Michael & Dustin reconnect and discuss Dustin's plan to grow a hedge to protect him from flying trash, a recent encounter with a cop while droning, and Dustin's incessant push to make the film he's editing better, despite the director's reluctance.
The guys pivot from the chaos of Atlanta's film scene to the equally unpredictable world of wedding photography, and Dustin ponders a future as a wedding photographer. Later Dustin shares the gospel of DIY renovations.
But wait, the rollercoaster doesn't stop there. The guys dive deep into the jungle of indoor plant catastrophes, alien conspiracy theories, and the emotional whirlwind of ditching a writing buddy. Curious about the messiness of ending a creative partnership alongside a hearty discussion on why talking to humans (and plants) can be ridiculously hard? Then you're in the right place.
Michael & Dustin reconnect and discuss Dustin's plan to grow a hedge to protect him from flying trash, a recent encounter with a cop while droning, and Dustin's incessant push to make the film he's editing better, despite the director's reluctance.
The guys pivot from the chaos of Atlanta's film scene to the equally unpredictable world of wedding photography, and Dustin ponders a future as a wedding photographer. Later Dustin shares the gospel of DIY renovations.
But wait, the rollercoaster doesn't stop there. The guys dive deep into the jungle of indoor plant catastrophes, alien conspiracy theories, and the emotional whirlwind of ditching a writing buddy. Curious about the messiness of ending a creative partnership alongside a hearty discussion on why talking to humans (and plants) can be ridiculously hard? Then you're in the right place.
Hey everybody, welcome back and we're back. Yeah, we're back with a new podcast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we got to. Oh yeah, that's your pun, because I'm in the middle of if you hear a lot of noise in the background of the podcast I'm choosing to multitask, so as I podcast, I'm also planting a bunch of plants, little seedlings that I propagated last, but just a I don't know, maybe two months ago, and a pretty low success rate. I used like 10 by 10, 20 trays and I did five trays worth and they all died, except for in one tray every single one worked and in the other one they all died, and I don't really know what it is Like. Too much moisture, not enough moisture. Too much sun, not enough sun, for whatever reason, this one was perfect and the other ones are all fucking duds. Too much airflow, not enough airflow Like you read online, like all the different things that can go wrong, but without spending a ton of money on you know instruments to be able to like like a hydrometer and a.
Speaker 2:You know thermostats and heaters and all that stuff. Like even just knowing what could go wrong, it doesn't help you figure out why something isn't working. And if I was going to spend all the money to get like a super, super fancy, smart setup, then I might as well. Just buy all the fucking plants. The whole point is to get hundreds of these plants for as cheap as possible. I'm trying to grow a 200 foot hedge, so I need a ton of these plants. In the store they're like $10 a piece and I need like 200 of them. I'm not about to pay for that. So I'm propagating and I've got time on my side. But of the probably whatever 72 times 5, I think I'm only gonna have maybe 50 plants actually make it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, you can buy trees that can give you that privacy right.
Speaker 2:Trees.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, it's the same thing. You still need a shitload of them. But no, no no, I want a hedge. This is for my front yard.
Speaker 1:I'm not trying to make it look like I live you know I'm not trying to look crazy. I thought you wanted to blark blark blark.
Speaker 2:Sorry, my dog just walked up to me, so I thought I do in the background, I do in the background and that's going to be a whole other propagation. I basically have, you know, four sides of property and I want to put a I'm growing a hedge on every side of them. So one I'm going to put green giant Arborvite, which get like 40 feet tall and 20,.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's the tree I was thinking of.
Speaker 2:That's in the back. But these are, these are boxwood, and so this will only I'll probably cap it at three, four feet high, eventually.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:This is going to run along the sidewalk in the front of the property.
Speaker 1:That way you could be in your front yard without pants on, but nobody could tell.
Speaker 2:Right. As long as I'm wearing a shirt, they'll think it's a bottomless, bottomless homeless situation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay. Now the other real reason why I want to hedge up front is something about this neighborhood. Every fucking week I'm picking up like bottles and trash like Dorito bags and shit out of my front yard. It's a super fucking obnoxious, and my wife and I have been sitting on the porch and seen people throwing shit out of their car at our house and you're like, yeah, okay, that's how it happens.
Speaker 1:Well, how would a hedge help? And so wouldn't you just be digging it out of the hedge.
Speaker 2:Well, the idea is that because we don't have like a front, like our front yard isn't like all that walkable. It's, you know it's hilly and it's covered in vines that you don't really want to step on. It's not like a lawn and we like the vines so we want to keep them. But the idea is having that hedge there. At least all of the stuff that gets chucked into our yard will be kind of right there. In the first the hedge is seven feet in, so at least everything will kind of I can just walk up and down right there and pick it up, instead of some of the trash being 20 feet in and some of it being 15 feet in and you know, like having a traipse all throughout my English Ivy that I don't want to stomp.
Speaker 1:You should just sit on the porch with a like a beanbag gun.
Speaker 2:Beanbag gun.
Speaker 1:And just like wait for them to come throw their trash, and then you just hit them with a Beanbag.
Speaker 2:We were sitting out there one day when somebody came by and chucked something and I thought really hard about jumping in my car and driving after him, but I just in my head.
Speaker 2:I just calculated that I would never catch him and I was just like, who needs that? There's like, by the time I go get and go in the house and get my keys open the garage, turn the car on, go out on the driveway He'll be long gone, yeah. And also like, what am I going to do? You go get shot because some guy threw some fucking McDonald's wrapper out of his car.
Speaker 2:Not if you shoot first, Like I'm going to go start a giant confrontation Like, hey, motherfucker, you coming back and picking that up, no, I'm not OK.
Speaker 1:Then yeah, oh boy.
Speaker 2:I got harassed by the police recently.
Speaker 1:Really How's?
Speaker 2:that yeah, so All right. So you know, I was the DP on this movie, this micro budget feature film that I was supposed to be done with months ago, but I'm still working on.
Speaker 1:OK, yeah. And the one you had a hard out on.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, the hard out got moved because my job got pushed back a month, so I'm having an excuse.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but you didn't have to tell him that.
Speaker 2:I know, but the truth is well.
Speaker 2:Part of why it's dragging on is because I personally am doing other shit, like right now I'm planting all these little seedlings, doing a podcast, instead of editing on his shit. So it's kind of like once, once my have to finish by this day got pushed. I also, like I took my foot off a little bit and started doing whatever I wanted to do, which is mostly remodeling my kitchen, and we were. I tried to do most of my kitchen remodel project over the winter break and the idea was like by January 2nd I would be back to not doing that, but it keeps that also keeps dragging on and on. So a lot of days I've just been doing that instead of editing.
Speaker 2:But anyway, one of the things about this movie that drives me nuts is that the producer, writer is having me use a bunch of stock footage in the edit, and it makes me cringe because in my mind, a feature film should not really have stock footage, certainly not a high volume of it and certainly not like the cheapest stock footage that you can get, where you have like a subscription and it's you're not even paying per shot and you're just paying to. Oh boy, oh, I'm just a member of, I don't know. Story blocks, art list or something I don't know.
Speaker 2:Whatever it is, he's not paying Per shot. You know he just has a subscription. He's just downloading whatever and you know you never know what camera it was shot on. We shot the movie at 6K. A lot of this stuff is like maybe HD of that, I don't know, but it's also. It's just like it seems weird to have shots that somebody has in their corporate video and now it's in our feature film and then it's also like a lot of the stock footage and then it's also like a lot of the stock corporate establishing shots.
Speaker 2:It does some of it, yeah, Some of it looks like you, like you would immediately know that stock footage. It just puts out stock footage vibes and it's giving me stock footage. Sorry, that's how youngsters and women talk now it's giving stock Anyway. So a lot of it are like establishing shots and some of them it's like we'll put up this aerial establishing shot and then we'll put you know, Atlanta, Georgia or whatever in text so that we're telling the audience this is Atlanta, except it's like Melbourne, Australia, and it's like well, anybody that's ever traveled or lived in this city or that city is going to know like millions of people live in Atlanta and if you show them you know the Sydney Opera House and say this is downtown Atlanta, they're going to know your fucking line.
Speaker 1:You're in Atlanta. How come you don't just get the footage?
Speaker 2:So there we go. So I decided to go out and go get some footage that I'm not being paid to shoot and it's kind of just like on me and all my time. But I'm like the thing that like kind of made me go OK, I guess I'll do. It Is like there's more than I'm, there's more stock footage in the movie that I can reasonably go shoot unpaid. You know like, yeah it was, it was a real movie and there was real budget and I was getting paid for it. Yeah, I could take a month to shoot all this shit and hire actors and set it up, but some of it I can't.
Speaker 2:But for the aerial shots of Atlanta I could. I could shoot at least that stuff. So it's a cop movie and there's a bunch of exterior shots of just some generic building that he's saying is the police station. And so I was. I just went downtown and was like Atlanta Police Department and I found the Atlanta Police headquarters and I was like you know what this building looks, similar to what he picked and it's kind of a dope building. Let me just shoot some of this and I have my drone and it's class G airspace. You don't go fly there and there's a parking garage next to the police station and I pulled into it to see if I could park and they actually had like a meter, Not a meter, what do you call it? Like a person in a booth.
Speaker 1:Mm, hmm.
Speaker 2:I don't know, that's what I call it A person, whatever. And so I pulled up and I mean shooting the police station, like you figure, nobody's going to be cool with that Like cops are notoriously not cool and but like I asked for permission, I go hey, do you mind if I go up to the roof and do some photography? And she's like, yeah, sure, that's fine. I was like, all right, I'll be back in. Like you know, 20 minutes, tops 15 minutes. I'm just going to get a couple of shots of, I just want to get a couple of shots of that building over there, and and that's it. And so I got up there, I got my drone out and I'm trying to log in. It's like, oh, you're not logged in, which is the thing that DJI does.
Speaker 2:Now, that fucking drives me crazy, it's insane because it's like doesn't DJI know that the majority of the places we're shooting don't don't have Wi-Fi and you have to get on the internet, Like it's so stupid, so I'm setting up a hotspot on my cell phone so I can, you know hot spot to sign in to DJI.
Speaker 2:So fucking stupid. And right as I get signed in and I'm about to fly a cop car comes around. You know, I'm like on the top of the top of a parking garage so I could kind of hear like meow, meow, meow while he's like coming up at me or whatever. Yeah, guy fucking comes around the corner. Had to be doing 100 miles an hour inside.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, the garage yeah.
Speaker 2:It was probably like 40 miles an hour, but you can imagine.
Speaker 1:Like way too fast for a parking garage.
Speaker 2:But way too like aggressive Dude. If somebody's walking out here, you're going to fucking kill them.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And he gets out of the car and he shines his like bright lights at me so I can't see anything. He's like blind.
Speaker 1:Wait, what time is it?
Speaker 2:Is it nighttime? Yeah, like 10 pm. Oh 10 o'clock, 10 o'clock at night.
Speaker 1:And the.
Speaker 2:Thing is like I could have just shot, because it's a drone, you don't have to necessarily launch from a high point, but right where I wanted to launch to shoot this building or whatever is like kind of like a homeless encampment area, like just like dozens and dozens and dozens of homeless people camping on the street in tents and stuff right outside the police station. It's kind of weird, but that to me that just seems like a good way to get harassed and get your shit stolen. And so I'm like you know, if I go up there in the garage this time of night, like the office is like there's just not going to be anybody up there. I was going to give me a hard time and also, you know, I feel when you're flying at nighttime, that line of sight can be really helpful. So being up on the top of the garage would have made it really easy to make sure I don't run into a power line or a red light, you know, like a traffic light or something like. Just it would have made it really easy for me to fly just 20 feet over there, get the shot that I need and fly right back and never worry about anybody coming up behind me and mugging me or never worry about you know anyone fucking me, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 2:But anyway, cop treated me like I was a fucking terrorist. He's screaming at me and he's like what are you doing? And I was like I mean, I asked for permission. I told her exactly what I was doing. She let me in and like he's like yelling. I was like just taking some photos and videos, man, and he's like not up here, you're not. And I was like get back in the car and you're leaving the garage. Now he's like yelling at me and I went home after that. I was going to probably drive around downtown shooting for like four or five hours just casually, getting what I get, no real shot list, having a good time, and it just like fucking. It just spooked me out so much that I'm just like man, fuck this shit. And this is part of why I've always hated the whole idea of drones. Drones it just makes people Drones fall.
Speaker 2:Fucking. It makes people so fucking hostile. It's the same thing as shooting a wedding at a Catholic church, where there's some lady who's been hired to be an asshole to you and you're like look lady, they fucking hired me. Like I'm just, I'm just trying to do my fucking job. I'm just trying to make a wedding video. I am not trying to end your religion although it would be nice if there were no Catholics left. I mean, like if I had the power to make all Catholics, just like we wake up tomorrow and like, oh, every Catholic died, whoops.
Speaker 2:But you know, like I just I don't under like how many other jobs like ours, just like you, constantly just trying to do your job, you're getting like harassed and people are. You know like people get. When you got to do interviews sometimes, you know people are like what is this for? Why are you asking these questions? Like people get so defensive Like they think they're going to be on the news and some scandal or whatever. And it's like no dude, it's a promo film. Your boss hired me to make you look good. Fucking, take it easy. And also, you know I don't personally give a shit about this. Don't attack, I'm just, I'm making this because they hired me to make this. This is not. I am not here to expose you with a fucking document like fuck off.
Speaker 2:Oh, boy have you have you experienced anything similar to the story I just told?
Speaker 1:I have, but it's gotten less and less since, like you, get it at mountain resorts when you're doing weddings to like.
Speaker 2:Well, ban you from ever shooting a wedding here. If you fly a drone here almost class G airspace I have a legal right to do it. Well, this is a private. But no, it's not private. This is a public mountain. This is not private. The government owns it. You, you lease the right to put your restaurant on government property. Shut the fuck up Beano's cabin.
Speaker 1:I. You know what's funny is like yeah, I used to. I used to have a problem with Vale and Beaver Creek and all that stuff in Colorado trying to fly and eventually, like I just was, like I'm not going to ask for permission anymore, I'm just going to go fly, and if somebody tells me to stop then I just act like I'm an idiot or oh.
Speaker 2:I'm just on vacation. My wife bought me this for Christmas.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, where I act like I'm from a different country or something I don't know. But no, I, I, I kind of know like I generally don't drive to what I'm going to shoot. I drive a little bit further away from what I'm going to shoot and then I launch and then you illegally fly, and then you illegally fly over highways and shit and like.
Speaker 2:because of their hostility, you end up breaking the law when you wouldn't have had to if they just weren't being dildos about it. Uh, yeah, you end up driving you end up flying over I 70, which is super illegal, I guess. Yeah, well, it is with our drones.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:There's a class of drones that you're. You are allowed to fly over like that, but DJI doesn't make them. It's some other brand that no videographer uses.
Speaker 1:Mm, hmm.
Speaker 2:I forget what it is, but you know it was something I learned about when I was getting my license earlier this year.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I also learned to just not stress about it anymore.
Speaker 2:I'm real sensitive to like I just I never want to do. I never want to film anybody that doesn't want to be filmed. I never want to like like I just don't ever want to make anybody uncomfortable. I don't ever want to be like like that gorilla mentality of like just go do it. What's the worst that can happen? I'm like well, the worst that can happen is they can be mad at me and I don't like that. I don't like when people are mad at me.
Speaker 1:I'm the same way but I think I just try to set myself up so that I probably not going to have to deal with it.
Speaker 2:Hey, listen, real, real quiet. Let's get some good, let's get some ASMR of me putting dirt in these pots.
Speaker 1:Lower the microphone here, so you can tell it's a thin plastic.
Speaker 2:Here's the dirt, just kind of patting the top off there and poke my finger in I don't know if you can hear that and the plants going in right there.
Speaker 1:You're talking over it. Oh, that's nice. Okay, yeah, all right, that's it.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you, I do like how everybody got super deep into that, like people who had no business caring about sound, or some aren't.
Speaker 2:I don't have like whatever, whatever the thing is that's supposed to make you feel like your, you know, like your spine is tingling and all that stuff. It doesn't really get me. Oh, is that a thing?
Speaker 1:But yeah, there's like certain people when they get involved with.
Speaker 2:ASMR. It gives them like a real strong physical response. That's a good thing. I think it's sort of like when you hear nails on a chalkboard and it makes your hair kind of stand up.
Speaker 1:But it's somehow.
Speaker 2:Well, but it's, it's. It's a similar thing, but somehow pleasurable, wow, and I think part of ASMR is like some people were like jerking off to it, but like some people just thought it was a cool sensation. So you know, it's like you know you're like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like. So you could kind of talk about like yeah, I'm super in ASMR without ever having to say like I'm one of the ones that's jerking.
Speaker 1:Mm, hmm, I didn't even know about that. It does when you say ASMR, though it does sound like it kind of. It almost sounds like it goes with BDS Like BDS ASMR.
Speaker 2:Yeah, bds yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know, man, I never got into it. I like it for like, I like it as a companion to video, but I don't like it as like the primary. Well, I don't know, I've seen a couple like social media vids where they show off like a, like the interior of a car or whatever, and they mic up like the windows and like all the little switches and buttons.
Speaker 2:I don't know it's, I guess it's kind of but that's just good sound, that's just good old fashion sound design right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, kind of. That's why I guess, that's why I appreciate that. I guess I don't know the difference between that and then whatever you're talking about, where people are getting rock hard to the sound of a sizzling egg or whatever, yeah, Well, I think most of the masturbators are the ASMR that really gets them going is a like a young, an attractive woman talking, whispering into the microphone and it got.
Speaker 2:it got pornographic where, like you know, porn six were like I'm touching my labia.
Speaker 1:I like, yeah, there's nothing less attractive than a woman like describing the word labia yeah. The scientific name for it. Yeah, Look at my vulva. It's like Jesus so gross yeah.
Speaker 2:Like that's disgusting. Can you please call it a content I'm trying to jerk off here?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know what you mean, man. It like put you in a bad mood after the cop yelled at you, so you just went home.
Speaker 2:Yeah, ruined my whole fucking night man. It really, it really. I don't like it.
Speaker 1:It's crazy that you brought that. You like that. You had that same exact experience, because I had that same exact experience this morning. Where there's this, there's this X no, x is not the right word Former co-worker slash friend of mine who's getting married to another co-former co-worker slash friend of mine and they're having their wedding in Denver. And like I was like all excited for him and so I was like, oh, I could help, like put together like a videography thing for you or whatever. And Then she sent me this video this morning and she's like my planner sent this to me. But it's total crap, I can't believe. Blah, blah, blah. She's like this video so stupid. And then I looked at it and I was like, oh, that's like Kind of like the kind of video I would make, like what do you? And she was like what was?
Speaker 2:she saying was total crap about it, like it was not good quality.
Speaker 1:Basically that it was like boring and like, yeah, she made it sound like it was bad quality. And then she I said, well, send me the link to it. So I couldn't see what you're talking about.
Speaker 2:It wasn't that you're so much better, and then you watch it.
Speaker 1:Well, it made me think that maybe she hasn't even watched any of my stuff. Hmm, because I always make the stupid assumption and I should know by now that people have watched my stuff before they talked to me about it Because, like, why would you get in touch with me if and asked me to do anything, if you haven't seen my work fucking not in Colorado.
Speaker 2:Dude. That was to me the shocking, one of the most shocking and biggest differences between Colorado and Texas. You know, I started my career in Texas, in Austin, and the calls that I would get, the inquiries that I would get when you talk to them, they would ask me questions about specific videos and stuff, like it would be clear that they not only watch some of my work but they watch like 10 of my videos or 15 of my videos and they would say like, yeah, we pretty much watch videos from every videographer we could find in Texas. And you know, we really got to have you and we want to book you before we start looking for a venue. Are you available next year? And then in Colorado they would be like, hey, we're gonna get a videographer about our plan. Or said maybe we should Recommended you. How much do you cost?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'm like I have All of that. Yeah, I can all of that. Oh, I've yeah.
Speaker 2:They're not. They're don't even, they're not looking at the website. They're not watching your videos, they're not shopping around, they just hey. Whatever my planner said, that's just what we're gonna do. It's fucking weird as shit to me, man.
Speaker 2:Yeah that was. And it sucks too because, like it was when I realized like, oh, I'm not good at sales at all, like I have no ability to actually sell something. The reason my I did so well in Texas was because my videos were good and people were shopping for quality. Once people just went on like the advice of their you know, the advice of their. What am I trying to say?
Speaker 2:Coordinator, like I couldn't sell shit because I never. I I went into every wedding going. My job is to represent my client and If the coordinator makes it hard for me to get a good video, I can just ignore them. I like I'm not here to satisfy the coordinator, I'm here to do what I was hired to do and if the photographer is a dick, then he'll catch my elbow, and if the fucking planner tries to screw me over, I'll just ignore every single thing she tells me. And I ended up kind of burning bridges that way, not realizing that in that market the only way to work is referrals. It's just. It's just not how it was in Texas.
Speaker 2:I Could, like fight other vendors and it didn't hurt me there hmm, hey, so I know I told you already privately, but my soul Mentioned it on the podcast I'm strongly considering returning to the industry in a slightly different angle.
Speaker 1:I Feel like we're just re-recording, like the previous 10 episodes of this podcast.
Speaker 2:Oh, did we already talk about it? Then forget it. Then I'll bring it up when I actually do it, if I actually do it.
Speaker 1:Dustin's getting back into the wedding industry. Everybody.
Speaker 2:I might we'll see. I have a lot, it seems like the end of April and then I have after that. I haven't officially booked it, but I'm pretty sure I'm gonna have a job that's gonna be most of the summer and and After that. If I'm still really struggling to find work here in the Atlanta film industry that I fucking change my whole life for, then yeah, if I, if I'm hitting a dead end, I'm gonna become a photographer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, are you prepared to be on Instagram every day?
Speaker 2:I am, or I'm at least prepared to Use some software where I can like, batch it and schedule it. It's like once a week I can, or like after every wedding, just pick like here's 50 images soon send out an image twice a day for the next 25 days. You know, like just every job, just pick the best 50 images and schedule them to release, so that I'm just always doing it, but like I'm always having stuff out there but I'm not personally Having to do it all the time. And then if it starts picking up steam like I don't know everybody does Instagram how hard could it be for me to like Train myself to? Just this is one more social media. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I didn't use to. This is tick tock.
Speaker 2:And now I fucking spend an hour every night watching people, either, like weed, eat their lawn or fucking Try and do drywall work.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's all about consistency. Just got a post regularly and then eventually, yeah. But I don't know.
Speaker 2:I don't know why, like, I feel like you don't like weddings, so like it's true I don't like weddings, but I I Like making money and I like not having a boss, and it's something that I Kind of know it and like I started thinking about, like what are the things that I hate about it the most and how can I change those things?
Speaker 1:How can I change people? No, it's not really well.
Speaker 2:Well, one of the things, like everything that I thought of that was a problem. I'm like I can fix that Right, like so part of the problem was I used to make a whole lot of money doing it and by the time I was getting out I was fucking barely making a living at all. So like, yeah, in theory, when I go back into it, I'm gonna make money again. I think going into photography instead of video is way more lucrative. I always thought it was more lucrative, but I just wasn't willing to do it because, like I was passionate about video passions gone so it's just a business thing. Photography makes way more sense. All right. So and then also like, yeah, I hated that I wasn't doing well at sales anymore, and I was for a bunch of years, and then for a bunch of years I wasn't. I realized, like now that I've had time to step back and think about it. I had no sales training, like I just kind of Everything was just working and it wasn't really so. It was just answering inquiries and like I I was booking you know 90% of my inquiries. Like I had good work. People message me, I had I knew how to have a one-hour conversation that hit everything they wanted to hear and everything I wanted to say, and 90% of the time they booked like that's not really sales, you know, like when it sells itself. That's why I was successful and so I go. I got realized like, oh, if I go into this now, I can actually Educate myself on better sales techniques. Like there's a ton of people out there that have these you know video things where you learn how to do it. There's books, there's websites, there's seminars and shit. I could go to like I can actually invest money into learning how to do this and Stay on top of like. The other thing was like you know, I use the knot in the wedding wire and that booked fucking everything for me. Like then those websites stopped working and I had no other plan. I didn't respond to it fast enough. Where, like, I probably should have just been like, okay, let me figure out new sales strategies, let me try, and, you know, let me pay for this and pay for that. You know, whatever like and I could, just I Don't know. My point is I can work harder at that part. So that was all that problem.
Speaker 2:The other thing that I don't like about it is just, you know, losing my life to editing and and if I get into stills, that will not be an issue. Dude, these fucking photographers are using AI now and they're editing an entire full wedding, like 10 hour package to camera to you know Two shooters. They're fucking editing this shit in less than an hour. I could shoot two weddings a week and by lunchtime at Monday have nothing left to do for. Like I have four days to work on my own short films and movies and writing and Remodeling my kitchen, whatever the fuck I want to do. And then you know the other thing that I really kind of well, I didn't like that at the end the last couple years working for somebody else. So like, yeah, I can go back into owning my own business and not go back into being somebody's employee. It's like, okay, I can fix that problem.
Speaker 2:And then the last problem that I was just like I don't know, I don't know if I could go back to that is, you know, dealing with photographers. I think photographers are the number one thing that makes me hate being a wedding videographers working with the photographers. So then I'm like, oh, I'll just be the photographer instead, and maybe I'll hate the videographers, but probably not. Probably I can get along with videographers fucking way better than that can get along with photographers. So by being a wedding photographer I can fix all of my issues. I Mean not the sales one, necessarily, that's like I have to do work on that, but I can fix that. Why are you laughing at me, chuckles?
Speaker 1:because it did it did sound funny, but I realized that if I just become a wedding photographer, then I don't have problems with wedding photography. All my problems will go away.
Speaker 2:No, it's not that all my problems will go away, but it's like I had to fucking do something and I can't just keep. I Can't just keep like waiting to get a job on a film set because people on the internet say Atlanta's a hot market. It's not. It's full of fucking posers and phonies and fakes and I Don't know. There are people out here working, but I'm not one of them.
Speaker 2:And if I don't know how many more years it's gonna take me, and yeah, like if I set up a Photography business and then I start getting more and more like I could quit. If I start getting more opportunities to work on films, I could back out of that. I could run that business for two years and then go. I don't need this anymore. I Don't know, and I'm not gonna name it after myself either.
Speaker 2:So maybe I could kind of make it clear up front that I have a team of photographers and I don't I'm not always gonna be your lead and also I could get into photography and try and make money in a lot of different ways besides weddings. I think weddings are. There's a lot of them. You can get a good price for them. So it's like not necessarily a bad business. But I could also go after corporate headshots and school pictures and you know, church directories and I can go after family pictures. Just try to you know, whenever all the leaves turn brown or whatever and everybody wants their fall family photos, like Trying to do two, three photo sessions a day for those like two weeks where the leaves are to find me and fuck you. Why are you laughing? You're the one who wants me to go back to building decks like as though that's sustainable in my weight with my back.
Speaker 1:What about a tree nursery? Stelly's trees.
Speaker 2:I mean it wouldn't be a bad if I could like really dial this shit in. I Definitely have thought of that. I have a lot of acreage here and by a 1.25 acres.
Speaker 2:Semity in your backyard I have the square footage to put in a greenhouse and the way that would work for me as a business is, you know, I would basically have a plant sale once or twice a year and try to make. You know it's not a real job but I could be like, yeah, like every March I have a plant sale one weekend and in last year I made $1,500, you know, it's like it's a thing to do. It's not exactly like I'm not gonna suddenly just become a fucking farmer, although you know, if we go into another great depression and everybody's fucking losing everything and there is, you know, like no work or whatever, it is kind of nice to know that, like I, I do have enough yard that I, we, we could potentially like save ourselves from starving to death if we had to.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, you definitely grow enough food for two people.
Speaker 1:Well, you would need. You would need some chickens.
Speaker 2:Oh, 100% chicken. Maybe some goats, goats and chickens we'd be in business. Dude, egg chickens, yeah, meat chickens. You ever thought about getting a chicken, about your boys would like that. I mean, you can't get one, but you know, get like three. My also can't get one goat, by the way. If you get a goat, you got to get two goats. Mm-hmm, they're social Mm-hmm. You get one, go to fucking be super depressed and it's not good for the goat. Yeah, they say what's good for the goat is good for the Gander.
Speaker 1:That's right. My neighbor has a few chickens.
Speaker 2:Yeah, my neighbor too. Everyone's on all. She messages me and she's like hey, have you seen my chicken? I'm like, no, I'm like I think I got eaten. She's not, she does. They're very, they're a little too free range and I think that she has to buy new ones a couple times a year because that like they get eaten.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, that's what chickens do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, are you into birds at all? You ever put up a bird feeder?
Speaker 1:I can't say that I've never put up a bird feeder in my life.
Speaker 2:I probably have like twice.
Speaker 1:But no, I'm not particularly into birds and the reason why is mainly If I had a spot in my yard where I didn't care if they like shit everywhere. Shit everywhere then that would be fine, except I don't really. Our yard is too small for any of that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I got super into it for a while in Denver and I mean, you remember our house, our yard was not that big.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but.
Speaker 2:I had like Five or so different bird feeders out there and I really enjoy it. I like filling them up. I like seeing the birds come into the yard. I like hearing them outside the window chirping in the morning. I love it. And now I got that 600 millimeter lens so like I really would want to fucking set some shit up here and start filming the birds and that come to my yard.
Speaker 2:Dang dude, I was spending like $80 a month on seed like you get, like you can really get carried away when you want to have like a variety of different size feeders and different types of seeds so you can attract a variety of different kind of birds, and I was. I'm been cleaning up my garage yesterday and realizing like I haven't, I've got like I don't know five or ten bird houses, bird feeders, rather, that I haven't hung up since we left Colorado and I'm like, man, maybe I should do this. But then I'm like, fuck, that's a like I'm pretty sure I'm gonna end up spending fucking $80 a month again if I go down to this road, so I keep not doing it. But then I'm like, well, not only do I want to see birds, I also don't want to fucking keep giving up garage storage space for all these houses. Her feeders.
Speaker 1:Hmm, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2:That's coming to my bird head talk.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a.
Speaker 2:That's stuff right.
Speaker 1:That's a situation. Um, maybe I'll get a bird feeder, but I'll hang it on a branch over the, over the property line on my, on the my neighbor's side, so I can still enjoy the birds, but they just shit in their yard.
Speaker 2:Why don't you let the bird shit where you're having a hard time growing grass and let them fertilize some shit for you? Uh yeah, thought of that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no uh actually front yard front yard's getting done this year, so I'm pretty pretty pumped.
Speaker 2:Oh, what do you? What's your next plan? Not more fake grass?
Speaker 1:No, no, no, we're going to do.
Speaker 2:You're going to have somebody coming inside.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're just going to do real grass in the front again.
Speaker 2:Cause you tried seeding a couple of different times and it didn't work.
Speaker 1:Well, I wouldn't say, I tried my wife. Yeah, your wife, I would be out shooting a wedding and then my, I would come home and see like this very half hearted attempt and I said that'll.
Speaker 2:I was like that'll never work.
Speaker 1:And then it worked a little bit, Cause remember you saw Clover. But then you asked me, why is that the wrong kind of Clover? And I was like I don't know.
Speaker 2:I didn't plan it, yeah, cause she grew Dutch Clover and set a micro Clover. But good for her, it's fine. I mean, Dutch Clover is a fine option if you can get it to take a and it honestly it's one of the easiest things to seed.
Speaker 1:So it was surprising to see how badly it went, but it went badly because it didn't get spread evenly and she also didn't put down any like new soil, the seed has to be a quarter an inch deep.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you have to like use a rake to put grooves in and then seed it and then very gently rake the dirt back over. If you rake it too aggressively you end up pulling all the seeds to one spot. So you just have to just very lightly get the dirt back over the seed. And then it really helps if you can rent or I own, but if you can rent a, a, a roller which is basically just like a giant cylinder that you fill up with water, so it's like 150 pounds or whatever, and then you roll it, you can wet your, wet your soil and then roll it over and it kind of compacts it and like it really gets it embedded, so it's really touching soil. And then when you're seeding, especially grass, you literally should water four times a day. You should water at least four times a day, not for a long time, like 15 minutes, but for like two minutes, three minutes, four times a day. And if you don't have an irrigation system, almost nobody will do what it takes to keep up with that and you skip. You skip one day or one afternoon and everything can fry out in one afternoon. So if you don't have an irrigation where you can set that on a timer, you really should just buy sod, cause it's too fucking hard to get grass seed to take. If you're just going to plant it and hope for the rain, it has to stay constantly moist for like 14 to 21 days. It can't dry out for one minute.
Speaker 2:It's very difficult to seed grass. I've done it. I grew my lawn in Colorado, kentucky bluegrass. I grew it from seed and I had to. I had to fill in bare patches twice a year for probably three years before the yard really looked good and then I sold the house and I went back like six months later and he had let everything die. It's hard to keep grass alive in Colorado. It's a Denver area and I assume Colorado Springs also. People don't realize it's a desert. It's very low precipitation, very, very low humidity. That's part of why I like living there. But fuck man, I don't know if I'd ever try to go grass there again. I got go zero escaping.
Speaker 1:You're listening to the number one plant based video podcast. That's right.
Speaker 2:Well, I told you, I want this podcast to be able to be about whatever, and true that all this is a bunch of whatever true that, true that. There. So what do you think Should I? Am I right to go out and reshoot a bunch of stock footage, or should I just?
Speaker 2:fucking put this project behind me and just be like, hey, if the producer doesn't care, why should I? The reason that pushed me over the edge was that he wanted to use some stock footage shots in the trailer, and that was just like fuck man, like the trailers 90 seconds, we can't. I shot on this, I shot this whole goddamn movie and you can't go 90 seconds without resorting to stock footage. All the good shit that I did with fucking no budget and fucking terrible sets, and I made it look not too bad With fucking gaffer that was on his phone a quarter mile away down street every time I needed him. I fucking put these images together and you're going to use stock footage from pixelcom.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I kind of thought you would have put this, you would have cut your losses and put this project behind you. That's kind of what I was thinking.
Speaker 2:But the but. If you really think about it, does that seem like me.
Speaker 1:Well, when I asked you if the project, like I was said, is this movie going to turn out well, and you said no. So then I was like, then what's the point of you like going keep, like keeping on this path?
Speaker 2:I mean like, logically, you're right, but don't I always make things too hard because I'm like a perfectionist and like I think you probably don't regularly find myself being a sucker.
Speaker 1:I think, yeah, but I think you can't, I think you're, you have this mindset of like, well, if I, if I just force this to work, then it will. You know, yeah, all right. Oh, you stop moving, and then I guess your phone or whatever thought that the ceiling fan was you. It's like there he is on the ceiling. Yeah, I noticed the iPad when you have it in vertical mode.
Speaker 2:It it's sort of like pan and scans.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like the the. Facebook whatever thing they tried to roll out. I don't know what you're talking about, but I'm just going to agree with you. My brother-in-law sent me this like Facebook video camera thing that you put on top of your TV and it connects to Facebook and then you can just go and see what's going on Facebook and then you can video call people and then when you get up it'll like follow you around the house like on video, like a surveillance camera in your own home.
Speaker 2:Wasn't there, like, wasn't there an iMac that did that? That like, like 15 years ago there was an iMac that followed you. Oh, I don't remember it was like a big monitor, but it had like a. The base was like a dome, like a half circle, half sphere or whatever. Okay, and then in the commercial it would like. I think that computer is like ancient now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't recall.
Speaker 2:It must be if you don't even know what the fuck I'm talking about.
Speaker 1:I remember it had a dome. I remember they had one that had like a dome base, I think for the screen. But I thought it just articulated. Are you sure they weren't just like making something creative for the ad? But I don't know that the computer would follow you around.
Speaker 2:I'm not sure of anything anymore. I don't even know who I am.
Speaker 1:That's, it's evident. Are you in a bedroom doing all this potting?
Speaker 2:This is my office.
Speaker 1:Why are all the plants?
Speaker 2:is like.
Speaker 1:It seems like you do that in the garage or outside.
Speaker 2:I know Well cause I wanted to propagate over winter. So I kept them by the wind, by the window, in trays and domes.
Speaker 1:So it's not like a total Deterter try to do an indoor mess or anything.
Speaker 2:No, and I'm working inside of this big plastic tub, so like the mess is very contained.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then, like you know, I'll vacuum when I'm done.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, welcome back to the wedding industry. When you start booking those, hold it and about six.
Speaker 2:And about six months is going to be when I'm like, okay, I guess I'm doing this, but also like, hopefully I'll just start getting work in the film industry and then it'll never happen, like there's still time for this, this other thing, to fucking work out. But yeah, we'll see.
Speaker 1:Hey, do you believe in aliens by chance?
Speaker 2:Um, not the way you do.
Speaker 1:Oh, how do I believe? I do know how I believe, like you think like, don't like.
Speaker 2:You think they're already here. I believe for sure there's life in the universe, but I don't necessarily believe it's come to our planet. I think it kind of I don't know, I don't believe that the government is able to keep a secret like that, but I don't know who knows. I mean that Bob was our stuff is seeming more and more likely all the time.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I mean, I totally believe Bob was our for the most part. I don't think he's really lying about.
Speaker 2:I don't say totally believe I believe he. I believe he believes what he's saying. Yeah, people always say that I don't know if he's cookie. So many he doesn't strike me as cookie so many like that's the thing, that's the you know like when, when, when they find out somebody's killed like 40 people and buried him under their basement, the neighbors like oh, never would have guessed. Seem like the nicest guy. Hey, you don't fucking know.
Speaker 1:That's a good point. You know what other people's reality is. Yeah, that's a good point.
Speaker 2:Dude, I'm doing some stuff in my private life that would shock you to your core. Oh, is that so funny?
Speaker 1:Oh, boy, yeah I don't know. Thank you, I don't know. Well, there you have it, everybody oh that's loyal cookie crumbles. Another another episode of the video bros podcast in the book.
Speaker 2:Yeah, have we done enough? I'm really kind of ready to start moving these plants, yeah man. There's enough podcast, I think so. Yeah, um, last week we didn't podcast. Wasn't that awesome. We got to skip. We didn't when you were in school and every day you were like maybe the teacher won't show up. It'd be so cool to teach it and show up today. Mm, hmm, and I felt when you, though that's how I feel when you forget to tell me we had to podcast.
Speaker 1:Yeah, every once in a while I actually forget about it and I'm like oh, we forgot to record on Thursday.
Speaker 2:I'm like we didn't forget.
Speaker 1:Oh, I see how it is Well.
Speaker 2:Oh, I guess that's the other thing. Um, I met up with my writing partner for the first time in like a half a year.
Speaker 1:Matthew Perry.
Speaker 2:Matthew and, um, yeah, I uh I kind of let him have it. I let him know how much he hurt my feelings and how much he made me feel abandoned, and you know he was pitching me a new project that I super don't want to do, and I let him know that like, yeah, that's the kind of thing I would have done for you as your partner Before you ditched me for six months, and now I'm no longer gonna be your fucking free videographer for all the dumb ways to shit projects you want to do. I'm still gonna make movies and I still think you could be in them, but obviously you're not interested in writing a screenplay with me anymore, so I'll let you know. And I need an actor and I don't know, it's a little. He definitely felt bad, yeah, but he also. It also seemed like he didn't even Know Like that I was, I don't know, like he was a little surprised.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, you pulled like the woman move, Like you didn't tell him how you felt, and then he was like how come you never told me? And then you said I shouldn't have to.
Speaker 2:That's exactly right. Use your fucking head, dude. Use your head. I Go look at this phone. I know you know how to use it. We're in the same generation.
Speaker 1:He was probably blindsided. Yeah, a little bit. He's like oh, I thought we were gonna meet up and do coke, and then you hit him with that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this time we didn't even do coke.
Speaker 1:It's like you don't even love me drink more than I wanted to.
Speaker 2:I Woke up the next day and I did kind of feel like I Don't know. I guess I'm kind of relieved that I got it out, but I'm also like I Don't know if this is necessarily how I wanted to leave things. You know, I Didn't want to give him the impression that he can't still call me to hang out, but I did kind of need to let him know that, like I'm not doing your stupid fucking music video and I'm not making a mockumentary for your Limp Biscuit tribute band and like I'm not gonna do promo videos for your friends art gallery, like you fucking blew that you're. You're fucking free videographers done Because you you didn't. You know you weren't a good partner. Oh.
Speaker 1:My god, this has like a break up.
Speaker 2:Way away from my microphone. It was a breakup, I mean. The thing is I I Already felt I already spent like a lot of months going. I think he broke up with me. What did I do wrong? Why doesn't he love me anymore?
Speaker 1:Why did he break up with me?
Speaker 2:What was it? Something I said, you know. Was it a week after, like six months back. Hey dude, you want to make this mockumentary about my Limp Biscuit tribute band. I'm like no dude, I wouldn't even watch that, much less make it for fucking two years.
Speaker 2:For free well and I told, and I told him, I go if I can do it in one day. That's what I told him when we were here. I was like if I can do it in one day, but it sounds like you want me to fucking make this a full-time job for two years and I don't even think it's that good of an idea and I definitely don't want to do it. I don't want to make a documentary, I don't want to make a mockumentary. I don't want to make music videos. I'll do those things for money. Those are good jobs, but if I'm like doing all the work and Spending all the money to get it done, I'm gonna make one of my movies. I'm not gonna make your dumb idea.
Speaker 2:I didn't move across the country, leave a place I love living, quit a decent job To come help other people's dreams come true. That's not what I'm here for. So that's that. I Guess I probably will hit them up again and be like hey, do you want to hang out a? You know, I Didn't mean for you to think that we can't. You know, get together and get drunk. You know, get fucked up anymore. I'm always down to fucking clown man.
Speaker 2:Wow, wow, wow well wow, wow, how's it going on? You booking us some Work outside of Colorado so we can meet in the middle somewhere? You up to a book enough some clients. When are you gonna kick it into salesgear Like bro? You really need to be putting in some equity on finding us Video work in the winters, when you're not making any money for like six months in a row. Everything slows down every winter. Why don't we start looking for industries that we can like, niche industries that we can crack into and, ideally, you know, places where we get to like fly and like travel and you get to sleep in a hotel and start a listening to your kids and, you know, I Get to get my passport stamped.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I just don't like flying with a bunch of gear personally, but I guess if I had somebody to take care of logistics, I'd be.
Speaker 2:Well, I'll carry half of the gear. And if we, if we're doing it more, you know right now it sucks Because we're not optimized for it. But if we started doing it regularly, we could rethink some equipment choices and we could streamline. We don't have to have all the shit we use like, yeah, I use everything I bring to set. I don't have to. There's a lot of video work that can be done without a big-ass fucking gimbal. There's a lot of video work that can be done without C stands. There's, you know, we don't have to fucking always have a Carry on full of V-mount batteries. There's other. There's rental houses, mm-hmm, we can. You know, we could like only been on jobs that are big enough to have a third person and always hire someone local grip where we go. So we're just flying in with cameras.
Speaker 1:Well, hey, this sounds like a good venture for someone who's unemployed to start working on.
Speaker 2:You know, no, no, no, my days are full.
Speaker 1:About with what? Planting a shrub that you're gonna grow over the next nine years.
Speaker 2:I'm never truly unemployed because I'm a house flipper, and that, that I'm a house flipper and that doesn't stop. I've got fucking three thousand square feet here and every inch of it's gonna be remodeled in the next like five years. So I'm never really.
Speaker 1:No, I'm a slow no.
Speaker 2:I'm a slow. No, you're right, I'm a slow flipper. I'm a live-in flipper like yeah, I don't, I understand. On HGTV they do it in four or six weeks or whatever. But you can't say I'm not a house flipper when I made like 300,000 dollars on my last flip and and I'm on my third flip, this is my retirement plan.
Speaker 1:I certainly don't have a Roth.
Speaker 2:IRA. But I can continue to do well in the real estate market and I am a plumber and an electrician and a drywaller and a framer. I basically can do every fucking. I could build a goddamn house by myself if I just had a hundred years to do it All right. Well, I'm not really a roofer. I I feel that I can easily fall off. So we have to hire a roofer. And I'm not an HVAC guy, because HVAC requires a tremendous amount of very expensive, very specialized skills and Tools. Hvac is pretty inaccessible to a DIYer. But other than HVAC and roofing, you know I'm probably not really ready to do a lot of sewer work, but everything else I got you.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:I'm a Tyler, I Can build decks, I can frame up walls, I could wire a whole house. I'm good to go, baby, but you, on the other hand, don't even mow your own lawn, so you probably should be kicking into sales and getting us some video gigs. Thank you.