Have you ever wondered how professional videographers handle the pressure of capturing those once-in-a-lifetime moments, only to realize they forgot to hit the fucking record button? Buckle up for a rollercoaster ride as Michael & Dustin confess their own cringe-worthy experiences in the world of event videography, including a wedding shoot that could have spelled disaster.
Navigating the challenges of live streaming and digital project management can make anyone's confidence wobble, especially when faced with the dreaded missing files or a technical meltdown. We take you behind the fucking scenes of our nerve-wracking encounters with elusive recordings and how we've turned these battles into lessons. Then we delve into the unsung art of posing – an essential skill that bridges the gap between videography and photography.
As we wrap up, the conversation pivots to the nuanced world of casting in filmmaking, where the right faces breathe life into a director's vision.
Have you ever wondered how professional videographers handle the pressure of capturing those once-in-a-lifetime moments, only to realize they forgot to hit the fucking record button? Buckle up for a rollercoaster ride as Michael & Dustin confess their own cringe-worthy experiences in the world of event videography, including a wedding shoot that could have spelled disaster.
Navigating the challenges of live streaming and digital project management can make anyone's confidence wobble, especially when faced with the dreaded missing files or a technical meltdown. We take you behind the fucking scenes of our nerve-wracking encounters with elusive recordings and how we've turned these battles into lessons. Then we delve into the unsung art of posing – an essential skill that bridges the gap between videography and photography.
As we wrap up, the conversation pivots to the nuanced world of casting in filmmaking, where the right faces breathe life into a director's vision.
You're on the, your 10th day of fasting. Then I had an update on my lens, kind of choice situation that we kind of worked through, and then we were talking about a movie that you had me watch, and that's when you realized that you weren't recording and we talked about your adventure at a summer camp and honestly, I'm glad that wasn't recorded, yeah, so, to sum it up, michael's gonna buy some CP2s.
Speaker 2:I kind of want to buy CP3s and rent them out, but I need a little bit more financial stability before I can make that investment. Watch a movie called the Hunt. I think it's really fun and exciting. Michael didn't love it as much as me, but whatever. And I haven't eaten in 10 days, I've only had water, and I'm down like 22 pounds and I'm going for 21 days, and I think that that's probably why I didn't hit record, because I'm, my brain is much slower and so is my body. Now I have no energy, I have insomnia, I have diarrhea and my face is getting thinner. So I think it's worth it.
Speaker 1:I do like. I do like how you have your hood pulled up over your head, like you're just like well, because if I turn the heater on in here it's too loud for the podcast.
Speaker 2:So I'm just fucking sitting in my office freezing to death so that we can have some nice quiet sound welcome listeners.
Speaker 1:I thought you were gonna try to like sweat your way to weight loss now I'm I'm shivering in here.
Speaker 2:So this is a good topic. Tell me about some times in your career. You're how many years in now? About the same as me, maybe more.
Speaker 1:I've been making videos basically since I mean really since high school, so like 15 years or more yeah, I think I'm 14 years.
Speaker 2:In anyway, tell me about some of the most memorable times when you forgot to hit the record button anything.
Speaker 1:I definitely did it a couple times in news when I was working in TV news and we get like an interview. I'd usually that what would happen there is we were using the ENG cameras with like the servo zooms and stuff and they had like a little hand grip where you have the button on there. I mean, I guess still a lot of cameras kind of have that and it was. I found that it was easy to double punch for some reason or I would start recording because I'm like shoot, I don't want to miss this, I'm just gonna start recording now and then the thing would start and I would yeah, and I would you know, in your head you're like, oh I gotta hit record, so out of habit I would hit record again and that would stop the recording and then I wouldn't notice.
Speaker 1:For I don't know, I I'm sure I've definitely had some, but I can't think of anything too crazy.
Speaker 2:I think I think every camera operator goes through that in their first year and then hopefully you get scared to death and you never do it again. But I are at the very first wedding I ever shot and I really didn't know shit about fuck right. Like I was there, you know, as the third person and we were shooting with only two cameras and one of the cameras was on a gimbal so the guy was moving around, so his camera was super unreliable. So like really my shot fucking mattered because it was kind of the only safety. And this camera I don't remember what it was, it was some kind of cannon it you could record on like a CF card and it would record on a tape, probably mini DV or something like that. I don't think it was hi-eight, I think it was mini DV. And so the idea was like well, the tape is gonna last for like three hours or something, but the, the CF card, is gonna fill up way sooner. So ideally we want to use the CF because it's easier to get into the computer, but it's a double backup, whatever. What I didn't know is that if the CF runs out, it stops the camera and you have to hit record again, even though the tape there was plenty of tape it wouldn't just keep rolling, only on the tape it would stop and then you had to hit record again. So I just didn't know, I didn't notice when the record light went off and we just missed, like the last, I don't know, four minutes of the wedding or something.
Speaker 2:All we had was that gimbal camera and it was moving around getting like the worst fucking. It was a GH2 or GH1 the very first Panasonic GH Micro Four Thirds camera and he had this little pancake, 50 millimeter on it. That was like 1.8. He had it all the way open, fucking nothing was in focus and he was moving around. It was a disaster. Like editing you know, editing wise, like it. Just to this day it shocks me that we never, like we did the best we could and we sent it off to them and they never go like, hey, how come, like the last three minutes of our wedding, like it just looks like it, like could you just use that other angle? That was good, you know what I mean. Like they never said anything about I guess that's, you know. Look, we're probably charging $1800, so I guess people just get what they get at that range people at that range, dude, or they could be some of the freaking, pickiest people yeah, that's true.
Speaker 1:I. I just did one this season where I like all I was supposed to do is show up, shoot the wedding, edit the ceremony and give them the raw footage, and I charged. I was like man, this is gonna take me like like two days, maybe two and a half at the most, to just do all this stuff, and so I just charged them like two grand. And this like I ended up texting with this client. This client sent me no fewer than like 65 text messages, like just back and forth about dumb shit, and like I delivered their stuff over a month ago and I just had my last hopefully my last text exchange I doubt it with them like a couple of days ago. So it's like those people can end up being crazy, but yeah, yeah, people don't notice stuff.
Speaker 1:I also had one this season too, where I didn't so my recorder somehow. I don't even think it was me, to be honest. I think maybe my assistant screwed up or the DJ did something. Somebody screwed something up because it wasn't me and the recorder stopped. Like I got all of dad's toast and then the best man and the bridesmaids or bridesmaid or whoever made of honor, gave her toast, and I didn't have that audio. I just had the camera audio which was like Not good.
Speaker 1:Thank God it was like you could make it out, you know, but like it wasn't good. It was way you could tell it was way different than dad's audio and they never said anything about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is weird the things that you get. So then the second one was after, I'd you know. So I worked with that first company for like a year no, almost two years. I started my own business and it was maybe my I don't know like one of my first six weddings or something. You know, after having started my own company, and the second, one of the shooters that I hired just didn't show up, cause she went to ACL, which is a music festival in Austin. She stayed out at this fucking concert till four o'clock in the morning and then the next day was like, called me two hours late and was like, oh, I'm so sorry, I'm gonna meet you there. And I was just like, no, it's too late, I had already. So when she didn't show it up, I made my wife, who was my girlfriend at the time. I was like, honey, you're shooting a wedding today. I'm sorry this is happening, but I don't see any other choice. And so I brought her and made her one of my shooters, and a lot of my audio gear was still new to me and I knew how important it was.
Speaker 2:So when we went to do toasts cause I used to work with the crew at three. So I had two camera operators, including one that was my wife, who didn't know what she was doing, and so I made the decision to spend the entire toasts monitoring audio. Like I just stood at the DJ's table with headphones in because I didn't really trust the auto limiters and, like you know, I didn't know if I was gonna need to rock the fade up and down and that kind of thing If somebody started getting loud and quiet. And so I didn't operate a camera and my wife double recorded. You know she recorded two frames. She hit the button twice or whatever, and then the whole toasts go on and then she hit record again when it was over. And I knew it immediately, cause when I went up to her right after toast and grabbed the camera, it was recording and I was like, oh, you didn't stop recording. She was like, yes, I did.
Speaker 2:So that one sucked and gave me a panic attack and it was another one where I did my best to cover it. Client never said shit and I, with the two cameras that I had I had one, the one that my wife missed was the one looking at the person speaking, and the other camera was just pointed at the bride and groom so for, like her sisters, whole toast all they see is themselves. They don't ever see the sister talking and they never said a word. Wow. And then the other thing I did. It's not that I didn't hit record, but I recorded something for somebody else and then I forgot to give them the memory card. And then, like two months later, I formatted the card and that someone else was you, and it was when you went to go have a baby or whatever, and I was like I'll just film the exit for you, don't worry about it.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, and it never gave you that.
Speaker 2:Remember that it was your wedding.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you shot them leaving. And the sparklers? And everybody going oh.
Speaker 2:And then, after like two months, you never asked for the footage. I assumed you had it and I just I was on a job and I formatted the card.
Speaker 1:Well, I asked for the footage.
Speaker 2:Oh, I just never said to.
Speaker 1:But you never sent it. And then, when I asked again, you were like oh shit.
Speaker 2:I don't know how you're still friends with me. If somebody did that to me, I would just like cut them out of my life forever.
Speaker 1:What can I say?
Speaker 2:I'm a nice guy yeah, we can do? We need to end up. Oh, and then today I didn't hit record on the podcast. So that's four. Not bad for 15 years, but I also hope it never happens again.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I know how it feels just because I've done it myself. I mean, I've lost files, I've I forgot to dump cards, you know, or like missed a card, or like split a shoot across two different cards and then forgot that I split it across two different cards because I don't normally, or like whatever. And then time goes by, you find that old card and you like you're like, oh, I didn't realize this card was in here, great. And then you format it and then you erase it's a nightmare. And then you don't get around to editing it till three months later. And this is a. This is one of those jobs where, like, I still get nervous when I open a project and I start importing all my files.
Speaker 2:And I go yeah.
Speaker 1:And I'm like going through the folders and every time I double click a folder I just get like semi-panicked.
Speaker 2:So like while.
Speaker 1:I'm waiting to see if everything's there. You know, even though, like, I feel like I do a really good job on you know, like when I'm saving everything, I try to be pretty methodical about it, so I don't usually have any issues, but it's happened enough that you start to question your sanity, quite frankly. Like you're like, how could this happen to me for like the ninth time in 15 years? And you just like you're like, am I not? Is this job not for me? Like who loses something nine times? Like you feel like I don't know, you feel like a failure or you feel like a total idiot.
Speaker 2:Well, dude, that's what live streaming was for me. We were selling live streaming and failing every fucking job, every fucking job. The live stream wasn't going out. I wasn't in charge of it, like I was doing. I was actually running the cameras, somebody else was handling, you know, the live stream, set up the ATEM and the switch and like all that fucking shit, and like, every fucking time something would go wrong where, like, the internet would just suddenly go out. You know, a lot of times it was the, a lot of times it was just there was just no internet there.
Speaker 2:The venue told us that they had really good internet. We got there and they didn't, or everything would be working fine, and then all the guests come in and then it didn't work anymore, as though like, oh, you run out of 100 cell phones in the room, so now this doesn't work, or they just fucking like would have something plugged into the wrong thing. So, like one time we were sending out video but no audio, because they had the audio plugged into the wrong port and like it wasn't my job, but it made me feel like a fucking clown and it was humiliating and I mean that made me want to quit the job for that company right there, cause I was like I was screaming it. You know, I was just an employee, but I was screaming at my boss just like not fucking. I didn't sign up to go look like a fucking idiot every week.
Speaker 2:This is not going to be part like. Failing is not part of my job. I am not here to fucking fail Like, and we're failing so consistently that at this point we're running a fraudulent business, you know. And he always say like well, you know, this technology is new and it's unreliable. And I explained that to the clients and in their contract it says that you know, if there's technical errors, we're, you know, but we'll boss, so we don't have to give refunds or anything. Well, that's not the point. You're selling a product that you have like a fucking 10% chance of being able to deliver.
Speaker 2:And it's like we're getting better, we didn't get better, we didn't get better.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:The technology's not there. It's not that it doesn't work. It doesn't work consistently enough for you to charge money to people for it and know that you're gonna be able to provide the service they paid for, and that's like. I don't ever want to be in a business where, even fucking 10% of the time, we fuck it up. I only want to be in a business where I can be perfect 100% of the time, deliver on expectations, and so I don't ever want to be in live streaming.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I always felt like live streaming is one of those things where you have to dedicate yourself to it. I knew one person who was really good at it, but that was like most of his business. So he and he would go do site visits beforehand so that he wasn't surprised by anything. He would like run certain speed tests and he did all sorts of stuff that I don't even know.
Speaker 2:But you can do that stuff, and when you bring another 100 people into the room, your test doesn't matter. It's now a different. There's a hundred bodies and they all have cell phones in their pockets and it changes the game. And think about, like, when you watch TV, you know, on any of the cable news network or network news, whatever, anything that's like a live show, like news think about how often they fuck up. And it's like dude, if CNN can't fucking figure this out, if MSNBC can't figure this out, why the fuck do we think we can do this while also filming an entire fucking wedding? We just think we're just gonna throw this shit together and it's gonna work when, like, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I mean, I love it.
Speaker 2:You watch Bill Maher on HBO and sometimes he has a satellite guest in, and half of the time that shit's fucked up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, usually they're using trucks for that, you know, satellite trucks or whatever. We don't have a truck.
Speaker 2:We have like some fucking shit. We bought Just some shit. We bought because we saw a YouTube video and so you know it's with a thousand dollars, it's fucking. Live streaming is not a winner business. For me that's a loser business.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I always. I always was like no, I'm not. People would always ask me, hey, is this something you do? And I was like nope. I was always like you can either spend a bunch of money and it may or may not work, or you could have your cousin take out her phone and do it on Facebook Live.
Speaker 2:Yeah, just have your cousin do it and like, if you really care that much, instead of spending $2,500 for me to do that, how about give me $800 and I'll deliver ceremony within 24 hours?
Speaker 2:the next day delivery on ceremony only Exactly Cause that's what ended up happening when we had all those failures. You know like, yeah, technically we didn't have to give refunds or whatever until we weren't going to, but I still felt that they were screwed. So what I would do is, after shooting a whole fucking wedding for a 10 hour shoot plus three hour drive on either side, I would go home and pull in all night or editing their ceremony, get their footage imported and edit that ceremony and get it to them before the sun came up the next morning. So then I just worked like 24 hours straight.
Speaker 2:It was fucking, that's not a business man. So I could just see being like look, I'm not, I can't live stream. If you really want live streaming, hire a different company, cause I'm not going to ruin my reputation for it. Or why don't you just pay me and I'll edit your ceremony? Like, pay a rush fee and I'll edit your ceremony next day?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But whatever, I'm not in that business anymore, so I shouldn't be getting my heart racing about it.
Speaker 1:Or maybe you should get more into down that ketosis road.
Speaker 2:I'm into ketosis. I've been peeing on the strips. I'm actually I'm at the perfect optimal, you know, like there's like eight steps or whatever on the little piss strip and I'm at the right level for like the optimal fat burning zone. And if I go higher it's where it starts to be like, ooh, I might be doing damage to her, Maybe I need to go to the doctor or hospital or just start eating again. So I'm keeping an eye on it. There's certain things that will like. My goal is to go 21 days, but I'm not. You know, I'm masochist, like is it the right word? Is masochist when you want to hurt other people or when you want to be hurt.
Speaker 1:Whatever, I'm not looking.
Speaker 2:I'm not an asshole, okay, I'm not looking to get fucking killed here. So you know, if I start passing out regularly I haven't passed out once If I pass out like I do not need to get a fucking concussion over trying to lose a couple pounds, if I pass out and hit my head, I'll be like all right, that's it, it's over. This isn't safe anymore. If I start just like vomiting uncontrollably one day, like just like, yeah, I can't stop dry heaving, then it would be over for me.
Speaker 2:So far, what I've been tolerating is insomnia, diarrhea, and now I'm starting to get a sore throat. My throat is starting to hurt, which a friend of mine that asks a lot for religious reasons told me to expect a sore throat. So now I have it and my understanding from like just googling it is that it's just stomach acid coming up and irritating my throat because there's like nothing to keep it down. So that's cool and like yeah, I'm fatigued, you know. But yeah, I mean, if things got like really fucking like, I'm not just going to just suffer in misery. I'm uncomfortable, I am really uncomfortable, but I can tolerate being uncomfortable. All right, what is your feeling about posing and how strong you are at posing your, your you know your couples and subjects.
Speaker 1:I'm not great at it. I'm okay. I would say I'm not great. I'm not great at it compared to photographers, but I do feel a pull to kind of move away from that. But it is nice to kind of have some of that footage because I do think it makes the edit easier. But then there's part of me too that's like I need to challenge myself and like get away from, like some of the that cliche kind of stuff. You know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think as a videographer it's really easy to go a long time without ever really being great at posing. You know, you can just have like five or 10 kind of things that you do over and over and over all the time and for the most part you can piggyback off of what the photographer is doing and then you can convince yourself just like, oh, I don't need that type of footage and or the people don't need to be posed, I'm just here to capture the day, like I'm just a documentarian, I'm a photojournalist, so I don't really need to do all that. And, like, you can definitely have a good career without ever really getting good at posing. But I think that it's a skill that would be really helpful to have and I think could elevate your work, and it's one of those things that I just like you know I got by forever and I'm kind of.
Speaker 2:You know, what happened to me is I went to the build expo in New York, which is the B&H thing that they just started this year, and one of the lectures that we sat in on was the dude talking about posing and apparently he has a book that picture, picture, perfect posing system and it's like, if you look up like best books for photographers on posing, it's like right, it's like everyone recommends it, so it's like the go to kind kind of thing and I bought that and I'm reading it and I don't know it's weird because I'm just like feeling like, oh man, I really this is information I needed like 15 years ago. I definitely should have gotten into this, like for sure this is going to translate to my work. You know, instead of just telling people stand over there and then I just I don't know hold hands or blah, blah, blah, like to actually like be able to refine, like lift up your elbow a little bit and like some of it, I'm doing enough camera movement and if you have them move, like if you have them walking and stuff, you're not really posing. You know you can give them an action and then that kind of takes some of that out. But it's just like dude, there's fucking fundamentals here that I am shocked, that I don't know and I'm embarrassed that I haven't like looked into this before.
Speaker 2:I think part of it is that because I think photographers are the worst people on the planet and I fucking hate photographers so much that I just dismiss their art form sometimes instead of, like, I probably should be studying what they do more and seeing how some of those skills can translate, because it's fun to say how our jobs are completely fucking different. Don't ever call me a photographer, you know, but in some of that hatred I maybe have held myself back by not kind of learning from some of the stuff that it's like, okay, maybe isn't a huge deal for me, but it would be another trick in my bag.
Speaker 1:You know, I've been thinking about this and one is I always kind of like laugh at, like like some people when they're posing people, like the things they ask them to do are so stupid. And I was like pretend you know. I think I made the joke a long time ago. Pretend you're on a, pretend you're on, pretend you're on a cruise, but the cruise has just been taken over by Somalian pirates and they walk in trouble with the boat. All right, that's good.
Speaker 2:You used to send me those photographer scenarios all the time, Like pretend you're inside the dishwasher but you're really only supposed to be on the top shelf, but someone put you on the bottom shelf. You used to make up stuff like that. You were making fun of one particular photographer that does that kind of thing to give people analogies. The thing that drives me nuts about photographers is the excessive confidence building. You were like yes. Oh my God, this is so gorgeous. Oh, yeah, Like.
Speaker 1:I love it. It gets to the point where it's like they don't even believe you anymore, like your clients like starting to catch on to the fact that you're full of shit. I would say for posing.
Speaker 2:I think to just finish that thought is like at that lecture, even this guy who's like an expert at posing talked about how you constantly have to give them confidence, because confidence comes through in photos and people are like the most self-conscious they're ever going to be. And if you don't constantly and he was like, even if something is going horribly wrong, you don't even let him know you just said that looks good, let's just try this, let's just try this. So you change it without ever telling them that you're changing it. You don't ever go like no, no, that's not it.
Speaker 1:That's something you would do. I would never do that.
Speaker 2:I was like no fucking idiot. Have you ever taken a picture before? What are you doing? What do you do? Do you have a mirror in your house? Look at it, you call that a smile.
Speaker 2:Yeah, what are you doing with your fucking face right now? But no, like dude, I know for sure. I've been on shoots and we're shooting, you know, a bridegroom or even in corporate stuff or whatever you know. We're shooting footage of someone and they go to me. What do I do with my hand? What am I supposed to put my hands? And I don't know the answer either. So that's why I'm going to read this book and find out, because there's a whole chapter on what you're supposed to do with your hands and I'm like fuck, why have I not looked into this before?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'd say for corporate stuff. I'm a big fan of just hiring actual models that do it and know oh my God, you don't even have to tell them.
Speaker 2:You don't even have to tell them, it's so much easier. Yeah, you don't even have to tell them.
Speaker 1:That's, that's dope. But for like stuff where you're working with like private clients or like a wedding situation or something you know I was thinking about, I was like there's two ways to approach it. Like, if you really want to go high end and there's a budget for it, you could just shoot on a different day and you could get them. Like you could shoot them in some scenarios where, like, they're making breakfast or they're having a pillow fight, I don't know, but like that's like a better.
Speaker 2:Pretend you're going to work and then you get close up with the hands on the steering wheel. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I guess you know, close up with their face, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you're just like why do we need a shot of me driving the car? Cause I can't think of anything else. You know you work in HR. There's nothing sexy about sitting at a desk all fucking day. We already did the typing, the fake phone call, the looking out the window, the conference call. What else? What else is there?
Speaker 1:Yeah, sometimes I look at fashion films. You ever like go on like YouTube and like just type in like fashion editorial or something.
Speaker 2:And don't.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, you don't because you're not interested, but like I started, Cause I'm not interested.
Speaker 2:I always see that stuff and I think this is a fucking waste of time. I don't understand this art form.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this doesn't mean anything, it's stupid. I guess. But like, if you're looking to see how models pose themselves, that would be a great place, because a lot of that's a little more. Some of it like okay, some of it's super artsy and shit that people would never do with their bodies, Right.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:But then some of it like the more subtle stuff. That's stuff that people do all the time, so I think that's a great place for inspiration. As far as like posing goes, I don't know.
Speaker 2:I'm really excited about getting through. I'm going to try and get through this book in the next 15 days, cause it's 15 chapters and he breaks it down into 15 points that, like, these are the 15 things you need to focus on every single time you post somebody and if you can just get to a point where, like, you don't have to look at the flash cards and you don't have to, like, reference it or whatever, if you could go through that checklist, like you know, instantly, boom, boom, boom, boom boom you know, look at all 15 things, real, real fast fix, fix, fix, fix.
Speaker 2:I mean God, what a tremendous skill that would definitely set me apart.
Speaker 1:I started getting into those fashion videos cause I was like looking at like different camera tests and stuff, you know, or looking at like different lenses and stuff, and there'd be these guys making these videos and you know it's like it's like models and it's set to music or whatever, but like you could see there how they were color grading, you could see like I'm using this lens or I'm using these kinds of lenses or this camera, but it was like I don't know. I was like, oh, that's pretty cool.
Speaker 2:I went when I was a before I ever did video, I studied audio engineering in college and when I was a audio student we would go in the recording studio to you know practice and we would have to play music because we needed something to record, you know. So there'd be like 10 people in a class or maybe even less than that, I think. We would be in groups of like six or five or something and we would have to take turns playing and then you know we would just always be frustrated that just like nothing we're doing sounds good or professional or whatever.
Speaker 2:And we're racking our heads over like which microphone? Where should the microphone be placed? You know what microphone technique? How should we be queuing this and all this kind of stuff, whatever? And then the one time we got somebody else to come in and play music, that was like a legit badass guitar player. You know like you're like you have to get the levels right. You're like, oh, it doesn't fucking matter what microphone we use, all the tone is in his fingers. You need an actual. You needed somebody that can actually play music. Like we weren't. Our recordings don't suck because of our engineering, they suck because none of us can fucking play music. Like we're all like very mediocre musicians. That's why we want to work on the other side of the booth. But that's kind of reminds me what you're talking about, of like when you're doing a corporate thing, like it's kind of nice if you can convince them to use models and actors instead of the HR lady, right, cause they just like elevate the project and it takes a lot of the.
Speaker 1:You know, I'm not busy trying to hide your flabbery arms and figuring out like the thing about the lower end corporate world is like they want what they want and in their mind they think they know what's best. And for them, what's best is we need every employee in the video so nobody feels left out, and it's like bro, you probably don't even want.
Speaker 1:If you're going to give me one of your employees, send me your like, most outgoing, charismatic, best dressed, best looking person and maybe. But otherwise you just need models Like why are we For sure.
Speaker 2:don't give me the person that comes in the room and says I don't want to do this. They're making me do this. I am so scared of this. Please, I don't want to do this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're on their knees, that is not the fucking person that's going to make a good film, yeah, and they're just like sweating.
Speaker 2:And then they're like can we take a break? And they're like crying. I've literally seen somebody have a full on panic attack and just burst out into tears on the on, like the first question, like on the first question. That was just like so tell me what your name is and what your job is here at the university. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I can't do this. And you're like what is you need therapy? That like that level of stage fright is like dude. This is kind of a mental health situation If you literally can't just say to somebody I'm the professor of whatever the fuck.
Speaker 1:I still remember the orthopedics the name of the orthopedic surgeon, which I won't say here, but the guy like he's like. He's like hi, I'm Dr Martin Yodick, and then he would like launch into this thing about like bone on bone, bone on bone injuries and stuff. But then I shot this whole day with him and then they called me and they're like Dr, dr Yodick would like you to have it, would like you to come back. And and he wanted to reshoot all of them because he said he's like I didn't like the way I looked, or I didn't like the way I sounded, or like my forehead was a little shiny, or like I I don't know, and it was just all. Like I Was like it wasn't that much better the second time, but he thought it was and I was like thank God, you thought it was better, like whatever it was that he screwed up the first time. I guess he fixed, even though it looked exactly the same to me, but it turned.
Speaker 1:It was like oh, this turned into an extra day and a half of work because you're so conscious about your looks.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you ever recommend that they bring in hair and makeup, that that is a thing that makes a huge fucking difference, that no one wants to pay for. No clients want to pay for that, and it can make so much of a difference, especially on the men, like no man wants to wear makeup when you're doing corporate video, but some of these motherfuckers just have blotchy ass skin. They're sweating all over their forehead. They're red in the cheeks.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and like a little pancake can go a long way, but I'm not gonna do it. I don't know shit about fuck. I'm not gonna invest in hundreds and dollars worth of makeup and go to Cosmetology school like that's. I'm already doing Too many jobs in the film industry. Yeah, I'm already doing sound. You know I'm already doing audio and video and producing and editing and coloring, like someone else has to do the fucking makeup.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my priority is getting models. My second priority would probably be that, as far as, like, the talent goes, yeah it just they, just always, they just, they just never go for it.
Speaker 2:when you tell them, like it's another 300 bucks for a Whole another person, well, we don't need that.
Speaker 1:I did a shoot in Aspen. It was like a fashion show thing that was spread over three days and I Remember at one point they said, hey, can you come to this store that sells like fur coats or whatever and shoot like some of the like we have? We're having an Event here. It's it's kind of to promote the fashion show but also to promote one of the vendors, and blah, blah, blah, and I was like, okay, so I went and I and they, I get there and they have all these models from the agency like standing around wearing the fur coats and stuff and I was just kind of shooting it, like just kind of showing what was going on in the space or whatever. But every time I would point the camera at a model, they would instantly pick up on it and they would like instantly like turn on like this, like Thing, like they were kind of already kind of doing that like in this space, because they were like wearing the coast.
Speaker 1:It was their job to model stuff as people were walking around.
Speaker 1:But when they go to work, yeah, as soon as they saw a camera on them, I didn't have to say anything. They would like turn towards me and they would do like a whole thing and it was like oh, shit, like that. I remember that skill. Yeah, that was the first time I remember being like, oh my god, like that's yeah, like you said, it's a skill, it's like oh, I didn't, I don't know why. I never really thought that, like oh, yeah, that's what models do, like you know, you see models or whatever, and you don't even really think about it. And then would you put your. When you're in that situation, you're like god, that makes that. That makes all the difference in the whole world. I felt like I barely had to do anything. I just had to make sure. I just had to make sure I was recording.
Speaker 2:You know, and it's. It's the same thing with actors. Like I used to think that being a great director meant you're a director that could take anybody and Get a great performance out of them. And yeah, some of that is true. But If you just do casting right, your job is a fucking thousand times better and people will think you're a good director because you just got the right talent in front of camera. And Like you know, like I would think about like well, if it's Spielberg made movies with little kids. You know, kids don't know anything, they can't act, yeah, and then you read about like how they found those kids, like oh, y'all audition 4,000 children for this role before you found Drew Barrymore.
Speaker 2:To be an ET, like oh okay, it is casting, it's not, there's, there's no reason for you to go. Oh, you know, what I'm gonna do is take somebody that has no fucking talent at all and I'm gonna make them look good, cuz I'm a brilliant director. Like, yeah, you kind of need to be able to make elevate people or whatever, but like fucking like, don't make it harder than it has to be. Get somebody that knows how to behave in front of a camera, cuz most people can't do it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man, I, I agree, and that I Don't. I Think, when I approach corporate clients, I'm just gonna. I'm gonna do two, two different things. I'm going to create like a dramatic, like storyboard, edit out of like screenshots, right, so it's just kind of like, you know, it's like a, it's like a storyboard that you can just show them. It's like simple editing stuff, nothing crazy. I think that's one thing I want to do, but I also want to find two videos, one that I've done without models and one that I have done with models, and Just send. I'm gonna be like, hey, here's the difference.
Speaker 2:You know would be good project that way they can you just take a real project and then reshoot it with models.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:I could definitely well.
Speaker 1:I actually you've, I have you have to.
Speaker 2:You gotta have something, then, where you can get access to the location again. But take something you've already done and redo it with models and actors and then just be like. This is the difference I.
Speaker 1:Have budget. I have a client that I like. Well, I mostly like them. They have like a kind of a cool. They have kind of a cool kind of thing going on where they what they do like Backpacks and bags and stuff, but it's like really targeted towards the weed industry. But I can never I haven't had really good luck at getting to do the stuff that I want to do that I think would really work for them. So I was thinking about just saying, hey, can I borrow Like five or six bags or whatever from you guys? And then I'm just gonna hire a model for like two hours Like not even anything crazy, not even the best model, cuz like no best model is gonna work for two hours probably and then I'm just gonna go shoot the thing that I want to shoot the way I want to shoot it, and Then you're gonna know who the model, who are we gonna know if the model's a good model, though?
Speaker 1:because I, I've already, we've used models, be oh no, but like there's pieces like there could just be something has a good picture.
Speaker 2:That doesn't mean they have the model skill set that you're looking for. Well, how many? There's a lot of. I'm gonna audition them.
Speaker 1:There's like social platforms now for models like hiring platforms now, where they tell you like what their skill set was model, model mayhem. Yeah, there's.
Speaker 2:There's things like model mayhem and other stuff point is you're only gonna hire one, so like You're taking a chance if that person shows up, and they're not any better than a regular person either.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but I'm I'm gonna look at the reviews somebody with a big portfolio.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna look at the reviews. I'm not gonna go cheapest, you know, but I'm also. I'm gonna say, hey, I'm gonna pay, like whatever their hourly is Like there. Maybe their hourly is like a hundred bucks an hour, which is pretty good for like what I'm trying to do. And maybe I'll say, hey, I'll give you 150 an hour if you just come for two hours, right, you know? And then I'm just spending 300 bucks plus whatever, blah, blah, blah, and then I could sell it to the client. You know, I'll sell, I'll sell that I'll. I'll send it to. I'm gonna say, if you like this video, let me know I'll, I can do more. I can do more it, you know, at a discount or whatever. But then I could just sell them the video for more than what I paid to make it, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, anyway, I've been thinking about getting more into stills and buy more into I mean into it at all, not that I've never done it, but I don't know. It's something that's kind of been on my mind. It depends how this year goes. If I end up getting on set enough and like having enough film related work, then I don't need to go down the road. But I mean, if I work Anything like I worked last year, yeah, I think I might start doing stills.
Speaker 1:What are you gonna take pictures of?
Speaker 2:Well, maybe second shooting for maybe see if I can start getting to being a sister photographer for some wedding folks.
Speaker 1:But then and get back into the business Dustin in Dustin's maybe just doing headshots. Yeah, nice dude, I never thought you'd come back.
Speaker 2:I Mean he's back baby I. Mean first of all.
Speaker 2:I'll be back and I am back and also I've never I mean I won't say never I've shot three weddings of stills in my whole life but you know, that would be a pretty new thing for me. I don't know what kind of camera I would use. That's kind of a bummer. I don't really want to spend a bunch of money, but I guess I'm gonna do it. I gotta do it, and I know what kind of camera I want to get and it's like way outrageous. So but I don't know. It's something I've been thinking about and I and also because I live in a film hub, there's so many starving actors here I might be able to make some good little side money Just doing headshots regularly head shots oh.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you could do boo boo doir and Headshots. You could call it headshots and bedshots by Dustin.
Speaker 2:You know, anybody could use that title. Didn't have anything to do with my name. I'm all right, I am I have things to do now and, due to the 30 40 minutes that we didn't record, I'm at mile limit here, so I gotta call it a day and we'll talk soon.
Speaker 1:But All right, man. Well, thanks everybody for listening. I know Dustin isn't.
Speaker 2:Please, please email us so we can Answer your questions and discuss your topics of interest. Thank, you. We're begging you.