Founding Creative & Videographer

Job Description

Job Description

Who We Are:

Aurelius Systems is a VC backed defense tech startup building autonomous, edge deployed directed energy systems for counter-UAS. We build laser weapons to shoot down drones.

We're a small team of engineers, former US military, and subject matter experts scaling America's directed energy dominance. The first cost effective, reliable and robust laser weapon system.

Our namesake isn't an accident. Marcus Aurelius wrote about doing the work in front of you, every day, without excuses. Henry Ford didn't wait for permission to reinvent manufacturing. That's how we operate small team, unreasonable output, no hiding behind the unachievable.

In addition to our San Francisco lab, we opened our Detroit manufacturing hub and field test weekly on our own 400-acre private range.

The Role and Your Impact

You own the way Aurelius is seen. The visual system, the narrative, the shots, the cuts, the stories we tell about what we’re building and the people building it. Factory floor in Detroit. Field tests on the range. Founders working late in SF. Lasers hitting drones at full power. All of it, through your lens.

We want someone who looks at the hardest stuff happening at the company and figures out how to make it feel as real and as important as it actually is. You’re not just capturing content, you’re building the way the world comes to understand directed energy and the team doing it in America. That’s a big seat for the right person who wants that kind of ownership.

You’ll travel with the team. You’ll be in the room for things most creatives never get to see. You’ll ship fast, you’ll shoot more than we can post, and you’ll have real ownership on what makes it out the door.

What You’ll Own

• Visual and narrative system for Aurelius across YouTube, X, and launch content

• Shoot, edit, and ship end to end. Camera to final cut

• Factory and shop floor documentation in Detroit and SF

• Field test coverage on the 400-acre range. Lasers hitting drones. Real footage, not stock

• Founder and ghost writing short, punchy, high-cadence

• Long-form product and launch films that set the standard for how defense tech gets shown

• The branding and company look. You make the hard engineering actually look as cool as it is

What We’re Looking For

• Shipped real YouTube. Channel, series, or long-form product or factory films you owned end to end

• Portfolio that proves it. Reel plus links. No resumes

• Gone viral or broken through on X or YouTube with hardware, industrial, auto, aerospace, or defense-adjacent work

• Set the look for something and then gotten behind the camera and cut it yourself

• Talked shop with at least one founder shipping real product, not just decks

• Native English speaker

Where You Probably Come From: Hardware or industrial YouTube channels you ran yourself. Auto, aerospace, or defense creative shops where you did more than one job. Studios where you were the whole stack from brief to delivery. Founder-adjacent creative seats where the content shipped fast and performed.

We Want to Talk If: You’ve built an audience from scratch on hard-to-film subjects. You’ve made industrial look beautiful. You’ve shot in environments most creatives would never go. You want the ownership and the range of a founding seat.

Not a Fit If: You direct and don’t shoot. You need an agency wrapper around you to work. Your reel is all polish and no substance.

How You Operate

• Bias for action. You shoot before you storyboard

• Travel without complaint. Detroit, SF, range sites, demos

• Comfortable embedded with engineers for hours getting one shot right

• Native taste for what’s cool and what’s filler

• Self-directed. You find the shot and go get it

Why Join Aurelius

• Direct report to the CEO

• Visual and narrative DNA of the company starts with you

• Real subject matter. Lasers, drones, factories, field tests. Not slide decks

• Your work ships to real audiences, not internal decks

• Travel the country shooting down drones with lasers. If that doesn’t sound like a dream, this isn’t it

How We Work:

Core hours are Monday through Friday, 9 to 6. When we're sprinting toward a demo or field test, the team ramps up — nights, weekends, whatever it takes to ship. When the sprint lands, we ramp down. We don't manufacture intensity for show.

Benefits:

• Competitive salary and equity

• United Health Care medical, dental, and vision coverage

• Flexible 18 days PTO plus 5 sick days

• Travel to field test events and range days

• Covered daily lunches and office snacks and drinks

• E-bike and scooter stipend up to $500

• Direct access to leadership and real ownership over your work

Export Control Notice:

This role requires access to export-controlled information or items that require U.S. Person status. As defined by U.S. law, individuals who are any one of the following are considered to be a U.S. Person: (1) U.S. citizens, (2) legal permanent residents (a.k.a. green card holders), and (3) certain protected classes of asylees and refugees, as defined in 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3).

Compensation Range: $100K - $120K