Aspiring cryptozoologist Doctor Sherman treks through the dense woods. He pauses, kneels and ushers a nearby cameraman to a footprint hidden beneath fallen leaves – an unmistakable sign of Bigfoot. Behind the camera, Jonah Holland carefully frames the shot, panning from the track to the dense Mississippi wilderness beyond.
This was just one of Holland’s favorite scenes from “Befriending Bigfoot,” a 10-minute mockumentary-style film that won the 48-Hour Film Competition at the 28th annual Magnolia Independent Film Festival.
For Holland, who served as the film’s cinematographer and co-director, the challenge of creating the film was exhilarating. In just 48 hours, he and his co-director Sarah Kirk had to decide on a concept, write the script, recruit his wife Lizzy and friend Audie Kirby to act in the film, and then film and edit the entire project.
“It was incredibly hectic but so fun and so rewarding to be able to start a project and finish it in such a short amount of time,” Holland said.
This was not Holland’s first attempt submitting work to the festival, but it was his first win. As a long time supporter of The Mag, Holland described the moment as surreal.
“Getting to actually hold the trophy at the end of the Mag was just so surreal because the trophy itself is just a beautiful stained glass magnolia flower,” Holland said. “It’s just such a cool and rich piece of Starkville history. So for me, as someone who just loves the town of Starkville so much, it felt like I was holding a piece of Starkville history.”
Holland works full-time as a freelance photographer and videographer. Though filmmaking has become an exciting part of his work, Holland’s true passion has always been photography.
“Photography is my first love, my biggest passion, kind of what I’ve built my career around. Videography came as a necessity, and for lack of a better way to word it, it was like the second love,” Holland said. “I’ve fallen in love with it now in my career, but at the end of the day, it’s however I can tell someone else’s story.”
As a child growing up on a dairy goat farm in Belmont, Holland’s two favorite things were video games and cameras. The turning point, he said, came at four years old while playing Pokémon Snap on the Nintendo 64 – a video game that focuses on taking pictures of the classic creatures.
“That just flipped a switch in my brain,” he recalled. “After that, I wanted to grab my mom’s camera whenever I could and learn as much as possible.”
In rural Tishomingo County, Holland said there wasn’t much to inspire him aside from nature. He searched for ways to photograph the textures of plants, details of flowers and light playing through the trees. Eventually, his lens shifted to people, though his childhood focus on horticulture photography still shines through in his work.
“Some of the little things that I gravitated toward when I was a kid, it even influences my style now as an adult and as a professional,” Holland said. “A lot of the natural color tones and textures that I would photograph in plant life, I try to work my way into my portrait work as much as I can.”
Holland had turned his passion for photography into a business by 16, photographing weddings and taking on freelance projects under the name Photography by Jonah, a name he still uses today.
At 18, Holland moved to Starkville, a place that had felt like home long before he ever lived there. Growing up as a member of 4-H, Holland spent much of his childhood visiting Mississippi State University for 4-H events.
“For me, growing up in a really small town, Starkville felt like a big city,” he said. “There was just something about Starkville that I loved ever since I was a little kid. I felt strongly drawn here my whole life.”
Holland started taking classes and working at Mississippi State in 2018 as a photographer and video producer for Extension in MSU’s Office of Agricultural Communications, where he remained for five years. He then spent a year working as a staff photographer for MSU’s Office of Public Affairs. But after six years working in institutional photography, Holland took the leap into full-time freelance work.
“My wife and I are at a stage in our lives where we value flexibility,” he said. “As much as I love Starkville, it allows me to seek work outside of Starkville and keep things interesting and fresh.”
His freelance work takes him all over – New Orleans, Birmingham, Memphis – but his heart remains in Mississippi.
“I feel especially in Mississippi, we experience life in such a way that’s so unique to our region of the United States,” Holland said. “I feel like it’s important to preserve that and … being able to share that with others, I feel, is really, really special.”
His business today is a mix – half weddings and couples’ portraits, the other half spanning commercial photography, music videos and short-form documentaries. He and his wife, Lizzy, often work together, blending her background in graphic design with his photography.
Looking ahead, Holland hopes to expand his work into larger commercial projects – bigger storytelling, more documentaries and more music videos. At the core of everything he does is a love for preserving moments, especially those that reflect life in Mississippi.
“My heart is in Starkville,” he said. “I want to stay here for a while … and continue to tell Starkville’s story the best I can. For me, it’s my unique way of being able to serve Starkville.”
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You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 30 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
