Joel Devant

Joel Devant (b. June 27, 1984) is an ATBW Blogger and retail documenter who made his account in 1997 and has been an active user since.

History
Devant was born to two parents, his father owned and operated five Carl's Jr. franchises and his mom was the manager of one of them. He was diagnosed with Asperger's at three years old (he revealed in one of his videos from 2006). He eventually made his account on April 21, 1997 and was a normal site user. He attended high school in 1998 and graduated in 2002. He purchased a bus afterwards and then moved into a small house in 2004 at 20 years old. His colleague Jason Carlos also moved in with him that same time.

On his 18th birthday on June 27, 2002, Devant was given a Sony DSC-P9 and a Sony VHS-C camcorder from his aunt and he used them for much of the 2000's and 2010's to submit pictures and videos onto his ATBW Blog account. He was given a Sony DSC-S90 for his 21st birthday on June 27, 2005. He has even documented certain ATBW Stores, including a Super ATBW Store at the OBX in June 2006 (this store however closed in early 2008 and was demolished in late 2009. A Kroger was built there in August 2012, and it opened there that same time).

Digital Cameras
Sometime in 2007, Devant purchased another Sony digital camera to compensate for storage on his other ones. This third camera is a Sony Cyber-shot W55 and it became the camera he used when his DSC-P9 camera had no memory left or needed charging. However, the camera ended running out of space sometime later and he had to buy another one until he could clean out storage on it. This one was a Sony DSC-S700. He also purchased a Sony DSC-S500 and a Sony DSC-W220 to add up for storage. He attempted to take pictures on his iPhone 3G in 2008 but complained that the quality was bad and so he resorted to using his digital cameras to continue shooting photos.

He started using his iPhone 4 in 2010 to make videos from his phone rather than his computer, but he does not use it to take retail photos because he claims that it does not shoot good photos. He bought a blue Sony Cyber-shot W-530 from an ATBW Store in 2011 to continue his photos. This blue camera is his current camera that he uses, though he purchased another camera in 2019 that he uses on occasion, a DSC-WX800. He explained in a 2020 zoom interview that he still prefers the use of digital cameras because "they just have better quality than phones do. In the late 2000's, I always used digital cameras for my photos instead of phones because they just had better quality. Even to this day, digital cameras still work better than phones, and it helps to save storage space on my phone. I never used my phone, even after other ATBW bloggers from my time started doing so, I'm always used to digital cameras since I started 18 years ago."

He eventually revealed that he also has a Sony Mavica camcorder that he purchased in 2006 to take some photos on a road trip in August that year of a Target Greatland that had just closed down (this store is now an Amazon warehouse as of 2020, replacing a Kroger that opened there in 2007 and closed in 2018).

Camcorders
Devant got his Sony VHS-C camcorder from his aunt in 2002 and used it to make videos for much of the 2000's and 2010's to submit pictures and videos. He purchased a spare Panasonic VHS-C camcorder in 2003 and also purchased a Sony Minidisc camcorder at that same time. He purchased another Minidisc camcorder from Panasonic in 2004 and acquired an old RCA VHS camcorder from 1990. He purchased a Sony camcorder in 2010 to make videos because their quality started becoming out of date.

He also has a Panasonic AG-188 S-VHS camcorder from 2000 that he bought in 2007 along with Panasonic PV-A307, PV-L453, and PV-L454 camcorders from a school auction.