even a run-down squat in a city. I live in a van now and, because of this frugality, I have the freedom to experiment and take risks, such as freelancing and starting a media company.
Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
Freelancing and starting a media company was not easy! It is one of the most difficult challenges I’ve ever undertaken. Confidence is required to set a price on ones work and advertise it to the world. Thankfully, after years of biketouring, thruhiking, and traveling around the world, I learned many of the requisite lessons already. Asking money for photo, video, or words is relatively easy after asking, or sometimes practically begging for shelter, food, or water. In an extreme moment during a tropical storm on a mountain top, I stood shivering in hypothermic conditions while pantomiming for shelter to an indigenous man in Mexico. I was taken inside and sat beside a wood stove before being handed hot coffee and later dinner – hand-ground tortillas with beans, rice, and squash. I was allowed to sleep on the bare earth floor of their kitchen while thunder cracked and hail pelted the adobe structure. Experiences like these are humbling in deeply human ways that make value for money trades a relatively small ask.
Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
I’m not much of a city person, so I’d take a friend into the mountains. Were they an experienced backpacker, we’d go somewhere well above tree-line and summit a peak, with camp waiting beside a remote, alpine lake. Dinner would be boiled in water filtered, or not, from said lake and eaten right-out-of-the-pot with a metal spork! It’s most likely a Knorr Rice Side or Kraft Mac n’ Cheese but perhaps we’d splurge on a delicious, dehydrated dinner. A campfire would crackle – if allowed – and morning would be welcomed with an instant packet of coffee. For the less experienced, the itinerary would be the same, only less remote and extreme. Car camping in an established site, complete with picnic tables and glorious, flushable toilets is just as rewarding.
Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
If I could view life in a different realm of a multiverse, I would LOVE to know how my life transpires without having read “Into Thin Air” by Jon Krakauer. It was this book that started my life down the ‘adventure rabbit hole’. Then adventurers such as Alastair Humphreys cemented my fate and I quickly followed in their tracks. Joel Sartore was an early photography mentor, and so was Christian Schaffer.
Website: www.wilderland.media
Instagram: Ryankodakbrown
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/ryankodakbrown