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Brandon Washington from BWash Media returns to the show to discuss his thoughts on a year with the RED Komodo and V-RAPTOR, how he grew his freelance business to crazy levels and his new course on video production business!
Connect with Brandon:
https://instagram.com/bwashmedia/
Business Guide for Creative Professionals: https://learn.creativefamacademy.com/courses/BGFCP
Connect with Dave:
» WEBSITE — https://davemaze.com/
» TWITTER — https://geni.us/davemaze_twitter
» INSTAGRAM — https://geni.us/davemaze_ig
» YOUTUBE — https://geni.us/davemaze_youtube
Note: Golden Hour transcripts have been generated with automated software and may contain errors. Timecode also isn't accurate.
Hello welcome to another episode of the golden hour podcast brought to you by the polarpro studio I'm your host Dave Mays and joining me again for the second time on this show is my good friend. Brandon Washington from bwash media all the way out in Dallas Texas Brandon thank you so much for being on the show today. Not Dallas Houston I knew that.
01:19.41
Brandon Washington
Thank you I appreciate that I do have to say I I'm in Houston yeah, all my houstonians would have like completely checked me if I didn't make that correction Houston and Dallas different places all day.
01:30.58
davemaze
Yep, No no I As you said that as you said that I started to realize that let me do that again because I could dummy. Yeah alright.
01:36.84
Brandon Washington
Ah, oh no, you're good I mean people would have just ran with it been like like as all goes act as long as I rough the H we're good.
01:43.84
davemaze
Ah, okay okay I won't redo it then um, in fact, yeah, you were telling me last time we talked which by the way was on what Sunday or Friday. Yeah, so we let's let's just get this straight. So yeah, like we were gonna do this interview on friday.
01:54.88
Brandon Washington
Friday friday.
02:03.70
davemaze
And ah called Brandon and his voice sounded like really hoarse and you know you're just going through something had a cold or something and I was like hey like it doesn't even matter like let's just let's just do it later like you know, no pressure. Um, turns out we ended up talking for like 2 hours like
02:10.30
Brandon Washington
And.
02:22.56
davemaze
As friends and then like the whole time are like oh we should have been recording this. So um I don't know we're just good friends so we have a lot of lot of things to talk about same here same here dude and your voice was totally fine, but it it sounds much better now. Um.
02:27.81
Brandon Washington
Yeah, it was a great conversation I I mean honestly I like just talking to you So whether this recorded or not. It's fun.
02:40.22
Brandon Washington
Well good I I feel like I'm about 85% so you know it is what it is the information's the same it just is gonna sound a little different.
02:42.28
davemaze
So ah.
02:49.86
davemaze
So Brandon and I met um in person at Inab and we kind of go over this in our first interview which we can listen to on the show but I just think it's it's still so cool. How like I was a 1 Dc a one Dc fan boy I still have mine here.
03:05.83
Brandon Washington
I Do always wanted that camera.
03:09.13
davemaze
Remember this camera Brandon ah, but you had the 1 d x mark too which I always wanted because it has auto focuss. So we both had like coveted cameras. But um I was watching your content at the time and like I just happened to see you walking around at NA b
03:26.45
Brandon Washington
Um, yeah, yeah, we were just on the streets of Vegas.
03:28.12
davemaze
2018 I guess or 2019 I think yeah and we just I was just like are you brain in Washington I was like it was a total fan boy moment.
03:36.20
Brandon Washington
I think that's the first time I ever was recognized in Youtube like from Youtube ever. Yes I like I'll never forget that moment. Not only because I made a great friend that night but like it was like that first time I was like oh my god.
03:41.69
davemaze
Ah, really, that's awesome. Yeah. Is working but that's what I miss so much about going to events man is like I I haven't been to a ah proper event in like 2 years and that's the thing that makes it so real for all of us is actually meeting all the people who watch the stuff who you know listen to this podcast I mean i.
03:54.80
Brandon Washington
My subscribers are real people.
04:01.00
Brandon Washington
Um, yeah.
04:11.40
davemaze
This podcast has really existed throughout the whole pandemic. So a lot of the people that start listening to this show I've definitely never met so I would love to do that again. I really miss in a B that was such a fun convention to go to.
04:17.70
Brandon Washington
Um.
04:23.47
Brandon Washington
Yeah, same here it was kind of like my mecca every year but hopefully hopefully we'll get back to it soon.
04:28.16
davemaze
Yeah, so you've got a lot of things that are going on in your career and in your life. Um, it's kind of endless really and we have been talking about it nonsop even before we were so recording this podcast. We started kind of going. On a rant about work and and stuff and we were like oh shoot we need to actually record this thing. So ah, but 1 thing that I just want to get right out. The gate here is the red I feel like you've become like the red guy over the last year um you bought a komodo. And you even bought the new What's it called dude. So tell me about the red and your red journey over the last year because um, you've really kind of gone full into it.
05:04.70
Brandon Washington
Yep, the v raptor. Yeah. Yeah I know it was not I mean so full transparency when I was first starting out in this industry like that's when the reds first came out and that was like the goal you know that was like the dream. It was like one day. Maybe that'll happen and so that's always kind of been there but um for me I was shooting on. You know, like you mentioned before like the 1 dxmar 2 like I definitely went down the Dslr route and then when mirrorless cameras became more popular I went down that route and then. Um, it was really the year that the black magic pocket cinema camera came out that I kind of made that jump over to cinema cameras and stopped using photography cameras to shoot video and started really focusing on actual video cameras and you know when red announced the komodo. And it was going to be $6000 which I mean mind you, that's a little bit more than what I paid for the 1 dx mark 2 but now I was getting red raw I was getting the red sensor and that dynamic range and the skin tones and everything I was like all right. This is my chance to jump into the red ecosystem. And just see if I like it and at the time I was also growing my business so I started hiring on editors to work within the company. So a lot of stuff was changing but I can tell you when I got the komodo and I started using it I realized kind of that red difference like what. Made reds really stand out and once you kind of work in red raw on a consistent basis. It's really hard to try to edit video and anything else. Even if the project doesn't necessarily call for red because you have so much latitude in post you just are spoiled. The entire color process. So I shot on the komodo for basically about a year loving every second of it and then red announced the raptor and you know when they started releasing specs on the raptor.
07:20.28
Brandon Washington
At first I was like I was like oh yes, a new red to partner with my komodo. This would be great but then they were like 8 k full frame I was like out of my price range like instantly I was like this camera's gonna be $60000 because that's where the mantra was sitting and it had roughly some of the same specs. But this was supposed to be a newer camera. So I immediately thought okay, this is definitely gonna be monsrow price but it came out at like roughly half the price of the manro so you literally got a camera that was better than the manro that was $60000 but they gave you a v raptor that was about half the price. And for that I was like yeah this time to get the big brother to my komoto. So my komoto can really sit where it's supposed to sit and that's in that bee cam spot and I can have a v raptor and again my company is at a place now where I have employees and. Have offices and you know there's a lot of stuff going on ah hr and all that fun stuff. Um, but that's the reason why we decided to jump full steam into the red was just because there's just something that you get out of working in that red raw and I just wanted that in the v raptor on the full frame side. And also the ability to have some of those higher frame rates because the komodo is fairly limited with the super 35 sensor and having you know, almost no high frame rates without crazy crops. So the the v raptor kind of solved all the problems that I had with the komodo and it was half of what I thought it was going to cost. So it seemed like a worthy investment and it's pretty much already paid itself off just by taking it out on new jobs. So it's I mean I love the investment I love the camera. But yeah I guess I shoot right now.
09:07.70
davemaze
And that's amazing. You're you're just like ah marquez brownley like taking the the red banner with ah with you on Youtube I mean you're not ah using it primarily as a Youtube camera but have you used it as a Youtube camera and what are your thoughts on using the komodo. And now the the raptor as like a primary Youtube camera with all of your experience now like marquez really is kind of in his own world with that. There's a couple of other tech youtubers that also do that. Do you actually believe now that you have all this experience that that's a little overkill or do you see the reasons. Why.
09:34.80
Brandon Washington
Yeah.
09:43.00
Brandon Washington
So I will say that like when it comes to the the images that you get out of the red they are unmatched to me honestly I mean the flexibility the raw like you really do have the most and when you're shooting content for Youtube.
09:45.80
davemaze
Chooses to do that.
10:02.54
Brandon Washington
You know if you are shooting products or you are or you're actually like filming something else. That's not just you I do see there being a benefit in trying to get the best production quality you can I mean for marquez. He's trying to show off these phones or these other pieces of tech. In a way that you know you can feel like you are there physically holding the device yourself that is the experience he is trying to present and so why not do it at the highest quality you possibly can that being said, if you are filming yourself shooting on a red is probably one of the most. Frustrating things you could possibly do if you are like a 1 man band and you're trying to film yourself. That's one of the reasons why I still have other cameras around that are great for that. For example, right now I'm shooting this whole podcast set up with the Sony fx 3 which is a fantastic camera. Has great auto focus and it's one of my go to cameras when I have to be the one that films myself and I need to worry about things like audio and focus and all those other elements you just that's too much for 1 person to do with a red. So. 1 of the big things I always say is you know if you're working with a team consistently. Then yeah, definitely consider the red you know, but if it's just you or your other person is focused on audio or your other person is focused on lights and you can't at least have 2 hands on the camera then I would say you know it's. Probably overkill, especially just for Youtube.
11:39.62
davemaze
Yeah, and I mean when I did my review with the komodo with Indiemoba by the way everybody makes fun of me because it sounds like I'm saying kimono like multiple times in that review. Um, which I kind of agree with so ah.
11:53.72
Brandon Washington
I Was gonna say I remember that video it it I thought it was like a like a joke. Okay.
11:58.82
davemaze
Ah, the red Kimono like I just kind of was letting it roll off the tongue I Definitely knew what I was saying but I may have actually said Kimono a couple of times and just left it in but you're the one you're the one who told me one of the best Hacks about.
12:09.19
Brandon Washington
Yeah, just like yeah yeah.
12:15.69
davemaze
Youtube is like say a mistake on purpose. So that people in the comments like can start to argue about it. So like hey you were you said this or ah.
12:19.64
Brandon Washington
Well, it's not on purpose. You don't make the mistake on purpose. But if you make the mistake I leave it in and then I trust my audience in the comment section to correct me, you know.
12:26.67
davemaze
Yeah. Ah, ah yeah.
12:34.13
Brandon Washington
Like it's like if I'm in the middle of edit like I'm not going to go back and reshoot something especially if it's like vlogy type like you can't you can't go back and fix it. So either. You could do the little assterress in the corner to correct yourself or you just let your audience. You know you know, have your back in the crumits and it gives them more to talk about because. Honestly in the comments sections where I learn a lot of stuff like I've said stuff wrong on accident thought it was right. Got the common section realized I was 100% wrong and learned a lot from it and so you know Youtube is one of those places where there's a great back and forth. Ah, you just got to be careful about going in the comments. It's not always it's not always positive
13:13.64
davemaze
I But anyways, yeah, totally Anyways, back to the red thing like I was really kind of impressed with the app and I don't know if you've had any experience using it or have at least tried it as a tripod camera for self- filmming like the autofocus isn't terrible with the like.
13:22.42
Brandon Washington
Ah.
13:32.65
davemaze
Touch to focus is it just not reliable enough for you when you've got the Sony.
13:33.70
Brandon Washington
Yeah, yeah, so I mean it really comes down to like what's the purpose of this now. Um you know I will say that you you technically can do it with the app. But I find that the app like the phone physically needs to be. Fairly close to the camera. It does not have great range whatsoever and then also you have to be working with ah rf lenses at that point which I mean don't get me wrong. Our flenses are fantastic, especially you know like we have ah we have a canon r six that we use for a lot of bts stuff. Around here and we use ah rf lenses with that camera but I just personally feel like when I'm using a cinema camera I want to be using cinema lenses and so at that point all the autofocus features are out the window and you know. Even red as of right now like the komodo's been out for about a year and a half almost two years now and their autofocus system is still technically part of the beta process. So even though they have full built versions of the operating system on the raptor and on the komodo. When you go into the auto focuscus if you have an ah rf lens. It's still beta and it's not fantastic. So I would say if you are gonna use it maybe use an ah rf lens do not do continuous autofocus that thing hunts like crazy. But if you want to do like you know single shot where it just will lock focus and then it won't rack anymore just be careful of moving back and forth between the camera you can get away with it. But at that point I say why? not just use like an Fx 3 or a canon artist 6 or something that has more reliable.
15:11.66
davemaze
So so so what you're saying so what you're saying the autofocus on the red is beta and the autofocus on Sony Sony is alpha right.
15:22.70
Brandon Washington
Ah, ah God That's a good one. That's a good have you done have you used that before.
15:24.93
davemaze
Yeah, because no I literally just like as you were saying all that my mind thought of that joke and if you get it then you get it. Um, if you don't I'm not ah.
15:34.35
Brandon Washington
So I have until you release this to use that joke as many times as I possibly can because I 100% I'm gonna steal that joke.
15:44.77
davemaze
Please Do please do? Um, okay, cool and then so the V raptor tell me about your experience with that because I have not had any hands on time with that is it very similar to the komodo which you almost say it's just kind of a full frame better Komoto or is there. A lot of things about it that you just really love that are new.
16:04.40
Brandon Washington
Yeah I mean I personally think that like you know the sensor and just the full frameness of it makes a huge difference I mean the super 35 sensor is a little limited especially in you know, low life situations or just high cow it handles the shadows the v raptor. Miles better. But like I have this problem when I talk about the v raptor because I'm like oh my gosh. It's amazing I love everything about it. It's fantastic. blah blah blah blah blah but it's also like a $30000 camera like it. it better be you know like it's it's kind of like you know hyping up something it's like oh my god the lambo was so amazing it was like yeah it's a freaking lambo it better be right and so that's the same thing I have with the v raptor like I love it and I think it's a fantastic camera. The image is. Beautiful. Some of my favorite shots. We've got this year came in the latter part of the year once we started introducing this camera and it's it's just a fantastic camera to use I will say though I 100 % enjoy filming with the komodo more. Then I enjoy filming with the raptor primarily because that touchscreen on the komodo is like it's just so easy it's so easy and I really wish they would have brought that touchscreen over to the v raptor they didn't there's like this button interface and it's slow and it's a little clunky. And so um, you know I have the monitor on order but I haven't got it in yet. It's the touchscreen seven inch monitor so I'm assuming once that comes in my use case will be a little bit better and then also I use my app I actually normally have it hooked up to my ipad mini and that helps with the workflow. But if you don't have the phone or it hooked up to some type of device and as I said the touchscreens haven't gotten shipped out to everybody yet. Um it pushing those buttons on the side they're they're not ideal I mean simple things like just trying to magnify in so you can. Go ahead and you know pool focus and make sure your focus is ta sharp can take like you know, easily 20 to 30 seconds and it doesn't sound like much but when you have a client or you're on set and you're just trying to quickly just magnify in it'd be much nice to to just tap on the screen to do that.
18:22.25
davemaze
And well red has kind of always been known for having incredible touchsc screenen support I mean the touchscreens themselves especially on those older reds were basically like early Android phone level like in terms of like when you when you would try to change the Iso you end up like swiping it like 5 times over and over.
18:33.38
Brandon Washington
E.
18:41.22
davemaze
Um, and I was always just like ah freaking they had work like an iphone you know, but um, they got better over time and stuff and I think small Hd now is making some that work for it too right? Like they're kind of partnered together.
18:50.72
Brandon Washington
Yeah, so actually the the one that read red did something really unique with the komodo and with the raptor is like they're not actually making all the accessories they're partnering with companies to make the accessories. So like for example I just happen to have them here. But like these two like red official memory cards. So like this is the ah the this is the cfexpress and this is the cfas card and they're both branded. They say red on them but like they're actually made by angelbird like and they say it they have angelbirds logo and everything on it. Um, the same with the monitor the monitor that is the official red monitor for the v raptor is actually made by small Hd and so it's doing a couple things. It's you know 1 it's you know, bringing in the actual industry leaders in those areas. So maybe now red to can actually just focus more on their cameras and their customer support which I can say is fantastic I've had some support with the v raptor already and they're just amazing every time I talk to them but ah. I will also say that like the accessories that even the red branded accessories are in my opinion better than the original red accessories and I think that's just because red's kind of giving some of that you know attention to detail to other areas and bringing in partners that can focus on the accessories. The right way and they're doing what they do best you know small Hd makes monitors. Why not have them make the red monitor.
20:24.88
davemaze
It totally It's a brilliant idea and I'm surprised it took them so long to figure that out because it's a great way to kind of offload the work that they don't really want to do. They're still a part of it so it still kind of has that red touch if you look at the monitor. It still looks like 1 of those red monitors. In fact. Um, if you remember the I think the original like epic one I think it said red pro seven on it or something 7.0 is that what the old one said I think um, but I remember every every time we do a shoot with the red people would see the monitor they like oh are you shooting on the ah the old red pro 7.
20:48.23
Brandon Washington
Um, something like that.
21:00.74
Brandon Washington
Yeah, that's just the monitor.
21:01.66
davemaze
I'm like no, that's the monitor. Ah such a muggle. Oh my gosh. Um, you know what? I mean but no, that's a Harry Potter pun I'm watching all the Harry Potters my wife is a huge Harry Potter fan and I've never been into it and we just got Hbo Max
21:09.70
Brandon Washington
Totally.
21:17.24
Brandon Washington
What.
21:20.55
davemaze
I've never like ironically I as a Magician wasn't a huge fan I don't know I don't get it. But yeah I you're right I mean I watched I watched them? Yeah yeah I did watch them but I don't know I just never got into it I was more of a lord the rings guy. But anyways.
21:23.20
Brandon Washington
That that's what I was about to say like that's that's your childhood. That's what you wanted.
21:36.83
Brandon Washington
Ah, okay.
21:40.34
davemaze
I've been watching them. We're on the we just watched the fourth one and there it's it's gotten like really dark the topics have gotten really deep like the fourth one kind of had some team teen romance going on in there which I wasn't a huge fan of but man it's it's good. It's good movie though I mean it and it.
21:50.43
Brandon Washington
Yeah, that's only for 1 movie, you'll be okay, yeah.
21:57.40
davemaze
I noticed dramatically from 3 to 4 the visual effects just like went like nuts next level and of course we're talking several years ago yeah I'm excited so yeah that's that's why muggles are on my mind right now. But um, but yeah I think that's just a brilliant idea for them.
22:02.41
Brandon Washington
Oh just keep keep watching keep watching man. It's fantastic.
22:15.61
davemaze
Apple does this you know I think belkcon makes a lot of the cables from Apple ah accessories like the hdmise or balcons and a lot of the random accessories. They obviously worked with lg with their little monitor that the l g five k.
22:26.32
Brandon Washington
Here.
22:29.87
davemaze
Um, but a lot of people don't like that I hope that Apple actually makes an Apple branded display soon because that would be really fun. A cheaper one not ah, not the the pro display. Do you have the pro display xdr did you buy 1 of those. Yeah, what are you doing? You're shooting on a red you should have 1 Ah.
22:38.40
Brandon Washington
No no I I definitely did not um, but I so I actually just got a brand new dell monitor. Ah, and they they actually were nice enough to to sponsor the channel. So we've got a nice little hdr with mini led like four k monitor so we do have our Hdr workflow all lined out but ah, no definitely didn't buy the apple xdr one I didn't like it look like a cheese grater.
23:04.42
davemaze
Nice, nice, nice, nice, nice. What are some? What are some of the things that you don't like about Red What are some things There are a little nitpicky kind of issues that you have with that I mean you you just mentioned the the raptor doesn't have the.
23:17.42
Brandon Washington
Um, if.
23:22.21
davemaze
Touchscreen and you really like that from the komodo. But I think just overall red as an ecosystem. What are some of the things you don't like that you would like to see changed.
23:28.31
Brandon Washington
Um, I mean I honestly I'll say I'm still fairly new I'm about a year and a half in like I said a year and a half with the komoto couple months in with the v raptor. So I'm still pretty early and haven't found too many. Um I will say like. Whatever you think you need to spin to get into the red ecosystem whichever camera whether that's the v raptor or the komodo go ahead and like almost double it. Um because it gets pretty wild pretty fast like for example, like me and my team. We just made this joke the other day but like okay so I have three Cf Express cards in my hand I've got 2 c fast cards in my hand. Um, this is about $4000 between 2 fingers like.
24:20.94
davemaze
That's what she said.
24:21.44
Brandon Washington
I'm sorry but that's that's ridiculous like I mean that's I did not expect that um, but me obviously can go on their website and you can do research blah bla blah bla blah I get it but like at the same time realistically like I think I spent like. $3500 on my first car now. Granted my first car was crap but like the fact that I'm holding more in this hand than what my first car was worth kind of blows me away sometimes when I think about it so that's 1 big area that kind of you know? ah.
24:51.80
davemaze
I But but could you but could you make what the the kind of money that you're making now with your first car. No obviously you know technically? yeah ah yeah.
24:57.27
Brandon Washington
That is true. This is more of a I mean Uber didn't exist back then but no, so but it was my car probably wouldn't have made all the trips Uber wouldn't have accepted me with that car probably but yeah I mean.
25:10.68
davemaze
But no, it's It's kind of the it's a it's a low.. They don't make a lot of them So you know you have that to in play there. The fact that it's a low you know there's not a ton of it. So It's an already a niche market and then it's a pro market so you know you're making money with it. There's but again, it's.. It's just like ah anything that's expensive. There's um.
25:30.43
Brandon Washington
Yeah there's always, there's always extra cost so that's that's the 1 thing I would say I mean I trust me I don't I don't expect them to change the price and like now that's really not that crazy but like that was one of the first big things. Ah and then like I said my biggest gripe with the with the v raptor is really just the. Just how you navigate through the menus with the buttons like I say once I get my monitor in I'm pretty sure all those gripes will be gone but really every gripe that I was running into with the komodo. The raptor solved it like. And that's kind of mentally where I am where like I was having you know like I was saying like oh my komodo like sometimes the shadows are super muddy and we're having to crush them I mean you know what is exposed properly looks fantastic. But if you have anything lost in the shadows. It's really hard to bring those things back. And then you know if I wanted to shoot at full. Ah, the full sensor in 6 k um I was limited to you know 24 30 or I think it could do 40 frames per second which really isn't all that useful to me so I was like oh I can't do any slow motion unless I have to crop in or window in. On the sensor which you know you have to do because it's raw. Um, but with a super 35 sensor windowing in even more it just was even more it was even less of a frame I had to work with and so all of those things though the v raptor fixed them. And so right now I'm kind of in this state of bliss with the v raptor where like I see other cameras coming out today and some of them seem you know crazy fantastic like the new canon r five c that just came out like that camera seems amazing but like. I'm not gonna go sell my v raptor for it like with the v raptor and the komodo I really feel like I'm in a state of like okay I love my cameras and nothing else is really coming out that's making me say I want to sell everything and jump ship. And that's really where I was a couple years ago where I was jumping from blackm magic to Sony to canon trying to find something that would like like you know satisfy what I wanted to get out of a camera I find that these 2 cameras together. They pretty much do everything I need minus photos.
27:53.55
davemaze
So while you're saying all that it brings to mind a tweet that I posted like last week and I know you agree with this and I just want to call it out. There's no piece of gear. There's no material possession that can ever satisfy us like and fulfill us right? like I think as geared nerds. Ah. I struggle with like I need this to be happy. You know it's like this camera here the 1 dc for years was that for me and I still hold onto it because it's kind of like ah you know like a fossil that I love to have and own as like ah a thing that I wanted to achieve one day. But.
28:14.40
Brandon Washington
Um, yeah.
28:31.78
davemaze
Once you once I got the one Dc I was like cool I got it. It's okay, you know like I'm I'm kind of over it now and like I'm shooting on the c seventy now which when I was starting out would be a complete and total dream to have what this camera is capable of and I'm kind of like bored with it and it's awesome that you're so satisfied with what you have.
28:43.70
Brandon Washington
E.
28:50.51
davemaze
Think it's important for all of us no matter what stage you're at to try to you know, be content you know and and also like suck it dry with what that camera is capable of doing and just learn it and make it as good as possible. But that being said the money that you're spending like.
28:56.28
Brandon Washington
Yeah.
29:07.43
Brandon Washington
Right.
29:09.58
davemaze
So many people spend so much money on lenses and map boxes and accessories to try to finagle something to be better and sometimes it's better to just kind of save up your money for a couple extra months or even another year to then put that towards a purchase like a red. Or a c seventy or a Sony fx 6 something. That's like a real true cinema camera. That's a little bit more expensive than you want to spend in the long run that camera will serve you as a better workhorse because it has all those things built in I know.
29:37.86
Brandon Washington
Yeah I mean I I a hundred percent agree with you I find that at least for me when it comes to gear in general like I know a lot of people are like oh just use what you have and just make it work. But I believe that like it's okay to have aspirations you know aspirations are the reason why I am where I am today like I I wanted to have these cameras and I wanted to have a team and I wanted to grow my business to these places and I didn't necessarily have to do any of those things you know. But it was that desire that pushed me forward, especially during those late night edits or dealing with those difficult clients or whatever it might have been it was those aspirations that pushed me forward. So I think having a dream camera in mind is huge because it gives you something to work towards. And I think you should you should get a camera that you actually want to use because it'll actually motivate you to want to go out and film more like I've gone out and filmed probably more passion projects and tried different things with the raptor and with the komodo than I ever did with some of the other cameras that I was just using. Because these cameras motivate me to want to go out and use them and I enjoy it but do know that like like you mentioned earlier like that happiness. It's fleeting like you're gonna buy that new camera and you're gonna go through the honeymoon phase and after a while it's not gonna have that same you know that same tingle anymore. But It's okay, like you know you should go it at that point like gear and material possessions are never going to 100 % satisfy you all the time. It's it's not possible. I mean that's the whole definition of happiness. It's temporary. The only way to experience. Happiness is also not experience happiness to know the difference. So.
31:09.45
davemaze
So yeah, we exactly. Yeah, and you and you and I really understand what joy is and fulfillment through our marriage through our our faith through our our relationship with our kids like that's where that's where true fulfillment comes from there's the like wholesome moment of the podcast. But um.
31:21.30
Brandon Washington
Um, right hundred percent there you go the more you know this is a good clip. You just use that as.
31:36.27
davemaze
Yeah, 100% so yeah Brandon actually if you guys watch or subscribe to the golden hour podcast Youtube channel you may have seen my little announcement that the you know the Youtube channel is turning into eclipse Youtube shorts channel and Brandon with our initial call kind of helped push me over the edge and just make it happen. So thanks Brandon for that.
31:54.30
Brandon Washington
No problem. No it it will work now. It'll work it'll work just get those thumbnails down. Trust me, it'll work.
31:56.25
davemaze
Hopefully it works if it doesn't I'll I'll give you call it'll work. Yeah, ah well, that's the thing is like yeah I'm trying I was trying to post podcasts on Youtube and like Youtube wants Youtube videos not podcast. It's not a podcast site. You know so makes sense.
32:11.36
Brandon Washington
Yeah, not yet they see they. It's coming I think it's coming. Yeah.
32:15.26
davemaze
Not yet. Yeah I think it would be cool if they had yeah seriously Spotify Spotify is doing videos. It was so well with Joe Rogan enough no if you've watched one but it's like it plays as a normal podcast. So even if you're not watching the video. It's there. And the background and then you just turn on and then there's the video I think that's ah, a nice workflow. But um, anyways, going on a tangent here r five c you mentioned it do you own a c seventy I know you may have had 1 do you have 1 still? okay.
32:32.19
Brandon Washington
Um, yeah.
32:43.48
Brandon Washington
Yes I do not have one still but I sold it to a really close friend who's here in the city. So if I ever need it I know where to go to get it. No definitely not the city of Dali. Um, no I mean I so.
32:51.85
davemaze
The city of Dallas I'm just getting ah.
33:01.24
Brandon Washington
I I loved the c seventy initially I rented it and fell in love with it really quick and as quickly as I fell in love with it after having it like owning it and taking it out on a couple more jobs I felt out of love with it and the main reason being. Is what I needed it to do I mean at the time I already had the komodo so that was my cinema camera so I was looking for something that was like you know had the audio inputs on it. You know was pretty small light wait could be a great Youtube camera. Um, and. When I shot with a c seventy the problem I kept coming into was just like I never loved the look and then as far as being a Youtube camera it was just too big and 1 of the biggest problems was that it could not take photos now I know everyone's gonna say. Brandon. It's a cinema camera. You don't want it to take photos but I'm not saying that That's why I'm saying like is this not that the cseventy was a bad camera. It just wasn't the right camera for me at the time and. Ironically at the same time I got a chance to shoot with the fx three I was one of the lucky people who got it early before Sony actually announced it and what I really liked about it was it had all the things I was looking for out of the c seventy it had the you know the xlr top handle. It had you know, amazing video quality because it was basically a a 7 s 3 but then they also allowed it to take photos. They had a full shutter real shutter just like you could do with ah the a 7 s 3 or an a 7 3 or really any other Sony mirrorless cameras. And so for that reason I went ahead and left the c seventy and decided I was gonna you know, dabble back into the Sony ecosystem a little bit because I was looking for that perfect Youtube camera my problem again becomes you know, just my world right? I have the komodo which is an r f mount I have. The v raptor which is an rf mount as I mentioned we do have an r 6 that one of my team members owns that we use a lot for bts that's also an ah rf mount. Ah, and we have tons of ef lenses that we use as far as like that we adapt to our cinema cameras. And so my fxthree has been great. But I only have one lens for it and only one way to use it and that's with the 24 to 70 g master. So now that Canon has announced this basically smaller c seventy that gives me all the things that I was looking for. But.
35:39.17
Brandon Washington
It also now actually has like a true photo mode and a true video mode I I mean I don't think it's really a hot take but I do believe that the the art What is it the five R Five C I Hate all these letters in number deal. It's.
35:50.48
davemaze
This r five c it's really like the it's the real true update to this camera that the one Dc.
35:57.98
Brandon Washington
It's it really is I mean it's it is. It's it's a I've looked at a ton of the videos and I can't wait to get my hands on one but I do believe that this is not only gonna be probably 1 of the most you know sought after cameras out there. But I do think it is probably the first. True and this is probably my first time saying this on camera I think this is probably one of the first true hybrid cameras and probably gonna be the perfect camera for most shooters I mean I think whether you do weddings or your content creator because of the size of it because of the actual switch.
36:35.69
davemaze
E.
36:35.89
Brandon Washington
From photo to video um and you have a you have a high megapixel photography camera you have an 8 k at 60 frames per second which nobody needs a k honestly. But if you have it. It's nice. Ah, but it has 8 k at 60 frames per second like I just think this camera is gonna.
36:54.98
davemaze
And the ah rf and the rf system is great I mean the lenses I hope they continue to make more lenses. That's the problem right now I also wish third parties like Tamaron who has tamaron has that amazing 28 to seventy five two eight that they have on Sony and panasonic like I would love to see that sigma.
36:55.81
Brandon Washington
Slaughter and I mean. Yeah.
37:08.57
Brandon Washington
Yeah.
37:14.50
davemaze
I Would love to see say sigma doing some art series. Rf lenses I don't know why anybody's not I don't know why people aren't doing rf but anyways and them well in the mirrorless game in the mirrorless game. Yeah.
37:20.98
Brandon Washington
I I mean we gotta think Sony's Sony's been around for a long time and we just now and we really just now in the mirrorless game right? and we really are like you know Tamron is starting to drop some really amazing Sony lenses but that amount has been around for years at this point.
37:38.20
davemaze
Yeah, um.
37:40.12
Brandon Washington
And the rf is still fairly new. So I think you know I think eventually we'll get some more of those third party ah manufacturers hopping in and making some lenses and then it'll really just blow up those cannon systems because that's one of the hardest things like for me like people write. They're like oh what camera do you recommend? and.
37:48.21
davemaze
Yeah, of course. Yeah.
37:58.22
Brandon Washington
Really want to recommend a lot of rf cameras but they don't have a lot of inexpensive lenses to go with them. You know like the the Rp is a fantastic starter camera but all the lenses are so expensive you almost can't justify buying an Rp because you can't really get a good lens at a decent price to go with it. So.
38:16.26
davemaze
Well, they do have the ah was it that 35 one eight or something that's pretty decent. It's like ah five hundred bucks
38:18.20
Brandon Washington
Um, yeah I just feel like if you're buying I feel like if you're buying ah an inexpensive camera like that you know relatively inexpensive camera like that you're gonna want a decent Zoom lens you need more focal ranges.
38:34.17
davemaze
Yeah, they do have the they're doing the nifty fifty now they they have the nifty fifty two hundred bucks for the fifty one eight for RF now so that's that's good. That's a good starter point. But yeah I mean you're right.
38:37.21
Brandon Washington
Out of 1 versus just. Yeah, do they have like a 28 to like you know like ah like a 24 to 1 oh 5 that's not an r that's not a l series lens you know something in that range that.
38:50.25
davemaze
Yeah, yeah, they do. But it's awful. It's I mean so it's a kit lens. It's it's an f four to get this seven point one on the tide and I've never heard such a ridiculous.
39:03.35
Brandon Washington
Oh oh.
39:09.54
davemaze
Aperture shift 4 to 7 one on a kit lens. But that is.
39:09.91
Brandon Washington
Ah, could you imagine if you had everything you wanted to shoot. You had to have the aperture at the at the smallest 7.1
39:18.41
davemaze
Usually the kit lens is like ah 3 5 to five six that's usually what it is and 5 5 6 like I actually use five six like I often will go there especially on full frame if I just want things to be in focus. Um, so I never found that to be.
39:22.19
Brandon Washington
Right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
39:31.46
Brandon Washington
Yeah, but 7 1 there's no shallow depth there.
39:35.73
davemaze
Too bad for kit lens but 7 one that's awful. Ah, but anyways, yeah, even with the compression but you're totally right? And like I wish I could recommend the originalosr and or Eos as you're supposed to say it. Um I you.
39:49.28
Brandon Washington
Go I'm always gonna get that wrong.
39:53.80
davemaze
I think I owned like 2 or 3 of them throughout my Youtube career and I even owned the 15 to 35 rf which is a brilliant lens I love that thing. It's huge and it's expensive. But the fact that it's not even 16 It's fifteen two 8 with I s built-in is pretty cool. But.
40:04.96
Brandon Washington
The.
40:11.35
davemaze
Ah, hate the r like I hate the buttons I hate the little touchtrip. Um I don't like anything about like the body feels good in the hand but like they drop the ball on the build of that thing. So I hope they make up like an r two that kind of the basic like you know they need like a good kind of 5 d version I guess the r six.
40:11.95
Brandon Washington
Yeah.
40:20.38
Brandon Washington
Yeah.
40:29.73
Brandon Washington
Yeah I would say the r six is that I mean really I think eventually you'll see like the the 70 d the ad d the ninety d I think we'll see those phase out and then there'll be an rf version that sits in there like I said like ah like an RP line
40:30.96
davemaze
Is that now I guess but yeah.
40:48.17
Brandon Washington
Like the rp 2 the rp 3 like I think we'll see like an Rp line of of cameras because honestly I feel like canon needs a 100 % step away from dslrs. The technology is done like okay, let's scrap. It. Let's move everything into rf so now they can like 100 % just devote some time to some inexpensive ah rf lenses like we've got the you know the trinity. You know the 15 to 35 the 24 to 70 and then 70 to 200 which I have the 24 to 70 and the 70 to 200 and they are fantastic. Lenses. And that's great and we've got a couple primes like the fifty the eighty five um but I think you know in this is obviously these are not lenses that I would buy but there are lenses that I'd like to recommend to other people and they're just some inexpensive are you know good rf lenses. That can go with some of those more budget. Friendly cameras.
41:42.72
davemaze
Totally So I Totally agree with the R Five C discussion we were having earlier. It's truly the best hybrid camera I've ever seen because not only is it like giving you the ability to shoot video and photo like every mirrorless camera has been able to this entire. You know time. But it's like a true menu and Ui shift like it's actually when you go over to the photo mode and it's a true like switch to a camera icon switch and then you literally physically switch it to video when you're in the photo mode. You can only take photos I don't even think you can.
42:06.51
Brandon Washington
Yeah.
42:16.24
Brandon Washington
Um, yeah.
42:22.25
davemaze
Pop out of a video at all, you literally have to physically go to video which I kind of like for my mental mind model. But um, when you're in the photo mode. It's the traditional canon photo menu layout which is super intuitive. It's one of the best menu systems I've ever used and it's kind of what a lot of people know canon for it's it's.
42:25.88
Brandon Washington
Ah.
42:41.73
davemaze
Fairly straightforward and most people who have shot on Canon all know how to use it. It's basically just an R five at that point you switch it over to the video mode and now you're in Cinema mode and the menus are just like my C seventy. It's the same menu system which honestly I kind of like the photo one a little bit better if I'm being honest, but.
42:53.72
Brandon Washington
Right.
43:01.72
davemaze
You know it. It just makes sense the way that they've designed that and it's really cool. The 1 kind of thing that I didn't realize is they did remove ibis from it. So it doesn't have stabilization anymore. But um, almost all the lenses have is and their digital stabilization isn't terrible. So.
43:11.90
Brandon Washington
You know? Yeah yeah, I've honestly I've never been a huge fan of internal stabilization I Understand why people like it. But as someone I guess who's used like I'll mostly Cinema cameras for so long like whether that was with the black Magic. The Komoto or now the raptor like I'm just used to not having it and I do find that when I go back to like even with my fx 3 that has pretty decent inbody image stabilization like when you're shooting on some of those wider Lenses. You just get this wobble and you can't get rid of it. And I would rather have a little bit more shake than that you know rolling. It's not really rolling shutter but just that rolling of the the frame like it just wobbles especially in those corners and so you know for me personally I'm okay with not having stabilization in the camera. The lens is a great place to have it. So if you want to use those ah rf lenses. This is you know you have it. But then I'm also of the mindset that like hey if this shot needs to be stable because you're doing video right? if this shot needs to be stable. Throw it on a gimbal like gimbals are so advanced Now that like you're more than okay, but then worst case scenario. Like you mentioned it has the digital stabilization which does a better job in most cases than that wobble that you would get but then also if you throw that in premiere and you throw warp stabilizer on it or if you throw in a final cut and you just throw stabilization on it. Those also do like a really really good Job. So I think you know that little sacrifice is not really too too much in the video space. The only time I would say that that stabilization really comes in handy is on the photography if you're trying to bracket shoot something handheld.
44:59.80
davemaze
It? Yeah I think that's really where the stabilization on the sensor came from is it was a photography tool to allow I think it initially started with Olympus. Actually they kind of pioneered it and um, you know for a microphone. Third sensor it allowed. People to actually shoot at like really slow shutter speeds and still have a sharp image because it basically just makes the sensor float in midair and stay perfectly stable as your hand is wobbling around so it just so happened that it was a cool feature for video but you're right like.
45:21.92
Brandon Washington
And.
45:35.12
davemaze
Um, unless there's a digital stabilization on top of the ibus to correct some of the wobble. It's you get that wobble going crazy have you experimented with the Sony with the active stabilization because there's like 3 levels of it I think if you go to the active mode. It does take some of that wobble out I don't if you've experimented with it.
45:50.97
Brandon Washington
No I haven't done too much experimenting because as I mentioned like you know the the fxthree is really more of our Youtube camera. We shoot a lot of like content like that kind of stuff for it or we're shooting you know now we're shooting Instagram reels for clients. Um. So we're shooting that type of client that type of work. We'll break out the Fx three for it. But it really is more of just like our Youtube camera vlog kind of with it shoot some bts with it. Um I think it's a really great hybrid camera and then up until this new cannon being announced I thought it was the best. Hybrid camera that was out but canon has definitely come out with something that is you know I think it'll shake up the game quite a bit. Obviously some creators have gotten their hands on it. Not everyone has yet I'm really excited for what I can get my hands on it. But if it's anything like. Just the regular r 5 um, and now it just doesn't overheat and it's got a better video mode. Um I think it's gonna be amazing.
46:54.63
davemaze
I yeah I can't wait I I can't wait to get my hands on one I may exchange my c 70 for 1 honestly as much as I love having the built-in indies I think having a hybrid camera especially as primarily a video slash hybrid shooter youtuber like. It's just even just being out and about shooting on a camera that looks more like a stills camera is just a little less unassuming and a little bit more stealthy. Um, that being said, the cseventy doesn't look too bad, but.
47:20.42
Brandon Washington
Yes, ah I've still had people walk up and it's that top handle people see that top handle on there. We've had to strip it down and just make it look like a big Dslr I can say that's.
47:29.10
davemaze
M.
47:34.30
davemaze
Ah.
47:37.17
Brandon Washington
Back to your other question about you know what are some issues you run into with having a red ah you go anywhere with the red and you're bound to get kicked out. It doesn't matter what you're doing. You can just be walking with it. It draws attention the komodo not so much but the raptor definitely and it being white doesn't help but ah.
47:55.65
davemaze
Ah I didn't yeah I I actually haven't even like thought about it but you do have the special edition stormtrooper version which is super cool.
47:56.89
Brandon Washington
But yeah, but yeah, not.
48:05.75
Brandon Washington
Yep I've got it right here and I didn't go with the white one with the komodo and I kicked myself for not doing that like I was stuck around and wait for the for the black one. So with this one I went ahead and grabbed the white one and there are companies now that are coming out with raps for every camera So I figured.
48:13.31
davemaze
Ah, it's so cool man.
48:23.66
Brandon Washington
Let's get the white one and then if I choose to wrap it and turn it black if I need to because it needs to be on a professional set or something like that. Um, then I can do that but I've had no problems with it being white being on set.
48:34.00
davemaze
I No I think honestly I think it looks pretty like B a and like people on set are gonna think it's awesome. So i't I don't you got the white camera.
48:39.67
Brandon Washington
Yeah, heck I mean that's the camera that our every client walks up and they're like yo. What is that like why is your camp. What is that camera How much is that camera I get all those questions.
48:48.56
davemaze
Yeah, it looks like a so that's what I love about red and I think they know that they they design it like intentionally to be very sci-fi in a way like they don't have to make it look so extreme. But that's part of their branding and it makes you.
49:01.43
Brandon Washington
Ah, oh yeah.
49:05.41
davemaze
And makes you look like a boss when you show up on set with those cameras because they look like they're from the future.
49:07.86
Brandon Washington
Yeah, and I mean people who don't even do video know what they are. It's crazy. Actually it was funny us to kind of go all back full circle back to the top when we talked about red when I showed up on one set I was shooting with the komodo. Ah had a client walk up and and he walked up and he was looking at the camera he goes. That's one of those red cameras and I was like yeah he goes. That's the camera marquez uses and like I was just like Wow this guy knows red but from a youtuber that's crazy. But yeah.
49:38.77
davemaze
I I wonder how many yeah I Wonder how close I know that marquez gets stuff sent to him and he has a good relationship with them. But I think you know I think he's bought everything but still I'm sure he's sold a lot of them as well as as a influencer for red in a way.
49:49.34
Brandon Washington
Um, yeah.
49:55.99
Brandon Washington
Yeah I mean I know for me I see him you know use the red and that definitely motivated me I remember the first video actually I ever found of Marquez's was years ago he got the red Raven and that was a video of his that.
49:57.86
davemaze
Ah, so.
50:12.38
Brandon Washington
Might have seen some of his other videos but like it was I remember specifically when he did the video about the red Raven I was like who is this guy and I started watching more of his content I've been watching it ever since.
50:19.23
davemaze
Ah, you're so you're so right about red once you start using it from the obviously using it on the shoot day is 1 thing. But once you start using it in post-production. That's really where the magic of it shines the it's kind of almost hard to explain on a podcast. Really need to have experience with it and red does provide downloads on their website from all their cameras so you can download a couple trial shots and and play with it and whatever editor you use in final cut premiere and resolve they all have support with the raw codecs.
50:40.87
Brandon Washington
Yeah.
50:55.35
davemaze
And the thing that makes red different than any other raw compared to blackm magic is the fact that they I mean first off, they were kind of first and they have a ton of patents on all this stuff. So a lot of companies like blackmagic and pro res raw like they're not able to do a lot of the things that red can do because I think.
51:03.60
Brandon Washington
Um.
51:14.45
davemaze
Has a patent on it and cinema d and g is really good in resolve. But it's not very good anywhere else because blackmagic designs it and it's great for them but like using d and g in final cut or using cannons raw in final cut. And not their own proprietary app. It just you don't get all the same features like being able to change the Iso and the white balance and the the color profiles and red just has amazing color and they spend tons of money developing different color profiles that all have their own unique flavor to them and they're incredible. Um. Can you speak to that as far as the editing process with a red.
51:52.16
Brandon Washington
Yeah I mean I mean that's I was actually about to jump in and say like that's one area like the like. So like we talk about the color profiles which you know once you kind of know what color profile you're gonna use you pretty much stick to it but like something that I found. Really interesting, especially because as I mentioned we got this brand new monitor in and it's an hdr monitor which means now we can actually like you know, truly see our Hdr content but like for since basically from from the beginning we shot everything in a rec seven zero nine color space because that's where everything was. But now like iphones are starting to come out and they can support hdr video so that means now you can technically work in a wreck Twenty Twenty color space and start taking advantage of Hdr and you can actually have people play that back on their iphones now. Are we there yet 100% I don't think so but what I love most about filming on red is that everything that I have currently filmed in red raw at any moment's notice any moment in time I can go back to those edits and literally just. Change my raw metadata from rec seven zero nine to rec Twenty Twenty and it's literally gonna give me a like hdr and it's it's that easy. It's literally a snap literally you click you drag you snap your fingers. It's done. And I think that is so huge when it comes to future proofing your video content because I can create content for what's happening today and then in the future when hgr becomes the norm if I need to go back to an old video to reexport it out to take advantage of Hdr I can do that and it's. So nice to have that type of flexibility in a raw space and there's not another set of raw I've tried prores raw with multiple different cameras and setups because that's 1 thing that I didn't realize at first with prores raw is not all prores. Raw is created equal. Like 1 camera will give you the ability to change the iso and then another camera will give you the ability to change white balance and then another camera won't give you either like it's weird. It's not true raw and you can't change color spaces the same thing happens with black magic raw. Like if you're shooting black magic raw on 1 of the black magic cameras specifically like depending on where you are in the Iso range when you actually capture that image. You can only play so much within that Iso range like you're locked either in the front half or the back half and.
54:33.91
Brandon Washington
It limits you quite a bit and what I love about red raw is that you don't have those limitations and then if red figures out. Let's say in like six months from now red's figures out a better way of doing color. All you have to do is update your your camera and you update. Your red setting. Are you just add the new plugin and literally all the raw footish that you already shot now gets access to that new color processing and now that's the way that your image looks and now you can take advantage of that update. That's what red raw really gives you and so for me. It's not only the benefit that we get today from the benefits of where raw is with with red raw. But it's also knowing that like 6 years from now like the technology will get better and because we filmed it in red raw we'll be able to take advantage of those benefits you know 6 years from now obviously there's still the limitations of the camera and what gets captured to the sensor but the red sensors are amazing, but it's also knowing that that raw data that it's actually capturing can be altered in the future. So that's kind of one of the huge benefits and one of the big pluses of shooting red raw over any other type of raw out there.
55:48.47
davemaze
And again if I didn't mention it already. It actually runs really well like on the machine. They've really optimized it Well um, whereas some of the other uncompressed raws like really is a big taxing you know thing on your computer. That being said I haven't.
55:54.11
Brandon Washington
Yeah.
56:06.74
davemaze
Use some of those older legacy Raw codex on the new M one max maxed out like obviously now I you know computers have gotten better too So things have been able to catch up. That being said I've always found red to play pretty you know smoothly for all you know.
56:14.44
Brandon Washington
Yeah, that's true.
56:25.66
davemaze
Things being said in terms of you know four k six k eight even 8 k being able to play that back in final k is surprisingly easy and a lot of times people think like oh wouldn't raw files be ridiculously massive and it's like well yeah, if it's uncompressed. It would be unreasonably massive. But.
56:28.58
Brandon Washington
Here.
56:45.33
davemaze
Red's compression is so efficient that you can actually shoot at a high compression rate and your files may come in actually smaller than what you're getting on a Sony a 7 s 3 You know it's really pretty amazing. What they're able to do with their compression.
56:54.12
Brandon Washington
Yeah, yeah, we find we find that like you know, ah shooting on shooting at first we were like oh maybe we'll have to shoot in pro res for big projects but we find that you know the raw is actually fairly manageable. You know. Not, it's not too difficult. The file sizes are not insane. Um, and that's shooting in eight k raw you know and 6 K Raw so we we find that those work out perfectly. Fine.
57:24.87
davemaze
So one of the main things that's happened this last year is you've been able to really dial in your freelance production last time I talked to you you did not have employees I do not think you were making as much money as you're making now what happened what? like what. Triggered the growth of your business to get to a point now where you've got employees and all these clients.
57:48.30
Brandon Washington
Yeah, so um, so what I did was and kind of back up just a little bit so on my Youtube channel I had this like I was doing freelance video work I was doing it by myself 100% and trying to post on Youtube and i. Knew the things that I needed to do and so I decided I wanted to start helping other creators and I started coming out with this thing called business mondays and every Monday I was talking about a new business tip whether that was how to find clients how to invoice clients something that I was personally going through at the time. In order to help my business grow and I decided at a certain point that I had been teaching a lot about it but like I had never really like actually grabbed everything myself and put it all together and just focused on growing my business. You know like. Take all the things I talked about whether that was like following up or how to invoice properly or systematizing the business or you know, reaching out to new clients or whatever and I decided I was just going to hone in really really hard on just. Growing my business and see if I put all my efforts towards that could I actually really grow it into where I wanted it to be and the funny thing is is that like I found a couple things that one you don't need a ton of clients. You just need to. Focus on finding the right clients and that was a huge area where I focused in the most. The second thing was that I started trying to hire people or bring people into the fold as quickly as I could before I needed them. And what that allowed me to do was to really kind of relieve a lot of the pressure and instead of being up until you know, two o'clock in the morning trying to knock out an edit I could actually get a good night. Rest wake up the next morning know that someone was gonna help me edit the next day and I could focus on finding the next client and growing the business and so that was the second thing that I did and then like I said the third thing was just having certain goals set in mind and then just kind of like building out plans on how to get to those goals and you know realizing that you know along the path. Is that always gonna go great I might run into a hurdle here or there but learning from those hurdles and then figuring out like a system to make sure that I don't have to deal with those same issues again.
01:00:22.28
Brandon Washington
And it was going through that process over basically the last two years and like over that process I'd made some videos here and there like when you know covid hit and all that happened to us we changed our business model slightly and started offering live streams like temporarily just to kind of get through. That phase so instead of shutting down. We offered a new service and that brought in new clients and because now I had a system on how to take care of those clients. It made it easier for me to nourish those relationships. So when things started opening back up I not only had you know my existing clients who came back. But then I also had my new clients who came in and we were able to nourish all those relationships and build out a system to where I can honestly say now like we can take on as much work as we could possibly have thrown to us because we have a system in place on how to actually manage it all. Um, and it really just came on just going 100 % in on that but ironically at the same time we're also trying to continue this Youtube side of things because I just have a internal passion for teaching I just I see so many creators out there who are extremely talented. But they either struggle in the business aspect or they just don't know what to do whether that's how to film or how to run it as a business and so I've always just had like this passion to try to help as many creators as I can. Like whether that's you know friends like you where I'm telling you like hey like you should definitely do a clip channel and do it just go like I want to see other creators thrive. That's just I don't know that's just always been a part of it because I guess I saw so many talented creators that couldn't do it and every time I saw that it kind of hurt me. So I was just like man I gotta figure out a way to help as many creators as I can so that's why we've never you know, walked away from Youtube and we've even built like a whole training course platform specifically to trying to even go even deeper because you know you can't really do too much on Youtube there are bounds. So it's like all right? we need to figure out another way that we can teach creators how to really take advantage of this art form that we have because it's extremely valuable like people need it. They have to have it at this point. It's not a nice to have. It's actually a necessity like you have to have content. So. I'm just trying to help as many creators as I can and grow my team in the same process.
01:02:48.94
davemaze
So yeah, definitely want to talk about the courses and that's one of the reasons why I have you on the show today is because I was really curious with what you're doing with that but I want to go back to what you said at the really the beginning of that finding the right clients can you elaborate on that who are the right clients for you.
01:03:04.98
Brandon Washington
So for me I kind of define the right client as you know a client that I would like to work with who can afford our budget so there is there is you know there is a kind of ah a balancing act there. You know there was a point in time where.
01:03:06.80
davemaze
That you were looking for. Yeah.
01:03:23.20
Brandon Washington
I was taking clients that had great budgets but I didn't like doing their work so I spent more time doing it because I was dreading it most of the time or I was putting off the edit which meant that I was stuck with them even longer. Um, and they were depleting me creatively. To where I didn't even want to move on to another project because I felt like I just needed a break when I was done with him on the flip side of that I had people that I loved working with but they didn't have the right budget. So that meant I was having to work 5 times as hard on a project and make you know 5 times less than I should be. And that meant I had to just do so much more work that I still end up burnt out anyway. So what I found for me that really worked was you know I found an area that I work well in which in my space is commercials right? So I don't do weddings I don't do ah you know bot mezfas. I don't do I don't typically work on weekends either I like working with like business clients because let's face it I like business I love I love business myself. Um I also love business hours because my clients are only going to want to shoot on Monday through Friday between like 9 and 5 which are great hours for me to be working because that means I get a chance to spend my evenings with my kids I get chance to spend my weekends with my family and my wife and you know I have that flexibility so it was like okay these are the right clients and they also happen to have a. Ah, decent budget. So I don't typically work with like beginner beginner startups because they don't have the right budget I try to go after clients that have a more established you know track record they have a billing department. They have a marketing budget. So like when we start talking about finances. It's not a foreign concept to them. So it was really about finding you know that perfect space for me I tried music videos not for me, they want to shoot at night and it's too rowdy for me I'm getting older I'm like no thanks I'm moving on ah and. You know it's just really about finding what you want to do now if you like shooting on the weekends because you want to have a day job and you want to shoot on weekends and great. You need to go find clients that will allow you to shoot on weekends but then don't you know don't neglect that budget piece like I think one of the biggest. You know sins that creators make is we undervalue ourselves and I know I'm 100% guilty of it. That's the reason why I speak on it. So openly you know I was one of those guys that shot for free for a while and then when I tried to convince my client to pay me.
01:05:58.95
Brandon Washington
And they were like ah we're not really sure and I would spend so much time trying to get them to pay me when I just needed to realize that okay that client is not the right client for me anymore. Let me spend my energy going and actually finding the right client.
01:06:12.71
davemaze
So there's a lot to unpack there and I think a lot of us can relate I was just kind of like nodding along just not nodding along as in like falling asleep I was nodding along in agreement and I struggle with that. Um, and the thing that stands out to me and. The the thing that I struggle with is the art form of creating films and videos and that's why I latched onto Youtube so heavily and just freaking love it because it would for me as a artist in air quotes. It was the first time where I really felt like I could. Completely be in control of the videos I was making and there's no ah producers. There's no gatekeepers involved. It's literally like I make something I upload it audience reacts. They either love it or hate it. Thankfully some people loved it enough to subscribe which then led to sponsors and stuff like that. You obviously have experienced that too as a youtuber and now you you know you're so heavily involved in the commercial stuff. What is kind of your takeaway from kind of being in both worlds and. You know, obviously you're making it is I assume you're making more money now doing the commercial work than when you were doing Youtube that being said, do do you prefer 1 over the over the other. Do you think there'll ever be a point where if the Youtube were to take off more. You would just like put that away completely or a little bit of both I mean.
01:07:44.92
Brandon Washington
I mean I enjoy doing commercial what I like about Youtube and being able to generate you know income from Youtube is that it allows me to be more selective with the commercial projects that I choose to take on.
01:07:47.22
davemaze
What are your thoughts.
01:08:01.70
Brandon Washington
Um, that's one of the big things I tell most creators is try to diversify your income as best you can because if you get all of your projects strictly from or you get all of your finances coming in strictly from client projects then you have no choice. Yeah, you have to take whatever comes across the table. But if you. K and diversify a little bit with Youtube or if you you know something completely different. It could be not even camera related it just allows you to be a little bit more selective about the client projects you take but I do enjoy a lot of the client projects at this point in my career I don't really take the ones that. I don't like anymore and I love that. Um, if Youtube was just you know bank roll in and I was absolutely crushing it I think I would probably still take some client projects because I have found like this really happy medium of being able to shoot client projects and then take that knowledge and then teach about it on Youtube. And so you know my clients part of 1 of the things that we negotiate is that we're gonna shoot behind the scenes and I'm gonna take that content and use it to teach online and you know I've only ever had to sign like maybe a handful of ndas here and there where we didn't do that but typically then I charge more. You know, offset the fact that I can't then go ahead and turn that into more content somewhere else. But I mean for me I like shooting commercial projects at least the ones that I choose to take but I also love youtube and I think it's okay to do both. Obviously that means you know, um, if that. That sacrifice of doing both means that I'll never be the number 1 filmmaking Youtube channel on the platform I'm okay with that because I think you know by shooting client stuff sometimes at least for me, it allows me to go into shoots. And do things that I wouldn't have even considered doing because sometimes clients will call us and they'll be like yeah we've got this great idea. We want to reenact an Snl skit which we actually just edited and I was like okay like I would have never thought to do that myself or would have ever put that production together even for my Youtube channel. But it was really fun and we learned a lot from it so you know it's like little things like that where I still think there's a lot of value in that collaboration process like sure Youtube is great because you have full 100% control but I also like the idea of collaborating with a lot of my clients. And shooting things and traveling and doing things that I wouldn't have probably just done on my own.
01:10:35.35
davemaze
And how again how do you? How do you find those clients that are right for you. Do you just like cold email people. Do you? You know you know somebody who knows something like how how did you end up booking those clients.
01:10:47.84
Brandon Washington
Yeah, so I mean now now I'll say that you know most of if not almost all of our work comes from word of mouth of some sort. We've made some really great relationships and that's 1 big tip I would tell you is that? um. Make good relationship with your clients because most likely your clients friends are also people that you would like to work with too because if you like your client you'll probably like your their friends but when you're just starting out I would say you know there we kind of go over this in the course and so I'll kind of. Give ah a shorter version of this cause it's a fairly longwinded answer. But um, what you want to do is you want to try to find you know first of all what industry do you want to work in definitely start with like a niche right? So let's say you want to work in the the fitness gym industry you want to shoot. Gyms right? But there are lots of different gyms so you narrow in on crossfit gyms you say? Okay I'm gonna shoot crossfit gyms. So then you gotta figure out how to get those clients. Well you gotta go to where those clients are and that's either digitally or in real life now they might have social platforms right? But if you go to their social media pages and. They don't seem very engaged. They're not responding to comments. They don't have a lot of followers then they're probably not that good at social media so messaging them. There is probably a waste of time. So then your option is to go actually see them in person and bring something to show them whether that's an ipad that has a demo reel on it. Something like that bring them something that you you can show what you're capable of but the secret is when you are cold callinglling people about offering your video service. Don't tell them that you're just going to shoot a video for them because this is something that I actually posted on Instagram not too long ago and that's. People don't buy videos. They don't like the video is a solution to a problem whether that is a marketing problem or it's a sales problem or it's a brand awareness problem. Whatever it is the video is just a solution to the problem. So when you go pitch your videos to them. You need to be solving a problem and tell them a potential problem. You could help them solve when you go meet them in person and that's gonna immediately let you stand out from every other videographer out there who's like hey hire me I shoot in four k. They don't care about 4 k like they just don't I'm just I'm just gonna be 100 % real with you. No client cares about four k like they if they if they say they care about four k is because they care about quality in which I can guarantee you if you shoot in the dark in four k.
01:13:37.56
Brandon Washington
And you give me 3 lights in a ten eighty p camera they'll think my footage looks like four k over yours. So that's just that's just the truth clients don't they don't pay for videos. They pay for solutions and once you start selling solutions. You'll you'll immediately make a huge difference in your business.
01:13:55.37
davemaze
So dude that was a great tease and a great trailer for your course? Um, which yeah 100% dude dude I yeah that that was killer and I'm I'm sure that you know it's you have all that so well crafted in your mind because you've been working on this course so now.
01:13:58.76
Brandon Washington
Ah, can I get this as a clip.
01:14:15.38
davemaze
That's a great segue into the course talk to me about what you've been working on and who the course is really for.
01:14:20.33
Brandon Washington
Yeah, so we created the course it's called the business guide for creative professionals and it's over on my platform at the creative fame academy and this course is really for filmmakers and photographers too who are looking to. Really take their hobby as a creator and turn it into a business with the primary focus right now of shooting content for other businesses and so whether that's weddings or whether that's commercial or whether that's music videos. Whatever it is if you are trying to sell. Your skill as a creator to another business or or company or even an individual This course is really for you and in this course we go over a lot I mean we talk about how to find clients in the different ways and really the mindset behind it because for me, it's kind of the old. Additive you know you can give a man a fish or you can teach them how to fish my ah my my idea is that I want to teach you guys the right mindset and it's very straightforward like I just was very blunt. This course is very blunt because at the end of the day you are trying to run a business and there are certain things you have to know. Like how to set it up. Should you be a Dba should you be a lllc should you be an Scorp do you need your ein number like we go over all the actual details of establishing the business but then we get into the how to get your clients how to stand out as a creator. What are clients looking for what are the problems as you know myself as a creator who's been in this business for years. What if I come across and how did I overcome them and then one of the big ones. Probably our biggest section in the course is we start talking about how to systematize your business. Because I think for most of us as creators we don't actually like doing the business side of it. We just do it out of a necessity because it's what allows us to get to the creative part like we deal with the clients we deal with the invoices we deal with the contracts but we don't want to do those things. We just have to. And I walk you guys through how to actually go about systematizing your business and what to look for in ways of how to systematize your business and as simple as you know doing it for a cheap inexpensive way and then I I talked to you guys about the way that like now I have done it. Which does require some software but I walk you guys through like you know that entire process. So that way you can get to the creative one and then my favorite actual module in the entire course is I talked to you about how to actually price your work and this module to me.
01:17:09.40
Brandon Washington
Was one of the hardest ones to to do and to come up with because every creator can tell you like oh yeah, there's a perfect price but the truth is is. There's not a perfect price there's no perfect price like I don't care what calculator some other software told you like oh just punch in your numbers here and it'll tell you how much you should charge a client There's no perfect price because depending on where you live depending on what you shoot depending on your skill level like there's no perfect price. There's so many variables so instead of trying to get this perfect calculator to try to tell you how much you should charge I really walk you through how to acknowledge those different variables. And then assign value to those variables. So then you can find a price that works not only for you but also for your clients because you don't want to overcharge a client to where you lose them. But you also don't want to undercharge the project to where you are devalued either. And so we go over all that in this course it's you know it was a lot It was a labor of love and it's really It's all the things that over the last couple years that I have like just been diving head force in it's all tested through my own business and it's the reason why my company is where it is today. Where I have employees and we've upgraded gear and bought new cameras and new lights and and I've been able to do all the things I always wanted to do but I had to build a business first that could actually you know sustain. Me making all the differences and all the changes that I've made over the last couple years.
01:18:42.80
davemaze
So well dude I don't know what I have to do to get a copy I guess I got shell out 150 which by the way is unbelievably a killer deal for all the information you're sharing there because that is absolutely the number 1 issue that I think many creatives struggle with is the business and. Um I know for me personally that is absolutely my issue taxes figuring out how to you know, invoice people forgetting to literally forgetting to invoice people. How many people by show of hands have done a job and then like literally a month goes by and they're like hey where's the invoice and.
01:19:20.45
Brandon Washington
Right? I need the money. No it happens I mean and that's why you know we built a whole system around it I mean we're and the nice thing I Love about this course is as you mentioned like.
01:19:22.32
davemaze
Like oh yeah, the 1 thing that I need to actually do to get paid. Yeah, it's like so dumb.
01:19:38.65
Brandon Washington
Right now. It's priced at one fifty and that's because our goal with all the courses on my platform is you should be able to book 1 job and the course be paid off like I don't believe in going in crazy amounts of debt I just want to put out content that. People can learn from and people can immediately take hold of and if you use the things that we talk about in the course the course will pay for itself in no time its it should be an easy investment but also you know. This courserus right now like we we have it where it is and we're getting feedback from it and we've done this soft launch. So it's one 50 now right? But that's doing our soft lodge. So if you're listening to this far in the future and you're like hey wait a minute. The price went up that's because the course got better and that's what we've been doing. We've been soft launching this course now and. Getting some you know some great feedback from people and really a lot of the feedback feedback that we've been getting is that the information is in like it's so informationally dense that people are like watching it like multiple times and taking notes because. Business There's a lot to it and so we tried to you know, get it all in there and answer all the questions that we've been given like we literally went back and watched every single business monday video I released on my channel and we read every single comment and we made sure that all of those questions. Also were addressed at some point within the course because these are the things that people have been asking for and so we wanted to make sure that we created something that would solve a true creator problem. It wasn't just like a cash grab. It's really there to solve the problem. It's something that I'm so proud of that like if somebody reaches out to me and they ask me a question I know I can send them to this course and that question will be answered.
01:21:31.55
davemaze
I Yeah, so if you're listening and any of this sounds appealing to you which I think this is this resonates for so many creators go pick it up now on the http://creativefamaccademy.com go to courses business guide for Creative Professionals. Like he said it's one 50 now because of the soft lunch more content is being added and the ah the price may go up in the Future. So buy it now if you want it? Yeah hopefully.
01:21:59.70
Brandon Washington
Yeah, nice part is if you buy it now we're just gonna add the the new content to the existing course so you'll just get an email that lets you know hey your course has been upgraded and like we've done this before like with our with our real estate training Course. We shot New houses and so we added bonus content to that course as well. So It's something that we try to do with all of our courses instead of trying to keep releasing new courses after new courses if we create something new that is like that we can use within an existing course we just added in there so that way the people who've already invested in it. Now, get that extra little dose of you know content. So yeah, if you take advantage of it now you'll 100% get the new content that we add to it in the future and we already have like a full mapped out plan of things that we want to add to it So we're gonna get ready to start ah producing those real soon.
01:22:51.53
davemaze
So awesome. Yeah we're all looking forward to it. Everybody go follow Brandon on social media brandon Washington beewash media everywhere um I want to get your thoughts at the end here about Youtube and Tiktok Youtube shorts Tiktok just Youtube in general. Um, what are your current kind of thoughts on. Things 2022 I mean things have changed a lot since when we initially met in 2019 even which really isn't that many years but in 3 years ah is it only three years I feel like I've known you for more than 3 years but I guess it's only about three and a half but anyways it's almost four I think this April before but.
01:23:15.83
Brandon Washington
Yeah.
01:23:22.67
Brandon Washington
I Know it does with it. Yeah.
01:23:31.34
davemaze
And de 2021 22 now it's 3 I'm stupid um no what are your thoughts on I just went to public education here in Tennessee. So um, that's my blame. Yeah, what are your thoughts on on just the current status of kind of social media feels like everybody's like desperately.
01:23:34.40
Brandon Washington
I Know you not.
01:23:39.78
Brandon Washington
There.
01:23:51.23
davemaze
Trying to compete with Tiktok. We've got reels. You've got shorts snapchat has their thing like what are your thoughts on just the current platforms.
01:23:52.60
Brandon Washington
Yeah, yeah, I mean for me social media has first and foremost been like a more of a job right? like that's the way that it is operated in my life I don't really have like a. Personal account I I mean I guess I have one but I don't I'm not as active on it. So I look at it 100% from a business standpoint. So just so everyone understands that's the lens that I'm gonna kind of explain my thoughts through um you know I think Tiktok is a lot like Instagram in the early days where it's very easy to grow quickly and to you know, amass this um following but the following in and of itself has no value unless you know how to monetize an audience right? So whether that's selling Merch. Or doing brand deals to that audience something along those lines. Um, that's to me where Tiktok really lies ah kind of how Instagram was early on and now it seems like Instagram is trying to kind of catch up and do the whole reals thing to try to get back some of those eyeballs because. So many people jump ship went to Tiktok and now Instagram's trying to play ketchup but where I think Youtube is very uniquely placed is that Youtube actually allows you to monetize your audience in platform which is. Ah, very unique thing that Youtube does and I think sometimes it gets overshadowed but because on Tiktok your video got two point three million views but on Youtube your video only got you know a 0 but you actually got paid for those 100000 views on Youtube and on Tiktok I mean you might be a part of the creator fund but the more people that they add to that fund the less. Your views are actually worth and so it's a very hard business to try to establish and so I think sometimes you know just as a society. We get caught up in those numbers right? We get caught up in this many views this many so followers on Tiktok versus this many views and this many followers on our subscribers rather on Youtube but you know again thinking as a creator and thinking about creators trying to create you know, sustainable businesses. Where you really have to think about is where is your financial gain really come from and what is the best option for you now. That being said I personally think that for most creators that's still Youtube but I I don't think that Tiktok is like you know a bad platform either I just think that.
01:26:44.66
Brandon Washington
Tiktok should be used as part of a system for your for your creative journey right? like so you can go to Tiktok create short form content because yes you can get a lot of eyes on you and on your brand and on your business but at the same time you don't want them to just stay there. You want to be able to try to convert as many of those eyeballs and those viewers over to your other platforms and in my opinion one of the big ones should be Youtube. You're already creating video content just go ahead and convert them over to Youtube and that's gonna give you something that's way more. Ah. Established. But even to go 1 step further than that even though I have a Youtube channel I still have a email list and I have a text chain list and that's always about just getting my audience in other places so where you know like a couple weeks ago when Facebook went down. If you needed to promote something on that day. Let's say you had a big launch on that day and your whole audience was on Facebook well Facebook goes down your launch is completely ruined and you have no control in that and so. I personally find that like you know, spreading your audience out as much as you possibly can across different platforms is definitely the way to go use Tiktok use Instagram reels as a quick way to get eyes on your brand but then put your brand in something a little bit more. Sustainable a little bit more established and a way in an area that actually pays you for your views where they share the revenue with you on a you know 50 5 45 split I believe it is and that's Youtube right now and quite honestly I was just say create Youtube content and then repurpose it. Tiktok and Instagram reels and that's really the best bang for your buck. You can really get as a creator financially it's better time wise it's better and you kind of get the best wins from all the different platforms. So that's personally where I stand on the matter. Obviously I look at it 100 % through a business lens. Because I don't care if you're a Youtube creator a Tiktok creator or you're shooting content for commercial clients or weddings or whatever you're a creator and you should be able to make a living as a creator and so I just mentally immediately go to. What is the most sustainable business model for a creator when it comes to creation regardless of that social media or for a client.
01:29:09.77
davemaze
I Preaching to the to the choir here because that is exactly the strategy that I have going into my next venture which is going to be an entertainment and gaming comedy thing where yeah so I'll be going. Ah you.
01:29:22.33
Brandon Washington
I Want to see it I'm already sold where do I subscribe.
01:29:29.25
davemaze
http://youtube.com/ultra maze working on it hopefully ah February will will do a full launch with it. But yeah I mean I think entertainment content especially can be clipped out and into tiktoks. But I think there's something to be said to with the native natively shooting for the platform. So.
01:29:30.15
Brandon Washington
Die.
01:29:48.36
davemaze
You know if you are able to whip out your iphone and shoot something intentionally for Tiktok. It just plays better almost because that's kind of what's expected on the platform. So you notice like Mr beast Mr. Beast doesn't post his repurposed Youtube videos on his Tiktok account.
01:29:55.31
Brandon Washington
Um, yeah.
01:30:05.76
davemaze
Uses an iphone and he'll come up with a stupid little challenge with his friends just like his Youtube videos but it's shot on an iphone. So.
01:30:10.88
Brandon Washington
Yeah I mean I think you just need to keep your cost of entry as low as you possibly can because the return on investment in Tiktok is just really low. So yeah, just shoot it on shoot it on your iphone or whatever. But yeah I definitely I definitely ah I like that idea for you I think.
01:30:16.70
davemaze
Yeah. Oh yeah.
01:30:30.64
Brandon Washington
You know creators should be thinking more about you know how to use the platforms that best suit their needs and not necessarily your needs are not the likes and the views just you know, build something that's sustainable for you. So that way you can do more of it.
01:30:42.86
davemaze
Yeah, a hundred percent and we still are like at such a beginning stage for all of this even Youtube actually it's it's still fairly new when it comes to you know entertainment medium. But. Ah, Tiktok especially is still very new even though it's been around for a couple years and Gary Vee's been talking about it for 6 years now um like the fact that you know we're still in this stage doesn't mean that it will always be like this maybe eventually things will be more monettizable but I think just by nature because it's. Short form very disposable content I don't think it'll ever become as much of a moneymaker in business as Youtube so just keep that in mind as you develop stuff. So anyways, it's eleven o'clock we've talked for an hour and a half I really appreciate your time Brandon I learned a ton everybody go check out.
01:31:27.52
Brandon Washington
Um, yeah.
01:31:38.59
davemaze
Amazing courses that you've produced I'll link it in the show notes and in the description of the video. Thank you Brandon for coming on the golden hour podcast yet again. Hi there you go.
01:31:45.40
Brandon Washington
No problem. Thanks for having me awesome.