Other things, golden line that other YouTubers do that.
You don't think that you would ever do you tend not to do
unboxing. First of all, as a word.
I hate that word unboxing. How can you that's like, I know
I tell you what. This goes back to that song,
Unbreak My Heart which at the time I thought that's not even a
word. How do you mean Unbreak?
My Heart? How about make me feel better?
Cheers. Me up, please.
Unbox my camera assuring. Yep, 12.
And that's probably how every episode will start someone's
chest shot. And that's going hello testing.
I've got this idea for this series called Great British
YouTubers the best. I've got for a logo at the
moment is kind of a Frankenstein bolting together of the YouTube.
Go and the Union Jack. So I both infringe copyright,
and in rager Nation, I job done. But the first person I wanted to
talk to was you wasn't available.
So you came to me, whenever I feel that we have explained each
other on another video. That makes one of my favorite
videos in my channel. I'll run a clip now and there's
a link in the description to it. But before we get into the chat,
can I just ask you, what is your all-time favorite video that
you've made on your Channel Gordon line.
My all-time favorite. And this is this is the problem
that all creators have is that everyone wants you to be
pigeonholed and then, and we'll talk about this.
I'm sure later on but in the same way that Jamie Oliver
probably wouldn't be that successful.
If you suddenly did a video reviewing, a car or doing
gardening or something like that.
People know you for one thing and if you deviate from that,
woe betide, woe betide. The algorithm will punish you.
Video will underperform terrifically and you'll be put
off. You will be beaten into
submission to continue doing what you were put on this Earth
to do which is what you initially, defined yourself for
us, which for me was a camera reviewer and it's amazing how
specific people can get. Because even though we're
talking about hybrid cameras. Now if I go off and with your
microphone, nope, too far off, so I'm going to choose is one of
my favorite videos. My first attempt to actually
doing a vlog, which was Eight years ago into.
No, No 9 years ago. 2011-2012 time frame.
I went on a holiday from where I lived at the time in New Zealand
for three weeks or three weeks, family, holiday, that ended up
taking a year and a half. And we were location-independent
for a year and a half, which is just a fancy way of saying
you're homeless and you, and you spending the money that you
would have spent on rent or a mortgage on hotels and
surprisingly it's actually similar when you're not paying
utility bills. Insurance on the car that you
don't have all these things really add up and you could
spend that in a different way. And I tried to make a series of
Vlogs about it. That, of course, I thought were
revolutionary and interesting because I was doing something
quite different and people saying, hey, if I think you
Neil, I think you actually said to me, you should make a video
about that. So I started making videos about
them. They're really rough because I
was talking about the cameras. I was using on this trip, but I
only have one main. Amber.
And I wanted to show that camera.
So if I want to show my proper camera, on camera, what am I
filming with? And I scrambled around in my
second, best camera was an iPad and iPad 2 generation to Circa
2011. And if you've ever tried to film
video with that, it crops. So massively that you have to
position it so far away that I was literally filming with an
iPad balanced against walls in various cities around.
Around the world, about 4 meters away from me, right?
Somebody tried to pick it up and walk off with it with the iPad
or the camera. Yeah, because it was, it's just,
I'm being a crazy guy on the street go.
Hey, everyone. The reason that I'm doing this
and everyone's like, you know, whatever and then they'll walk
past moment because, of course you're drawing attention to
yourself. So, they're looking at looking
at what you do. And then they notice this iPad,
just sat meters away from anyone.
They, and they would, as anybody in their right mind would think
well. Someone's obviously, left.
It doesn't want it anymore. Even those kind of tally light
on it. And of course, it was so far
away. The audio would have been
rubbish. So I was using a zoom portable
sound recorder, whether it was quite close to me the sound
quality, and these are quite good.
But anyway, I thought these were quite fun videos and it was my
attempt at vlogging, which eight years ago was, you know, not
that common a thing, but of course, no one watched him
because it wasn't a pure camera review.
So those were probably my favorite videos that I did.
Put the link to those in In the description and I'll run some
footage while you speaking there.
Oh, make sure you use the footage of me in Morocco with
camels going by behind me. That's that's quite fun.
Rocco. Yeah, because we visited Morocco
and camped out in the Sahara Desert as you do, which I highly
recommend doing that. You're wearing a, did you
wearing a thing thing thing? That's, that's the technical
term of the privileged white, man.
He's wearing a Foreign thing, but it's okay because he's one
of us. Oh, brilliant.
Yeah. Those were fun.
What? One of the other favorite videos
of mine, which is actually one of my most successful videos,
which automatically makes it one of my favorites was a tutorial
that I filmed photography tutorial, of course, try and do
a tutorial. Anything else you've finished
and this was about long, exposure photography, and a lot
of people when they go on YouTube or other social
networks. They want the secrets.
They want to know the top tips. How you going to succeed at
something and it's actually pretty obvious what you need to
do. It's just a very few of us do
and I rarely do it, but I did it in this one, which is you do
everything right? And that sounds glib.
But here's what you do, you plan it, you plan very carefully.
What you want to say and where you want to say it, you don't
skimp on things like locations. I've done two tours that I
thought were great, but it was just miss out on this sofa.
Didn't really engage with people.
This one. Because if you do use tutorial
on how to run, you don't do it from your sofa, you go out and
you run if you want to do a tutorial about cooking you
getting, you don't do it for yourself, you do from your
kitchen. And when you set up that shot in
your kitchen, you realize that your kitchens a mess and that
you have to tidy up and frame, it carefully.
And if I'm doing a tutorial about long exposure, landscape
photography, I'm going to be out there doing it.
So even though it was awkward and difficult.
I did it. And guess what?
It it came across really well and I cut away.
Way to me on the sofa. When I wanted to add additional
details that I'd forgotten in the, on the location.
Of course that made it more interesting switching between
two locations. I also filmed it very carefully.
I filmed it in the best quality that I could.
I edited it in the best quality that I could and then and
perhaps more important than anything else.
It has a decent thumbnail and that is what more than anything
else causes people to open and play a video on YouTube is
decent thumbnails. And as someone who fly, The
thing that that content is okay, and that you're above these
things, you're not it doesn't work.
You could you could produce the best video of all and if it's
got rubbish thumbnail, at a terrible title, no one is ever
going to play it. However, conversely in this is
what frustrates me about YouTube, the best thumbnail, and
best title will guarantee opening, even if the content is
rubbish completely. And, of course, we, we call that
clickbait, don't we? But it works.
And a good thumbnail game is is critical and I haven't mastered
it, but I was very lucky to have Of a picture that I took that
worked really well with the text.
I wanted to use, and it's very easy to see in a very small
scale because a lot of people are looking on mobile devices.
So, I looked out on the thumbnail and that really helped
but basically it was a good video.
That's the thing. It's a good video.
That was proud of and guess what I did or right, but that's so
frustrating, isn't it? I suppose it's the the story of
art since the dawn of time. Is that once you've created so
that is your Bohemian Rhapsody back.
Your November Rain and now you've got to make another one.
It's crashing. What the algorithm does, some
naughty things as well. Well, we don't know what the
algorithm does. We can be paranoid about it and
suspicious and we can guess it the things that it does.
But one of the things I think it does do is encourage you from
time to time, especially new creators, who maybe haven't had
a lot of luck yet. At some point for everyone.
One of your videos will do really well really well.
Way better. Better than the others in a way,
is gone viral. No, so viral that you can retire
or there or anything like that, but it does comfortably better
maybe not 10 times, but 100 times better than one of you.
Normal videos you like. What on Earth did I do there?
But wow, the potential the potential.
How did you know that your channel is a thing?
It was a it was a thing because no one else had that thing.
When I started I started on YouTube in 2006 and was one of
the first channels. To review anything let alone
cameras today, reviews are absolutely everywhere and it's
great because it's cause is forces everyone to raise their
game. It can be very disheartening and
demoralizing big especially if you're reviewing something
that's popular because everyone else will be reviewing it and
you're going to be trying to get attention for something that a
thousand other people pulling more than 1,000 of the people
who have got, a lot of them will have way bigger following than
you may have. We may have, and you're trying
to compete against these people, which is very hard, which is
again, just before I ask you question, your top tip number to
talk about stuff that no one else is talking about some of my
most successful reviews and videos have not been because
there were any good or useful or incisive.
It's simply because no one else had reviewed them and you can't
guess what that's going to be, you know, a new camera comes out
and you like, is everyone going to do this?
Because time is of the essence, you've got to be one of the
first as well. So you don't know if anyone else
is doing it, but typically when I attend like a camera launched,
as a journalist does rarely just one piece of news or one
product. There's typically lots of
different things. They'll be the one main product
though. That's the thing which you came
along for and that's the thing which everyone's going to be
talking about, but they'll be some crappy accessory that
you'll be like. Yeah, whatever film it talk
about it, review it because no one else will ABS.
You could end up getting way more views and Revenue.
Based on that, then the main thing which are invited for.
So the unfortunate thing is to cover everything.
But how did I know when it become a channel?
It's because again, when I started no one else was doing
this. So when I put out review, it
kind of it was such a refreshing.
It was such a nice world to be part of because there was no
competition. So, everything you did did
really well because there was nothing else.
There were no other camera views, you want to review of the
Canon whatever. It's Bold British guy again
because no one else has done it. So let's listen to him and look
at his terrible technique so it against to interrupt but you
started in 2009, six as sorry. 2006.
Yeah. So did you know quite early in
the late naughties? Then the this is a thing that
actually is going to be quite big.
No, not at all. I'll tell you why I started
doing it. So I come from written.
Well, I have done some broadcast or TV or radio, but But most of
what I do is written, so when you're writing reviewers,
something you have to describe it with words, right?
And if you pay by the word, which are.
Anyway, forget that you've got to describe how something looks.
How something moves, how something sounds.
And when you're reviewing a camera and you want to describe
in words how the lens extends, the kind of noise.
It makes when it extends or zooms.
The clicking sound. It makes for some reason under
certain circumstances. It's Lead difficult to write
that in a sensible way. The best way of doing it is to
point a camera in it, film it and say look this is what it
does. Listen.
This is what it sounds like. But here's the rub.
I've been publishing on the internet since the late 90s and
back then in web 1.0 video, Was Out Of Reach for pretty much
everyone even major corporations.
It was so expensive to serve video.
Because you would have web hosting for your web pages, but
then you need separate hosting for audio or video and they
would charge you per view and it was like something stupid like a
pound of you or something. Right?
And the quality was rubbish as well.
So if you wanted to post a video, it was going to cost you
tens of thousands of pounds or dollars.
And if you're who's gonna pay that now, even a corporation is
going to pay that. And then in 2006, YouTube comes
along and says, oh, well will host your videos free of charge.
It was completely revolutionary completely revolutionary as a
content creator to suddenly have a platform which let you publish
videos and embed them on your own web pages if you wanted free
of charge. And then shortly after that,
they allowed you to monetize it now, as anyone knows who tries
to monetize on YouTube, you don't get paid a lot, but you
can see that it's scalable and if you get enough use it can
actually bring in some money. So it was, you know, a truly
revolutionary. The platform back then.
But so I got into it as a way because it was the most
affordable way to demonstrate something on video and I had no
intention of it wasn't in my mind to see it as a platform
which will grow by itself and where people would go to
YouTube. I thought people would use it
the way I was using it, which is to host video that you then put
on another page and people would view it there and I think they
did initially with my content. And in the meantime, while
you're doing that, you're getting all these And it's on
this other platform this YouTube platform you like who are these
people that are actually watching on YouTube?
So once that started to come in and once you were getting really
massive views at the time because there was no
alternative. That's when I thought this is a
thing and I should actually produce content specifically for
YouTube and for people who are consuming on YouTube, what you
roughly was that out a couple of years in In this was
approximately at the time that other people really began to
catch on and suddenly I was getting or went from having no
competition to loads of competition.
And it was, it was really hard for me, because imagine imagine
thinking you're the most popular person on the Block.
But sadly, it's actually only because you're the only person
on the Block. And these are the people coming
along, who were better in every way they were more entertaining.
They were way better presenters, some of them.
Girl. I thought were the one thing
I've got is experience and Technical knowledge, but people
come along with that as well. And people most crucially of
all. And this is how you disrupt it
as a Creator people who are coming at it.
Not with a journalistic perspective, you know, like
sometimes I think I should put on a dinner suit and do
everything like the early days of the BBC and speaking at a
voice like this, you know, maybe we should go back to that, but
no, these are the people. Come on, say, I've no idea how
to pronounce. Isn't this guy's, but here it
is. And you'd look at it and you go,
what's this rubbish? And then you'd look at the views
and be like crikey people really like this.
And actually, I like it too, because it's entertaining and
it's fun and it's a bit like when you I encourage anybody to
do a quick experiment, which is to play any episode of the first
season of friends where everyone speaks in a kind of monotone
voice. And they deliver like this go
forward, a few seasons and everyone's up and down there,
doing comedy voice. Is I'm now speaking like this.
When did that happen? And the same thing happened with
YouTube, except he took ages for me to catch up for year up until
I can only a couple of weeks ago.
I was still speaking like this. Hello.
I didn't even say hello. No, it was worse.
I would actually read out the URL.
I think I actually said, hello. I'm Gordon laying editor of HTTP
colon forward, slash forward slash Dot.
And if you still have viewer retention or today, you've
nailed it. They love you both.
Of course, they all go. Who's this?
This guy Compares their eye goes.
Hi guys. I'm going to be looking at the
new whenever who would you prefer to watch?
And that's what happened. And I got really disheartened
because everyone started watching them.
My Views went from literally, everything.
I posted got hundreds of thousands of use, half a million
views was not unusual for me now half million views.
I've only had like one video in the past two years that has had
that number of years and that's the long exposure tutorial
because it did everything right. Everything else to these days.
I'm delighted with ten, twenty thousand views.
Because there's so much competition.
It's a good. We've achieved so much.
I mean, just look at your channel.
You've uploaded 342 videos. You have a whole lot more.
I bet you also have 160 thousand subscribers, which in itself is
a massive achievement. You've got 48 million views.
You run camera Labs, as well as this YouTube channel and a
podcast. And you're an author, we can see
a little delicate nod to that. Your shoulder.
If you're good enough to include this field of view in your edit
Neil. You will see my product and I'm
wearing my product, my merchandise, well, link to all
of those in the description. The I suspect you're going to
crappie to about this shape-shift me to one side,
either this side, or this side, and then put you on the other
side, so that way. And then scale it.
So that in fact, you know, what, we should have outlined up.
We've got bit space above our heads down to base almost like
we plan this, I have tried to plan this before and it Doesn't
work as well as you and I have done it here.
We're quite well matched, even though we didn't try and much
focal lengths or coverage. Yeah, so well done deal.
Well, thanks. That's because I watched your
blooming channel is because you're a broadcast professional.
Well, that's the weird thing. We talked about that on the
other video that your background is Prince journalism.
Specifically magazine journalism.
My background is comedy entertainment formats for TV.
And that's sort of why I wanted to make this show.
I still don't know whether to make this as a playlist.
Or a whole other channel. I know the answer to that is
going to be a playlist because I'm clinging to the just
clinging, it's whatever statistics I can get, but I
looked you up on you sure though.
You're sure that's the right approach because I asked myself
this all the time. Is it better on YouTube to put
everything in one basket or to create smaller?
But multiple baskets. This is exactly the know.
Knows this is exactly the the a nerve-wracking that I wanted to
get down to you. So, what do you think?
Nobody knows? And even if you did know the
cutting algorithm, which changes all the time, anyway, by the
way, when I mention algorithm, that's basically the, the
software behind YouTube and, and every other social platform and
search results, which show you what you see.
So, when you look at YouTube, they'll be a bunch of
recommended videos, down the side.
Sometimes from people, you follow, sometimes from people
that you don't follow. But you watch sometimes from
people who are posting something similar to something you've
liked or watched a lot of before, because you don't have
to like a video, Although you should and just going to put a
little request in here for any anyone, whether you're a content
creator or of consumer or viewer, if you want something
and you think it's good, click like, you know, it's easy to
think what a great video then walk away and do something else.
Click like because not only does it make us feel better as
creators. It really does make you feel
better. It also gets fed back into the
algorithm and YouTuber. Go not only do they watch it,
but they liked it. And therefore, I'm going to
recommend it using the algorithm to other people who may not.
Of course this person before and that's how our channels grow and
that's how we sustain a business.
So always do a like. But in terms of the question of
whether to do one channel or multiple channels, I don't know
what I can tell you is what I mentioned earlier, which is, if
you are known for one thing, if you deviate from that thing, you
probably won't do very well. Like recently.
I did a video on it, sound really into coffee and I
thought, well, it'd be fun to do a tutorial or a video.
So, about how I make coffee the, you know, now don't be put off
by the fact that there are already a million other videos
doing the same thing. There are there were a million
long exposure videos before I posted mine, right?
Just do it differently or better?
Or hopefully bit both. Well, my coffee video wasn't
different or better, but I thought I'd do it.
Anyway, and of course it bombed. No one's interested.
They're like, yeah, we know you're interested in that but
you're the camera guy. I did one on, I'm also really
into Hi-Fi. There's an interesting crossover
to, in photographers and Hi-Fi, enthusiasts.
I think it's maybe the They call nuances the details that people
are into. I see a lot of that a lot
crossover. So the been this thing I was
trying to do. Am I high five for ages
streaming high? Definition audio blah blah blah.
It was this really like most of the things I try to do this
really obscure solution that nobody else had written about or
talked about and I thought, you know what, there's got to be at
least one other person who wants to know this.
So I did a video about it and I've got it all across and the
people all the companies involved.
They were like really liked it. That was you.
Ali, good, you're the only person that's doing that great
blahblahblah. And, of course, it got hardly
any views at all even worse than the coffee video.
So you begin to think, should I do a different channel for just
general interest stuff. And in fact, as a side note,
this is the advantage that vloggers have because of lager,
the thing that's consistent. So for me, the thing that's
consistent on my channel as photography, and specifically
camera reviews. That's what people look for.
If you follow a vlogger, the thing that's consistent on that
channel is them they could be doing.
I think they could be cooking today.
They could be doing makeup. They could be doing photography.
They could between travel gardening anything because the
consistent thing that people have subscribed to is damn in
their personality. So if you do that, then you have
the flexibility to cover almost any subject.
So I'm kind of frustrated that didn't go down that route
because that would give you greater flexibility.
I mean, is that something you might still experiment with what
doing doing different videos or experimenting with a different
Channel? Experiment to be different?
Videos and committing to the channel.
Because, you know, that deep down that those couple of
thousand to watch the coffee video, a probably the Diehard
fans, the ones that do actually like, you doing staff.
But they, but it's such a double dare from YouTube, isn't it?
Because they feel so much at stake?
The more achievement you retain the more at stake suddenly
appears. There's also a kind of paranoid.
To this. And again, I have no evidence
for this and like everything that happens.
You can read anything into anything but let's play which is
this if you post a bad video or were still too badly / fun.
So I'll rephrase that not a bad view of badly performing video,
a video. That doesn't get that many views
or likes. Okay?
Doesn't get as much engagement. People don't watch as much fear
blah, blah blah. If you post a couple of those in
the in a row, will the YouTube algorithm punish you so that
when you You come back and you say, forget this this strategy
is not worth it. I'd better go back to my core
subject. Whatever that is and post this
amazing video that you put in so much work into you.
Try so hard and you tick all the boxes.
This there your know your subscriber base is going to love
this. It's perfect.
It's you it's the definition of channel you post it.
But what if YouTube is punishing you for the previous deviation
and that video doesn't do well and I have seen that is it
because they are punishing. Or is it?
Because it just, coincidentally didn't do very well.
And I don't know. But again, it does kind of put
you off. It's like the day, you know,
you're in the schoolyard and you standing, so you have it.
Why are we doing this? Whack?
And then you like, I'm not going to stick my head up again, in
that environment on a video by video basis.
It's so difficult to take that leap.
It's incredibly hard. There's a creator that I follow
called the everyday dad, who I met because he did camera
reviews, and they were great camera views, but then he did an
iPad review. And it did like 10 times better
and he was like, oh my God, this was a bit of a shock and they
did another iPad video and it did really well and he thought
wait a minute and then he did a camera view and it didn't do
very well. And the message was getting
across in. The interesting thing about that
is that his channel while it is about technology and while it
was initially about cameras. It was more about him than he
perhaps realized or even that his viewers realized that it was
more about him. So he's easier for him to Pivot
to transition to a different subject than it was for me
because mine is more about the products.
So, the thing as opposed to me as a personality or as a person,
you might be interested in hearing or watching.
So I thought that was really interesting.
And I know that I have tried to do videos about phones which are
massively successful for the channels and just haven't done
anything for me. I think my channel has been
algorithm to to a point and I found this with some other
creators who started in like 2006. 2007 sort of pre-2010.
Basically those sort of first three or four years worth of
creators. They have weird Channels with
weird stats and they don't grow very fast.
Like you were saying, oh, you know, you've got a hundred and
sixty thousand followers, which, you know, which is great.
It's all right, but for a channel, that's 14 years old.
It's terrible. And in my market, the people,
Steve Stargate invited to. I'm the smallest one, most of
the most of my contemporaries or peer group.
Well, I called my peer group, you always refer to people who
are better than you as your peer group that that they don't refer
to me as being. They like, who's this guy?
Who's this loser? There are over a million and
their younger channels younger as in than the channels aren't,
as all the people may be the same age or older.
Generally a bit younger. Always more fun.
Is that a factor? I don't know.
You tell me. But the the more recent Channel
seem to experience greater growth than the older ones.
So again, there's the paranoia. No the grumpy older channels get
together and go. Why is the algorithm punishing
us? Is it the algorithm?
Or is it just that? No one likes us?
I don't know, but I do know that the channels that started at the
beginning had surprisingly fewer followers than you'd expect that
seems to be a common theme. So should I start a new channel?
I don't think so. I think you should train that
algorithm. I think, honestly, I think
putting in curveballs, makes it more interesting for your core
audience. Yeah, you can you can look at
statistics and analytics and till you go mad and they provide
a ridiculous amount of detail. Mean, if you're a YouTube
Creator, there's a there's an app or a page on the side but it
works better on the phone. I think called Creator, isn't
it? Yeah, and it with the Yap School
Studio, but it's analytics. Yeah.
Yeah, exactly. And it, the information it
provides is is absolutely fascinating.
But also disheartening as well. And now I kind of have the I'm
of the mind that maybe the hours.
You spent looking at analytics, might be better spent producing
more content to feed the beast. But then I'm the most successful
YouTubers. I know, know that analytics back
to front. So they know their audience back
to front, they know when they stopped listening.
I mean, typically people don't want a long video.
I I don't want a long video and I get to the point and I'm the
worst for it because my videos are long and surprise, surprise.
The shorter ones generally do better than the longer ones.
But do I pay attention that? If you're on YouTube, you
probably not going to be making much money from YouTube until
you get over a million subscribers, right?
At that point. You're going to be able to make
some decent money. You're also going to get better
sponsorship and stuff like that. So that's when the money really
starts coming in below that you're not going to make too
much or make some money, but not a massive amount.
You're going to have to have another Revenue stream as well.
Like, I have my website as well. YouTube is just a small part of
that. So you've got to love making
those videos. I know a lot of people go.
Oh, and what am I going to do for job?
I'm going to be a, I'll go on YouTube because that's an easy
way to make money. It's nice.
A terrible way to make money, especially if you're not utterly
passionate about that subject because you're going to have to
talk about that subject a lot. And you're going to think God,
do I have to do another video about cameras?
You've got a love that subject and I do.
So I'm with the kind of personality or mindset, which
is, I'm producing the kind of content.
I would like to consume. So, when I review a camera, that
I'll look at it and I'll go, hey, they It's got this
stabilization mode, that the marketing people says he's
brilliant for this. Well, I want to try it but I
also want to try it while I'm jumping off a cliff towards a
thing on a parachute. Gianna mean, some weird
combination that appeals just to my mind.
And I think I wonder what it would do if I did that to it and
you get a surprising result. Sometimes it does better than
expected. Sometimes they just much worse
and you, then you've got a story and it's an interesting thing
and that's what I, that's what turns me on their kind of
detail. You know, they say it.
Does this Us. But let's just as take a closer
look and yet it does do really well at that but this thing
actually less so and it might be that.
That's the thing you want it to do and and you know, these
things are pulling against each other.
So I produce those videos and just hope that people are also
interested in watching which is why I should probably very
satisfied with my subscriber count because I'm not
specifically targeting anyone apart from me which sounds
selfish or arrogant. I produced videos that I would
want to watch. It said they were a bit longer.
Actually, I'd like to short version of me and that, as Yoda
says, is why you fail, you know, produce what people want.
You know, I'm producing BBC four shows.
Now. I'm producing shows that even
BBC forward turned down because they're too long and obscure and
of to limited interest. There's the format point there
actually that once introduced and you've just said great into
it. Just take a drink.
Let's do that. And you at home, have a drink as
well. This is the drink break.
So maybe we do this in slow mo. Peter McKinnon Style.
He's done. Well, that's great.
So this this he likes coffee and if you've got to this point, hit
the like button. Let us know.
It was saying, the comment. What can I say?
What can we say in the comments? What the code word?
Yeah, in camera, I was going to say pineapple, but Owen and
pineapple is better. Actually.
This was the next format Point. Can you pick your favorite three
YouTubers and explain them for 15 seconds.
Each just off the top of your head.
No, give me any exact. This is a new question.
Got to be off the top of your head.
Oh my goodness. This is fraught because if you
forget someone yeah, it looks right.
Okay. Off the top of my head.
Yeah, it's from this week that you happen to watch this week's
that you have others favorites, but these are the ones you've
watched recently. Okay.
I really like you rock stars. This is a huge Channel.
That's probably the biggest Channel that I follow.
And what they do is really geeky in-depth analysis on Easter eggs
and stuff. You didn't notice in sci-fi and
fantasy movies. So if you're into Star Wars Game
of Thrones marveled else. Say, look at that picture.
That means that could be the second act that's reading.
S, brilliant. The next one. 15 seconds go.
Okay. Camera conspiracies.
He reviews cameras, but not as a journalist because he doesn't
get sent them. He's not privileged.
Like I am he actually has to borrow them or by them or get
lent them and because he's not tied into that world.
He's extremely honest. Not that, I'm dishonest but I've
been really fantastic. I think I think this moment
points a bit of awareness is the right.
Yeah, dr. With this.
All right. Yeah, okay.
Third YouTuber that you watch a little too much of okay.
Again, it's in my own industry and that said DP Review TV
because it's Chris and Jordan who used to be on the camera
store. I know those guys person.
I really love them and their way presentation.
They're doing similar sort of videos to what I do.
So I watch them and think how are they missed out?
The thing I found and I do know they found the thing.
I've seen s would you like would you like a bonus YouTuber?
Yes. You Neil because always
flattered. Interviewer actually Neil, so
I'd watch. I'm sorry.
It's very bright. I've watched all of your videos
and they're very entertaining and I and I feel that you
followed my advice of filming the video that no one else has
done a bit too seriously to obscure but I admire that I
might let you stuck to it. Yeah.
Well, the scary ones. Face mask is my favorite two
dates and that got picked up by BBC news.
That was. Yes talk about front and you
know what I was In your advice about long exposure photography,
which is to. Yeah, I took some time on it.
I planned it out. I didn't over script it, but I
did structure it and I did some shooting and some editing and
then went back and do some shooting again.
And that's exactly the same advice that Shelby Church
proposed for how she makes videos as well.
That if you mix up the scripting, the shooting, the
editing, you know, rather than treating it as a pipeline, but
you make better work, but it's you also happier doing it.
It you need a narrative, I think.
And I'm too tired to my narrative and I realized that
but I think you do need to have this is what frustrates me about
a lot of TV shows is you like or movie series and you like you
didn't plan that this character is just said this thing.
They'd never say that thing. You know, what?
Why they doing that, that makes no sense and you and I think you
have to have an idea of where you're going in a video even if
it's like, my goal is to make a biscuit right?
The end think you should be visualizing you with a tray of
So the ad may be going up. Cheers readers.
You know what I mean? Is that's the way I think about
it. Now, what happens in that
journey in between, mix it up, play around, have fun.
And if things change include it, you know, if the biscuits get
burnt, then include it. It doesn't have to be perfect.
In fact, it's better if we see the fails.
But, but have an idea in mind. I see so many videos from, like,
quite high end. People that don't do that, and
they still May perform well, and that's kind of disappointing me
on a personal level. I like to see some sort of A
sort of plan like you've liked you, the YouTube creators
Twitter Channel, and and lots of Twitter channels.
Frequently asked. What would you what do you want
to make a video about or what you're going to make a video
about today? Like as if you have to make a
video today, they want you to make a video today because they
want you to produce content for their platform.
But do you have to produce a video today?
I'm so old that. I think you should only say
something. You've got something worth
saying or something useful to add to the conversation.
Don't just under, just going to cut a video because I like the
sound of my own voice and want to film.
Do the process produce stuff as often as you want.
So long as it it gets across the message, you want to get across
and that can be as simple as you like.
It can be as short as you like. It could be as silly as you
like, but do it for a reason not just because you want to feed
the beast. That's so true.
It's so true because that's what blade out with the the facemask
video. That was.
Absolutely a subject. That was really bugging me.
The best stuff absolutely comes from something that is truly
bugging you and face masks were bugging.
Me. It was bugging me that people it
would seem to be so anti them. So I thought it would actually
help the world for me to have a go, even though it was just a
dumb video of me copying how to make a face mask.
There was a useful to humanity. Question underneath it or
division. Important.
SEO tips are what search engine to most of us use, right?
Say it Google. Therefore, if you want, good
SEO. Are you going to try and
continue to push your own website against every other
website? Or are you going to post a video
with a good SEO title on YouTube?
Which Google the provides with the biggest search engine in the
world uses? How hard is it to search
Facebook and Facebook results? Don't appear on Google?
Do they? Well, at least not properly.
So if you want to search for, and I've done this before, I'm
like, oh I did this post on Facebook, where I mentioned
something and I Is there anywhere else, right?
So I've Got to Now search for it on Facebook and I couldn't find
it and that's why I thought cash, actually, the search on
this is rubbish, and I'd become too reliant on rather than
indexing things, or storing things properly on relying on
search instead. But of course, search will only
work with what search wants to show and search wants to show
what search owns and if you're using Google.
Well Google's going to give prominent results to YouTube
obviously because it owns it also because people like
consuming video as well. Other things good in line, but
other YouTubers do that, you don't think that you would ever
do you tend not to do unboxing? First of all, as a word I hate
that word unboxing. How can you that's like, I know
I tell you what. This goes back to that song
Unbreak. My Heart.
Make sure the time I thought that's not even a word.
How do you mean Unbreak? My Heart?
How about make me feel better cheer me up, please and box my
camera and that is why I gave up YouTube for Three years, which
is, which really confuse the algorithm because I was pouring
my heart into these technical reviews.
Right? Look, testing every aspect of a
camera and trying to get that across to people.
And then some kid doing an unboxing video gets more views
and all he's done is filmed him opening a box.
It doesn't even test the camera or turn it on.
It. Just opens the box and they were
getting more views and I was bewildered by this.
I just couldn't understand why this was more popular and it put
me off so much. I thought this this I kind of
came to terms that that's what people wanted to see or that's
what people wanted to watch on that platform.
And that I wasn't right for that platform.
I was just some crusty old dinosaur.
So I gave up, I went back to purely written content for three
years. It didn't close the channel.
Obviously. I left it there because it was
hosting my videos that were also part of my written content, but
I got into right strap over and it was unboxing that did it and
I still to this day with not. Now I Love opening boxes, and
some of the packaging and some things, you know, Apple
products, and, or some high-end consumer products.
Nice. It's nice practically.
Put some thought into it is called, but I guess what they're
doing is a review of the packaging.
If I look at it that way, then it's more acceptable to me.
I think it's might just be the word on box that I have a thing
about you thought of any boxing video, you have done Lots.
I unboxed Chinese Takeaway from from.
Waitrose you and boxed one of my t-shirts, this In a blatant
attempt to get some coverage from someone else.
Not, if I don't, if I was to test what much?
She's like, it was. But it did have the benefit of
plugging you to my 12 subscribers at the time that
they went down. So it didn't and it didn't get
cold in the video featured, by BBC News at 6.
P.m. On bbc1.
What is the hardest part of running a YouTube channel?
I think the expectations that you have for its performance not
being met and feeling disheartened by the fact that
you've put this work into something that you think should
be doing better. And it doesn't, it's what
effects artists of all. You know, Van Gogh was
frustrated that he wasn't getting enough attention and
they were all the same. I'm not the same rank obviously,
but everyone is everyone thinks they're better than they are.
Maybe all that, they're not being recognized for something.
Frustrated that. Yeah, maybe I'm not as good as I
think I am or that I did, you know that you want the videos to
do better. You think they deserve better,
and they're not doing as well as you think.
And then you see someone else who's done the similar video
similar subject and as he's doing way better than yours and
you think that's just not fair. Why is that doing better than
mine? And then you look at it and you
beat yourself up over, you know, is it is it?
Your presentation? Is it, the thing they covered is
it, you know, is it? Because they've somehow got more
followers that are getting, you know, they've been amending
more, you don't know what it is, but it's that's probably the
hardest thing for me of all and you've got to kind of stop
looking at it. Stop looking at like well, you
can't help it. You do look at the number of
views you've had and it does, you know, if you consistently
get poor views and you seeing other people doing way better
than you, it can put you off long-term and it did put me off.
Like I said, I quit, I quit. And If This Were a YouTube
video, I should have made a video about it and you would do
I And in capital letters, quit qit.
Why I quit, I've seen videos where people say why I quit and
they didn't even quit. It's they talked about why they
might quit or why somebody like them might have quit it or why
they thought about quitting but they didn't quit.
I have however, started to use Capitals in some of my titles
tits. Shout out to shout for that last
bit of attention, please watch or I'll quit good and laying
from camera Labs. Thank you so much.
You've been so generous with your time and literally your GB
because I think you know we're going To stitch this together
now, which is going to involve a massive transfer.
This video will never see the light of day because we could
grow and be able to get the file to you.
It's true. And then Zoom will delete it
before we go Kitt. Can you pick a favorite video
idea that you haven't yet made unboxing?
And you would like to make one? I think I should.
What if it does really well. Maybe they should all be
unboxing from now on who doesn't like origami boxes are nice and
they put me in a box. You see the pigeon?
Hold me in the Box, so why don't I talk about boxes?
That will show him good. The grand reveal revealed in
capitals. Why I quit unboxing?
This is gold. If you reach it to you in this
video. This this is the gold.
This is what you pay for Gordon. Thank you so much.
You're very welcome. Thank you for having me.
So we just sit here, awkwardly in this two shots.
And how are you going to do this shit?
Are you going to? This isn't cinematic enough.
Let's do it in wide. Yeah, like an apple, the movie
to remember that. Let's do it in widescreen and
please hit the Subscribe button. If you want to see more Great
British YouTubers, there's a playlist and a podcast, all the
details and links are in the description.
I'm Neil Morrissey and I'll see you on the very next episode of
Great British YouTubers. Do you want a series of
reactions now? I think you still have to do
that on the TV. They used to ask me to do that.
They go. Can you do one more?
You go, the say, no now sarcastic, it's degree.
Incredulous. Angry at those are all
thumbnail, pictures, as well. That's that's what you do.
At the end of the video. You record your thumbnail, but I
want some textures and so you have to position yourself to one
side. So you can put the text here.
Why I quit unboxing. Oh my goodness.