As excuses for needing time off college go, “I’m on tour with Louis Tomlinson” takes some beating!
But that was the legitimate reason given by Lily Ajaib as she juggles the final year of her BA (Hons) Film Production & Professional Practice at York College with a burgeoning videography and photography career that has already seen her tour more than 70 cities in 13 different European countries.
That has included working in some of the continent’s biggest indoor arenas last month with Louis – the former One Direction megastar who Lily had posters of on her bedroom walls growing up.
She has also worked for the likes of Bring Me The Horizon and taken pictures of Billie Eilish.
Louis’ tour promoted his latest album “How Did I Get Here?” and Lily, from Wheldrake, might be forgiven for pinching herself whilst asking the same question, having first enrolled at York College as a Creative Media & Production Technology vocational course student at the age of 16.
The opportunity for Lily to work directly with Louis in cities such as Barcelona, Madrid, Lyon and Munich came after she had impressed photographing support act Only the Poets on his tour.
She went on to picture him performing and in relaxed shots away from the stage – a genuine bucket list moment ticked off by Lily at the age of 20.
Lily said:
I went to six shows on his last tour four years ago, just because I enjoyed it, but I also took small digital cameras with me and took photos.
In terms of the big dream and somebody I had photos of on my wall, then it was always Louis, so I had to compose myself a little bit when I met him!
Doing a tour with somebody like him, the scale of it is so big, but you still have to be very normal about it and, being the photographer for the artist, you need to have a good relationship with them and get along.
What I’ve found out, though, is although they might be big and famous, they’re generally very normal human beings.
They just do a really strange job and you have to blend in with that. Whilst you know it’s a big deal when you’re doing it and everybody’s saying it’s a big deal, I just try and tell myself, ‘This is normal’.
It’s so exciting but so work heavy as well and you have to make sure you’re delivering for the management team.
The nature of Lily’s work can vary – sometimes she will be asked to use an iPhone for raw looking footage and, on other occasions, she will be operating a £5,000 camera as part of a multi-camera shoot.
Earlier this year, she also worked on Robbie Williams’ tour with his support act The Lottery Winners and she has just finished touring Europe again with American pop-punk, singer-songwriter Taylor Acorn.
Lily on life on the road, she added:
It’s luxury in a way, but then you’re also sleeping in a bunk on a bus with 14 other people, so it can feel like a hostel and the 19-hour drives are the hard bit!
But I don’t like being sat at home, so I love it. I really like doing shows in Munich, because the German music scene is amazing. I also liked Oslo and Scandinavia.
Remarkably, Lily has combined this hectic lifestyle with completing the final year of her degree studies.
On managing such a difficult balance, she has relied heavily on the support of her tutor Josh Roberts, who has taught her throughout her five years at college.
Lily said:
I’ve managed to hand in all my assignments and just dedicated certain times in the year to my degree work.
Josh has allowed me to go out and do things, but says, ‘Just make sure you get this done before you go’.
It’s been unbelievably difficult and I wouldn’t recommend it, but it means I can go straight into industry when I leave college. Josh has genuinely been the most unbelievably supportive person I could have ever had.
Him encouraging me is probably more than 75% of the reason why I’m doing what I am now.
Lily’s first steps into the music industry came when she approached magazines, such as Taped, Indie Boulevard, CLUNK and Karma, asking if she could take pictures at certain shows.
This led to voluntary photography work and Lily made herself even more helpful by offering to write gig reviews and interviews with bands and singers.
Lily said:
It was hard work because the reviews would often have to be done by the next day.
But, in that time, I was building connections and getting jobs, which is how I started being paid.
Offering advice to anybody who would like to also work as a music industry videographer and photographer, Lily added:
It sounds so silly, but just show up in the right places. Then, if you’re in that environment, look for the sound engineers or tour managers.
Talk to them and be willing to listen. You’ll find that 90 per cent of people are way more friendly than you perhaps thought.
Most people just want to help, so be social, work as hard as you can and be dedicated. If you can make friends and make yourself available and useful, even if it’s just offering coffee, it goes a long way.
