Hi! My name is Devon, and I'm a videographer and creator from New Jersey.

Unfortunately, on April 16th, I had quite literally the worst possible nightmare happen to me. I took the bus from Houston to Austin to see friends I hadn't seen in about a year after an amazing opportunity to shoot for the YouTube creator Jidion. I was expecting a great trip with some of my favorite people when I got there. I left my equipment and everything I had for my trip to Texas in the backseat of my friend Josiah’s car while I went out and helped them film. We were gone for only 30 minutes, so I wasn't worried anything was going to happen. We were parked in a public parking lot entirely out in the open, and it was my only option to leave my stuff in the backset of his truck (because his pickup truck didn’t have a trunk). We got back to the car not too long after only to find out the window of the backseat was shattered.

For those that know me, you know my life revolves around shooting. The one thing I genuinely enjoy in this life is filming and creating. This wouldn't be possible without the equipment I have worked for years to get. Coming from a non-wealthy family, I've been grinding and working for my entire life to get the equipment I need. The emotions running through my head during this moment were completely surreal.

My new 2021 MacBook Pro I bought myself (after having a 2013 Macbook for 8 years) is gone. My new Canon Eos r5 is gone. My entire lens arsenal is gone. All of my SD cards and hard drives with memories that I cannot get back are gone. Memories from traveling the US... all of that is more valuable to me than everything on this list. It's all gone. On top of that all of my clothes, essentials and everything I packed for my trip - gone.  As I'm writing this, I have been searching the internet almost 24/7 to see if anything came up being sold online: Marketplace, Craigslist, Offerup, Mercari, etc. 

Asking for help is not something I ever do. If you truly know me you know I always have the mindset that I'll figure it out myself. I do not expect anyone to donate anything, but if you are able to and have it in your heart to help out I would really, truly appreciate it. This is not a small set back - my only source of making money relies on my equipment. Although it seems like this could have been prevented, we all make mistakes, and it’s just a very unfortunate situation altogether. 

But who knows… what if I never went to Austin but ended up getting into a car crash on my way to the airport back to New Jersey? Everything happens for a reason, and the one thing I took away from this past week when filming for Jidion was to always remember to pray when life is going well because we often forget to until things get bad. 

Thanks for reading, I deeply appreciate your time and donations,
Devon