In his or her own way, almost every person in the world is a travel filmmaker. When people find themselves in new places, they get out their camcorders and hit Record. These videos, of course, are historically some of the most boring videos ever made. That’s why when a professional travel filmmaker like Brandon Li turns his eye on a place, the result is so striking. There is an art to making a great travel film, and we hoped Brandon could teach us what it is.

As a former MTV producer and a current vagabond artist, Brandon is something of an expert at both filmmaking and world traipsing. And he’s found a way to put the two elements together. He told us, “[I realized] I could just go out and live and do cool stuff and film it and make stuff that people would actually want to watch because it’s actually interesting stuff.”

For anyone who thinks that sounds like a pretty decent life (count us in), watch it. Brandon Li has a few things to teach you.