(car driving)
- It's so quiet out here it's crazy.
Uh-oh, lens is dirty.
This sound is just...
(kisses)
Can you guys hear it?
I'm gonna turn up the sensitivity on this microphone.
(crickets chirping)
Now can you guys hear?
Mother Nature, beauty.
All that stuff happening.
Can you hear it?
It's beautiful.
The title of this video is YouTubers
versus professional filmmakers.
But technically speaking, Youtubers
are professional filmmakers, right?
Because they're making it as their job.
They're making money off it,
and that kinda qualifies them as professional filmmakers.
But what I really want to talk about is solo filmmaking,
and independent filmmaking and then like big productions.
Everybody pretty much starts off as a solo filmmaker, right?
The very first time I picked up a camera
I was like, how do I turn it on?
Let me call some friends and see if they're down
to being my actors.
Maybe they'll let me light them on fire.
(fire crackling)
(laughing)
And really that's when I fell in love with filmmaking.
I mean, it was early high school days,
and I was like, I want to do this the rest of my life.
My mom definitely had her fingers crossed
to at least have one child go to law school
or become a doctor.
But by now, I'm pretty sure you guys are very thankful
I did not decide to become a doctor.
Could you imagine?
Oh, my feet are turning purple
and I'm coughing up blood everyday and I'll be like,
you should probably put some ice on it or something.
First few years of working professionally,
I would still consider myself to have been
like a solo filmmaker.
I mean, I was doing everything myself.
The lights, the cameras, the sound, everything.
As I starting progressing in my career,
I started partnering up with very creative people.
And then it started to become
more like independent filmmaking,
and I would consider that to be about like five
to 15 people on your team.
So you have your producer, director,
cinematographer, your audio, your lighting.
And I remember just like constantly pushing
for bigger and bigger projects,
and now I am right back here, solo filmmaking.
Had to stop one last time
and just like look at this.
I'm using the Freefly Movi Cinema Robot
and this thing is awesome.
Full video on this guy coming soon,
but real quick, let me just get the shot.
(cars driving) (horn honks)
Did you guys see that car?
It literally went "awooga!"
Woo, back in Los Angeles,
I got a bunch of stuff in my shoes.
Notice the change of scenery,
not all of LA is beautiful beach, okay?
So when people ask me what I do,
I usually just say "a filmmaker"
I mean, that's kind of a blanket term I use
to cover most of what I do.
Filmmaker is a pretty good description
of what I'm doing right now, with these YouTube videos.
I'm creating content.
But once you get to a bigger sized production,
there is no real like filmmaker role.
The two roles I usually play in bigger productions
are either a director or a director of photography.
Usually it's recommended to do just one or the other,
that way you can focus on just getting really good at one.
But I just generally get called for both pretty evenly,
so I just kinda say, "Okay, I'll do it."
So let's start with a film director,
it's ultimately the director's job to tell the story
or convey a message, or make it entertaining,
whatever the film is about, it's a director's job
to make sure it's good.
- [Narrator] Fast, fast, and fast.
(record scratch)
- Specific tasks of the director can vary,
depending on the director or what they're working on.
Some like to be very hands on with the camera.
Sometimes operate.
Some don't even know what camera they're shooting on.
But the main objective for the director
is to make sure that the film is good.
If the film flops, the first person the studio
comes after is that director.
(knife slicing sound)
Me personally, whenever I direct a project,
I usually work with the actors mostly
to make sure they know what they're doing,
what their character is doing,
and feeling at that point in time.
And also working with the director of photography
to go over how the film should look.
But usually once they understand the feel
and look I'm going for, I try to leave it up to them,
to kinda take it away.
Of course I also work pretty closely with the producer,
in my case that's usually Steve.
Steve's the guy that brings it all together.
He finds everyone that needs to be involved,
brings them all together.
He's usually looking ahead to see any
potential issues that might come up,
and of course he makes sure the total project
is on time and on budget.
That's usually how our conversations go.
"Hey Steve, I think we should shoot this next
project on cook lenses."
"No, it's not in the budget."
And then you have to have an Eric Fickenwirth.
I actually have no idea what he does
but he's always around and I think he's doing something.
But I couldn't tell you what.
And when I'm not being hired as a director,
I'm usually getting hired as a director of photography.
Or DP for short, or cinematographer, any of those work.
So the DP is in charge of how the film and video look.
Not necessarily to make beautiful images,
unless the scene itself is beautiful,
then yeah, do it.
Get some golden hour backlighting going,
get some bubbles flying around in the air.
You can't go wrong sunset golden hour back light.
But let's say it's a scary film, then it's my job to say,
"Oh let's shoot this on red," just to get that
kinda gritty darker look out of it.
Let's make the room look dark and shadowy,
let's give them an incandescent flashlight
to give that orange glow.
If it's supposed to be really happy or funny,
then I usually make it really vibrant.
Usually it starts off with a location scout,
really helps to have a pretty good idea
of what angles you're going to shoot,
and what lighting you're going to use.
Remember that when you have a full crew,
every minute is expensive and Steve's always standing by,
just staring you down, "Better not go into overtime."
So you know, in those cases,
you don't really have the luxury to say,
"Oh, let's try this shot, ah you know what, nevermind,
it doesn't look good, let's try this shot instead,
let's try this light instead."
Once you get your frame, lighting works around that,
set dressing works around that,
and after all that is said and done, you can't just go,
"Oh, you know what, let me actually just
try this angle instead."
You know, the director's involvement can either
be really heavy or none.
Some directors are like, "I want this kind of look,
I want these lights, I want these angles,
I want it on the dolly, I want it on the steady cam here."
And some directors are just like,
"I don't know, just do your thing."
So as a DP I'll go to a director,
find out exactly what he wants,
and then I'll first work with camera department,
once I have that figured out then I'll work
with G and E, also known as grip and electric.
First you have to figure out
what kind of lighting are we gonna do.
If we're gonna do a direct sunlight shot,
then let's get a four by soak over there.
Are we gonna do it in a wide shot?
Then let's get a twelve by.
We have direct light coming in through the window?
Let's counter it with the M18 HMI.
Shooting around a fire?
Let's swap out the Kino bulbs with Tungsten lights
and soften it out.
And having a great crew makes a world of a difference.
You can achieve so much when you have the right team.
Sometimes you'll see sets with tons of people,
and you might be like, "What could all these
people possibly be doing?"
They're all doing something
and they all have specific tasks.
Being part of a big production is an amazing experience.
You almost become like a family,
you spend all these long 12 hour days,
every day with them, and then last day of shooting
is usually a very bittersweet day.
But anyways let's talk about YouTubing a little bit.
Let's go.
Gotta clear out the background.
This place also doubles as my living space
and also my gear space too, so.
For me I always feel like I'm fighting a lot with space.
All my gear is like stacked on top of each other.
I'm not cool enough to have my own studio space yet,
but maybe one day, that would be awesome.
I've looked at studio spaces before
here in Los Angeles and they're so crazy expensive.
I literally have no idea how people can afford
to rent studio spaces in Los Angeles, it's crazy.
I feel like I need at least a million subscribers
before I can afford one, so please subscribe if you haven't.
Oh yeah and also buy all my products.
I have lights and courses
and soon I'll probably be selling bracelets.
We're back.
Now obviously there are major pros and cons
to small, medium, and large size production.
Me personally, the biggest draw I have
to starting a YouTube channel is
the fact that you can be very spontaneous
and creative, just like that.
You come up with an idea, you gather your friends,
you shoot it, you make it, you edit it,
and upload it that same day.
I love how fast-paced and just in the moment it is.
On bigger productions, you know,
you have an idea and then you have to run it
through a chain of command to get it approved.
And then you go shoot it a couple weeks or months
after you got your budget together.
You know a lot of big projects take
like six months, a year, two years.
So the fact that with YouTube videos
you have an idea, you pick up your camera,
you record, you do it, and just that's awesome to me.
For example that shot I got with the rental car.
I just pulled up to a spot and I was like,
"You know what would be kinda funny,
is if I just do a J-turn
and land right in front of the camera."
Should I just try it?
I'm just gonna try it.
And it landed so perfectly, I gotta admit,
I'm really proud of that J-turn.
To do that shot professionally you would
have had to do a ton more work.
You would have had the location scouted,
hire police officers to close off that block of the street,
you have to get insurance, you have to get a permit,
a stunt car, stunt double, all this stuff
just to get this one shot.
Here's another example, if you're a solo filmmaker
and you want a shot of someone checking out
at a store register, sneak the camera in,
try to get that shot real quick.
If they kick you out, go next door to the next
grocery store and try again there,
until you get the shot.
Five years ago I directed a commercial for Secret deodorant.
I'm not saying it's a secret type of deodorant,
it's the brand is Secret (laughs)
but the scene was somebody checking out
at the cash register with a line of people
behind them in a grocery store.
What made that so complicated is that
you have to completely close down the grocery store,
we had to fill the store with extras,
we had to go through and hide all the logos on products,
you know, chip bags, like Doritos and all this stuff,
you have to cover all those up.
We actually had an art designer that took
a Snickers chocolate bar and then she redesigned it
so it said like Smudgers or something like that.
And then everybody in the line behind her,
all paid actors.
With bigger productions like that there's a lot
of pre-production work that goes into it.
But once you have all the pre-production complete,
everybody's there, you spent all this money,
it's awesome because everybody there is
there for the same purpose, which is to get the shot.
So you have complete control over who stands where,
and what they're doing.
And then you get to have the actors perform it
the way you want them to.
And if they don't get it right on the first time,
go for a take two, go for a take three.
So here are the three main reasons why
I decided to start this YouTube channel
and step a little bit further back
from doing commercial work.
Number one is scheduling.
When you're freelance you're kind of depending
on other people to give you work
and you kind of have to live on their schedule.
So it's hard to plan ahead because a lot
of people call you last minute.
Number two is stress and pressure.
Yeah there's some pressure making YouTube videos,
you know you're not sure if it's gonna be good,
or if people are gonna like it, or whatever.
You're very vulnerable.
But it's nothing compared to
the stress I felt making commercials.
Every commercial, every minute of shooting was expensive
and you're burning through money.
Every mistake can become very expensive.
Every time you present your video to the client,
it felt like this life or death situation.
Because you essentially just spent like
tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands
of dollars of their money to create this video,
and if they don't like it then you'd expect
not to get work from them anymore.
And finally, and most importantly to me,
it's who you're making the content for.
In bigger productions you're always making
work for somebody else, you're trying to please a client,
or you're trying to make the studios like you,
or you're trying to make the ad agency call you back.
There's a ton of politics involved
and people to make sure you don't piss off,
and ultimately a lot of times,
it doesn't come down to making good content,
it came down to making sure one or two people
liked the video.
And sometimes those people that judge your video
they know nothing about making videos.
So that was always very frustrating.
I've been lucky with having some really really great clients
but I've dealt with some terrible ones as well.
On YouTube I'm making it basically for myself
and I put it out there and hope you guys like it,
but I don't have anyone I have to please.
And if I make content that I know is good,
then I know you guys would like it,
so really for the first time ever
I'm making videos professionally for myself really.
So that is such a good feeling, so yeah.
What did you think of that, was that good?
- Eh.