rising star in Canada's music video industry.

Bermudian Ian Tucker is a 28-year-old film director and editor who has founded a company called "Flex Films'' along with cinematographer Rion Gonzales.

Mr. Tucker and Mr. Gonzales teamed up while attending the Ontario College of Art (OCA) and began working on film projects together.

Mr. Tucker, who dabbled in other forms of art while growing up on the Island, said attending film school gave him the opportunity to try an entirely new form of expression.

"When I left the Island, I had it in my head that I wasn't going to do any of the kind of artwork I'd done here -- it was like breaking free,'' he said.

"I was young and I was trying to escape a lot of things about Bermuda... so my first year, I threw myself into film.

"And Toronto is an extremely busy city in terms of film production -- it's number three after Los Angeles and New York.

"We were really ambitious... We spent what little money we had on filming, because it's an expensive medium -- I was living on Kraft Macaroni and Cheese and lost about 25 pounds the first semester,'' he laughed.

Mr. Tucker spent long afternoons in Canada's $2 movie theatres, watching as many as four films on Saturdays to fulfil his obsession with visual images.

The first film he and Mr. Gonzales created, entitled "Akasha'', was inspired by a character in Anne Rice's vampire novel "Queen of the Damned'' and won him a scholarship.

His second film, based in Bermuda, was a 20-minute fairy tale about capital punishment involving animals living on the Island -- which won him $12,000 worth of film equipment through the William F. White award.

However, Mr. Tucker was still somewhat dissatisfied, and faced the common dilemma about whether art should function as an expression of personal creativity or as a means of communicating with an audience.

"I'd do a film at OCA that would get good reviews and teachers would love it -- but I'd bring it home, and my mother and friends wouldn't understand it,'' he said.

"So I had this real struggle... I had a big realisation that art in itself is a medium of communication.

"I think you have to be honest -- if you're not communicating what you want, you need to look at your art and think about the fact that you're not the smartest person in the world and may not be communicating well,'' he added.

Mr. Tucker's third film, which he completed for graduation, was initially supposed to continue with the theme of capital punishment -- and he planned to do a documentary about Erskine (Buck) Burrows and Larry Tacklyn who were executed in 1977.

"I was advised at the time that it wasn't a good idea, but I may do something at some point in the future,'' he said.

"There are so many Bermudian stories that need to be documented, and we shouldn't be trying to hide that part of our heritage -- it happened, and we need to look at what it was to learn from it,'' he added.

After graduating from film school, Mr. Tucker worked as a production assistant "pouring coffee for everyone under the sun''.

"It was a real eye-opener coming face to face with the feature film business -- the stars, and how they're pandered to,'' he said.

"But there's no real glamour in this business -- unless you're dating Nia Long,'' he chuckled.

The first set he was on was "Madame Butterfly'' with Jeremy Irons, and later was on craft service for "The Ref''.

"I spent hours out in the freezing cold while I was on the set just to get my foot in the door -- that's when I realised that it was just a job,'' he said.

After running low on money and energy, Mr. Tucker returned home to Bermuda -- where, ironically, he got his first real break working as a cameraman and editor for local production company Fresh Creations.

"Elmore (Warren, Fresh Creations owner) pushes you to the limit of your abilities -- he expects the best of you, so I pushed myself,'' said Mr.

Tucker.

After spending three years in Bermuda working with Fresh Creations on television shows, commercials, corporate videos and documentaries, Mr. Tucker returned to Canada with plans to branch out into motion pictures.

He started working with music videos -- considered to be "the bottom of the pile'' for those in the industry -- but also as a place where he was able to gain directing experience.

Mr. Tucker began directing videos for a Jamaican hiphop group called "Women A Run Tings'' and a dance group called "After Dark''.

He has also worked on videos from country western artist Phil Reynolds, reggae group Lazah Current and rap artist Phat Al.

Mr. Tucker got a grant from Canada's video channel "Much Music'' to work on the "Women A Run Tings'' video -- which proved to be a great success.

"I wrote, directed, did the graphic layouts, editing, and handled some of the wardrobe... it became a labour of love and I didn't want to put any old crap out there,'' he said.

"The video put women in a magazine layout, and the articles showed them in different occupations that were once thought to be for males only, like fire fighting. I then turned it into a funky animated layout.

"Anyway, I was sitting down in October on the phone, arguing over a bill, when Rion yelled that Much Music had called on the other line...the jury panel stopped watching videos after seeing ours to call us.'' The unsigned band had their video placed on rotation at Much Music, playing three or four times a day, "simply because the video was that good''.

"And when I think about the fact that big record companies like Warner Brothers have started to call me, I get a warm, tingly feeling,'' he smiled.

"But music videos are the first step -- my heart and soul is in feature film and one day, I want to be like Allison (Swan).'' Mr. Tucker is trying to find ways of incorporating Bermudian themes into his work, and hopes to one day market Bermuda through film.

"We don't export stuff anymore -- we draw stuff in and it stays here -- but the things most interesting to people away are the things we take for granted.

"There are so many stories on this Island that we can present to the rest of the world -- and I know they'll watch it.''