Who is Zdenka Darula? Who am I? Who am I? Ahoj! This is Zdenka. I'm holding this really shiny
phone in my hands... so when I was using the optical prism, I was adding something extra to
the image. I was actually covering up that hallway which didn't look good... FPV mode
imitates aircraft moves.. so... and try to do some serious work. She always gets...
no, I think I'm obsessed with this photo. Like when I have it in my mind,
I feel like I need to make it work. I have to get it until it's right.
Such as opposite of mine. If it doesn't work, I just give up and I move on. 336 videos,
6.6 million views, 106 thousands of subscribers and this is all because of you. Thank you.
Everyone has their own unique story. Why they started posting on YouTube. Nothing lasts forever.
Especially when it comes to photography. I've been making a living with a camera for 15 years
as a photographer. As technology evolves, so do trends and opportunities to make a living.
At first, there was a boom in stock photography and then eventually it went down. And then
you could make pretty good money with glamour shots and all those makeover photo shoots. It
was popular for a few years. And then you could make pretty good money in weddings.
It always comes in waves and it's up to you to surf the wave. You gotta grab the opportunity
while it lasts. And as the wedding wave was slowly going this way,
my sense was telling me it's time to maybe look up for a backup plan or some side job just in
case. So I decided to open up this YouTube channel. Little I knew at that time how good
move that was and I'm not talking about money. I'm not rich or wealthy. Two years later, when
I was just starting to see a little bit steady, you know full-time income from YouTube,
I was diagnosed with an eye condition banning me from working with flashes.
Goodbye weddings, goodbye all the studio photo shoots. And a pandemic was about to start.
All photography jobs were about to hit the pause button. I have love and hate
relationship with YouTube. I am super thankful that I have the opportunity, the space to create.
That I have a job and I can do this for a living ...but ... There is a very dark side to this.
It's a giant marketplace where money talks. There are lies and pretended friendships.
It can be very scary world. You got to be like an x-ray to find out who is honest
and who is not. You can go very quickly up but it can fall even faster. It's like you
are racing a fast car and you gotta hold it with both hands, grab the opportunity and hold it,
otherwise you're gonna crash and it's just gonna blow up. I learned so much about myself. It's
shaped me into the person I'm right now. It made me realize who I am. It made me realize who I
want to be and it made me realize that I cannot do this alone and I've got you. The audience.
I actually met one of the subscribers. A couple. We chatted online first and then we took it to
email. And then we realized that we live pretty close by. They also have a YouTube channel. I
made a new friend today. I drove all the way to Bobcaygeon. It's a beautiful little town
with all these little lakes and I stopped by to have a little chat. You know with these new
youtubers. Actually they have a YouTube channel as well and they have an online business and I'm not
gonna tell you more.. but can you guys introduce yourself? Hi. I'm Joanne with Muddaritaville
and Frank. How are you? When did you actually start following my channel?
Frank actually started following your channel and then he shared it with me.
We're thinking it's not quite a year ago. Yeah, close to a year. Yeah, we really wanted to
start building something for ourselves and Frank started following a lot of your tips and tricks.
Yeah, I followed quite a few different photography YouTube channels and I found Zdenka was kind
of straightforward, right to the point. There were too many salesmen jacking and yakking and
I didn't have time for that. I found it was just quite sweet, short to the point, great
info. And I've been following her ever since. Yeah, he looks forward to your Friday videos.
I gotta admit though, when I was driving here, it was weird for me too to meet somebody in person
like this first time. So we all agreed that it was kind of strange to look at each other first moment
because I see you from photo you know and I see all the websites and we just communicate
but we never really had a chance to meet in person. This is the first meeting and
it's it's kind of very cool to finally see locals who are doing the same thing you know.
They're on YouTube as well. They're trying to run their business, it is really cool. So
the business name is Muddaritaville studio and our main product is reusable stencils.
Our primary customers are DIY stores that teach workshops and they use our stencils to
teach their customers how to paint signs, paint pillows. We even do some laser cut wood and DIY
kits that we sell retail and wholesale and our customers will use these in workshops.
So we have 2 lasers we also have a UV printer that we can print directly onto substrates like wood.
We also are expanding to engrave other products. Frank's been working on some projects and paddles.
Oh and he's got a couple of products there we've printed some on our UV printer
where we've printed some cars for some local car clubs. But the primary business is stencils. Our
goal is to share some very short videos on how to for our customers so that they can get the best
quality with their projects, so really quick how to stencil how to stencil on different mediums and
then also with our DIY kits how to get the best results with the DIY kits. So that's our goal.
The Zdenka red challenge. Yeah, it became a quick video. It was supposed to be a real long involved
video because we have so many red items. It's amazing what red does in attracting people.
I mean, there's red everywhere. I had plans on lining up about 40 different red items and just
going through until I found the right one. Didn't get a chance to get all those items together so I
just thought let's just make a video and with our, with one of our lasers here that does engrave.
I've always admired the signature that
she shows on her ..on your website or on your YouTube channel. It's really just a cool looking
and I thought. Is there a way that we can snatch that off of YouTube somehow
and we'll get it on our computer so that we can make it larger and put it on here? So we did.
We did that. We took her signature. We didn't ask your permission because it was a surprise
and there you go and the red became the Zdenka red challenge with the name and there you go.
And then because I figured that her husband might get angry that I made this Zdenka coffee mug,
I did one in black but now he has to walk around with her name on his coffee mug so
that's too bad, but there you go. What does the future hold? I don't know.
I honestly don't know where it's going to go but to be honest, it feels like I'm still only
about to get started like I'm not even there yet. I don't know why I have that feeling but
I don't know. Sometimes I don't even understand myself at that point. Well,
cheers to the future and I'll see you in the next video. Cau... Ahoj...