I was born on July 1976 in Istanbul. My father was Luthenant Colonel in Turkish Air Force and my mother was housewife. I was the only child of my family. In 1983 my father had to fly to America to fly over the first F-16’s to Turkish Army. On that trip he brought back a video camera and that’s how I met capturing real life and watching it later.
Than VHS tapes came around and we started to watch more authentic things because around that time we had only one national TV channel in Turkey. Around 90’s I was more in to this Handy Cam world and started to make little films with it and showing it on family visits to family members on their TV. On that time there was no home-computer to edit. I was editing the videos by recording my footage to a VHS tape from a Handy cam by hitting stop, play and record of course.In 1994 I discovered that I can study in an art school in Istanbul. With my drawing skills I applied to the Mimar Sinan University and I was accepted to the Industrial Design department. I studied there for 4 years and didn’t make any movies during that period.After my study I worked on product design scene but It was not satisfying for me. I met my wife and moved to Amsterdam applied to a very conceptual art school Gerrit Rietveld Academy with a short film and accepted within thousands of applications. With this school in 2003 again I was back to my camera. Technology was more developed on the mean time. I was able to edit on an Apple computer. All my study I did a lot of Video work and participate many exhibitions in Istanbul, Amsterdam, Berlin, Paris.Around 2007 Marc Zuckerberg released Facebook. I opened an account but not on my name. With using my video and sound design skills I created a Turkish digital pop-star. He became viral and got quite popular on that time. An advertisement agency called Wieden + Kennedy discovered me through this digital pop-star. They signed me a contract. For few years I worked with them as an Art director and Copy-Writer for their campaigns in Turkish market. My clients was Coca-Cola, Nike, Lego, etc… All of a sudden, I was in million dolar film sets working with biggest directors and producers for global brands. I did mostly Nike projects for Turkey and in one of those sets I decided to be shooting my own films again, like back in the old days.After my agency career, in 2009 I made a funny documentary about Amsterdam doner shops called SUPER HELAL. This documentary was exhibited in Amsterdam’s biggest interactive gallery Mediamatic.In 2010 I moved back to Istanbul and opened my own Digital Viral Production company El Turco Digital. In a year we were the craziest production house of Turkey. We did more than hundred films and all off them are directed and written by me. After 4 years my company started to grow but I started to become a boss more than a director. I decided to shot my company down around 2016 and opened a Youtube channel called tunctop, I showed my viewers how I closed my company and moved out from my office in episodes. By using my editing skills I made some people cry even. At the end of the day this episodes watched a lot by advertisement world in Turkey.After these videos I have got an offer to be a director of a production house. Between 2017-2019 I did top notch commercial films for biggest brand with the best agencies. On the mean time I am followed IDFA documentary festival since 2007 until 2019. In my work I use the essence of documentary/reality a lot. In the mean time my Youtube channel had 30 K followers, this channel also has that documentary vibe to be honest…I still keep my hundreds of Hi8 tapes in a box in my studio. Lately traveling around the world, writing new documentary concepts, my camera is always on me, open to any filming job opportunities where ever you want.Amsterdam, 2020
