Charles Chambers

Please provide a brief bio.

After receiving a Premier’s Award and a 99.8 score for VCE English, I decided to study Media and Communications at the University of Melbourne. I was lucky enough to start copywriting about a year after I finished, which I really enjoyed. I have been a professional copywriter for a number of years but have just completed a master’s degree in teaching and am transitioning into that vocation. In my free time, every day of my life I ensure that I devote some time to my own personal creative projects.

Please give a brief description of your trajectory from Top Designs until now.

After university I took a copywriter role at a small advertising agency that mostly handled car dealerships, with a few other random clients sprinkled through, which was helpful in learning the basics. I was one of the only copywriters there, so I got to do a variety of jobs – everything from billboards and print ads to radio and TV scripts. Nothing I could creatively hang my hat on, but this led me do a short course called AWARD School. I would strongly recommend anyone who wants to pursue work as a creative in advertising (either in art direction or copywriting) to have this on their résumé – in my mind it may be more valuable than a degree.

After completing the course, I ended up being hired at Ogilvy, a creative advertising agency, mainly because I had met their Executive Creative Director during the AWARD School rounds and they had seen some of my basic sketch ideas. I was a copywriter there for about a year and was involved in a lot of great stuff; I worked on BMW, AAMI, Kraft and Cadbury. You basically think of ideas all day, hundreds of ideas, and all your best ones hardly ever make it through. It’s exhausting but great development. I decided to leave the job eventually, as advertising was never something I wanted to do forever. It was, however, a positive creative outlet for me and I’m glad to have had that experience. I’m still working as a copywriter, now for the National Trust. I love this role, but am also transitioning into an English teaching role soon.

What advice do you have for people wanting to work in your field?

Be persistent, be prepared to work really hard and develop a thick skin. You will get plenty of rejections, not just for jobs, but even more so when you’re in a job. Build idea after idea. If you can learn to take the work seriously, but not take yourself seriously, this helps. Also, do AWARD School, and work on your personal portfolio. Your portfolio doesn’t have to be full of work you’ve been paid for. You can and should fill it with your own ideas too.

It’s clichéd, but ‘keep it simple’ is actually true. But most importantly, any design and all design elements should be informed by a single, leading idea.

What are your future plans/goals?

The same as they’ve always been – to continue writing books or write movies. I give as much time to that every day as I can, often at night. But these are both hard industries to crack in Australia. I’ve been writing like crazy lately. I finished four scripts – one a six-episode series – and half a new manuscript this year. Currently I’m spending all my spare time on a screenplay about Melbourne’s red-light queen, Madame Brussels.