Robert Headen

I was born in Washington, D.C., and moved to Montgomery County, Maryland, as a preteen. Despite my parents’ efforts to make me a good student, I struggled in public, private, and Catholic schools. I also attended a military boarding school for a year, but it didn’t make much difference. Finally, I graduated from Calvin Coolidge High School in Washington, D.C.

After high school, I started working and didn’t perform any better on the job than in school. One day, my father gave me a video camera, and that’s where my entrepreneurial journey began. During the day, I worked and, in my free time, performed at open mic venues under my stage name, Bob Smoke. I started recording the performances and sold them back to the performers the following week.

Under my performance name, Bob Smoke, the open mic rap group I was with appeared in the “Unsigned Hype” column of Source Magazine. Sony Records distributed my work, and I became a published writer. I also received writer and performance credits for the Epic recording artist Ruff Endz’s “Someone To Love You” album, which sold over 300,000 copies worldwide.

By this time, I was directing and editing music videos and comedy skits and purchasing professional equipment with my paycheck. However, my passion for video production, graphic design, and photography interfered with my job. Eventually, my employer laid me off. However, it was then that I realized my poor performance in school wasn’t due to being “slow” or a misfit but rather because my way of thinking was “different.” 

While my friends paid thousands for a semester of college courses, I spent my money on equipment. I would tell the salesman, “I’m not buying it unless you show me how to operate it.” As a result, I acquired applied knowledge as a video engineer, four years of clients, and my own equipment – all debt-free – over the years my friends spent in college. When they came out, they had to find jobs to pay off their thousands of dollars in debt. They had only a theoretical understanding of motion pictures. In contrast, I was ready to roll.

Yet, I found myself suddenly unemployed. I took on a suggestion from my mother that I start my own TV show. I took my unemployment check and purchased thirty minutes of weekly airtime from Comcast Leased Access. I became Executive Producer and Director of the self-titled television series Bob Smoke TV. The variety television show featured celebrity interviews, musical guests, and the nation’s hottest entrepreneurs. I produced one show a week for two years without fail, which turned me into an editing expert. Bob Smoke TV became the most-watched show on the channel. Comcast eventually started rebroadcasting the show daily, which allowed me to sell more advertising time with direct access to 390,000 viewing households throughout Prince Georges’s County, Maryland, and Washington, D.C.

During this time, I started the multimedia production company that today specializes in video production, social networks, graphic design, and still photography. 

I have enjoyed working with several International and National broadcast stations, including Fox, NBC, CBS, CNN, and Headline News. Additionally, I have worked on feature-length motion pictures and several on-air segments for networks such as BET’s Black Carpet and Rap City. I was also the Director of Video Production for the retail company DTLR.