Studio Sessions
Discussions about art and the creative process. New episodes every other week.
Links To Everything:
Video Version of The Podcast: https://geni.us/StudioSessionsYT
Matt’s YouTube Channel: https://geni.us/MatthewOBrienYT
Alex’s YouTube Channel: https://geni.us/AlexCarterYT
Matt’s Instagram: https://geni.us/MatthewIG
Alex’s Instagram: https://geni.us/AlexIG
Studio Sessions
37. Spreading Your Forces Too Thin: The Art of Choosing Your Battles
In this episode, we explore the delicate balance of managing multiple creative pursuits and the intensity that comes with feeling behind in life's various domains. We dive deep into the contrast between different approaches to content creation, examining the authenticity that emerges from simply documenting conversations versus the fabricated nature of more produced content. Through this discussion, we consider how employment situations can influence creative freedom and the way we choose to share our work with the world.
We also reflect on why certain creative endeavors, like our bi-weekly podcast, feel more genuine and sustainable compared to other content formats. This leads us to examine the unique value of recorded conversations as time capsules of thoughts and ideas, and how they differ from more polished, commercially-driven content. The conversation touches on the satisfaction that comes from connecting with an audience through authentic content rather than strategically crafted material. -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
And it had been a golden afternoon and I remember having the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summons.
Speaker 2:What do you think? So we discussed this a bit at some point last year, but this idea and you know we kind of discussed this a couple of episodes ago but this idea of you having too much on your plate, per se. Yeah, too many areas, you know. I like to think of it like you have an army of ten and you have all these fronts.
Speaker 1:And you have to.
Speaker 2:Okay, you can put three here, you can put two here, you can put, you know, two here, and then you've you've only got two left right, one, one, whatever. You've got to pick which fronts are the most important, and then some fronts you're going to have to leave on, on on guarded what. What is your thought on that? You know just how have you navigated through that. Where are you at right now?
Speaker 1:I think, and I mean, yeah, I'm willing to you know, kind of talk through this too, but it yeah, I mean, I definitely want to try to edit down so that it's not that many fronts, that it's, it's fewer fronts. Um, you know, I think someone could make an argument that just having my main channel and then the content that I make for my channel members, this podcast, sort of sporadic post to my photography channel, it's way too much going on. Um, I think I think there's a's a especially in one domain too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like that's all one domain, that's right including this stuff that you're selling, or like personal projects, family, that's exactly right, so yeah um home maintenance selling cameras on ebay and let's, let's.
Speaker 1:let's restrict it to the stuff that I have more choice over. Obviously, home maintenance is, if it was like, I'm going to renovate my bathroom, I don't need to, but I want to, versus my retaining wall collapsed and I have to rebuild it.
Speaker 2:I don't have a choice. You have to mow your lawn. Yeah, I have to mow your lawn.
Speaker 1:Do your laundry, whatever, yeah definitely editing down the amount of fronts that I'm managing for sure. So ideally I would be focused on my main channel and the content that's public, and then my member content, which is obviously tied to revenue. They're paying a monthly amount to get specialized content for them as members. The first thing that I would take out of the equation of all that stuff that I listed was selling cameras on eBay. I haven't been out camera hunting extensively. I drive by every time I come into you or go to the coffee shop or run an errand. I drive by a couple of thrift stores and I'll always pop in just to see what they have, but I try not to spend a lot of time on it. So definitely I want to shed that.
Speaker 1:I, you know, I certainly have no, no, no plans at being like, um, uh, you know, a camera store, a digital camera store, um, and I want to be careful too with going to a state sales that it's not well, there's a typewriter and there's vintage stereo equipment and there's records and, like you're spending 15, 20 hours a week cleaning them up and then taking them to the store where you sell them and cleaning records and all this stuff with for what ends up being uh, up being $300 to $400 a month. You're just putting in way too much time for too little financial payback. Now, there is some emotional reward to that. There is again the joy of working in the analog world, tinkering with a typewriter or this thing or that thing and restoring it or improving it so that it can be used or saved or whatever. But I can't, I can't, um, I can't put too much time to to those, uh, idealistic pursuits, uh, when there's more important stuff to tackle. So, to sum up, my main channel my photography channel being something where I post maybe one video a month, and then obviously this podcast I would like to write more articles for Medium, but I can kind of double dip often, because many of the scripts that I write for my YouTube channel can be easily adapted into a Medium article.
Speaker 1:My YouTube channel can be easily adapted into a medium article, um, but that is definitely something that I enjoy doing is is writing my scripts for my YouTube videos and adapting them for medium, but then also writing articles that would be exclusive to medium, that I wouldn't make a video out of, um. I'm trying to think if there's any other areas where I need to edit out those obligations and there's probably some editing within each of those that I could do. But I think also there does need to be a little bit more systemization of some of that stuff. For example, my member videos are very basic, some of them for the low-end members that pay the least. It's just me flipping a camcorder on and talking about a passage from a book as it relates to creating content or artistic pursuits or whatever.
Speaker 1:But then I also want to make Final Cut pro centric or post-production workflow centric content, and I can do that with my live streaming setup.
Speaker 1:I can, you know, record myself and my screen at the same time do these graphic overlays, and I could sit there for 15 minutes and talk about something and teach something, but then I don't have to necessarily go in and edit it and like zoom in on this and highlight all this stuff and spend all this time.
Speaker 1:But if I tasked myself with making one or two of those every Monday, for example, like Monday at 10 AM you sit down and teach something, final cut pro, and you know it ahead of time, you know you've got a lesson plan, all that stuff, um, that small investment of time would have, you know, a considerable yield as far as ROI goes, versus the video I'm working on now, which took, you know, a ton of time to film it.
Speaker 1:Scripting the a roll editing is going to be incredibly time intensive. You know, probably four to six days of, you know, from rough edit to finished edit, um, and you know, coming up with a video that I can make that is a four minute final cut pro tutorial that takes me a day to edit, trying to find those, the vacillations between really intensive stuff and stuff that is still well-made and quality but a little bit simpler to do. That can maintain the business side of the channel but then my artistic and creative needs as well. So, yeah, but yeah, still just a general sense, like you said, that there's spinning a few too many plates.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You need to edit them down a little bit. Take some of them off, yeah. Does the same apply to you? Do you feel like?
Speaker 2:I've been thinking a lot about just building systems that kind of scale. They scale in a way that's uncorrelated to the, the raw, um effort that goes into them, or like the raw, you know, um. So, for example, um, like this podcast is a good one. So you know, we put this out and um, there's so many things that I get from doing this podcast. You know, yes, it's it's fun to grow the channel, but that's always been like just like a tertiary kind of thought. Or it's fun to grow the channel, but that's always been just like a tertiary kind of thought. Or it's fun to grow the podcast, but we get time to catch up or to talk or to exchange ideas, which is always great. It almost acts as like a therapy session in a way sometimes, or just working through something.
Speaker 1:It certainly has for me.
Speaker 2:It also helps with our ability to speak and process thoughts, and it helps with writing and with preserving our sense of self, especially when I had this interesting thing. I'm not sure where this came from, but it's like outsourcing your sense of self because outsourcing it to algorithms because they can do it better. So your self-identity, you're almost outsourcing it to these algorithms, instead of keeping it internalized, because the algorithm is more effective at managing what you like than you are, yeah, and sort of keeping what you like visible, like accessible.
Speaker 2:So it's easy. It's just you're almost taking that, you're taking that burden away from your own.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're delegating. You're delegating it to something else.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know, having conversations helps to counteract that I think yeah.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I mean, I look around in areas of my life and obviously you can only put out so much effort, so it's really only choosing the things, that kind of check multiple boxes and doing those things. For example, I really wanted to. I wanted to learn some new languages in 2025 and the, you know, just also learning about, you know, computer interfaces and building things, um, in general, and I'm trying to figure out a way to do that. That also benefits my writing or also benefits, you know, building this reservoir of reference material that I can go back on. So you know it's like, oh, let's set up a blog from scratch, let's, you know, host it ourselves and let's do all of these things and um. So that's just one example, you know.
Speaker 2:So it incorporates a lot of different threads into one thing. So you're putting troops to one area, but that area has more than one thing going on. Um, yeah, I mean I. I definitely think I've got too many plates in the air sometimes, though, but sometimes I'm like man. I think I've got too many plates in the air sometimes, though, but sometimes I'm like man, I wish I had more. So it's, it's interesting, it's just what. What's the? What does the week look like? Yeah, and the. There's a very fine line between overwhelmed and not having not feeling like I have enough going on, right, so, um, and then obviously, the seasonality of things affects everything. Um, I do feel like I fall into season. Like you know, if it was 65 or 70 out every day, then part of what I, one of my fronts, would be running, or whatever, and fronts would be running, or whatever.
Speaker 2:And, but when it's 20, I care less about having people on that front. Um, and I you know that effort goes towards other things.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I mean something I'm curious about, uh, in the context of all this, what we're talking about, and definitely curious for viewers or listeners to where they are with what's on their plate. So you know there's there's spending a lot of plates right and underneath that. For me, you know you have seasons where you feel like you're spending a lot of plates and it's a lot to manage. I do too and correct me if I'm wrong in making, in making this distinction, Um, you know, one of my you know it's something that that is a strength at times and it's something that is a struggle at other times is a general feeling of of of an intensity and an anxiety about being behind, sort of like.
Speaker 1:Being behind, sort of like I'm not in a place where I think I should be in a number of areas, and there's just a general intensity to get caught up. Um, and I don't ever get that impression from you, and that's not to say that it's not there. There aren't times where it's there. You, you might feel behind on a specific project. My intensity is I feel behind in life, I'm behind on a lot of areas of life and, whether or not that's true or it's just something that I've told myself, the narrative that I have in my mind because of some idea I have of where a 45-year-old person with my background should be in their life.
Speaker 1:You know, coming here today and doing this podcast, there's a certain amount of anxiety it creates, and not in a bad way necessarily, but it's related to that intensity of feeling like I'm I'm behind and that sitting down to do this podcast, while it's great and it is progress toward all my goals and it's a part of my overall plan and strategy to create things and, you know, provide value to an audience and, you know, get something out of it myself, there's a general sense that it's a little bit lower on the priority scale compared to my main channel Right, and I don't like that feeling of intensity, I don't like that to do something with you and to do this during the day that I I almost categorize it I almost categorize it as as a generally I don't negative is not the right word, but sort of like like going into debt a little bit to do it.
Speaker 1:And what I like about you and your energy and all of this and with where you are, my read is is that that type of intensity or anxiety isn't present at all. So you, you come off as and I don't mean like come off on the show but, just to me, you know more even keeled, and that's not to say you don't have you know your drama or your issues or your concerns, but just a little bit more even keeled where all Matt's is like just yeah, intense.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think, I mean I guess, yeah, that's definitely a compliment because there's definitely still anxiety present, maybe not for those things. Right, I kind of just take the moment as the moment. I try to. I mean, you know me, I'm very singular, focused, and sometimes maybe that's like an intensity of focus and certain I just try to focus on whatever the task at hand is.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I'm usually not that good at multitasking, so I just give up on it, like I'm not going to try to do it. Um, so you know, you just pick the whatever the thing that you are doing right now, try to put as much focus and intensity into it as you can and then, when that's done, move to the move to the next thing. Um, it's just like a generally useful way from my perspective, of how to look at things, or at least that's been useful to me. I mean, there's moments of anxiety or you feel like you're behind, but I think a lot of that does come when you start to look out and compare to other people. And, yeah, it's probably not the most useful thing.
Speaker 2:It's human, everybody does it, I think but it's probably not the most useful thing to look out and just compare yourself, right, I mean, yeah, it's just everything is unique to whatever the particular situation is. Yeah, um, yeah, I mean I. That probably is a byproduct, though, of me, just like when I'm doing the podcast, usually all I want to be thinking about is what the conversation is. Yeah, and you know I'm not, I'm trying not to have more than that go on, and sometimes, though it's hard, like I'll sit down to read, or something in my mind is in a different place.
Speaker 2:Um, I wish I could kind of have this focus when I'm doing things like that. Yeah, Um, and it didn't have to fight so hard for that. But you know, one thing at a time, I guess.
Speaker 1:And I think that's part of why I push sometimes towards doing the podcast more in the evenings or on a weekend, because I can be more present. Um, because and not that it should, but that that the sort of the value of that time real estate is. It's not that it's less valuable, it's just that it's more open and accessible than during the day, and this is all. Just. You know um unnecessary classification of the value of certain parts of the day.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But I've just convinced myself that if you're not working on the thing that is of primary importance to your financial well-being and all that, that you're sort of going into time debt by not prioritizing those things.
Speaker 1:Yeah prioritizing those things. Yeah, and it's, yeah, it's, it's, uh, I haven't felt it in a while and I don't know if there's something about having come out of this break, you know, for the last 70 plus days and getting back into making videos for the channel. If it's um, the the year coming to an end and like, really, you know, like everybody does with New Year's resolutions, and me in particular like, okay, january 1st, like a new approach to everything, like we're going to do this and this is all this stuff Maybe all those things converging creates a little bit of this intensity and anxiety. I don't know.
Speaker 1:I also think I get anxiety too because there is money in the bank account. So it's like, are you taking your foot off the gas pedal right now a little bit, and again, not not going towards toxic hustle culture? But it's like, are you just giving yourself too much time, too much leeway to screw around with other shit? Um, rather than building up like a solid savings account of time and um revenue so that you can loosen up a little bit, so that there is a daytime podcast or you want to go out and do street photography, it's, it's like you're not having those feelings of intensity and anxiety in doing that it is funny.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is, I'm very neurotic obviously. You will, you will, like I think the pendulum will swing back and yeah, yeah, you just yeah it is. This is kind of a opposite to how some of the I think if you didn't take the time to just kind of relax, then this wouldn't be the feeling. Yeah, um.
Speaker 1:I think the other element in all of this too, is there's something about, like the compression of time that getting older has has this effect and you know, I I never sort of was, was sort of like aware of my age and that that that compression of time on the, on the backend of my age between you know, the age of 45 and 60 or whatever like it create the perception of that, creating an intensity Like I don't have as much time as I used to accomplish these things, so I've got to.
Speaker 1:I've got to, I've got to kick things up a notch to to try to catch up. It's like, it's just weird to feel it. Yeah, you know, and I think too there's an amount, there's a certain amount of like. Well, you know, you let it be that intense. Yeah, yeah, like your, how you perceive of it and how you handle it, you know, informs your emotions in response to it, because you know someone could be listening to this and being like look man, it's not like you've got one foot in the grave. And like your, your, um, your days are numbered as far as you know, making great work and you know earning revenue and all that stuff.
Speaker 1:But, yeah, I was my daughter in the truck the other day was like asking me how old I am, like she was like are you 30, something? You know, 30, whatever? Oh, no, baby, yeah, oh, what, what, what? How old do you turn on your birthday this year? 46 years old, yeah, you, and you just sit there and you know I don't want to get into like the, it's not like some, you know, like, like sort of Matt's having a midlife crisis.
Speaker 2:Live on.
Speaker 1:It's just. It's just. It's just fascinating. As someone that was relatively intensity free for most of my creative life, that's something in these last few years has just ratcheted up the overall intensity of all of it and I I can't pinpoint if it's. Is it just too many, too much stuff? You're just doing too much. Or, you know, compression of time, feeling like um, feeling like what you think you should have accomplished at this point. You know you're, you're behind on. Is it the?
Speaker 2:gap the gap. Do you feel like it's the gap that the concept of the gap, like where you, what you see, that you admire and what you see?
Speaker 1:potentially. Yeah, you know, and that's again goes back to what we were talking about earlier you.
Speaker 2:You've got to have like part of the gap. Is seeing the like having the strength, metaphorical strength, right or time to get over it? Yeah, maybe that's like yes, compress, that's right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, before yeah yeah yeah, I think all that stuff all that stuff factors in um and uh. I think's what's exciting about doing this podcast with you is the juxtaposition that we both have with what we're doing creatively. And I think sometimes part of me wants you to be aggressive with YouTube. Be aggressive with YouTube not that you were aggressive before, but you were doing stuff more regularly with YouTube and your photography and all that stuff Um, to have more proximity to those feelings like more of a shared experience with you.
Speaker 1:But at the same time I I'm like, but I'd like and again, I'm not saying like you're just chill and calm and everything's great. I'm not trying to say that you know you have plenty going on and all the stuff that you're doing and the stuff that we don't talk about on the podcast, but but I think I have a desire to like to bring people into those shared experiences. A desire to like to bring people into those shared experiences, um, and there was a little bit of a sense of loss, as you, you know, moved away from your prime focus being, or one of your main focuses being, your YouTube content and, uh, your photography in a more uh, in a way that it was just much more present from my point of view.
Speaker 1:Losing that overlap. Yeah, I don't know what I'm really trying to say. It's just there's more of a divide there, and it's not a bad thing, because I think for listeners and viewers it's interesting to contrast my intensity and all my neurotic issues with what. I'm doing and you're seemingly less, you know, not having issues like that, like similar to me me.
Speaker 2:I think with me, the biggest thing was just more of a shift away from, like, what youtube represented or what any of that. I mean just it. I just kind of reached a point where it wasn't giving me anything but it was taking more and it was just taking away from the experience I had making anything and not saying that I'm like I would never, I'm never gonna do anything on that platform.
Speaker 2:Or I mean, obviously we're doing the podcast on that platform and in a sense, but I just like I wanted my work to be different than that, like I wanted it to represent it, or for me it represented something different and, using that kind of falling into the, what that meant was a betrayal of what I wanted the work to represent for me. Yeah, I think yeah, that's just kind of. I mean, yes, I've really spent the last couple of years just redefining how my process works right, trying to bring things more, make things more cohesive where the overlap is more seamless in my life, professionally, personally, and um with with the work that I do, and then also just where there was more control over every, over all the aspects of it from one place, and it's not all these like satellite things that I don't, I don't control, right, um, in terms of like, oh, youtube, and there's like, oh, you're putting things on Instagram and like just yeah, these models that I don't really agree with. I was like then why am I?
Speaker 2:why, am I feeding into them? Yeah, um, and yeah, I mean I don't know what'll come out of kind of turning away from that. But yeah. I'm very, I'm very glad that I made that decision and we'll see yeah, We'll see where it goes, but um yeah, I don't have any intention of like abandoning work or anything like that, but yeah, I, just I, I wanted to.
Speaker 2:I felt like I was owned by those things I didn't want. I don't want that to be the case. I don't want to feel owned. I want to feel like I'm dictating my own experience to an extent.
Speaker 1:How much do you feel like having full-time employment makes ascertaining that easier? Cause it I would. My assumption would be like it takes, you know, the. A big factor for me is the money. You know I need to earn a living and I am not drawn to employment and building a career and a body of work through.
Speaker 2:And neither am I. Yeah, and I am I.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I don't mean to imply that you are, but this is again the contrast too. You're in your late 20s, I'm 45.
Speaker 1:I've had different experiences with employment that have led me to being committed to making something like this work, even though I think sometimes, yeah, you have to focus on the commerce aspect more than you would want to Do. You think that having your employment situation helps help to ascertain that that wasn't a good fit for you? Or do you think, had you still been doing the freelance stuff with crew work and all that stuff and and and, having been monetized on youtube and I know it wasn't like a windfall or anything you think there's some possibility?
Speaker 2:that you're still in it. That's probably a big reason. Having something that does like having when, when you are monetizing completely off of the work that gets done. And yeah, you are.
Speaker 1:I'm trying to think of the best way to and you're certainly, like you know, don't feel like you have to tread lightly, like you're going to offend me or say something.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, it's not that, it's more just presenting my thoughts in a clear way. When all the work that you do goes towards making a living and if there's still a scarcity aspect to that, I feel like it it always compromises what the work is. Yep, and you know the whole time that I was quote, unquote, you know when I was like doing freelance and I mean you, always you continue to feed into the whatever YouTube, whatever Instagram, whatever like networking or that aspect, because you feel like, well, maybe this will take off.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And maybe this will give me an opportunity or whatever, and then I don't have to feel this financial stress. So, yeah, having that taken away is a big thing. No-transcript, and I'm trying to find an even stronger it's like the word of the day, but an even stronger synthesis between all of these things to where there isn't a bunch of different, like walled off corners of my life, but to where there's more just one flow between them.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's there's one cohesive hole and yeah, though I do to answer your question, I I do think that there's a. There's a big thing that having that stress or that burden lifted from your shoulders of you have to keep your name out there whatever relevant and yeah, you've got to stay relevant.
Speaker 1:I I think top of mind, and yeah, it's that's.
Speaker 2:having that taken off does kind of let you just, you know, relax a little bit and, yeah, you can redefine what, what actually matters a little bit. Um, in the sense of you know what? What kind of work do I want to create? And only using these platforms as like there was no reason for me to make a video every week, other than to be like I want to grow a thing, yep, and I, you know the thing, I, I never really cared about the growth of the thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It was more what that growth represented. And so, yeah, when that suddenly it's like, okay, this isn't gonna be the answer financially, and there's other things that are sustaining you.
Speaker 2:I was just like, yeah, I'm not, there's no reason for me to put out a video every and then. Part of the thing that I got out of just doing the little interstitial videos on there, like that weren't the, you know, more explorative projects were was getting to put my thoughts into words, and then this podcast kind of took that and helped me do that in a way, so that became less necessary. So now it's like you know, I'm not going to put something up unless I really care about it. Right, and you know the good that comes from that is you're only going to get stuff that I really actually care about. Yeah, so if it goes up, like you know the good that comes from that is, you're only going to get stuff that I really actually care about. So if it goes up, like you can.
Speaker 2:There there was something that made me care enough to be like I want to share this Um, and is the growth going to be there? No, um, but yeah it's. You know I I'm looking at it more more personally now, like I just want to focus on doing things better than than doing things often, and not that I don't, I'm not like I'm constantly kind of messing around and doing different things, but, yeah, it's just a lot less public and I feel less need for it to be public. You know, would it be great if, if I had a large audience of people that cared about the stuff that I was doing, maybe.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm not sure I you know there's a lot that goes into that thought experiment.
Speaker 1:What do you think? Again, this is just curious to you know, for the people listening, if they're making content regularly where it is scheduled, like ours is, I'm curious why does our podcast feel different to be fairly regimented on? Now, I haven't been as good about posting the clips every Tuesday and Thursday, like we talked about, and I want to have that consistency. To me, it's just a failing of making the time for it and all that stuff as far as I'm concerned. But what's your attitude about? Every two weeks, we post a full-length episode of this podcast. Come hell or high water, you have to do it. You have to edit the podcast.
Speaker 2:And you are a good driver. That's fun. To me, though, that's like discipline.
Speaker 1:Versus your main channel that you were creating for. And this isn't me challenging you, I'm just curious what is it that makes us happy to be disciplined about coming up with an episode of this every two weeks, but something feels off about your main channel.
Speaker 2:I think I have an answer Like.
Speaker 1:I think, it's.
Speaker 2:This is, this is discipline. Like that's an act of discipline, where, and like recording this isn't an act of dis. I mean, yes, there's like discipline aspects to it, but I, every time we sit down and we talk, I get something out of it, and at this point we've been doing it for so long. It's like why do I go to the gym on a regular basis? Or why do I do X, y and Z? In life and that's always what I wanted. We talked about this on some of the early episodes of.
Speaker 1:We want to just have the routine or have the repeated discipline of doing this over and over and over and over and over Yep, and so we're doing that. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like this is. You know, this is part of the project. Yeah, and that was never part of the project. With YouTube, um, or with posting videos, it was always there were different motivating factors, yeah, and once I realized some of those motivating factors didn't I didn't agree with them. I, you know, I just I kind of dropped it for lack of a better yeah.
Speaker 1:And I just I asked you.
Speaker 2:I didn't drop it completely, but I mean you know there's, but I want to. I want to try to build away from that platform also, like I want to. Yeah, I the thing I'm most interested in these days, especially in personal work, but I mean, this isn't all work, it's just ideas like exploring ideas like ideas is as as atoms like ideas is just these things that connect everything, and that that's kind of where I'm, where I'm at right now and I want the yeah, you know, finding the platform to best platforms, the best explore those, those topics with those things.
Speaker 1:That's interesting too, just the sort of how this podcast helped be an outlet for those ideas and exploring those ideas and sharing those ideas, and it made that exploration through the videos that you made on your main channel less necessary, yeah, as one bigger contributing factor toward you know just kind of going on yeah. I don't really have a video. I don't need to make something, I don't have anything to say that requires a video.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't have anything to say. That's important.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And the other thing too. Not that anything I say on here is important either, but this is the medium's different. It's not as.
Speaker 1:It's not as self-motivated well, and it's also share. You know you're sharing the exploration with you. Know you and I are exploring those things together and exchanging those ideas, whereas maybe making a video on your main channel, on your own, is, you know, you exploring it internally with yourself and then, yeah, externalizing it through the videos that you make I think there's something just functional about it too, though, where it's like we sat down and had a conversation at this table, just like this.
Speaker 2:Obviously the cameras weren't set up, but the cameras are very unassuming anyways. Yeah, but we sat down and I even think the mics were here and just had a conversation like this the other night right for 30 minutes before we had to get out and go grab dinner which we always do and it would, but like that wasn't.
Speaker 1:It was completely indistinguishable, other than these cameras not having the record button pressed from what we're doing right now and so that, yeah, there's something about it's different than, yeah, setting up the camera and doing the well, there's something about too, like with the cameras being set up, it doesn't really change anything about what we do or say necessarily. There's something about making a video by yourself where it's synthesizing something versus just documenting. You know, and obviously you know, there's some videos where, like we want to talk about something specifically, there's a there's like a little touch of show business to it, in the sense, like you're, you have a plan versus every sit down at a coffee shop as we go, somewhat of a touch of show business, though oh, boy, I like that.
Speaker 1:I would you agree with that? Yeah, well, I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm getting sucked into that idea. Yeah, this just goes back to yes, wendy, we all mass, metaphorically speaking it's, it's just yeah.
Speaker 2:You can's just yeah you can't control for that you can try to, and there's certain formats that lend themselves more to maybe a genuine show of inside out.
Speaker 1:But then there's something too, and maybe that's why we gravitate towards these conversations. Like I don't know, there is some feeling that these conversations come from, a place of for the people watching us, that it feels sort of objectively truthful, like these are just two guys talking about something and it doesn't feel like there's some agenda. So like if I go meet someone who's connected to or you know, like when I was in Poland for motion VFX and Peter Lindgren was there he's a big YouTuber, 500 plus thousand subscribers I actually held back talking to him because I was worried if I spoke to him it would look like I had some like is there something about me wanting approval of someone I look up to, or wanting to be in that friend group, or accepted, that is, informing how I speak to him, and therefore there's some weird sort of inauthenticity to it because there's this agenda layered over it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I think that happens in something like this in a lot of cases and why podcasts tend to be the platforms people gravitate toward most, because the cameras do become invisible and instead of listening to nicole kidman on the steven colbert show and there's sort of it's's packaged Like you gotta have one little funny anecdote to talk about, you gotta promote your show.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It feels fabricated.
Speaker 2:It feels charming, yeah right.
Speaker 1:Versus her on Marc Maron's WTF podcast, where it's like oh, there she is, that's the real person.
Speaker 2:It's really difficult to fake. I mean, at this point we've done what 37 episodes? Yeah, I guess fake. I mean, at this point we've done what 37 episodes, yeah I guess I guess this is 37. So 37 hours, I mean that's tough to. Yeah, I mean I'm sure there's somebody out there that could probably daniel day lewis could probably make it happen, but I'd be curious from that's his meta project. Right is the.
Speaker 1:I'd be curious from people watching or listening. Have you tried a podcast, which to me again, is a format that lends itself towards people being in a state of objective truth, kind of like a reality show you know people kind of want?
Speaker 2:you know there's an element in those early reality shows where people kind of forgot the cameras were there, or documentary films where they Well, see, and this is what I almost see this as is, it's, it is essentially a journal entry that we do every couple of weeks and you know, so far we've only got, you know, a year and a half or so of journal entries, but I just want to keep making the journal. That's part of why the discipline doesn't feel, why it feels different from YouTube videos. This is just me sitting down and kind of checking where I'm at, like, writing a couple of notes about my day every couple of weeks, and we're putting that onto an archive and it's just something again, something really cool about where we are in time right now, where we can do that. And it would have been so valuable for me to be able to go in, you know, every two weeks from the time you know my dad was whatever to whatever, if he just kind of had a little check-in and what?
Speaker 2:how does how? How does he form thoughts on things? How does he approach things?
Speaker 1:What is his? What's he chewing on?
Speaker 2:Yeah, what? What is he thinking about? What's important to him? Uh, how's he processing that? Uh, you know, I think that'd be.
Speaker 2:We would love to do that with our grandparents or our parents, and it's just an interesting thing that we have the opportunity to do, and it's only as good as you allow it to be.
Speaker 2:You can be completely fake, yeah, and, you know, have some kind of but if, if you're truly taking advantage of this medium for, like, the change potential that it offers there's, you can just be yourself and have a conversation and just kind of archive it right, every couple of weeks, you just archive it away, archive it away and it it's not going to mean a lot immediately, but as time goes on, you're going to become a different person. Yeah, and instead of having to look back and be like, oh, how did I get from here to here, you can actually see that. But then also, yeah, you can communicate with other people. You can track ideas, you can track. You know, other people can kind of see how your mind works, because everybody's mind works a little differently, and that's really exciting. Yeah, that's that's. I mean, that's what I freaking love, that we can just do this like we can just like that we can.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's and I think it's the. The discipline is aided because of the ease with which we are able to write our journal entries through our conversations and even when I sit down to you know um kind of tell an honest story about overhauling my studio. There's a extra layer or two or three, even of fabrication to it and while I think what I say and how I communicate it comes from a place of authenticity and sort of like a journal entry, it's a little bit more like prose rather than stream of consciousness and even like for us in an episode, the variations between the episodes that we've done very conscious where there's those that like this today we just arrived at what we're talking about.
Speaker 1:We didn't have notes, we didn't do a big pre-show or we said what do we want to talk about today, with some agenda coming in, versus a show where it's like, well, let's do a year end wrap up. Or another show where it's like hey, alex, I just read this book and this idea is really exciting to me.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about this. You're coming in not knowing a lot. I'll get you up to speed and then we'll go from there, you know. So you have all those, those variations of fabrication, or you know, uh, having synthesized something ahead of time, Um, but you know, the hope is that there always is that objective truth that's underneath all of that, Um, objective truth that's underneath all of that Um and I bring this up because I am curious for people who are, who are watching or listening how does that relate to what they're making, what you're making, and how does it relate to what you've consumed? Have you listened to a podcast and given it one or two episodes and just feel like it's bullshit? And what about it makes it feel like bullshit? Is it just like a bank that?
Speaker 2:started a podcast. Does this one feel like bullshit? Is it a bank that?
Speaker 1:started a podcast because they know that the playbook of social media is to have a podcast that will get people aligned with your brand and sell more checking accounts. Get people aligned with your brand and sell more checking accounts like, or is it, um and is is the form itself. You know the popularity of podcasts because it's this sort of like oasis you know this, this uh oasis in the desert like of where I'll you know.
Speaker 1:Finally I can just kind of have a break and just hear people just being themselves, versus this guy's vlog where it just feels like I'm going to do this and do that.
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, I think, like I mean, through the time we've been doing this, I've gained so much respect for the, the true features of the medium the medium of podcasting um, which you know that brings its own connotations with it, but just sitting down and having a conversation, like conversation, recorded conversation the medium of that right Is. I've gained so much respect for it and you know, obviously we thought something was there, but and then every time we put up an episode and we see it grow, it's exciting. And I talked about that.
Speaker 2:we talked about this on the phone like it's exciting, not in the way of like oh, this is going to be our big like escape like we're going to get out or we're going to be whatever cashed in the lottery exciting though, because it's like a little notch in the in the side of not trying to do anything, like not coming with this crazy corporate agenda like we're gonna do this, we're gonna do it this way.
Speaker 2:It's this little like small victory on the side of just be yourself right, and maybe there's enough people that care that it could you know. I don't know, it's just it feels like a win in the sense of we could have you know, try to do this or this or this, or we could you know, I mean.
Speaker 1:It reminds me of like back in the day, like you would hear, like, like the like in the 30s and 40s. You know, like I'm taking my act on the road. You know, like you, you come up with your bit, you come up with your angle, you come up with your little slice of the show business pie and you're going to, you know, present it to an audience and see how they react. And while I think that that aspect of show business, when you do make something that is good, it's entertaining, it's funny, it's dramatic, you know, whatever it is like, that's amazing and and and I and I do look for things like that Um, there's something about, yeah, just sitting down and having a real conversation that you're documenting and seeing that it does connect with an audience. That is, that is a nice antithesis to something that's highly manufactured and planned and adjusted and iterated on. Or I didn't get a laugh there, or I didn't quite get the thing there, so I'm going to tweak it. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:I think content matters. Content not in the sense of content, but what something contains, the ability something has to elevate you know how somebody, or change the way somebody looks at something. Um, that matters more than anything else. Yeah, and there's something nice about just the shitty footage doing well, which someone else commented on earlier People like it. People seem to like it, and it's like we didn't do that because of who. We were like oh shitty footages. We didn't do that because of. We were like oh shitty footages.
Speaker 1:We didn't do it as part of our act. It wasn't like it wasn't. Well, wait a second If we want to have a successful podcast.
Speaker 2:And it's funny Cause in the back of my head I'm just like, oh, it's gotta be HD here, it's gotta be this. It was the easiest way to get three cameras set up and it was the least data. Yeah, it was the least data and we could see the little record light and we could do rechargeable batteries and they're inexpensive compared to like an FX3 or something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they were like 20 bucks and you know we were. I guess we had the thought like, oh, maybe we'll just do this, and then you know, if this thing ever gets to a point where we can upgrade the cameras then but they kind of became a part of the thing. It's character in the show it's a character at this point and it's just. You know, every time we put that up and it's looks like shit, and then I see but the content is real. Yeah, yeah, like not.
Speaker 2:It's just not you don't roll your eyes and it's like there's so much garbage out there that just has nothing to give.
Speaker 2:And you know, I, that's all I want to see out of my work and anybody else's work is just like I want to see something that's real.
Speaker 2:I want there to be something beyond just the, the plastic layer, and a lot of stuff doesn't have anything beyond that plastic layer or that just, it's just pure plastic, it's just, you know, it's brittle and it's hollow. And I think when you, every time, yeah, we put up a garbage video and in the back of my head I'm listening to somebody be like oh, you would have to do it this way or this way or this way, because this is the, it's like a nice little, just middle finger to that. You know like, yeah, I think it is the content. Like my, you know, a big part of my lens in which I view the world, or my model for the world, is that content matters. And you know there's plenty of examples that make me think that maybe that's not true. But then every time we get a new subscriber or something, I'm just like right, I think it might like, you know, just another notch in the belt or another piece of evidence that maybe it does.
Speaker 1:That was a bit of my. One of the questions that was going to ask sort of like what's your, how do you feel when we have a rip of, like, a bunch of subscribers coming on versus when that might've happened with your main channel, and not that there's not overlap there, but that even just with me, there's something weird about how I feel when we add a bunch of subscribers to the podcast channel, where that middle finger or that making this thing, just pressing record on a conversation we would normally have, um, brings, brings on subscribers, more people into the fold. There's just a completely different reaction to it. I don't know how to describe it.
Speaker 2:Um, I'm sure aspect to it is validation or something, but Sure.
Speaker 1:What we're doing is working.
Speaker 2:I really don't think that drives it completely. I mean, and I'm so disconnected from the YouTube, Like you handle that 100% yeah.
Speaker 1:I will see it usually, and I'll text you sometimes of the videos ripping.
Speaker 2:And I mean, yeah, I love it, but I don't think it's for reason of Is there something like, like. I don't look at this as like oh my gosh, it's going to rip and we're going to be successful, because it just doesn't matter to me in that way.
Speaker 2:But it's like I'm sure this is like the feeling that if somebody is blogging just because they love to blog and share ideas, yeah, and then that blog takes off and there's like an immense sense of pride in the, not in the fact that my blog took off, but just that like oh man, this is, this is a medium that people yeah, if you respect the medium, people care about it.
Speaker 1:I don't know maybe it's just like media and people care about it. I don't know. Maybe it's just like I don't know. There's something about this not being an act that it makes you not expect anything.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So then, when unexpected things happen, you know, like, like. I think there's definitely an element of you know, if I spend six days editing a video on my channel, there's some expectation that it's going to connect with an audience and when it does, cool on to the next one. When it doesn't, oh, that sucks. Whereas it's the opposite with this one, oh wow.
Speaker 2:If I had to describe it and this might be the most clear way to put this is it's like proof of concept. I've had a lot of conversations with people and everybody has their idea for how you should do something yep and a playbook, it's never.
Speaker 2:for the most part, at least in my professional experience, it's never. You should just do something that like is it's? It's always just fabricated right, and the more, the more proof of concepts we can get in the other direction, the more we have that to push against that, that wave of just bullshit. Yep, and I think the world is gonna would be a much better place if the quote-unquote playbook was just doing things from a place of compassion for the the thing you're doing Right, and so, yeah, the more proof of concepts we can get, the better, yeah.
Speaker 1:So I think this conversation, too, is not like let's talk about our podcast the whole time. Again, I, I, I, I am drawn to talking about it this way and I know I've kind of thrown things out to the audience a few times. But I am particularly curious for people watching and listening, how this conversation relates to your own experience making work, whether it's you know, youtube video like I might make on my main channel or you made on your main channel all the way to a photograph, a sculpture, a painting, a podcast, whatever, Um, and then also your experience in the consumption of those things. How does this idea that we're talking about relate to a particularly elevated response to a painting, a photograph, a podcast, a video that you watched on the internet? And I'd be curious, if there are those examples, to share it in the comments. Like you know, if it's a video, I want to watch it. If it's a movie, if it's a painting, whatever. I'm just curious the delineation between those experiences.
Speaker 2:And you know, I've certainly seen people that have an act like a standup comedian where I'm like, what a like, what mastery of of fabricating something that feels so real and so um or maybe it feels highly technical but then it transcends through that Right, but usually that is a by of that person carrying like I think of, like a jerry seinfeld stand-up act or something like. It's so fabricated and just pieced together yeah that it. It's like fake, but it kind of transcends that a little bit. But it's only a byproduct of him caring so much about the thing that he put all of this time to just, and so therefore it is real.
Speaker 1:It is you know and that it's like it's a surrender to the like, to the laugh, like like the goal is.
Speaker 1:I want to figure out like the purest way to make people laugh, to make to, to, to, to do something that's funny, to say something that's funny, and he'll talk about that like man, you just make two wrong word choices in how you, or your cadence or your rhythm or whatever.
Speaker 1:Like his attention to the minute details of how to craft comedy is incredible. So I don't want to make it sound like well, if you're not just sitting in front of your computer and like stream of consciousness, creating a comedy act, you're inauthentic or that it's not good. We need fabricated show business, for lack of a better word, um, but there's certainly a lot of noise out there and I think for you and I and the things that we watch, especially digitally, youtube, whatever part of this podcast probably is a little bit of a response to that noise where we said to ourselves you know, we're having these conversations that give us a lot of value, let's record them. Yeah, it had been a golden afternoon and I remember having the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.
