Allen, who lives in Back of the Yards, said he got in trouble for drug dealing and gang banging — the "same old, same old," "everybody's story," he said — and was on house arrest and on parole when he connected with the Chicago Area Project, a nonprofit that works to prevent juvenile delinquency in disadvantaged communities. The group steered him toward a job in a youth mentorship program at the community group Fellowship Connection in Humboldt Park, where he helped with a documentary project and got his hands on a video camera for the first time.