Ever since he was a little kid, Provost loved movies and was intrigued by how they were made. The first time Provost became especially curious about film production was in seventh grade when he picked up his family video camera and started recording short, unscripted comedies called The Cul de Sac with his friends.

“I realized once I started The Cul de Sac that I really liked the filming aspect of videos but not really the acting aspect as much,” Provost said.

Since the The Cul de Sac, many of Provost’s friends, including Lucas Boegehold, Isaac Greenawalt, Liam Fay and Tommy Bernotas, frequently star in his videos.

“They’re all in plays, so they’re pretty good actors, and the group has expanded; now we have Matt Broomer, Kevin MacIntosh and a lot of cool guys doing it,” said Provost.

Sophomore Martin Narciso has also assisted Provost with filming many of his videos and projects.

“I’ve realized I can’t really have a one man crew anymore behind the camera, so Martin definitely helps out. He has a lot of great ideas,” Provost said. “I’ll run the show for my ideas, and then he’ll have an idea, and he’ll talk to me about it, and I’ll help him out film-wise on that.”

Provost learned the majority of his filming skills independently but learned about directing and the film industry at a three-week New York Film Academy summer camp at Harvard. At the camp, he had the opportunity to direct actors from a theater camp.

Since The Cul de Sac, Provost’s work has become more professional.

“The episodes of The Cul de Sac were not very funny; we tried to make them funny, but they were not,” said Provost. “Usually they were unscripted, but that was the basis to what my friends and I tried to do later on as a group.”

The next series Provost produced was called The Business Man, which Provost described as a “spin off of The Office.”

“Everything was a step up with that because that was when I got a new camera and started taking it more seriously. I took a general plotline for the show, though it still wasn’t quite scripted,” said Provost.

But many of Provost’s ideas don’t go beyond the planning stage. After The Business Man, Provost and Greenawalt wanted to make their work more professional and started to write a full length movie. However, the movie was not going in the direction they intended, and they dropped the project.

“We realized it wasn’t going to work out as well as we had planned, so we gave that up. We’ve started a couple scripts that haven’t really met our expectations as much as we would want them to,” said Provost.

The next series Provost produced was The Five O’Clock Shadow, a series about friends who had their own blog and went around interviewing people. This was his first video series that is currently on YouTube.

“The Five O’Clock Shadow was unscripted. There was a lot of rambling there, and that was what we were trying to eradicate with our more recent shorts,” said Provost.

A series Provost produced recently was Recovery, which Provost described as the largest production he has ever done.

“For Recovery, we really wanted to move out of scriptless comedies into a more serious, written out plot line,” Provost explained.

This series required a large crew and a lot of equipment. However, the series never made it to YouTube due to an excess of violence. Provost’s most recent video on Youtube is Alone, featuring Lucas Boegehold and Matt Broomer.

Recently, Provost began working towards his goal of completing more professional jobs by creating a television commercial for Friends of Boston’s Homeless, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping the homeless population of Boston return to society through education, permanent housing, life-skills and employment.

“I didn’t charge because it’s a nonprofit, and I liked what they were doing,” said Provost.

Provost shot several five minute videos and sent them on to Shotgun Productions, a Boston-based production company that edits the footage to prepare it for television.

Currently, Provost has been working on an advertisement for Wayland resident Steve Geiger’s invention, the backyard snowboard. The advertisement is similar to his work for the Friends of Boston’s Homeless, but it will not air on television, and its purpose is to encourage investors to back the product. This is Provost’s first paid job.

Provost’s inspiration for his work comes from movies he sees or videos he finds on YouTube or Vimeo.

“I would say most of my inspiration for particular shots comes from movies,” said Provost. “In Alone you can really see that it’s like all of my favorite horror movies, like when you can only see the feet of the killer going down the stairs.”

As someone who loves filming, Provost also admires the styles of famous producers such as Darren Aronofsky, David Lynch, Francis Ford Coppola and Stanley Kubric. Provost also enjoys a variety of films including The Graduate, Apocalypse Now, Drive, The Shining and The Garden State.

Provost’s plans for the future include taking a break from documentary filming and returning to writing short films.