The Creator Spotlight Podcast

“So I always tell people the one thing that you cannot teach is intuition and, like, decades of obsessive, chronically online content consumption, which I have engaged in over time, and it gives you, like, such an intuition for what feels right in terms of, like, pacing and things like that. The technical stuff, you can always add in and learn how to, like, rotoscope and after effects and all that stuff. But the intuition is, like, the core part.”

“So I definitely like to start by knowing the title and thumbnail, and most creators at a certain level have that, like, right off the bat. Like, before they film the video, that's how they kinda, like, figure out their good video ideas based on what's clickable. So I love knowing that and knowing, like, what words to even emphasize in the intro, maybe with, like, captions and stuff to kind of, like, drive that home. Whatever information the viewer had to click on is what I want to emphasize and gear the whole video towards.”

“So then I'll take all that information and say, okay. I think this project is going to take me, for example, no longer than twenty hours. So on this first project, we're gonna do an hourly invoice. If we go over twenty hours, that's totally on me. I will not cap I'll cap my invoice at twenty hours, and that's on me. And then if it ends up taking me, like, forty hours, that's a conversation that we can have if we wanna work together more moving forward.”

“And then I run a business on Etsy making disco ball lamps, and that's my last 30% is my disco ball lamps. And I'm about to start another Etsy business that's, bibs for brides at their wedding so they don't spill their food on their white dress. The disco ball lamps are really fun. So I spend all day editing, and then I sit down to watch YouTube, and I make a disco ball lamp.”

“But ever, you know once I started taking, like, serious editing jobs, I would always ask myself the question, is this content making the world a better place? I would ask myself for every single person that I worked with that question. And there are a lot of creators that the answer is no. And I would always be like, okay. You know, if I wanted to just, like, make a paycheck and dip, I would have chosen a different career path. Like, I chose this career path to uplift people that I feel like are making the world a better place.”

“But just the other day, someone in the Discord was talking about they they were working for a YouTuber, and there was, like, you know, all the different team rooms. And the cleaners would come through at night, and the editors were always there. So the cleaners would just learn over time, oh, just don't clean the editing room because they're using it. So the editing room got progressively more and more dirty because they were always there, and the cleaners wouldn't clean the room.”

“I was floored because USC Annenberg trades with Columbia for the top journalism school in the country. There there was granted, there was one professor that was excited about new media and YouTube. The rest of them, not only not only were not excited, they actively disliked new media. And even when we would screen our documentaries, if he saw a jump cut on screen, he would scream and pause it and say, people don't people this is jarring. Jump cuts are jarring. Don't use jump cuts.”

“And I also I read in, one of my editing books. I think it was the art of the cut. Somebody talking about if you you need to be able to build a scene that stands alone without music because music can be such a crutch that if you use if you build it around, like, one track, for example, and the client's like, I don't like that track. Like, that's, like, the worst thing to hear as an editor, and you're like, I built this whole thing around that track.”

“And, also, I think the term is radical it's not radical ownership. Extreme ownership as a leader of saying, if this goes well, it's because of all of us. If it doesn't go well, it's because of me. I didn't communicate effectively. If something comes back to me not looking like how I want, it's not your fault. It's my fault for not communicating effectively and and taking that ownership even when it's the hardest to take that ownership.”

“This is another piece of advice for editors, but I think a lot of editor times, editors, they don't emphasize what makes them different enough. And as an editor, you're molding to whatever it is the footage and the content that you're working on. And some little piece of your experience that you think might be irrelevant to editing could actually be extremely relevant and make you irreplaceable in an editing role. For example, I, like, took some coding classes in college. I had a new statistical programming software. And there was this guy in Upwork that was making video tutorials for statistical programming. Where where else is he going to find an editor that understands what he's teaching and what he's saying and statistical programming languages?”

“What makes a good presenter? It's pretty boring answer, I think, but it's that some that someone is themselves. I don't think people need to sort of act like someone else or try and do something they've seen on TV. It's about just being them.”

“journalism is something that you do. It's not really something that you are. And so, happily, lots of people can can do quality journalism. If someone choose to define themselves that way, it probably means that they're making a statement to the world that they are either, you know, holding power to account some description or investigating something or are published or are connected with legacy media.”

“They will either think that, oh, well, people who do this kind of thing are just like people trying to sell you stuff. Or they will say, oh, we can't make this because it's not polished enough. And, you know, the stuff that we make has to be really polished. And it's very worrying when I'm being told things like that by by people with with power in newsrooms because they're wrong. And if they'd spent any time on social media, they they wouldn't have they wouldn't have those views.”

“the most shocking thing that happened when I left the BBC was how the BBC disappeared. So I I went from just, you know, being totally surrounded by it. Because, obviously, when you're an employee there, you're getting all these newsletters. You'll you'll you'll you'll seeing your mates there. You're hearing about all these things. You're seeing all these things. And then I left, and all of a sudden, I stopped seeing the BBC anywhere.”

“sometimes people who are, you know, naturally multi talented, multifaceted, they think that they can make content about 10 things. And I try and say to them, how about three things that are all united by this one common theme?”

“I assume that some people had a sort of great fear of cringe. and, you know, yes, there were survey respondents who said that, but it was by no means near the top. Something else. Oh, yeah. That their that their, bosses wouldn't let them do it. And, you know, you can predict why I thought that would be a problem. But it turns out for most people, their bosses are very encouraging for them amplifying their work on social media.”

“if you're relying on the organization you work for to be responsible for your sort of entire video presence on the Internet. I worry about, in reality, what kind of connection and community, if any, you're gonna build with people that is, like, direct between you and them rather than this really tangential link like, oh, you're that person who works at this place. What happens if that newsroom makes you redundant? What happens if that newsroom has to stop operating? you you're what are you gonna have that's yours?”

“I do generally think that, like, content creators have a ton of opportunities in The US because you're at least five years ahead in The US compared to The UK. I would love someone to explain or even speculate why The UK we are actually like really quite backwards when it comes to video adoption as a market in terms of how we consume content. A lot of markets around the world are way ahead of us in video consumption.”

“I do loads of projects I don't get paid for at all. You know, I do pro bono stuff and God, I would never I would never be able to do pro bono stuff if I had stayed as a staff journalist. The highly paid thing I get to do here helps me do the less paid thing here.”