- In this video, we're talking about
some of the biggest misconceptions
that people have when they're starting
their journey as a filmmaker, or a creator.
We're gonna through some of the things
that you need to think about,
if this is something you wanna do.
(intense music)
So we're gonna talk about some of the biggest misconceptions
that people have about the industry,
and we're just gonna go through some of the things
that I thought about when,
(helicopter roaring)
Man, it's loud here.
There's like helicopters and stuff going on.
I'm done at Venice Beach.
I'm gonna go find a quieter spot.
(bass music)
Before we get started, my name is Jeven.
Tutorials, product reviews, and I also do some YouTube
training on this channel, so make sure you hit that
subscribe button, and turn on those bell,
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don't miss one of these videos.
Okay so what I'm talking about are some ideas
and some things that people think about the filmmaking
industry before they get started, some misconceptions
and the first one is that this industry is easy
and you can just jump right in and you can start
making money at it, and that's something that a lot
of people think about when they start getting into this
industry is that they're gonna start being able to make
a career out of it and jump right into it,
whether you're starting a production company or whether
you are just trying to do the whole YouTube thing,
a lot of people think that you can just jump in
and make something happen right away.
That is like, one big misconception because
this industry takes a ton of time to find success at it,
it's not something that's just gonna happen over night.
When we see people who have a successful company
or a successful channel it's very easy to think like,
oh I could jump right in and start doing this,
I can get a camera, I can start making awesome videos,
but there's so much more that goes into building out
your brand and your business and everything
that you're doing, so if you want to get into this industry,
if you wanna make money doing it, and have a career doing it
you're looking at a, obviously full-time job,
it's something that's not just gonna happen overnight
and I think that's one of those big misconceptions
that people start of thinking that they're just gonna
jump right into it, and make something happen
but I don't want to deter you from going after it
because it's something that we can all find success at,
it's just is gonna take some hard work and take a ton
of time and a ton of effort to get going in the industry.
Okay so the second thing is that there's this idea
that you need to go to film school.
You definitely don't need to go to film school,
I went to film school, I did the whole four year
down here in Los Angeles, tried to do the old school
way of doing film making which was getting an internship,
working for free for a long time,
and then working your way up the system
and honestly like, that is not the way that you have
to do things anymore.
Everything that you need to learn is accessible online
and the majority of everything that I learned,
I learned all of that after college and I learned all
of that just doing it, failing, doing more,
failing more, and just kind of back and forth,
and that's how you actually learn, it's not from
sitting in a classroom and being taught everything
you have to get out there, actually shoot,
you have to get out there, create content,
you have to fail sometimes,
and that's how you find success.
So it is definitely crazy down here,
I am gonna grab a scooter and go some other area.
All right we'll get back to the video in one second
but I just wanna say that this video is sponsored by, me.
This video is actually sponsored by the Creator Film School
which is my place that I house all of my courses
and guys I just released a new course on how to crush it
on YouTube so I highly suggest if you want to find success
here on the platform, then go check out
the creatorfilmschool.com and you'll see all the courses
available on there.
Well apparently can't ride the scooter any more,
I've entered a zone that's scooter free
but I did find a nice little park here.
So the next kind of misconception
that people have when they're getting into this industry
is that the camera matters and honestly every camera
nowadays, is good, especially the ones coming out now.
Like, all these cameras shoot 4K, they shoot some sort
of vlog or flat setting, like you can do some really
powerful stuff with the cameras that are available now.
When I started filming, when I started getting into all
of this I was shooting with the DVX100,
I don't know if you guys remember that camera,
but that is like an old school video camera,
all in one setup, we didn't have interchangeable lens
cameras and we didn't have access to all the tools that
we have access to now and you could still make some
awesome looking content and some great content,
so I think one of the big things that people think is
you need to have like, the best camera,
and when I really started my production company and got
into it, I was trying to buy like the newest camera,
that was like when the Blackmagic 2.5K came out,
I was like, I have to have that camera, I need the raw,
but you really don't need anything to make good looking
content and if you're starting a business you don't need
like the RED to be able to shoot like productions,
not at all, I shoot everything on my GH5
and ever since I've had my GH5, I've shot every production
that I've basically worked on, with the GH5 unless
there's something specific that I need, so if I needed raw,
then I'll get a RED, I'll rent one.
If I needed like, super high speed then I'll rent something
like a Phantom but I don't need to go out and buy all these
cameras, I don't need to have all this gear,
and you'll be able to shoot everything that you need
to shoot with the camera that you have.
So don't worry about your camera, don't always be focused
on the next greatest camera, because there's always gonna
be new cameras coming out and they're always gonna be
doing all these marketing things to try and get you to
buy the newest and the greatest, but honestly
the camera that you have, is all you need.
And you just gotta remember, the camera doesn't matter,
it's how you use the camera and the story you're telling
and everything around it, that is way more important
than the actual camera itself.
So the next thing you need to think about is just
the gear around your camera and there's so many products
coming out and you go on YouTube and you see people
using like all these crazy contraptions,
they're doing reviews and they're doing videos about
all these different products but in reality
you don't really need most of these products.
The majority of what I use is a camera, a tripod,
sometimes a gimbal, and you know, a few lens.
Honestly it's much smaller than you think.
Now obviously things have a place, and that's why there's
all these products on the market but I don't want you
to get caught up in all of these products,
I don't want you get caught up in trying to get
the latest and greatest and everything you can think of
to go around your camera because in reality,
you only need the things that you actually will use
and that comes from just doing this and creating
and just starting to shoot with what you have
and moving on from there and just getting the pieces
that you need to make your life easier,
that's kind of when you wanna get different products
around your camera, it's things that will make your life
easier or things that will get you specific shots.
So, the gear itself is not what makes you successful
or anything like that.
Okay I got another scooter, time to keep moving.
(wind blowing)
I wonder how the audio is on this new Osmo Action.
Just a little quick test.
Just seeing how the audio is, vlogging on a scooter.
So one big mistake that people make is they devalue
themselves when it comes to getting paid
for their production, and this is something that happens
all the time, in the film industry and as a creator.
So when you get started a lot of times you just want
to get the job and you wanna get the portfolio
and get the footage for your reel so you take projects on
that are, freebies, or you do favors or you do
reduced rate, and honestly that's great to get started
and that's definitely one way to do it, you gotta just
do the work, get the skills to be able to get the clients,
however, you can't do that forever and you need to not
get excited when you start getting paid
and just devalue yourself.
Once you've got the skills and you put in the time
and you've done like, your test shoots and you've gotten
the skills, and you're starting to get paid,
you need to start thinking realistically about how much
time it takes to do a project, and then come up with
an hourly rate that makes sense for you
and a lot of times you're doing per project,
so break down what a project takes to do in the hours,
and then think of what the overall budget would be.
So it might seem awesome that you're getting paid
a thousand dollars to do a production,
but if it's taking you a month to do,
then that's not worth your time.
And you really need to not devalue yourself,
because a lot of people think that we want,
because there's a lot of people out there
that think that filmmaking is an art and its fun to do
and it's something that we all get excited about
so we're going to just do it for free
and it's a good experience and things like that,
but honestly it's a business, and we have to make money
just like everyone else.
You wouldn't go to your doctor and ask them to,
do your exam or do your surgery for free, would you?
So why do people think that they can ask filmmakers
to go and spend all their time and energy making something
this really cool project that then they're gonna use
to market their product and make a bunch of money,
it's just one of those things, you have to make sure
that you don't devalue yourself.
Another mistake is thinking that visuals
are more important than audio.
By the way, check out this plane I'm at Museum of Flight
here in Santa Monica, random stop-off.
But honestly when it comes to audio,
I would say audio is more important than video
because if your visuals are somewhat off,
that's okay, it's fine but if your audio is off
your audience is gonna know that so much faster
than visuals, they'll let visuals go,
but they're not gonna let audio go.
So when you're getting into this, when you're learning
more about creating content, you need to focus on
getting better audio and you really need to learn like
what kind of gear you should use for audio,
and what microphones work best for the productions
that you're working on, and when you actually need
a sound guy versus doing it all yourself.
So audio is one of those things,
it's super important and super like,
looked over for some reason.
Now another misconception and it's, kind of ties in with
what I was talking about with cameras but when you think
that you need things like low-light capabilities
or 4K 60 frames per second, you know honestly
you don't need these things, you don't need a camera
with low-light, you don't need a camera that shoots 4K,
you don't need, all these features that are coming out
nowadays, you don't need RockSteady stabilization,
all this stuff but a lot of this does help in certain ways
so when it comes to cameras, don't just focus on
the trendy words, the things that people are excited about,
the YouTubers are just like going crazy about and shooting
crazy low-light settings, well in reality, how often
are you actually gonna use a camera
that can shoot in 50,000 ISO?
These are just things to get you to buy cameras
and get you to get excited about the newest products
but in reality the cameras that were made a few years ago
probably still work for most situations nowadays,
don't get caught up in all the marketing
and don't get caught up in all the buzz, all the time,
focus more on your craft, focus more on making sure
that you're making the best content possible,
'cuz that's way more important than any setting can be.
Wow, okay, it's been a long day.
A lot of walking around.
It's nice to be here, I'm a little crispy,
is what it is, I've got two more for you.
And these last two are super important
but I do want to mention, now I'm using my audio
in my office and can't you tell a difference between
having like this good audio versus just a microphone
on a camera, it does make a huge difference
when it comes to creating your content,
audio is super important.
But the next big mistake is, thinking that creativity just
happens and so what I mean by this is that
when you get on a shoot, a lot of times you'll think that,
you'll just get inspired to do something amazing
or really, you'll just come up with everything
when you show up the day of the shoot.
Some people can operate like that, some people can start
creating content and just show up and have all these
wild ideas but for the majority of us,
we need to plan, and planning is a huge part
of the filmmaking process and something that a lot of people
don't really discuss and you really need to plan out
everything that you do.
And when you plan everything out, when you come up with
your shot list, when you come up with your schedule
for the day and you have everything mapped out exactly
when it's supposed to happen, that's when you can have
some room for creativity, so once you plan everything out,
you're gonna be inspired here and there
to come up with a change something on the fly
or do something unique or you get some extra time
so you're gonna try something a little bit different.
That's where the creativity really comes in
and things don't just happen, you don't just start
shooting a video and then make this awesome piece
of magic, it comes from lots and lots of planning.
So don't overlook that aspect of creating content
whether you are working for a client or you're creating
your own YouTube content, you do have to plan everything
out and you do have to have structure in the whole process
and that's a big part of being a successful
creator or a filmmaker.
All right the last one that I have for you,
the last biggest misconception, mistake that people make
when they're becoming a filmmaker is
basically focusing all your attention on this
and not giving yourself any room to breath.
Now in this day and age people are like,
glorifying hustle culture, and hustling yes,
will get you to move and get you to do things
but hustling is not everything, you also need room to breath
you need to have those moments away from your work
so that you can come back more creative and so that you
can come back with more energy.
So it's a balance, it's a yin and a yang, you can't just
always be working and always be going.
Yes, there's gonna be those moments of hustle,
yes there's gonna be those times where you're just
buckling down and grinding and doing as much as you
possibly can and working 14 hour days, 20 hour days,
just all day, da da da da da,
editing, doing this and that,
but you also need space away from that.
And I think one of the big things that happens is
people get so wrapped up in this kind of idea
of always working and always trying to do the next thing
and grow this and do this and build this, and shoot this,
and you never actually give yourself space.
And space is important, it's important to hang out with
your friends, it's important to hang out with your family,
it's important to give yourself just some time to relax
and just take your brain off and away from work
for a little bit, you actually come back with more energy,
you come back with more excitement,
more passion for the craft, and you actually are able
to do more than you would if you just kept hustling.
The hustle culture is what's leading to burn out
and burn out has been such a big topic on YouTube,
in the YouTube space and that's because people hustle
and they never actually give themselves a break,
they never give them that space and they're always
focused on creating another video and being so here
all the time, you've gotta give yourself space,
you gotta calm the mind, you gotta step away from things,
and you gotta give yourself that breathing room so that
you can come back as a stronger creator and have
that passion, go consistently for everything that you do,
rather than just go hard for a couple of years
and then move on to something else.
All right guys, so what are some of the biggest
misconceptions when you started your filmmaking journey?
Guys I'd love to hear down in the comments below
and if you're trying to grow your YouTube channel,
and really go after this space,
then check out this playlist right here,
it's a series of four videos that goes through
everything you need to get your first thousand subscribers,
a lot of awesome content.
Guys I'll see you on the next one.