Get ready for storytime, discovery, and a whirlwind of curiosity with Amy Quinn! We'll learn all about her vocational journey and have a few good laughs along the way.
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welcome to Here We Are. The podcast where we celebrate the beauty of being a nerd by learning about nerdy things from fellow nerds. I'm your host Joy Bork. Today y'all are going to meet a gem of a human. I met Amy on a job site and we became fast friends. She's a graphics operator for the corporate events world, and she's also secretly a wizard. Today's interview isn't just about her job, but more about her evolution of discovery. So without further ado, here's my friend. Amy Quinn. When.
Amy Quinn:My name is Amy Quinn. And I am a graphic artist, not in a sense of what everyone thinks, but more in the line of digital video broadcasty graphics
Joy Bork:and that's why I met you.
Amy Quinn:that is exactly why we met. And thank God. Perfect segue into why I love my job.
Joy Bork:Tell me everything. So we're nerding out about graphic artistry.
Amy Quinn:very well graphic artists, and I guess what you'd call a, a graphics operator per se, right? Is that that's part of the job that I didn't know about. You get thrown into things That's probably what you did. You started out in the category of where we are and then went into everything. I mean, you're a genius. So you probably got yourself into little mini holes and figured it out. I have just stayed in my field. I went to four different colleges. Because why not? As a, Yeah. it just seemed like at the time, I didn't know you had to pay for it. So I just thought, Hey, let's go and do some college jumping. Dumb idea. But I, in a way was smart. I wanted to be a designer of furniture. I thought that was the coolest thing in the world until I realized that. Yeah, no, it's so cool. But, and then I realized that there are a lot of classes and money that you put into it. I went to the, Institute of design and after my first semester of heavily partying and still doing a side gig and doing a full-time job, I aced it. I'm like, how, how is that possible? Can't be possible. And I realized that's the first semester. And I was just wasting my time, but it wasn't necessarily, for me, it was just a launch to, to say, you know what, that's what they say to you when you're in high school, what do you want to do for.
Joy Bork:Right.
Amy Quinn:And it's you have to have an answer. I'm like, furniture is cool.
Joy Bork:Yeah,
Amy Quinn:That's fun. Let's go there. And so That's what I went with. But segue. Then I, because I didn't know what I wanted to do. I went to a junior college, I got my associates just because that's what you do again. Then someone said, hey, go to U of I. My best friend at the time was going to U of I Champagne. I want to U of I Chicago because my mom's a single mom and I didn't want to leave her. I was like, I'll just go there. It's the same thing. It is not. Whatsoever. Not only is the location totally different, people are totally different. And I just have to say, I didn't know what I wanted to be there either, but in this, and I don't mean this in any offense to, to any minority or anything, cause I'm Asian, but I found that the community was very diverse, which was great.
Joy Bork:Yeah.
Amy Quinn:Unfortunately, my biggest, my biggest predator were Asians.
Joy Bork:Wow.
Amy Quinn:they literally were like, why are you not having a major, like, why aren't you in medicine? And why aren't you an architect or why aren't you this? I'm thinking. Cause I don't, I don't know what I want to do. They're like, yeah, you're like, you're a junior. You should really should know this at this point. I saw this video class, I'm like oh I'm going to take that. Unfortunately, when I walked in, it was like probably 80 people in very large room. And as I was trying to hear what they were talking about, I realized that, wow, I don't know how I'm going to learn this because I can hardly hear as a bunch of us, everyone's asked the questions. So I went to, the woman who was teaching it. She says, unfortunately, this is a theory school. We don't, we're not going to give you a camera. We're not going to give you any equipment to do this. You just, here's your book and I'm thinking I can just read a book. Like, why am I here? You talk about things and that was fine. So I literally went to my Dean like right after that conversation and said to him: I think I'm going to go. Because I, this isn't for me. And he's like, I think you can make him making a big mistake. I said, no, I'm going to take off. And my only fear was telling my mom yet again, I'm going to another school, I was dating a guy who was going to Northern Illinois.
Joy Bork:Okay.
Amy Quinn:I was like, I'll go there. He's there. Right. So I signed up going to Northern, whatever driving there, I get there. And all I saw was fields of corn. And I said, And there was a train tracks and, then you had to go through another field of corn to get to the apartments, turn around, went right back home. And I said, that wasn't for me. So that's what I mean by the fourth school, but I really know, but so going back to leaving. I got on the train. I lived in Forest Park at the time. So it would be west instead of east, but I went east by accident on the train. Cause I wasn't thinking, I was trying to figure out how to
Joy Bork:It's an easy mistake.
Amy Quinn:Especially again, just not thinking and may do it. I did it everyday. Right. I went home and it, but I just went the other way. And all of a sudden I realize that I'm going the wrong way. And I looked out, I know I stepped off the train and I coincidentally saw this door and there was a lot of people. I don't know if you're familiar because you are young with the movie Fame or the show Fame. Anyone in my age would know it. It was a very artsy school. People are outside with their boombox dancing and,
Joy Bork:from 1980.
Amy Quinn:Yeah. I mean it felt like fame to me. So I got off the train. I went in and in the big banner, I can still see it. It says open registration. I was like today. Yeah. I'm going in. That's why I went in there. And this woman to this day, who I love and adore, unfortunately she passed. She's amazing. I told her what I want to do. I cried. Cause I said, I'm a loser. I can't figure out my life. And she goes, you've come to the right place. I said, yeah,
Joy Bork:you just walk into Narnia
Amy Quinn:Yeah, basically,
Joy Bork:through the wardrobe?
Amy Quinn:That's so perfect. the way you just said that, because it was. Like a Narnia wardrobe door and then it opened up to unbelievable possibilities, but things that I want to do, I wasn't afraid of it. And it was just like, what's this door do? What's this door?
Joy Bork:So it opened your curiosity.
Amy Quinn:Absolutely.
Joy Bork:It wasn't like shutting you in like the other ones.
Amy Quinn:Yes, but also on top of it all, there was so many doors, right. So even if I didn't like this door, I wanted to open this door because I knew, I just knew it was, it was in the spectrum of what I wanted to do. At least. It was creative. It was cool. People weren't different and it was fine. There were Asians like me who were not architects or doctors, they were writers and they were artists and they were, so it, it really, it gave me that like curiosity. And then like I'm staying. And the woman I talked to, she became my mentor with everything. And I just that's how this whole thing started. Towards the end of my days there, she said, Hey, I have this internship you should go do. I'm like, okay, great. And at the time it was these new daytime shows. So obviously there was Oprah. I don't know. I think, again, you're too young for Jenny Jones. Jenny Jones was a comedian turned daytime TV host. But she says, I have this Jenny Jones intern, you should go. And I'm thinking, oh Yeah, that's so cool. TV. Yay. Horrible, horrible, awful thing to do to yourself at that time because. You're, you, know, everyone does the PA work
Joy Bork:can you define PA real quick for my
Amy Quinn:Yes, yes. Yes. So a PA, is the production assistant. It encompasses everything. So that production assistant literally assists the production. Everything that happens within
Joy Bork:anything from coffee runs to
Amy Quinn:To writing things down because you have to, to putting things like continuity to looking through tapes yeah.
Joy Bork:printing off a million scripts. That change and then you have to print them all off again.
Amy Quinn:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, I hate that chair. Go get me a new chair like that. It's like the, it's a Butler that has to do everything and puts on all the hats. And so that's what I was, but I was a production assistant for the audience, which is even worse. Yeah. So audience production, which means, so I'm going to give you a perfect example. There was a time where she was having the Australian fireman calender people.
Joy Bork:Ah, okay. This is interesting.
Amy Quinn:Yeah, it was Amy, go grab 15 koalas and then some Palm trees. And I'm thinking now prior to Google, computers, and cell phones.
Joy Bork:And Amazon.
Amy Quinn:And Amazon. So there are computers, but there to type letters and stuff like that, they weren't like, oh, let's look this up. That wasn't happening.
Joy Bork:What did you do?
Amy Quinn:There was no internet. It was the yellow pages that was this thick. And you look. And you've called. Yes. And I was looking for, a fake koala bears and I'm like, maybe I'll go to toys R us, I'll just buy a whole bunch. Maybe I'll call a beach company to blow up, Palm trees, whatever I had, I had do something to the set and I'm thinking, wow, all right. I've never been to Austrialia. I just know about things. I'm like, how about sharks? to figure it out. What are you doing Australia? Long story short. I realized at that time, unless you loved it and you did it well, and you didn't think about it and just that it wasn't going to be for you. So when I left that, she said I have another internship, but said, no, no, no, no. I'm not doing that. That's not for me. She was no, no, no better. It's McDonald's I go, oh, great. You're like, of course in my head I'm going, why would you, why, what am I going to do there? They're like, we are still going backwards. Why would I go to McDonalds? I go to McDonald's every other day. I'm not going there to work. And she said, no, no, no, you don't get it. And then she explained to me that they have a TV company, blah, blah, blah, television. I'm like, okay, fine, fine, fine. And she said, believe it or not, it is the most coveted internship my department has. Oh, yes. McDonald's was the, the premier internship to get, because once you got in the door that McDonald's Corp TV department, the possibilities were endless. I was just like, oh, okay.
Joy Bork:And their headquarters is in the Chicago suburbs. Right.
Amy Quinn:it's in the Chicago suburbs. At the time they had a television studio, which looked if you drove by it on 90/ 94, you're like, oh, there's a McDonald's. It's not. It's where they filmed everything. It looks exactly like McDonald's but the back of it is all
Joy Bork:That's very
Amy Quinn:editing, very confusing. So I went and I interviewed, they did not hire me. They were just like, Yeah. we'll think about it. Right. Whatever. I'm like, oh man, bad news bears. I'm so sorry, I didn't get the job, like this and that, whatever, because it was one, one a year. Then this is why I believe in miracles. I get a call from a woman and she said, this is Tracy at McDonald's. We met with you last week or two weeks ago. And I said, yeah I said, I didn't think I got that just because someone said you didn't get that. They gave it to another person and, but that person started and all he did was make long distance phone calls to God knows where and they found out Yeah. Honestly, so they said they let him go and I was runner up. So lesson there, it's never bad to be second.
Joy Bork:Yep.
Amy Quinn:I'm second. And I went in there and met the most amazing people, Kate being one of them and everyone else. And we all had different jobs. I was the PA and I would do everything. But then there were people who started out as just doing like lower thirds
Joy Bork:What's a lower third.
Amy Quinn:If you're watching sports
Joy Bork:sports
Amy Quinn:The sports! And you see people's names and like, those are the things are going down that would be like, a Chyron operator at the
Joy Bork:Yeah, that's the, that's the software brand,
Amy Quinn:the software brand, Yes. Thank you. That they would use to have the name up here now. And then there was the show caller. Someone who told you when to do that and you call cameras and to turn them on and off and all that stuff. So we had a whole production going on and I noticed that I veered towards the background stuff. So when I say that as a lot of times, when you see someone without a background and it's, what is it? Chroma key, right? So it's a, it's a green screen. You had to design something to go back there. It was me like, okay, do that. And so I taught myself. When the day was done, I would go upstairs and I would teach myself how to do this because I, I thought it was very interesting.
Joy Bork:That's amazing.
Amy Quinn:yeah, I started, I opened up the paint box and I would draw on it to make backgrounds and I was doing doodling. I was just really having fun. Cause I just thought it was interesting. One of the producers side and was like, why are you really good at that? I'm like, really? Cause I just scanned a tie. I, I took a tie that I saw in a wardrobe room. I scanned it And then I do I drew over it and made some patterns that was cool. And they're like, we're using them. I'm like, what? So that's how I started. I just started pulling things in. I started teaching myself at night, how to do
Joy Bork:That's
Amy Quinn:because it was just cool. I was the art part of it to me was great. The idea of, creating something and then, movement. So I would just like, how do you move that? So I would scan one part and I'd scan it the other way, and I would make them go backwards, back and forth back. And. That made things move. And so we did have a show called What's Up McDonald's? It was like an MTVish show that they had made for the McDonalds crew. And they would see it once a week. And you tell them that the new things, Hey, have you tried this fry? Or, you don't have to shake it. And this type of fry and look what these buns, all that stuff. And so I would make fun buns in the background or I would make fries and that's how I started.
Joy Bork:that's amazing.
Amy Quinn:Yeah, and when I got, when I had my, whatever X amount of time with them, they offered me a job.
Joy Bork:That's incredible.
Amy Quinn:offered me a job and they said, Hey, would you mind being a graphic artist here? And I'm like, oh my God, a title and everything?
Joy Bork:Would I mind.
Amy Quinn:That's how I started in graphics, but I went into it. in the video realm. I wanted to do like some editing, or I wanted do some writing, but I discovered that I couldn't fake the writing, even if I tried. Like I would write something and people like, no, but you, if you drew that,
Joy Bork:go for it.
Amy Quinn:But then that's how, again, steps to where I am now, which that part seems so much cooler now. That department slash area closed. They no longer needed that, technology was getting better. So the funniest thing about this whole event in my life is when people ask me. Did you know what you wanted to do when you were younger? I always say what I do, how I got here was never in any syllabus. You couldn't go to college and say, this is what I want to do. Now it is. But when I was going to school, it was just self-discovery. You don't say you're going to be a graphics operator or artists but there was no such thing. So it's nice to pioneer this type of job where it was nowhere to be found, it was like how do you write a job description based on this? I just did it. Cause it was like what I wanted to do. Completely fall into it, but then fell in love with it because not the job itself, cause that was fun and exciting. Very, very stressful at times because okay, we're going to go on. We're live, let's go. But what was nice was the people. Again, such as yourself, you meet these different peoples from all walks of life. And they, at the time had the same experience I did where we were all like, Hey, what does this button do? What this door, open up to. So that was the coolest part about getting started in this business. Was all the avenues that met together
Joy Bork:so much curiosity. Would you say that kind of the through line of all of this is your nerd is actually curiosity?
Amy Quinn:Yeah, that's the root of it. I think it's it's curiosity and just like the adventure of, of that.
Joy Bork:The brightness of it.
Amy Quinn:yes,
Joy Bork:It feels bright to me. When I feel alive, I feel that bright spark of curiosity, when I am leaning more toward the depressed side, everything goes gray. But that is my experience of you. Like when we met the first time in the middle of a show in New Jersey, you were this bright spot that broke through like the gray of my panic, because I had no clue what was going on. And in that moment, like to me, That bright spot was enough to let me know I'm not alone. And you're going to be fine. And ha here's a joke. Poke, poke, poke.
Amy Quinn:And it's funny you say that, but I feel like that that's exactly, what's cool about our job is because there's a lot of times, like now there's a perfect story or the perfect example of you go somewhere. You don't quite know what your role is, you know how the whole production works. But at that time, I'm like, what am I supposed to do? But then you have these people who are in the same boat as you, you're all, we're all there. What are we doing now? And it's nice because you do have that camaraderie. If I fall, they're going to get me. Or this person knows just as much as I do and they're treading and they're doing good. So it's almost like you follow suit and you're Right, it's, that's exactly right. And I. One of the biggest reasons why I'm staying in this thing too. Isn't because I know everything. It's ever evolving. right. But the basis is what you know, but the people you meet that lead you to your next adventure they're there. It's very rare that I don't go into work and come home and something cool happens. Or my God, I saw this huge screen. I've never seen a screen that big. They take, it's always evolving. And there's always people that you look to because you did not think it was possible when you see them. And you, you see where they're at and you see what they're doing. You're like, oh hallelujah like we can do that. The curiosity gets you to this, and then it gets you further and further and further. That's where you can't wait to see what the next job is. Sometimes it's disappointing. Sometimes you come home. You're like wah wah, let's erase that, you know? But Yeah. I would geek out or nerd out about curiosity and I love that you pointed that out. Very, very cool. Cause I did not think that no.
Joy Bork:I love that about you. And I can't wait for the next job where I'm actually hanging out with you.
Amy Quinn:well, I always say now. Good for you or good job because at the end yep. proud of you. You do it better that, and I always. I do have to say, I am so grateful for you. Some people will freak out, but that's okay. It's new for them. People don't tell him that much, but
Joy Bork:It's a thing. Amy. This was so fun. Thank you for your time. Thank you for sharing your nerd. I love literally, anytime I get to spend with you
Amy Quinn:I'm more grateful because I cannot get over how fun that was. No one ever wants to hear about that from
Joy Bork:I want to hear about all the things. So
Amy Quinn:So I'm I'm pleased in them very happy. And you just made my week, you made 20 22, a lot cooler to me.
Joy Bork:love you. And like you see.
Amy Quinn:Love you. And like you, and I'm so proud of you got you.
Joy Bork:So here we are! I love stories of discovery. And if you can't tell, I love Amy. I heard over and over again in her interview, the phrase that went something like,"I wonder where this door leads?" And as someone who has typically been hesitant to make decisions because I'm waiting on getting enough information to make the right decision, I love the invitation of trying on curiosity instead. Leading with wonder. May you do the same. If you've got a flavor of nerd you want me to celebrate, I would love to hear all about it. So go ahead and email me at herewearethepodcast@gmail.com and tell me everything. I love taking time to sit and make space for nerd to be celebrated. If you really liked this podcast and want to financially support what I'm doing, head on over to patreon.com search for Here We Are The Podcast and sign up for one of the many, many beautifully and sassy written support tiers that I'm really proud of. So until next time, don't forget that curiosity wins and the world needs more nerds. Bye