[7] Picking's high school math teacher encouraged him to try out acting, and he took lessons with Carolyn Pickman, a casting agent who also represented Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.
To start a professional acting career, he moved to Los Angeles, where he initially studied old Hollywood films with stars such as James Dean, Paul Newman, Marlon Brando or Montgomery Clift in his one-room apartment out of loneliness.
He preferred moving to the West Coast to a possible acting course at the NYU Tisch School of the Arts, although he had no contacts whatsoever in Los Angeles.
In 2016, he was part of the ensemble of the drama Goat,[9] which deals with physical and psychological violence in the American college fraternity landscape.
In the role of the sadistic oath master Dixon, Picking tormented Brett, played by Nick Jonas.