Studio Sessions
19. Art or Content?
Our latest episode explores the differences between podcasts and YouTube videos, focusing on content ownership, artistic integrity, and creating authentic work that resonates with the audience.
As we've embraced online media, the absence of traditional gatekeepers has sparked a debate about whether the democratization of creativity enhances or dilutes the artistic landscape. We share our experiences, discussing the balance between feedback, self-assessment, and authenticity in a content-saturated world.
Join us as we navigate the technical and artistic aspects of creation, confront creative blockages, and strive to balance art and life's practical demands. We reflect on the tension between art and commerce, questioning whether our current climate prioritizes transactions over genuine artistry. -Ai
If you enjoyed this episode, please consider giving us a rating and/or a review. We read and appreciate all of them. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you in the next episode.
Links To Everything:
Video Version of The Podcast: https://geni.us/StudioSessionsYT
Matt’s YouTube Channel: https://geni.us/MatthewOBrienYT
Matt’s 2nd Channel: https://geni.us/PhotoVideosYT
Alex’s YouTube Channel: https://geni.us/AlexCarterYT
Matt’s Instagram: https://geni.us/MatthewIG
Alex’s Instagram: https://geni.us/AlexIG
Our latest episode explores the differences between podcasts and YouTube videos, focusing on content ownership, artistic integrity, and creating authentic work that resonates with the audience.
As we've embraced online media, the absence of traditional gatekeepers has sparked a debate about whether the democratization of creativity enhances or dilutes the artistic landscape. We share our experiences, discussing the balance between feedback, self-assessment, and authenticity in a content-saturated world.
Join us as we navigate the technical and artistic aspects of creation, confront creative blockages, and strive to balance art and life's practical demands. We reflect on the tension between art and commerce, questioning whether our current climate prioritizes transactions over genuine artistry. -Ai
If you enjoyed this episode, please consider giving us a rating and/or a review. We read and appreciate all of them. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you in the next episode.
Links To Everything:
Video Version of The Podcast: https://geni.us/StudioSessionsYT
Matt’s YouTube Channel: https://geni.us/MatthewOBrienYT
Matt’s 2nd Channel: https://geni.us/PhotoVideosYT
Alex’s YouTube Channel: https://geni.us/AlexCarterYT
Matt’s Instagram: https://geni.us/MatthewIG
Alex’s Instagram: https://geni.us/AlexIG
It had been a golden afternoon and I remember having the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer. And summer you went to acting school, you went to film school. You've kind of been immersed in creativity and I wouldn't say like art, but like making little home movies and all this stuff your whole life, little fake radio shows, you know, like making stuff. But I just don't know that I've really made any work since I've moved to Omaha. When I was living in LA, I mean, I wrote these, all these screenplays and I consider that work right, even though it was partially for a sort of commercial outcome, to sell the screenplay to get a movie made, you know, at a studio, at an independent, you know whatever, like to work with people to get a movie made and earn a living from it. But since then I don't really I feel like I've edited hundreds of videos that are capital campaigns, fundraisers, documentary style branded content for this business or that business.
Speaker 1:Um, you know, we made a big movie for a museum, uh, you know, for like the pre-movie they watch before they go on a tour, all that stuff. And I, you know, look at my channel and all of my channels and all that and I'm like am I just? Am I only making content? Is that all? Is that all I've really made? And yes, there is creativity in that. Some stuff feels like it's artistic in making it, but ultimately it's. It feels like the stuff I've made, especially on my main channel, is more analogous to, or synonymous with, a magazine about art or about creativity or about craft or about the tools to do it, you know, versus the actual work.
Speaker 2:so I don't know, just makes me feel like I just haven't made anything and it kind of bums me out yeah, what do you define, as I mean, we were kind of having this discussion before, so it's really it's very strange like a portion of the people are actually probably watching this on youtube yeah um, in part, are probably listening on the podcast app and what we we looked at like something that I was working on and I had this not realization.
Speaker 2:I mean, I've had this realization before, obviously, but maybe not obviously. But I've had a realization like this before, where I told Matt who's Matt? I told the other guy on the podcast who's Matt Basically that.
Speaker 1:Zero views, so they tried to kill Matt. Who's Matt, who's Matt, who's Matt.
Speaker 2:Who's Matt? I told, I told the other person on this podcast that, um, I wanted to film like a narrative style segment, but but the first thing I said, um, the first thing I I went to in my first place, I went to in my mind, was it's not worth it. This is just for a YouTube video yeah right, and even with the podcast right. People are watching on YouTube and then some people are listening to it. I found myself getting more excited about the podcast feed than the YouTube.
Speaker 1:The YouTube thing just seems so just seeing what the audio version is doing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, versus what the video, because it just feels so much more in my head, my perception seems so much more tangible.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It seems so much more sustainable. Doesn't seem like some you know? Just gust of wind that's going to go, it's going to continue to move. Youtube has that feeling a little bit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like in 15 years, we'll all be going remember. We used to watch YouTube all the time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I don't know why.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But it's. I think maybe it's because, like with YouTube, you have this structure of like, there's YouTube, the company, and then the company is hosting this platform, for it's not like like, but with the podcast. You know, we have our hosting website, we have platforms that carry the podcast, but those are just platforms yeah it feels like it all kind of starts with just and the files are on our computer, you know like they're stored in our clouds. It just feels like there's a bit more of a sense of ownership with youtube.
Speaker 2:It kind of feels like we're just renting yeah, or we're like giving it over to youtube and it just feels like a place where obviously, like there's so much on youtube, there's so much content, there's so much. There's such a library of things and when I say content, I don't just mean like things to consume, to entertain. There's great interviews, historical interviews, there's documentaries that you can't find anywhere else. There's really solid stuff. It's a great library.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But it does feel just less substantial, for some reason.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like almost like maybe to a lesser degree than like an Instagram or something Like Instagram is it's a joke. I wonder if it's like Instagram, like putting work on Instagram Facebook as, like, that is the primary district and a lot of people have made great careers out of doing this and I'm not criticizing those people, so don't mix that.
Speaker 2:made great careers out of doing this and I'm not criticizing those people, so don't mix that. But it feels like a joke in the sense that it's a lot of people probably put decent art on their myspace profiles yeah and it just faded everything in the internet age, kind of seems to come and go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I don't know why, in the last couple of years there's been a feeling that we almost reached a point where we're like well, everything that's here is here for good now, like youtube is always going to be around. And in the last couple of years I don't know why, but I've almost gotten the feeling of like, look the traffic's there. I don't think it's going anywhere, but it almost feels like this is just another flash in the pan.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And when you make work, it feels like you should have the negative. You should have the control over it, whether it's hosted on your website, like. Use these distribution platforms, but know that that's not the end game. That's just a tool to distribute it.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And then have somewhere where it's like sitting in the physical world, mm-hmm. But getting back to the original point, yeah, I just had that observation of like I don't want to do this, I don't want to put all this time into this YouTube video.
Speaker 1:Right, and I don't know where to take that. I think that's an interesting thing to explore, just that, not that we explore it right now, but just that idea that there's a slight I don't know if negative dark cloud, whatever it is that hovers over that idea. That idea I'm trying to think. I'm trying to think of the, the like, the ways that you would make something and exhibit it, something like you showed me, um, where it would be the opposite feeling when you talked about, uh, like I was thinking, um, I'd be, you know, you, I'm speaking for you. I'd be more excited to see a book I wrote end up in Jackson Street booksellers versus on the shelf at Barnes and Noble, as in Barnes and Noble being the YouTube of books.
Speaker 2:Yeah, or maybe it's just like.
Speaker 1:A Jackson Street being like.
Speaker 2:I don't. I don't even think it's like an independent thing or like not under some corporate umbrella. I don't think it's that, but it's more the idea behind it. Like I would love to see a book I wrote out there in the world, but then I know that I can look over and I can see a representation of that work in a book.
Speaker 2:And it's like no matter what happens with the licensing of the book, the whoever the current distributor is, whoever the current publisher is, I can look over and be like look, there's a book that I wrote.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And you know, no matter what happens, I can just take that copy and hand it to somebody and be like hey, check this out.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Not that I'm writing a book, but maybe I am. No, I'm just kidding. You know, I'm working on my novel.
Speaker 1:Sure, it's going to be the great American novel.
Speaker 2:Sure, it's going to be the great American novel.
Speaker 1:I think what's interesting for me is I have such an overall positive feeling toward YouTube because in everything that I've pursued artistically, creatively, I've always needed permission to work. Yeah mission, to work and I think for me, I have this feeling of excitement with posting something to YouTube because there's nothing in my way from doing it.
Speaker 1:So I don't even get to the point where I think, well, what does it mean to post something on YouTube, to have something there, to that to be I'm so excited about? I don't need a director to give me permission to act. I don't need a studio head to give me permission to work with a team of creatives to turn a screenplay into a movie, have an idea, start building on it and then take what you made and distribute it, to exhibit it and then let an audience you know a hundred people watch it, or you know a hundred thousand people watch it.
Speaker 1:And for me, I'm still hooked onto the excitement of that yeah to where, although I'm a, I'm starting to feel aware of content in the, in this, uh, this world of thinking. I, you know, I want to be someone who makes work yeah and this just goes back to the earlier point like okay, I'm making content, but am I making any work?
Speaker 2:I think it comes back to that the quote, the jurassic park quote that you gave. I love that quote where it's you know, like, maybe we got so excited that we could, that we didn't stop if we should. Um, the quote works on a lot of levels, but you know, maybe we got so excited about the lack of barriers, right, that we forgot like we got so excited about the anti-establishment like we could just do it there's nothing stopping us that we, you know the barriers, the, the gatekeepers that were there.
Speaker 2:This is not an argument for gatekeepers the gatekeepers that were there. I should just make my points instead of like giving the preface. Yeah, maybe it would like people then can pay attention to the point. I should just make my points instead of like giving the preface. Maybe people then can pay attention to the point, you leave the room for interpretation.
Speaker 1:Some spontaneous self-coaching. I need to work on that. Tell us in the comments what we both need to work on.
Speaker 2:I'm trying not to say you know, all the time You're so excited about this lack of barriers that you get it into your head like, oh, there's nothing stopping me from being this. But then the purpose of gatekeepers in the first place? And yes, there was corruption and yes, there was. But when that job is being done at the highest level, it is somebody who has an elevated level of taste and they're keeping, like they're guarding against things infiltrating the space that they're gatekeeping, they're making sure it meets a certain quality level, like you're not just anybody's able to join the club. And I know that seems exclusive and seems elitist, but there's, there's something to be said for that might serve an important function you have right, you have to be at a certain and youtube's taking that away.
Speaker 2:So everybody's just pushing their, their first project, into the limelight and being like you should pay attention, and some people have a level of notoriety because of a viral moment or something whatever, that when they push that, that is seen as a piece of work in the same light as some of, and so the gatekeeper is designed. Yesterday I told you the, the idea of, or the quote, quote you, you want, your, you want to look at your superiors. In a way, respect for your superiors comes from the idea that they can step in and do what you're doing better than you can at any time. Yes, we're losing that a little bit. Yeah, um, because everybody can just do anything.
Speaker 2:We're losing that ability of like man. They've really put in the hours and learn the craft and it's becoming more just political now, where you have people that are reaching high levels of status without checking the very basic boxes. I'm not saying I'm checking the boxes, you're checking the boxes. This is a completely different point. But you know, maybe we get so excited about the lack of barriers that then we just started pushing everything that came to mind out into it, and I think that's part of where the disconnect in YouTube comes from, from my point of view.
Speaker 2:I made a bunch of videos because I got excited that you can just make videos and then, after a certain point, I almost had the self-realization that I was just pushing out the same kind of thing and I wasn't getting anything from it. And if I'm not getting anything from it, I doubt that the people who are watching are getting anything from it and they might think they're getting something from it. But you know the whole point I'm not making, yeah, I'm. The only reason I'm making things is so I can move forward.
Speaker 2:I've evolved, get something out of it absolutely from the work um, and I think I got you know personally, I think I got excited about there are no gatekeepers, I can just do this. Yeah, that's right, and I didn't stop to think is this one worth doing? Well, what could make this worth doing? What Things could I add to this that would make this worth doing?
Speaker 2:and um, you, you know, it's just an interesting thing, right, maybe? Maybe you got so excited about You'd been gatekept, yeah, and that you just started, so you just started putting it out and then once you're in that content cycle, it's perpetual. You got to keep going. You got to keep going, you got to keep going, you got to keep going, so you never have the time to step away and be like what's the next evolution of this? Look like.
Speaker 1:Or how can I self gatekeep to better deploy my taste and curation?
Speaker 1:Take the best of the gatekeeping mentality and deploy it on what I want to make and what I end up making and then even from what I make, what I end up actually releasing. I think back to the first thing I thought about in saying that was you know, in the kitchen as a chef, you know like some of these shows, like Kitchen Nightmares or whatever you talked about the Superior, you know they might be, like you were okay with sending this out to the diner, like this lettuce is wilted or youed or it's under seasoned or whatever, is the chef succumbing to the pressure of getting the food out to these people but at the expense of the integrity and quality, the convictions with their mission, all that stuff? So that kind of free for all that there is when there are no gatekeepers, when there's nobody checking your work or you know the audience does by watching it or not watching it.
Speaker 2:We were talking about raising children yesterday and how this is a weird connection that just kind of popped up, but how difficult it is to learn anything without feedback Right, without feedback from somebody who actually knows. Yeah, like you're just throwing ideas into the ether yeah and if nothing's coming back, then you're just going to keep through like I don't know if that works, let's do this and this and this well, a lot of times the feedback you get with a platform like youtube is metrics and you get it from.
Speaker 1:You know views or comments. You know there's there's. There are elements of feedback, but it might be steering you in a more commerce based direction.
Speaker 1:Like oh, your CTR was low and you didn't, the view duration was low. And then you might be like, well, what gets higher view duration? Well, if I make fast edits and use this kind of music and like you start, you start working towards some kind of like like a puzzle piece that fits in with just human based, human psychology, versus, you know, making something that's powerful, moving, impactful, has something to say or ask an interesting question, yeah, something that is compelling work Sometimes too.
Speaker 2:And compelling to you I think yeah. That's the only metric that matters.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Do you watch it and you say it's good, but on an, on a, on a like be honest with honest with yourself. Yeah, that's one of the keys. Like you can't, like you'll watch something like oh man, this is so good, this is so exciting right and a lot of the times. That's just because it looks like something that you see in your head that you admire yeah there's nothing wrong with that per se, but I think you should almost try to challenge yourself to go a level, a layer deeper right two layers deeper, three layers, like you see something and it's compelling, but then think is this actually compelling or is this just aesthetically compelling?
Speaker 2:is there the you know? Yeah, is it wrapped in a plastic layer of compelling?
Speaker 1:but then it's actually just like what's the real substance of it was lacking.
Speaker 2:Be honest with yourself when you ask that question and I wonder if your critique is like. I don't know. It's interesting. It seems like you've kind of come to this conclusion more recently, within the last six months, because we we used to have conversations about how youtube was the work, or almost like was the work for you yeah, or is, is it?
Speaker 2:yeah, and then yeah, and it's like maybe there's a that detachment that needs to happen from youtube or that's just viewed as a platform. Yeah, and instead of being a youtuber making youtube videos, which is just marketing, it's just public relations it's just branding.
Speaker 2:You know, youtuber, you're a youtuber, you're part of this cult of youtube. Maybe there needs to be a detachment between that. And just like you're a, you're a. You know, you just tell stories, interesting stories, whether that's a story about video editing, whether that's a story and um, kind of putting that into the context too of what is the diary of that, what is the? Yeah, and I think you do a good job.
Speaker 2:This isn't me just like no yeah brown, I think you like there's been a clear evolution of you kind of opening up, especially in your videos, like I watched a video of yours from like six years ago yeah, it's like a studio tour or something right, and that's a much different.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm trying to be something this is what people who do what I do are supposed to do.
Speaker 2:This is my perception in a youtube video it's a facsimile of and you're not. It doesn't feel like that a lot anymore, but yeah, that distinction between why you're feeling like it's not work. I wonder what that is stemming from.
Speaker 1:Well, I think it's just there's an imbalance. I feel like I love having conversations about the craft and about the tools to the craft, whether it's, you know, video editing, whether it's, uh, cameras for photography, cameras for video, um, talking about like, what are the? What are things am I seeing in video editing styles? What uh things am I seeing in the photography world, like world from the actual work people are making? I love having conversations about that.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:I like that my channel can be a place where I can make videos that either continue a conversation, start a conversation Certainly like that they can be. Hey, if you like this style of editing, here's a tool that can help you do it and here's how I do it. I had a tutorial recently where I'm like showing people just some basic uh effects and final cut that can make your titles look a little bit less perfectly crisp and digital and just have a little bit of uh, of a of a feel of like the titles from a 60s or 70s film. You know where it's a little more, is a little bit of glow to it. You know there's a little bit of movement because of how they did this or did that, just to give it just less of a crisp, digital, whatever feel. So I really like doing that.
Speaker 1:I like if we go to a coffee shop or I go to coat with cody or my buddy nick, like well, what do you think apple's gonna do next with final cutter?
Speaker 1:You know I want to have those conversations and I want to extend that into youtube content, but it's too it's it's occupying too much of what I'm making. I'm not writing poetry, I'm not writing fiction or screenplay. I'm not going out and working on a photo project and then figuring out how I can print it into a book, um, uh, or or submit it to a gatekeeper to see if it passes passes muster. I did submit some photos to Aperture, aperture's photography contest that haven't heard anything back, other than you know we received your submission or whatever you know. So so, uh, you know, I, I want to, I want to make something that is an expression of whatever art is, and I think that's it. It's just the content and the conversation about the tools and the trends and what's going on, and all that is taking up this much space, and the work is this tiny little thing, where I feel like I'm making work.
Speaker 1:When I'm out taking photographs yeah, that I eventually turn into a youtube video um, and I feel like sitting down with that typewriter and writing what I wrote after the guy tried to kill this matt guy that we keep talking about.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know who that guy is um, uh, you know, I'm like, oh, this, and I think that's part of what I think, I think, you know, like. Then I start like attaching these emotions to typewriters and I'm like, oh, this might be a tool that like gets that out of me or gets me connected with that, because my laptop is like my content making machine and you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:It's like the cons, but part of I, I have that and I think a lot of that is like that constant search, for I can't do it, so I need something else, and then that'll be the key that unlocks.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I talk about this with my wife External things that solve internal problems that's not going to happen If you need a typewriter to write a poem because you can't do it on a regular laptop.
Speaker 2:I think everybody listening has access to these two things Right, and that's all you need. You're has access to these two things, right, and that's all you need you're coming up with these. We talked about seinfeld yesterday.
Speaker 1:Like yeah, they would write it with like big pins and right, legal, legal pads yeah, if it's, if it's, you know, if you, if you know not to go down another rabbit hole, but like that idea, like well it was. It goes back to the thing when I was living in chicago. My sister said I could have her ibook g3 and I declared at that moment that I could not write another page of a screenplay until I had that tool Like that. If that's out there, that's a possibility, I can't do it.
Speaker 2:I'm just going to turn this just to here. So I think we just haven't recorded in a while. I'm concerned about levels.
Speaker 1:Well, my levels are always kind of, I should probably just stick it, because I don't turn this way so yeah, I think that's something that I'm grappling with and I shared that video with you.
Speaker 1:I'll put it in the show notes. I promise I'll actually do the show notes this time. But that Venus Theory video where he talks about making art in the age of content and I think I showed you that video because that is something that I'm struggling with he set out to make a documentary and then he's sort of just grappling with everything feels like content. There's all this content out there and I'm doing a horrible job of summarizing what he was grappling with in the making of that video or in what he was talking about in that video. But it resonated with me because it kind of makes you pop out of your I don't want to say hypnosis, but your focus or blindness, whatever it is. On this thing that you're excited to do, there's no gatekeepers and it makes me money and all these things?
Speaker 1:What's really happening here?
Speaker 2:Well, it's interesting because you talked about he started. He was like I want to make a documentary yeah and I remember when I was I guess I was like in high school or yeah, I was probably early high school and me and a buddy and like my brother and my dad, we went to, uh, we were going on a little vacation, like a car trip or something and this was like the first year I could drive and I was.
Speaker 2:I drove and we were just super excited about it. Me and my buddy were, like we're gonna make a documentary right? Yeah, it's just a goof, like it's just some kind of copy of whatever you're you're making. I'm like 16, yeah, um, but we filmed a ton of footage and it's it. It felt similar to what he would like. Obviously, he's more versed in creating things yeah, he has a level of success.
Speaker 2:But he was like, okay, I just had all this footage, you know. He's like opening the door and like that doesn't mean anything, like what is that? Yeah I think everybody, though, has to go through that process not every, but most people have to go through that process. Yeah, they have to, like, go through that. Like when I first started taking photos, I was taking, like instagram photos yeah, you know that was kind of the influence.
Speaker 2:Yeah, on oh, I'm gonna take these photos and put them out on instagram and that's us. So like youtube and instagram, it's good because it can act as a motivator to get started, but the problem is is when we're just putting everything out there from like. We all have to go through those stages.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, the greatest directors had to go through just making some shit to kind of figure out.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay, well, this and this work together and like it's just iteration. Maybe there's a more intuitive understanding with some people than others, but there's always iteration. You always have to start somewhere and go, and the iteration phase has just it's almost expected that it's completely public now right, yeah, that's true, and it has been for about a decade yeah, maybe a little little over, and I think, like you, when you go completely public.
Speaker 2:Iteration needs to. It needs to be experimentation. You need to be the scientist in the lab coat. Iteration needs to be experimentation. You need to be the scientist in the lab coat. You need to be willing to throw out all of your data like throw out your journal, burn your journal start a new one, Throw out the experiment, do it again, and when everything's public, you lose the ability to do that.
Speaker 2:Everybody's afraid to look like an idiot every so why would you risk going over here and doing something that's completely different than everybody else is doing? Because the social stigma or the shame that'll come with you don't even know how to expose right, or you don't know how to do this, or you don't know how to do that. Why would you risk that?
Speaker 2:yeah uh, especially. You know you've been putting out videos, you know, in your experimentation phase, for a couple of years and you've got a subscriber base. Or maybe you blew up. Maybe you have like 80,000 subscribers. Absolutely Because something you said went crazy because the algorithm isn't concerned with quality, it's concerned with like people's attention and keeping people on the platform.
Speaker 2:So maybe something, and you're kind of trapped into that where, like, there is no room for evolution because you've created this safety framework that you have to stay within and there's a social construct, there's a social contract around it. The audience expects more yeah, and you have to.
Speaker 2:You know you have a reputation that you need to live up to. You can't just throw out. So I think something that's hurt art or just the you know creating work that is unique and meaningful I think something that's hurt that is everybody's just having being forced almost to evolve their skill set in front of a million people.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I don't think that's necessarily the best way to. There's a reason when you're training for something that you don't know how to do, you're not doing it.
Speaker 1:Broadcast to the right to the world, like you're.
Speaker 2:You're in a room with an instructor and like I, I so I think it's. I mean you all, you everybody remembers in school when you didn't know the answer to something and you're in a class of 15 other people.
Speaker 2:Maybe, yeah, you're not going to raise your hand and be something and you're in a class of 15 other people maybe, yeah, you're not going to raise your hand and be like, because you're risking getting that wrong and looking stupid yeah and I think, when that you apply that to a platform that broadcasts to the world, you're having to learn in real time and it stunts that ability to evolve into, to get back and I think with that video because I mean, yeah, he's talking about I shot a documentary and I'm like I've done that.
Speaker 2:I'm sure you've done that too yeah like I don't know what your first like foray into film was, but a lot for a lot of people. I feel like it's just like you watch some movies.
Speaker 2:You kind of get an idea of what what is and then you're like, oh, I'm gonna create a, I'm going to write a little script or whatever, and it's probably not going to be worth watching. But then the next one, you iterate a little bit, the next one, you iterate a little bit, and then after a decade sometimes quicker, sometimes, people, it's a couple of years You're going to be at a place, but your voice is going to be a part of that, because you didn't have to do that in public.
Speaker 2:You could just try whatever came to mind. This is interesting, let's try that. This is interesting, let's try that. And um, yeah, it's just an interesting way that we do things now and I wonder if because we're a decade into that if that's why it seems like everything is just derivative of everything and for most cases seems like there's like, oh man, content and then work if there's a. But I do want to also preface, like before we talked, some people just want to make content about typewriters. Some people just and right. For them the artistic merit of that doesn't matter. Some people want to just talk about books and they will see a video that they think is and there's nothing wrong with that, so it has. You have to live with, like, the duality of there's two different ideas that may not necessarily go together and but I think for those instances too, you know we talk about people that want to build community.
Speaker 1:They want to have that conversation around the water cooler. But now it's around my YouTube channel and there's people in the comments and I have a Discord or a Patreon or whatever, and I'm just really passionate about typewriters. I like to show me thrifting for them, I like to show cleaning them, I like to give pointers on where to get good ribbon ink and all this stuff. It's coming from a place, first of a passion for that thing, like a really pure excitement for it, and in secondary to that, or tertiary, there is a desire to. You know, hey, if other people have been able to, you know, blow up and earn a living off this or supplement their income, and I can figure out how to reduce my dependency on a job I don't love or don't care about, you know, using these tools to enrich their lives or to improve their lives.
Speaker 1:Um, I think what we really struggle with you know, some of the things that you showed in the video, that you showed me, um, this idea of it being this, this, this gold rush, this financial opportunity, and who cares what the cost is, like we're gonna make this thing. It's the jurassic park quote. You want to make it, you want to sell it, you want to ban, but you haven't actually thought about the repercussions or what comes from that. It's about something very um, you know, whether it's greed or power, something that's just yucky, um, and I think we feel like we see some of that and, uh, it just it's it. You know, we just don't like it.
Speaker 2:It just doesn't feel good it's almost like part of with you, like you have these passions and you're really like you're passionate about them, and then you also have that artistic side, yeah, and that urge to create work yeah and you're really good at talking about the work yeah and so it's like, of course, like you can like, you've done it. You've supplemented income, but to a high degree. With talking about these things, you're good at that and I think that.
Speaker 1:And then there's also this other skill set over here that's maybe not getting all the attention but I keep thinking, if I do more of this content, then it's going to earn me enough revenue where I can slow down the content creation and ramp up the work. Yeah, because and that's what's funny is it just keeps delaying making work.
Speaker 2:It's the computer right. You're gonna once I get this computer I'm gonna write so much.
Speaker 1:That's exactly right. And so how can I and there's so many forces at play there's meeting my financial obligations to cover my payroll through my business? To myself, you know, paying back my reserve line if I had to get some money to cover things because I was waiting for an invoice from a brand to, you know, get paid and living in our modern society, having a mortgage, having car payments, all this stuff that pushes me towards content creation versus making work. Now, there's obviously plenty of people who've made work and then had financial windfall or financial benefits, or they earn a living from that work. Millions of people from whether it's music, film, painting, sculpting, whatever, and for them there's always a mix, right, there's, you know. Well, they want to have us make a song for the soundtrack, or they want to commission me to make a sculpture for the town square. You know I'm, you know they're gonna. I want to paint a mural for the side of a building, and you know, downtown Creston, you know, there's always, you know, sort of that commission type stuff. Or or making content.
Speaker 1:And I think for me, making content is, it's my choice, I'm in control of it. Um, I'm not answering to anybody, uh and, and there's an excitement and and a thrill from all of that, coupled with earning revenue that keeps me from having to go get a job, which, for me personally someone who worked in a factory, worked at a grocery store, had jobs that I literally would be screaming on the inside going. I'm not doing what I want to be doing right now and that feeling isn't creeping into making content, but I want to continue to level up my feelings of fulfillment. So content fulfills me in many ways. It checks a lot of boxes, but there's a few it doesn't check.
Speaker 1:And so the point being is there are projects out there the Ted Snow documentary, the project I talked to you about yesterday, photographing these old, derelict satellite dishes, the 4th of July tents and the people that are selling that stuff. I have work in my mind. Fake work, fake work.
Speaker 1:All work is fake work, all work is fake work so when I look at next week and I'm going to wrap up here when I look at next week and I go, the weather is going to be great, the light is going to be good, early in the day, later in the day, whatever, and I remember all these satellite dishes all around town that I want to go photograph I'll sit there and tell myself you can do that when you've got your content made, when you have this much money in your bank account, when you have these sort of conditions met, to sort of give yourself permission, emotional permission, to go make work, because when you're making work that immediately has no financial benefit to you in the short term, you are being irresponsible. Because you have children, you have a car payment, you have a mortgage, whatever you need to clock in first. And I keep thinking like some brand deal is going to come through and it's going to be $5,000, and then it'll be okay to take a week to make work.
Speaker 2:I mean, that's the hamster wheel that I mean even, like you know, talking about like, there's a lot of companies that fall for that same line of like, oh God, yeah, Like, oh, you should, let's go and think about this idea. No, we got to make sure we're doing the emails and the, and then everything just gets lost in the shuffle. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so, uh, I sit there and I go well, if doing this, having this approach, the sort of like getting permission to make work, uh, these conditions have to be met. We talked about this yesterday with kids, like, oh, we'll have kids when all these boxes are checked, like they're never going to be checked, just just to have kids.
Speaker 2:I think it's the same thing, just make just make work.
Speaker 1:Uh, because if what you're doing right now is not getting you as far as you want to go, this goes back to seinfeld, the opposite george episode.
Speaker 2:Do you ever see this? Yeah, just do the opposite.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh, this is the most referenced thing I've ever so you know, and this isn't the true opposite but do take a different approach.
Speaker 2:Maybe if you and if for those that haven't seen it. Basically, george, george is this. Has anybody not seen science? I'm just going to assume that most people have seen it at least know of george costanza, but jerry tells him he's like.
Speaker 1:Well, if every decision you've made in your life is wrong. Do the opposite then by you know, by logic, gets like a beautiful, beautiful women like he he gets a job with the new york yankees.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's just all of this great stuff happens great stuff because he takes his whatever, his whatever his instinct is to respond to something. He does the opposite. So yeah, jokingly, but saying to myself when you have that feeling, well, you can't go shoot that. That stuff. That's more work, really, it's more of the work. Um, until you do this thing with content or whatever, have this much money or whatever it is, just don't do that. Do the opposite of that. Go make the work, don't worry about those things, and and maybe that doing that will create some kind of cosmic alchemy that brings you closer to what you're hoping to achieve. I think, too, also just settling down about trying to find the balance between the design that you have for your life and these goals that you want to achieve, and just spending time floating in, making things, making work, without all these outcomes and results.
Speaker 2:Take yourself off of the timeline and just be a point.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just be present, get in the flow and just make something. And I felt that when I wrote that piece after the guy tried to kill this mad guy I felt that in typing it and rereading it and now I'm not out there publishing it, submitting it to something like the New Yorker or something, and I certainly didn't reread it, revise it, whatever I'm like, okay, you just felt that, you made it, you put it out there and that felt great. Do more of that. That, whether it's writing, taking photos, making a video, editing the ted snow project, like knock it off. Yeah, I know we've referenced the ted snow thing numerous times, but I think honestly, at this point, the the biggest thing holding me back from working on it is I think I'm doing something wrong because it's not going to make me money right away.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I just hate that. Yeah, it's interesting how you can be so aware of, like the issue at hand or like the conflict Right Like it seems like you're pretty self-aware of what's going on.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And still find yourself unable to yeah, paralyzed by it. Yeah, yeah. I don't know what the. I don't know what the. I think opposite George is the answer. Opposite George is the answer. Opposite George is the answer Just do the opposite.
Speaker 1:And see what happens. What's? You know, what's the worst that could happen?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think yeah, that's, that's something that's a pretty profound way to look at things it's like what's the worst that can happen? And be honest with yourself, because it's easy to be like oh, this is choice there's. You're making a choice to lead with fear right. There's other emotions that you could lead with. So you're making a choice to lead with fear and maybe make a choice to lead with a different emotion and that'll change the entire. It'll change the structure of the problem in your mind.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:By leading with a with a different emotion than fear, by leading with a different emotion than fear.
Speaker 1:But I do feel like for me to bring it all full circle, sort of the second half of this episode making art in the age of content and, to me, making art in the age of social media and media. Social media and media deliberately influencing you to pay your mortgage, have new cars, have retirement savings, all of the stuff, checking all the boxes, being the good student of adult living and all of that. I think those pressures, whether someone is sort of consciously pressuring you a friend, in-law, parent, whatever or the institutions, banking, the automobile industry like we want you to buy new cars, we want you to borrow money, we want you to do all this stuff, borrow money, we want you to do all this stuff and all of those things funneling me towards just making content, turning out content. Give YouTube what it needs. They need more videos.
Speaker 1:Like I need more views, I need more revenue. I've got to make this video about Apple, I got to do a final cut tutorial. I got to make all this stuff and the art just doesn't get made because it doesn't help me in those two, with those two areas in the short term and that sort of immediate feeling. Yeah, and so art for me in the age of content ends up getting set aside because it doesn't help me move forward the way content does yeah, yeah, and I I think I don't think art is ever meant to help you move forward in a financial way.
Speaker 2:Yes, it can, it can, but there's plenty of examples of it happening. But you know the purpose of like, of making, of expressing something to the outside world, something you're feeling, trying to get it into some form outside of you. It was never, it was never meant to be like as a, as a, a piece of trade, exactly'm gonna hear, I'll give you this. And then somebody discovered like oh, this is, you can, kind of you know you can build commerce around it, but, man, this is like the commerce, and art is something you can just talk about forever I know we talk about all the time, but but it really it really is something that has permeated everything, and I do you feel like maybe this is a good question for any.
Speaker 2:I mean this this might fall a little flat, but for anybody that has been listening for a while, that has kind of heard this before do you feel like your thinking has evolved over the last? What have we been doing this for eight, six months, eight months, whatever? Do you feel like your thinking has evolved over that time on how you approach commerce, art, like, are there any like new, like distinctively new realizations you've had or you've come to? Um, I mean, obviously there's like the self-awareness that comes along with it. Yeah, but do you look at it a little differently than you did?
Speaker 1:last year. Yeah, because even kind of what started the conversation was, you know, sitting there realizing like you think you've been making work in a sense your whole adult life, but I haven't you know, Because we talk about this all the time, and today was like the first time I really have heard you be like.
Speaker 1:I feel like I just haven't made any real work or a camera or whatever it is, using these tools to make something that feels creative, but ultimately it's for some commercial end. It's for me to get a paycheck for a business, to raise money for them to sell widgets, all this stuff, writing screenplays, that I sit there and there's some deep aspect of bringing out what's personal for me and writing a diary entry through the screenwriting but then on the other half, going all right, putting it through this filter of if I go that route, the first act's too long and if somebody is going to buy the screenplay, if they don't see the act break by page 28,. You know, like it's, it's gonna, it's gonna suffer from its commercial viability, its perception of commercial viability. You know so. Even then, you're like making personal work. There's an element of a diary entry to it, to aspects of it, but ultimately the whole thing is governed by some commercial outcome. That the few things that I made or started to make, that ultimately had no thought of commerciality or transactions, like you're saying, like art isn't. That's not what art's for, that's not what art, that's not where art comes from. I sort of it's almost like you realize that and you set it aside. I really want to make this Ted Snow thing. You and I talk about it, we go and shoot it and all this stuff and then like, oh, I've got this mountain of work to do to edit it, but it's not going to make me any money, so so I can't. I can't do this. It's wrong for me to like like. I don't even know if I know how to like like you.
Speaker 1:You had this great comment that I thought about recently um, after we showed the, that Toymaker documentary, which ultimately was something that looks artistic but is ultimately kind of a commercial outcome. It was a short film for a film festival that was essentially commissioned. Right, it was commissioned, and I think you had some comment in the, in the studio, something about that, where, like, there's some feeling of marketing to it, there's something that it has a feeling of it being like a marketing video, and I think what you were feeling not to suppose what you were feeling was, I think you just sort of knew where it came from. It was commissioned, it was for a film festival. It was, you know. And then I think you saw ingredients of previous documentary-style marketing videos that I've made, that people here have made, that other people have made, and it had more of those hallmarks than a Wolfgang documentary or a Scorsese documentary. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean there was a care taken to crafting it Absolutely, but it was not art you can.
Speaker 2:You can take all of the care and craft in the world and it can still just blend in with everything else.
Speaker 1:But I was like I was. I was, I was drawing on all of the tools I used in the documentary style marketing content I was making for companies. And you know all that and making that I wasn't like asking questions based on I don't know some artistic motivation to speak to this gentleman and I don't know. Learn more, explore what he's doing, ask some question, get answers. You know, whatever it is that makes somebody make a documentary.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I feel like there was more of that with Ted sitting there going. I'm not going to come in with a plan, I don't have some agenda. I just want to like sit with this guy with a camera rolling and just learn about him and hear what he has to say. What do you want to tell us? You know, I don't know and then see how the footage plays out, find some through line, whatever it is, and I think, because so much of my work has been like a deliberate outcome that the company wants from the documentary style piece that develops an emotional bond between them and the customer and blah, blah, blah, like I don't even, I couldn't even see how to look at it artistically, and I think maybe there's part of me that's afraid of like making it a marketing video, because that's what I've done my whole, you know, the last 10 years.
Speaker 2:I don't know but, but I think there's almost, I wonder even if there's a way to like dialogue with yourself in the structure of yeah. Like asking yourself the questions, like you know when you're editing a piece or when you're you know like what would the marketing decision be here?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like should I make? Should that be like how? How can you you know you're almost having that conversation or that thought that you just laid out in the, in the piece that you're making?
Speaker 1:Right, I think even Ted felt like well, well, how can I use this to get me more gigs? Ted was ever.
Speaker 2:It was very focused on the, on leveling commercial out, yeah, output, and I think that and if it would have been cool if we had like, if, when you, when you're directing, the realization that you just had, if we had that when we went into filming yeah, yeah because I do think that that that you know, in my mind that's one of the more interesting ideas present in that is, you're trying to bust this marketing Right Idea.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And he's trying to Push it forward, Utilize you.
Speaker 1:I'm trying to make art and he's trying to sell concert tickets or sell CDs yeah, or get back in the studio or whatever Interesting yeah, it's interesting. And then part of me sits there and goes maybe you're just sitting on this until you see it. Yeah, I don't know. Part of me goes you're being. You know you're being. I don't know. You're avoiding it. Whatever it is, you're because you're scared or you don't know what you're going to make, or you don't know if you're an actual filmmaker or if you're just some content creator, marketing video guy. Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think everybody is. There is a. There is a sense to like Not everybody is, not everybody is. I've been, I've been playing with this idea a lot recently where it's like not everybody is cut out to do everything that looks appealing to them.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And this. Please don't take this as like this is not this is not like commit, this is a thought from you. You ended on maybe just some marketing content like there's a lot like I think it comes to realizing your strengths but then also trying to align those strengths with and like with with you. I don't think it's there, isn't a strength there like I've seen With you.
Speaker 2:I don't think there isn't a strength there. I've seen work from you that is very good work and it's almost creating the time and also stepping away and being willing to know that there's strengths and then that there's weaknesses. There are certain muscles that you haven't worked in a while because you've leaned so far into the content side of things, the marketing side of things. But you know, for some people, like it's, it's okay to accept that like there's some things that you're good at and there's some things that I see stuff all the time and I'm like I don't want to say jealous, but like you see something and it's so it's such a distinct piece of work it's they see the world differently than I do and I always appreciate that so much because I can't do that, not saying that like, but like when you see something that is distinct, you have to look at it and like when I see something, I'm just like I don't see the world that way, but it's fascinating how they see the world and I at it. And like when I see something, I'm just like I don't see the world that way, but it's fascinating how they see the world and I love it and I couldn't copy it if I tried. It was just no way. And some of sometimes it's.
Speaker 2:There's things that are commercially successful that are like that. Sometimes there's things that are just completely obscure that are like that. It's like wow, that is unbelievable, like, but not couldn't. I couldn't do it if I tried a million years. And not from the sense of craft, talent, whatever, which that's probably also true, but also just from the sense of they see the world, but what that person has done, if you flip the perspective they've singled in on what only they can do, they've done that so effectively that they're creating from a place that nobody else can copy. So it's like some.
Speaker 2:I think a lot of people struggle to just have that honest conversation with themselves because they see something and there's, it becomes this you know this thing that they can reach out and grab. Yeah, like I want to make it look like that and it's just like well, maybe you appreciate that aesthetic, but that's not your vision of the world and you need to be creating from a place that is capturing your unique vision of the world. And I don't know how that that conversation happens. But it's also, you know, talking about having muscles that you haven't worked in a while. Also, you know talking about having muscles that you haven't worked in a while. Sometimes that involves a bit of you know.
Speaker 2:Maybe the term that's coming to mind is professional embarrassment, but you know we build ourselves up as these statuses and like we have these like oh man, I've been in this industry for over a decade like I am well versedversed in da, da, da, da da.
Speaker 2:And if you're unable to accept that there's certain things that you just have to start from beginner mind on and you're like I'm just going to avoid that so it doesn't make me look bad, then you're just setting yourself up for failure, like you have to almost acknowledge, like I don't know how to do, that I got to start from scratch there and I think there's a lot of people unwilling to to make that choice, to make that and to make the distinction in general of like this is what I'm good at. I can't do this, yeah and we've talked about that.
Speaker 1:I think people sometimes get paralyzed with not making things because the version in their mind is great. But if I make it and it's no good, I don't want to endure that failure. I was thinking while you were saying that too, I think part of why I've connected with photography so much and the type you know. I don't know if it's true street photography, but going out into the streets and photographing things, whether it's a light shade of a lamppost on a building or a poignant moment with a mother and a daughter or whatever. That process is going out. And then I see something and I take a photo Versus editing Ted Snow, which is a mountain of footage, and I don't see it.
Speaker 1:You know I that connection with photography and I think that's part of that exercising that muscle and getting used to it is going out seeing something, you don't even have time to think about it.
Speaker 1:You just take the picture, yeah Right, and just and just, and then you can evaluate it after the fact, like, yeah, does this fit into a body of work I'm creating? What is the through line of this? Why did I take all these pictures? You're not, you know, and with editing a film, a documentary there's it's harder to just sort of like I feel this, I feel this, I feel this, and just go, go, go and then revise, go, go, go, revise. I do that in my writing and so I think you need to just get used to that through, through whatever medium you're, you're working and like when you're editing, most of the time, like your experience as an editor.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And you know, maybe part of that professional status is like fits in with your experience as an editor. You're not as willing to just throw it all on the table and just like write it like oh, here's an idea, let's go down this rabbit hole, right. And then you have to come back and just cross it all right, because when you're editing for your channel or when you're editing for a video, there's deadline. You know what footage is there, you know what the final product.
Speaker 1:It's sort of pre-crafted.
Speaker 2:The beats this is what we're doing, and there's plenty of great artistic work that is pre-crafted, but it's almost a different type of pre-crafted. There's a different group of muscles I hate to just bury that but there's a different group of muscles involved. Muscles I hate to just bury that, but there's a different group of muscles involved. And maybe part of that with Ted Snow specifically is like you're so used to working a couple of those muscles but then there's almost like a like, an unwillingness to go back and just like I mean beginner, mind comes to, comes to mind.
Speaker 2:Just work from a place of. I don't know anything about this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and I could be. You know cause I?
Speaker 2:I run into that problem all the time where there's I'm like there's some kind of ego block happening right now where I'm too important in my own mind to just start and act like I like to start from a place of I don't know what goes.
Speaker 1:It's okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't know I, I mean, I run into that all the time and I think I know too, and this is I know.
Speaker 1:If I sit there and watch through all the footage and and, and hear what he has to say, and and I will see it.
Speaker 2:No, I will see things you'll see, yeah, you'll get ideas, ideas, stuff will go over the timeline.
Speaker 1:I'll craft it together. I could get. Part of me has talked about being a little fix if I get super hyper fixated and I'm like I have to see this through. This is going to be a 27 minute, not that I'm predetermined as 27 minutes, but this feels like it's going to be, in that I want to allow this time to breathe. Maybe this is going to be 30 minutes long and I think about that's going to be two or three weeks and I'm going to be so hyper fixated on it that I'm going to set everything else aside. I'm not going to worry about money or selling a camera or getting another video up on my channel and all that fear of not being a responsible adult and father and husband, and art is a luxury and I have to work, work, I have to produce, I've got to turn out content. I gotta make that money. Um, like that conflict. Okay, you know, focus on the content yeah focus on the things that get you paid.
Speaker 1:And you know, cody, you know, is I feel like been like let's make stuff, guys, let's do stuff like let's, let's, let's. Uh, you know, is I feel like been like let's make stuff, guys, let's do stuff Like let's, let's, let's. You know, you don't need to pay me. Like, I want to work with you guys, I want to make a short film, whatever. And for me it's like you know, and I've been saying this for years Like, yeah, like, let me keep building this thing over here.
Speaker 1:And it's like well, well, aaron got a new car and, uh, you know, goalie needs braces. You know it's like you. Just you're just going to keep coming up with stuff that makes you avoid it. And then that goes to a whole other conversation.
Speaker 1:We're not going to go down this route, but it goes back to a previous podcast where we talked about the difference between people who execute on those visions, artistic visions, the thing that they want to make, even if it's hyper complex, like a movie, to the people that think about it in their mind.
Speaker 2:They've got great ideas, but then they never actually do anything about it yeah, um and I'm a version of that right now and you don't have to execute those ideas publicly no there's nothing wrong with executing those ideas in a dark room no and keeping them in the dark room yeah if you feel like you get to a place, and I think and that goes back to self gatekeeping, self gatekeeping. Having that voice in your head, that ready to take a pause, yeah, when something like you know before you just say something. Yeah, it's generally accepted that it's better to think about what you're going to say.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Unless you're too idiot. It's podcasting. Then you just say stuff and regret it, or someone like me.
Speaker 1:That's just like I think it, I feel it, Send it. It's just like I think it, I feel it, send it.
Speaker 2:And, but you know it's, you can make exact and now we have the ability to do this.
Speaker 1:The platforms that are out there that just allow you to send it, and the skills. I can make a video in quickly, five hours, and say what I feel without vetting it, gatekeeping it.
Speaker 2:And I think most of what we just say ends up. One of, like, the coreets of this thing is you know, we're hard, it's constantly evolving. Don't take an idea that we said in episode two and just hold that that idea is still a truth or a, you know, a belief that we have 15 episodes later right because it might not be.
Speaker 2:It might be, yeah, might not be. Um, I think there's core principles that have had, have maintained that, you know. But everything's constantly in flux and having the ability to, yeah, do a little self gatekeeping, like you can totally execute. Executing doesn't mean executing in public. Maybe that's the way to sum it up.
Speaker 1:It's just executing, and I think that's a layer of this conversation that I wasn't bringing in, and I like that you're bringing that to the table as well. Everything you think and feel doesn't need to be turned into either content or what you think is a finished piece of work, because maybe it isn't ready, maybe it isn't good enough, maybe it isn't, maybe you weren't honest in making it, maybe there was some result or commercial outcome or thought about the audience in making it. You know all that stuff.
Speaker 2:It is a numbers game. The more you you know you wrote that you said you like it's funny. You consider the piece of work. The one thing that came to mind. You're like I wrote a poem after. Maybe, if you write 100 of those just every day, I'm just like, oh, you don't have to put any of them out.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Maybe, though, you you write every day for the next 50 days and then you come back to it a year later and you're like oh my gosh, you know, 14 and 36 are really good.
Speaker 1:I, there's something there, yeah, so and I think with the photographs too. You know, yes, I'm making content by going out with these digital cameras and taking pictures of stuff.
Speaker 1:But I think after a year I just had my year anniversary for that channel being made. You know, I'm going to get to a point where I've gone out over and over and over again. Within that stuff I'm making Because even though I'm turning those photos into a piece of content ultimately and it feels artistic, I'm not you know, there's some photos that I'll go out on a session and not include in the video.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But then there are photos that I include that if I was making work from those photographs I wouldn't include in the work.
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, yeah, there's like an expectation that you're just going to go out. This happens in photography, but it bleeds into writing, it bleeds into filmmaking, it bleeds into every you know cooking, whatever. There's like this expectation that you can be good at something and just go out and get you know take photos for a day and you're going to get like six good photos yeah the reality, at least in my experience and probably in a lot, and I'll stick to photography on this example, because it's the reality is, you might go out for 15 weeks, yeah, and if you're being honest, over the course of 20, 30, 40 years, hopefully you're going to get nothing.
Speaker 2:Yeah 15 weeks, you could shoot 100 photos every day. Yeah, and you might have nothing.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:If you look at some of the people that you admire, in whatever medium or or space, it's likely they're only known for a couple of things. Yes, that's public. That's public notoriety, it's. It's a.
Speaker 2:There's a little bit of a difference there, but you know a life in 10 photographs right when maybe they took a million, and I mean I think so yeah, that that comes to aligning, making sure you're not just doing it. You're doing it because you enjoy doing it, you're not just doing it for an end, because the end. We've built a YouTube videos, have built an exception or an expectation that you're going to go out and shoot a roll of 36 and there's going to be five good ones or five great ones.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, you could probably shoot 360 rolls of 36 and get zero great ones.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Sometimes maybe just the universe is just open to you and you get 10 photos. That just yeah, are all time We've been there that you're like, wow, this is great, but you know never. You know never. Set that as the expectation Right. It's more of a meditation practice.
Speaker 1:You're not doing it for a yeah and and you know, and and also you know, I went out and I took these 47 photos and I felt artistic when I clicked to take the picture. Therefore, this photo, like I'm I'm blind to actually judging it as a self-gatekeeper. You know what its quality. Quality is, what it's saying, you know. Whatever I'm more attached to, I'm proud of myself for having an artistic feeling and snapping the picture and therefore that feeling is what makes the photo good. When the photo may not be good enough and I have to watch out for that too that's a different conversation.
Speaker 2:You have to create a buffer, a barrier between you, creating the work. And you hear about that in film all the time. That scene, that sequence took three days to shoot. And we spent $15,000. A shot it took and then it just doesn't fit.
Speaker 2:Right it just doesn't fit right. It just and the best or the best you know at realizing, or the best, usually the best work is going to be able to be like, yeah, well then, get rid of it. Yeah, but there is going to be a camp where it's like no, we spent too much time, money, we got to put it in, yeah, that's. I think from my point of view, that is objectively the wrong answer.
Speaker 1:A hundred percent, because you're, you're, you're answering to something other than the truth?
Speaker 2:Yeah, what the idea? The strength of the idea? Yeah, well, we did it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we didn't even talk about our little adventure, yeah.
Speaker 2:Maybe we'll do that next episode.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but we'll create a buffer zone between yeah.
Speaker 1:This was good, though, cause it's one of those episodes where it's like, you know, I need to work through some stuff and talk it through, and we talked, we've talked about this. Like, as we make this podcast, we can kind of feel, when an episode is, I have like I have strong feelings about this thing, this topic, this idea, um, versus, I'm kind of in this place, I'm feeling this way or that way, or this video kind of got me thinking what do you think about it? You know, and having and having that conversation to work through it Now, do I feel like I have more clarity?
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and you know, and this podcast is, you know hanging out with you has been really, really valuable for me to be able to to work through that and go through that. So we came in a little bit um, not 100 set on what we're going to talk about, but yeah, we started getting into it.
Speaker 2:So this has been very we also hung out for yeah, we spent, like, yeah, 12 hours together yesterday, so we kind of we didn't really talk about.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a lot of art creed you know, nothing that like I never I sat there actually hanging out and I was never like this could be on the podcast. I almost everything.
Speaker 2:It's funny it wasn't related to we like emptied the tank of everything else yeah, we kind of came in and which was kind of cool, yeah, yeah and it's good too, because, like I, kind of set stuff aside for a couple of weeks some of the stuff that I was working on and showing. Showing that to you kind of reignited a little bit of interest, yeah, cause I was curious, yeah, so but hopefully for our listeners.
Speaker 1:Um, you know me having a therapy session with you to try to work through some of this stuff. You know, my hope is is that, um, for anybody listening that feels that they're in a similar place, that what we talk about is helpful, and yeah and getting more clarity or getting a handle on it, or yeah, I kind of think that way or that's been happening to me or whatever.
Speaker 2:So and then just, really, I don't know if I'll even leave this end, but if, if you want to, you know, if you're, if you're subscribed to the youtube channel and you're listening and, by god, you've made it to the end of the episode, um, if, if you do listen to long form, just like audio versions of podcasts, if, if, if you wouldn't mind, yeah, subscribe to the audio version of this, whether that's on it's on, like apple spot, it's on apple spotify. Um, I don't know why, but I just I feel like that's getting into the, like the, just the weird perception I have. It feels like that's the sustainable thing. There's no, have it feels like that's the sustainable thing. There's no, yeah, it has to be presented by the algorithm. It's just there in the feed.
Speaker 2:If you don't do that, that's fine. I mean, a lot of people I know probably don't do spot. They listen to their podcasts on youtube and that's why we put it there. But yeah, that I don't. We've gotten excited about that metric a little bit. Yeah, just because it just feels solid, like it's there. Agreed, we kind of control it, we, you know, we pay for the hosting and then, but anyways, yeah, good chat bud.
Speaker 1:It's been a golden afternoon and I remember having the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer and summer.