About Jason Belsky
Jason Belsky has never followed a common path.
Born in Queens and raised in Forest Hills, Jason grew up riding bikes and skateboarding before moving to Woodmere and graduating from Hewlett High School in 1994.
His first career had nothing to do with photography.
Jason opened a cell phone store, worked for Mercedes Benz, moved to Florida and ran an automotive customization business before returning to New York and opening his own high end automotive shop, Auto Addiction, in Lindenhurst.
Auto Addiction became a place where Jason could combine his passion for cars with his growing interest in photography, video and the internet. He worked on high end European cars and performance builds, specializing in brands and products such as Renntech, Brabus and Lorinser.
Jason was also photographing the cars coming through the shop and producing videos about the work. He had started his YouTube channel on July 21, 2006, at a time when YouTube was still in its early days, and Auto Addiction gave him plenty of material to share.
The videos began getting attention.
In 2008, Jason reached out to Craig Lieberman, who was closely involved with the cars and production side of The Fast and the Furious franchise. Jason was looking for a way to work together and introduce him to what he was doing with Auto Addiction.
Craig replied that he had already heard of Jason and his work.
That conversation was one of the first signs that what Jason was doing with cars, video and the internet might have a life beyond the shop.
Then, in 2009, a production company called Departure Films discovered Auto Addiction through YouTube. Conversations began about developing an automotive television show for Discovery, with the idea of creating a new automotive series following the success of shows like Pimp My Ride.
For Jason, the possibility of going from filming cars in his own shop to having an automotive television show was a pretty wild turn of events.
Although the show never came together, the experience reinforced something Jason had already started to realize. He didn’t just want to work on interesting cars. He wanted to document them, tell their stories and create something people could watch.
That would become a recurring theme throughout his career.
In 2014, something completely unexpected changed the direction of his work again.
While walking through Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Jason saw someone flying a drone. He had never flown one before, but knew immediately that he wanted one. Eight days later, he had his own DJI Phantom 2.
He started posting his drone photography on Instagram, along with his other obsessions at the time: sneakers and cars.
That Instagram account got him plenty of leads for drone work… Which eventually led him to a Jet Ski rental business in Island Park. That’s where Jason met by chance, Will Skudin.
At the time, Jason didn’t know who Will was. He knew virtually nothing about surfing and had no idea that Will owned one of the largest surf camps in the country.
Will asked Jason if he could shoot some drone footage at his surf camp in Long Beach that summer. This role turned into handling all of the visual assets for their company and becoming the production manager.
He had to at that point, buy a “real” camera.
From there, Jason began developing his photography and building a career around visual storytelling.
Within a few years, Jason was traveling internationally with Will, photographing and filming surfing in places like Ireland and Nazaré, Portugal. One of his drone videos of Will riding a monster wave at Mullaghmore was even in the running for the WSL Billabong Ride of the Year.
Nazaré became a place Jason returned to year after year. He got to know people like Garrett McNamara and Andrew Cotton, and years later, the production company behind 100 Foot Wave contacted him to purchase his archival footage for the series.
At the same time, Jason’s work was expanding beyond surfing. He became deeply involved in the Long Beach community, working with local businesses and organizations, the Long Beach Herald, the Chamber of Commerce, the Long Beach Police Department and the Long Beach Film Festival.
He also co-founded NY Fit Fest with Ingrid Dodd and Colette Lee Morales, helping create and produce the festival during its first two years while handling branding, digital, social media and marketing.
His automotive roots eventually found their way back into his photography.
In 2019, Jason worked at the New York International Auto Show at the Javits Center with Manhattan Motorcars. Through that work, he met Mate Rimac, experienced the Rimac Concept One, filmed Hilda von Koenigsegg and met her husband Christian von Koenigsegg. He also covered events involving brands like Lamborghini and Beretta.
In 2020, Jason continued working on automotive events with his friend Soojin, including an exclusive preview of the Maserati MC20. DuPont later used his photographs from the event in its coverage.
Later that same year, Jason traveled to Oregon with Will Skudin, Ben Gravy and Ryan Mack Photo for a surf trip that took place from November 29 through December 10. During the trip, Ben Gravy caught the biggest wave of his life at the time, with Jason there to document it.
In December 2020, Jason also found himself photographing an unlikely surfing scene at Lido Beach. Action Bronson was out boogie boarding with Jason and Will while snow was falling.
In August 2021, Jason photographed his first Trybal Gatherings retreat. He has photographed every Trybal Gatherings retreat since then and has not missed a single one.
His work with Trybal eventually found its way into national media. In 2023, The Boston Globe covered Trybal Gatherings and published Jason’s photographs alongside its coverage.
And in January 2022, Floored Media opened.
Today, Floored Media brings together pretty much everything Jason has been doing for the last twenty years: photography, video, automotive, surfing, events, branding, social media and storytelling.
His career has never really been about following a straight line.
A skateboard led to cars.
Cars led to YouTube.
YouTube led to drones.
A drone led to surfing.
Surfing led around the world.
And eventually, all of those roads led to Floored Media.
Jason is still following the next interesting thing.