Oren Hod is an Israeli born videographer, actor, and entrepreneur. He currently lives in New York and San Francisco where he is working on creating a marketplace called VeedMe that connects videographers and companies. When he is not busy with work he enjoys creating videos and acting.
Where are you from?
I am from Tel Aviv, Israel born and raised. I went to a high school there called Tichon Hachadash, which is the same school that my dad and grandmother both went to. I went to the Israeli army after high school and served for three years in the Intelligence Corps, and that’s all I can say about that.
What is your story? How you became who you are today?
Well, before the army I was a semi professional basketball player in Tel Aviv. I quit when I was seventeen because I was too short. Right after I quit, I grew from 5’11” to 6’2”, but it was too late to go back. Anyway, during the army I had a girlfriend, and we dated for five years. When we broke up I felt like trying something new, so I moved to New York and worked in a café in So-Ho. Everyone at the café was either a musician or an actor, and somehow after a year I found myself in the Lee Strasberg acting school here in New York. When I graduated acting school I fell in love with another form of art – filmmaking – the other side of the camera. I went to Tel Aviv University Film School, the best film school in Israel and one of the top ten in the world. When I graduated, my partner Yoav and I wanted to do what we love, filmmaking, to make money. We saw the growing need of freelance filmmakers to find work in the industry, as well as the exponential growth of small companies that need promotional, explanatory or animated videos. We were born with the need for adventures, so we said “Lets do something about it,” so we created a global marketplace called Veed.me that connects both the companies and the filmmakers.
How come you chose not to go the standard track, working for a production firm?
In order to work in a production company or a studio you have to have experience and you have to show a beautiful portfolio. So you either worked with big names or you did amazing things. We didn’t have either, and we wanted to start working immediately!
What is your favorite kind of video to create?
Anything that is creative or based off of a great idea is a video that I would love to create. (I know the grammar isn’t great, but I didn’t want to lose his voice.)
How did you meet your partner Yoav?
Yoav was two years ahead of me in film school, and I was the lead actor in his thesis film. He produced a short film called Negative in which I played a young man who was seducing a 70-year-old woman. It was a very successful movie; we won second place in the Palm Springs International Film Festival and first place in Porto in Portugal.
What is your favorite movie or video?
That’s a good question; because I come from an acting background I would have to say anything staring Daniel Day Lewis.
Do you have a mentor, someone you look up to in the industry?
I would say Woody Allen is someone I admire; every year he comes out with a new film and they always fascinate me. (I know the grammar isn’t great, but I didn’t want to lose his voice.)
How did you come up with the name VeedMe?
In the beginning it was hard to find a cool domain name because everything was taken. We came up with needavid.com but it wasn’t cool enough, we didn’t want to be another company with a boring name. Then we looked for Vid.me but it was obviously taken, so we said; “Hey why not use Veed, it could be cool for a logo we could play with the two Es and you know it’s a cool and catchy name.” It is also like “Feed Me” which is what we do at VeedMe, our videographers feed ideas to our clients.
How do you speak English so well?
First of all it’s not so “so well” I am actually really struggling with English, I just try to put on a cute and professional accent. I also lived in Silicon Valley when I was a kid because my dad had a job there, but I don’t remember much.
What is the “coolest” company you have created a video for, through Veed.me or personally?
At the moment there are two cool companies that come to mind, one is Waze, which was just bought by Google for over a billion dollars. The other one is Powermat by Duracell, which Jay-Z is involved with. Also, the exciting news of today is that Jawbone, the speaker company, opened a project on VeedMe for $17,500 and we are super, super excited about it. Jawbone is for sure the coolest name we have had so far.
How did Jawbone hear of Veedme?
Yoav is friends with someone who just started working there. She was formally at Twitter and now she is pretty high-ranked at Jawbone. We told her about us and she did the rest. It’s great!
Where do you see yourself and Veed.me in ten years?
We aren’t thinking that far ahead. In the tech world you never know what is going to happen tomorrow let alone ten years down the line. Our marketplace has proven especially hard to create because you have to build two individual markets and balance them. I think we will eventually become a successful, very large company. So in ten years I see Veedme alive and kicking, I don’t know if it will be under a very large parent company that will buy us out, I don’t even think about that now. In terms of me personally, if VeedMe will be alive – and it will be – I will be there.
Is there anything else you want to add besides what I have asked?
Yes, there is; although the adventure in life looks very bright from the outside, in reality you have to know what you are doing. In other words, it is a roller coaster; it’s very, very hard. It’s the hardest thing you can do. It’s endless work, some days you are down and depressed, and other days you are high and smiling and singing to yourself. But, in the end it is still the most rewarding thing you can do.
