Welcome to another edition of creator reflection. As always I answer three questions:
- How did I move forward?
- What requires improvement?
- What did I learn?
In this edition, I cover taking a leap of faith, breaking my 1.5 year hiatus on my main channel, the dangers of having a backlog of content. I also talk about the effects of sentimental on speed of output, a breaking point I’ve hit, why content is critical to my consulting business, and the balance I failed to strike between the two.
How did I move forward?
I wrapped up freelance marketing. I’m sure I’ll work with others for commission again in the future, but as of right now, I just want to work on my own projects. So I decided to take a (scary) leap of faith to go all in on consulting and content creation. Maybe I’m a genius, maybe I’m a fool. Time will tell. All I know is, this period has been testing, growth inducing, and has given me a lot to work through at a spiritual level. And if this isn’t the time, I’ll continue to try and again and again because I know without a doubt, that this is my path.
Uploaded to the main channel after a a year and a half hiatus. Big W, feels incredible to be active again. Once I wrapped up freelance and had more time and energy, I focused fully on tackling a long overdue but very special project to me — what I call internally “the moving video” — which I started almost 2 years ago, in November 2021. This video was an absolute grind to put together and when it was all said and done, took me probably around 200 hours. But by the end, I was very pleased with what had come to fruition and that I could release a product that I was happy with. I am very grateful for the direction I received, to break the ice on my hiatus and get back in the game again.
Sound design/scoring. Audio is the most underrated aspect of video editing, it really makes it come to life. And this year, it’s become abundantly clear that with getting serious with music and sound effects is the way forward, so I’ve been putting in reps. I got great practice with the moving video with its music and sound effects and was pleased with how things came out.
Worked through a lot of underlying blockages and points of resistance around content creation with what I call on the backend moving video 1 & 2. These have both challenged me so much and it’s clear as day why I didn’t get them done sooner — I was deeply, deeply blocked on both of them. This was by far and away the main contributing factor to their standstill.
Began building up my database of memes. Looking forward to utilizing this going forward.
Began using visual animations with this whiteboard concept in my videos. Easiest way to animate a point without actually animating and is a great way to provide a visual stimulation.
What requires improvement?
Being behind within content. It’s the worst, but I’m working on it and hacking away at the backlog bit by bit. It’s so tiresome that anything I want to make is always in a lengthy queue. So many good ideas come to me, and while I write them down, I don’t get the pleasure of working on them while the passion is fresh and the excitement is the highest. Thank god things are progressively moving and I’ll be back on track soon enough, creating in real time. I miss this dearly and crave it badly.
The delay of bald reveal. People have seen it in person and some close online friends have seen it as well, but everyone else still hasn’t seen anything. It’s really slowed down what I want yo make as a result and I want to get back to putting out anything I want instead of everything being tied to roadblock concepts like moving video 1, 2 & the hair cut video.
How long it takes me to make a video. I’m hoping that this is just because of the less-than-fun nature of putting together a 2 year old video followed by a 1 year old video right after, as moving video 1 & 2 have been a grind and even more of a grind, respectively. I want to get back to working with raw inspiration and passion rather than the monotonous nature of tackling projects that are in my mind, outdated despite being part of my journey. I want to get back to having my release schedule be “up to date”, whatever that may best look like. Additionally, perfectionism. I allowed myself to be a perfectionist to a degree with moving video 1 because I left years, it was fine to delay it a few more days/weeks. But going forward, I’ve gotta get back to just shipping things in a high quality manner as fast as possible, which I just need to build up with reps. I can feel that I’m ready to do this with upcoming videos more and more.
Timelines and gamification. I’ve gotten too relaxed when it comes to timelines in the past month, and I want to get back to gamifying everything again. My performance in July and August had both, with clear end times, incentives, consequences, and processes. I also want to do a better job of implementing consistent timelines, as consistency shipping is a huge thing I need to work on.
The library for consulting. In Q2, I went to town on building up a library of written resources and how to’s for maximizing one’s potential. And while I originally intended for this gold mine to be only for clients, I think I’m going to put much of it out for the world to have for free. Coming soon.
Podcast. I intend to launch the podcast by year end — or latest, early next year — after I’m in real time with the main channel and second channel videos I want to put out. But before I do that, it’s critical that I find out who I want the podcast to be for, what I want the topic matter to be and what problem I want to solve — the overarching mission.
Locals. Doing absolutely nothing with this ATM. Go back to the drawing board and see what I really want to put out here.
Newsletter. Still don’t have the functionality up. And the consistency fell to the wayside throughout my month of focus on freelance (July) and then focusing on my own videos (August, September). Get back on track.
How little I am recording b-roll with my cameras or even my phone. Because I have been trying to reduce the queue/backlog for so long, I haven’t filmed many visuals this year unless they were timely. I am definitely lagging on things and I want to switch things up by filming more key visuals on a day to day, week to week basis again. I did however start to film some stuff again on the fly with my phone near the end of the quarter.
Not putting out raw, impactful videos. I miss being able to put out videos with just a message, nothing more. Yes, I am a very good (if not great) editor. But I also am in the business of knowledge and impact. I miss being able to put impactful messages out whenever, without fancy production. Get back to do doing these as soon as possible.
Camera. I want a full frame camera. That’s all.
Balance between consulting and content. A complete switch from last quarter. July was dedicated to wrapping up freelance, so I put all consulting development and growth to the wayside except for existing clientele. Then I wanted to tackle content for consulting’s sake, so I could make performance consulting video content by mid September, but things took way too much time — especially in September. It’s critical to correct course in October and make direct consulting tasks the main emphasis again.
What did I learn?
Putting out content is absolutely critical to my consulting business. Not only does it act as a taste test and a case study into my skill as a consultant and creator, but it’s also a lead generator and warms up cold leads too. There are too many reasons to why content is essential to have for this type of business.
If all else fails, vlogs and b-roll you don’t ever getting around to editing can be repurposed into b-roll for other projects in the future. While too much footage can be overwhelming, it’s better to have some footage than to have nothing. A surprising amount of the visuals in the moving videos were intended for different projects.
Sentimental content slows everything down because I want it to be told perfectly and accurately. The more I care, the slower it all goes, especially because I can’t work on it all the time, only times where I feel prepared to handle it and do it justice. And going forward, I’d like to work less on these types of projects and more of normal types of content, where I’m fine with cutting almost anything.
If documenting stops you from creating what’s necessary, limit your documenting to the absolute minimum. I’m really feeling the repercussions of taking too much time and energy within “documenting” the moving videos + the haircut video and I’m so ready to make resource based content again.
If you’re using your iPhone right as a camera, the only noticable thing should be the audio. I watched a comparison of the iPhone 15 vs a $100K camera by Matti Hapooja and it was mind blowing that on some of the shots, I couldn’t tell the difference. A good camera operator, a good colour correction and a good edit changes everything.
youtube-dl / yt-dlp (via command line) are probably the best ways to download YouTube videos (and beyond).
All non fiction writing are listicles in nature. Even the hero’s journey, is still a list. When all else, use lists to guide your content. [Ali Abdaal]
Each cut should optimize for story, rhythm and emotion, with 1 slightly emphasized over the others. [Hayden Hillier Smith]
Letting content breath is in itself, a pattern interrupt. Watching videos where the cuts aren’t overdone and people
With just a single shot of someone’s facial reactions, you can say so much. And with visual effects, sound effects and music, you can amplifying the emotion even further. That one shot in the middle [moving video]
