November 22, 2024 • 27 mins
Admittedly, the decision to purchase gear and the effects that it has on our productivity is a favorite topic of ours. Also, I'm pretty sure Episode One was supposed to be a test run but I really liked the way it turned out. This is a longer discussion that highlights different aspects of the decision-making process.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Hey, Laurel.
(00:02):
Yeah.
I don't feel like working today.
Then let's talk.
All right.
Today is September 19, 2024.
Okay, so I'd like to start by talking about gear.
And is this not going to be a techie talk?
(00:24):
It's mostly about, I don't know how to describe this, but I'm going to try anyway.
It's like how sometimes you get caught in this idea that in order to create stuff, you need better stuff.
(00:45):
And the danger there is the things you hear all the time about somebody who wants to get into carpentry, for example,
and they buy like the top of the line stuff, but then they never like do anything with it, you know,
(01:06):
as opposed to you're trying to do something.
And you buy the tool you need for the job.
Because you know that's what you need.
But there's this danger.
Now, there have been times, you know, where we have bought something that at the beginning didn't seem like it was going to add anything too much.
(01:33):
I remember how we were trying to do green screening before.
We were doing green screening and we just tried everything.
And it was always a nightmare because the lighting and removing green from people's hair and stuff like that.
(01:56):
And I mean, you could never, yeah, the lighting, you can never light it well enough that it was one shade of green.
It was always showed up as about 19 shades of green.
And then, yeah, then you had to like try and find pixels in the middle of people's hair.
And the problem with green screening is that if it's not done properly and there is a reflection of the green on people's skins and things like that.
(02:24):
And if the lighting is not even what happens is you tell the software remove what I think is green.
But then the software gets confused and says, oh, well, this also sort of looks green and that sort of looks green.
And you end up removing. There's holes in your picture. Yeah, there's there's holes on the person and things like that.
And so we were like, OK, you know, we we had we got it to a point where it was OK.
(02:52):
And then what happened was we upgraded our camera.
We upgraded our camera and we thought, OK, you know, we don't I think at the time maybe we thought, well, we don't need a new camera.
We don't need a better camera. But but it turns out that we were like, oh, now we can green screen.
(03:17):
Like because the new camera had more color information and so it was easier for the software then to interpret what green was.
It could tell subtle differences between shades of green that our previous camera could not do.
And so because of that, it turned out that, yeah, in this case, we didn't have the right tool.
(03:44):
Right. And by upgrading, we actually got a better tool.
But yeah, sometimes you're buying something and it's expensive.
And then you're like, oh, my gosh, that was so worth it because it changes your whole process in ways that you maybe hoped,
(04:07):
but maybe didn't even guess that it was going to do you thought it was going to give you a better picture.
And what it gave you was a better workflow. And we just had a similar thing happen with audio because, you know, for a long time we were trying to, you know,
(04:28):
we're doing this animation. So we're trying to put audio. And I thought, you know, listening to the professional ones versus ours just seems like our audio is not very good.
But we kept buying different microphones that were the budget microphones, even though they were still in the three hundred dollar range and below.
(04:51):
And all of a sudden, you know, I'm trying to buy another version of the cheaper microphones.
And the person that we helps us a lot from Sweetwater said, you know, you should try this one.
And actually, it came if I can back up a little bit, it came about because I was like, I'm often doing this.
(05:16):
What does Pixar use? You know, what does you know, if you're into cinematography and making movies, you're like, well, what do the Hollywood movies use as their cameras and sound equipment and microphones and stuff like that?
So I just happened to see in the realm of voiceovers, I was like, well, Pixar is really good with their audio.
(05:42):
And I saw a picture, I think maybe a video or a picture, and I sent it to our sales rep at Sweetwater and said, OK, well, that's this microphone is actually called a Newman U87.
And it costs an arm and a leg and two teeth.
It costs. Yeah, I think like three thousand six hundred as of this podcast. But I but then he recommended another microphone that was really good. And we had to choose between the cheaper mic again and this mic that was still out of our price comfort zone.
(06:20):
Right. So the cheaper one would have been back down in the three hundred range. And then the one he had recommended was between that and the price of the Pixar mic.
Yeah. And I think it was on sale for a thousand or something. And we just took a chance and said, yeah, let's do that.
And it literally changed our audio workflow and how we do audio, because once we heard how could that sounded much better than what we had, we basically stopped looking for other mics.
(06:55):
We consolidated to one microphone and then we started thinking about preamps and, you know, how do we make this sound the best and.
But it also. Yeah. And I mean, it's simplified that, too, because at one point we were using so many plugins trying to make things sound good.
And, you know, now it's like, oh, OK, now we don't have to worry about modifying it so much that we ruin the sound.
(07:22):
Now it just needs a little bit of tweaking to really, you know, take sound that was good to start with and make it really shine.
And the topic that I wanted to talk about is like, when do you stop?
Because I have to tell you that once I go down in that direction, it's really hard to hit the brakes because I'm like, OK, well, now we have this really good mic.
(07:51):
But in order, you know, if you follow the audio chain, the next step, the next piece of gear is usually a preamplifier.
And, you know, there you can like get, you know, spend easily two thousand dollars if you get a high end one, you know, maybe even more.
(08:13):
If you get a low end, you get, you know, we're talking maybe eight hundred dollars, but you're like, well, is it going to make that big of a difference?
Is it not? Is it, you know, is it going to be an improvement?
And neither of us has a really good ear. Neither of us have done audio enough to have a really good ear for it.
(08:35):
So we're always worried that, you know, so if we get the whole chain top end, I mean, the bottleneck is us.
So at what point should we not spend more than X amount because we can't get it to sound better than that anyway, because we can't hear anything better than that.
Right. And then there is a point also like where other people will not notice a difference, you know.
(09:04):
And, you know, maybe some people thought our audio was fine before, but we can definitely tell it's much better now.
Like we are very happy with how it sounds and things like that.
And if you're a real audio person and you're out there and you're laughing your head off because you're like, no, it doesn't, then give us a call.
Because, you know, could you help us out? Help us out. Help us out.
(09:28):
But the same thing happened. But there comes a point where like the platforms you're releasing to, like we're releasing our videos on YouTube and we're putting videos, you know, we're hoping to make apps for Unreal Engine and stuff.
At some point, the added benefit is not even something people can detect, you know.
(09:49):
The same thing happened with us with our movie, our live action movie, where we really found a nice camera. It was a really, you know, nice camera.
And we, of course, you're making your first feature film and you're like, oh, yeah, I got to get, you know, Hollywood quality.
And then you realize Hollywood quality is like mortgage level, you know.
(10:14):
And not on our house, on like a really nice house mortgage level.
Yeah. So you're like, OK, well, what can I get that sort of looks the same?
And I might go in a tangent here after this because there is a whole market for that.
For people who are like, you know, these companies are so funny about that.
There's a whole market for this is what you want, but this is what you can afford.
(10:41):
But we will sell it to you as if it is the other, you know, sell you on the dream of stuff.
But anyway, that maybe next time we'll talk about because that was eye opening.
Yeah. Yeah. And that's the whole thing that I think would make a really good topic.
But the thing is that we have a really good camera.
(11:03):
We got, you know, lenses for it, and then it turns out that you're releasing it through Amazon Prime,
let's say Prime Video and the resolution there is limited to something lower than what your camera can do.
And people don't notice, you know, they don't notice the difference in like, oh, I spent this much on whatever.
(11:30):
Right. Now, when you do your writing, that is one market that doesn't have as much gear.
It doesn't. But you can sort of get stuck in the same mindset where you spend so much time prepping.
And so it might not be, you know, buying all the software or, you know, finding the right, you know, computer or whatever.
(11:59):
But it can be the spending all of the time, you know, the back sheets for the characters or the settings
and getting everything so organized and working out your outline to the nth degree that you've almost.
I for one of my stories that actually I was never able to finish because it just sapped the creativity out of me.
(12:22):
I was going to be I had just come off of a story that I had loved and that I could not figure out an ending to.
And I it's actually now a trunk manuscript, which is one of the ones you throw in a trunk for later to try and figure out.
And so I wasn't going to do that again. I was going to be organized. I was going to have the outline.
I was going to. And oh, my gosh, I organized the heck out of this thing.
(12:47):
And then I just there's nothing to write. It was no, I felt out of it.
And just. Yeah. So I lost another story. That's another trunk story.
And so, you know, trying to find it's still about trying to find that balance where you're you're not losing your creative energy into.
(13:13):
You know, just trying to find the balance. And so I was just trying to figure out how to do that.
And I was just trying to figure out how to do the side things. Yeah. Straight of things. Yeah.
But I can I can see that because even as we're getting better gear for audio, let's say, let's say we notice a problem.
(13:34):
OK, we have an audio problem. We need to improve it right away.
You know, which is which is the actual thing.
You know, so you're like, oh, I have joy now because I am sort of doing my creative thing.
But this is a lot more relaxing.
(13:56):
But then even worse is when you do buy the gear and you get it all set up and you have.
Now it's time to do the creative thing. And, oh, boy, I don't know about you, but I get so nervous then because it's like, well, now there's this like really good microphone staring at me.
Like, I got to do something worth, you know, having the microphone for.
(14:22):
So it gets it gets a little bit scarier.
But there's also that, you know, the push and pull right where you feel good during that week where you're getting everything set up and you're doing the research and you're buying the stuff and you're connecting at all.
And then the next week, you're like, I wasted a whole week and created nothing.
Yeah, that is also a painful thing because you're buying gear and you're like, you're right.
(14:48):
And every gear that we get, I don't care what it is, it could even be a microphone stand. It consumes time trying to put it together, finding the right spot for it and all that stuff.
And you get that depression afterwards. Like, I wasted a whole week.
And what I really wanted to do, what I really needed to do was to put content out there. And I didn't do it. So anyway, you know, if you're feeling the same way, let us know we don't have an answer so much.
(15:25):
I'm not sure there is an answer, but you do, you know, you do have to find a balance. Obviously you need gear that you can afford. That's good enough that it's not getting in the way of your creativity.
But you also need to make sure that you're not obsessing about the gear or hiding behind acquiring the gear. Make sure you're still being creative.
(15:49):
And that's the thing. I obsess over it. I have that tendency because I go, okay, now we have this microphone that's really good, but what does Disney, what does Pixar use again?
What was the one I couldn't afford?
And if I got that, would I notice that big of a difference from what I have? I think at some point you really do have to say it sounds good enough.
(16:19):
Like, you know, lately when we hear our videos, I go, oh, you know, that sounds good. That sounds clear.
And actually we had the ultimate, oh, what do you call it? Compliment. Compliment. Yesterday when one of our kids came in and heard through the speakers.
(16:42):
And I think the compliment was something like, this sounds even better than you guys sound when you're actually recording.
I think it wasn't even that specific. It was just, hey, this sounds better than your real voices.
Yes. So we did all right with the audio, you know.
Or we sound terrible in real life.
(17:04):
And I still, you know, it's funny because I think part of my therapy during the week is just searching gear, watching videos on the gear, feeling like, hey, if I don't, if I'm sitting here having to do my day job to pay for the dream of us having a business doing our creative thing,
(17:29):
at least I can search gear and feel like I'm actually being able to do it. To invest in the business. To invest in it. Yeah.
But yeah, it is, it is interesting.
So,
and just if you hadn't been listening to our previous one, the reason we went from green screen to Pixar mics is because we switched from live action to animation.
(18:04):
And so now we, we don't need green screen and we don't need to hide little lav mics. We don't have to worry about mic noise or, you know, frequencies, you know, EMF stuff getting in and ruining our sound recordings, but we do want something that sounds really clear.
Yeah. And so if you picture, you know, again, Pixar, the voiceover, when they're doing their voiceover, that is kind of what we're attempting to do. And there's a lot more to it because our room is not treated with, you know, whatever.
(18:42):
And we have sound curtains that we've sort of made a booth out of, you know, we're trying to do the best that we can with the resources we have.
But, you know, there are limitations to what we can do in terms of both money and space and, you know, having to live in the space.
(19:07):
And here's a pro tip, I guess, if we have a tip to give out there. If you are doing audio and you're trying to, audio is different from video in this one aspect, I believe.
The microphone does matter, you know, like, people tell you in video. Oh, the camera does not matter. It's how you frame is how you light is how you use your phone.
(19:36):
You can use your phone, you know, that's not necessarily true all the time. But they do say in that world in the video world, the camera doesn't matter. Well, let me tell you something about the audio world.
The microphone is probably the most important thing, you know, other than your talent and your voice in the room or whatever. The microphone is very important. Like if you have $1,000 and you're trying to figure out preamps versus, you know, should I get a good mic or should I improve my preamps or should I do this?
(20:15):
You should look probably at your microphone first because that is like microphone and either headset or, you know, monitoring speakers because I mean, it's almost the same as saying I want to be a filmmaker.
Your camera obviously there's parts of it that do matter. There's a minimum you need to get. But also, if you need glasses, make sure your glasses are, you know, the right prescription. And that's kind of what having the right headphone or monitor is for audio is if you, you know, if you can't hear it doesn't mean it's not there.
(20:53):
You are so right because we are, you know, like we said at the beginning, we are not audio people. But let me tell you that there's, if you watch videos on YouTube where they say, okay, now I'm going to play this microphone.
And now I'm going to play this other microphone. And now I'm going to play this preamps and these other preamps. Could you tell the difference? Our answer was always no. I have no idea. They all sound the same to me.
(21:23):
But yeah, good point there. We had to upgrade our mic, our headsets, our headphones, to be able to tell the difference. And, you know, and we're glad we did that. So we upgraded our microphone. That was a big, big step. We updated our headphones.
(21:44):
That's also a big step. And the other stuff, I think it adds definitely to it, but it's, you know, it's not as big of a deal.
I mean, I think in some ways, the things that we've added are more about workflow than sound since we, I mean, there's things that definitely help with the sound, but switching over to a Dante system, because we are, you know, on two different computers and working on stuff at the same time or different times or, you know, if I'm working on stuff, I want him to hear it. If he's working on stuff, he wants me to hear it.
(22:21):
We've got spaghetti all over.
We were spending a lot of time reaching behind the console rewiring cable so we could reroute the audio to different things.
And in fact, we're having an issue right now where we're trying to figure out how to hear our surround sound, because our mixes for VR for they need to be so that you can tell the direction in which the audio is coming.
(22:54):
It's called spatial audio and spatial audio and bisonic is another type of audio that VR uses.
And because of that, that is so hard to monitor, because if you put headphones on, I don't know if it's coming from behind me or next to me or above me or whatever.
They try to simulate that on different headphones, right, they try to simulate it and to some extent.
(23:21):
You can tell but not. You can tell well enough to judge the final project, but you cannot tell well enough to make it yourself is what you know we're kind of realizing is that if we listen to somebody else's, or if we listen to ours that's already up there we can say
every time I close my eyes and spin around and try and point to the thing I am three feet to the left or yes I'm dead on. But in the process of trying to create it.
(23:52):
You really need a surround sound in your room so you can, if you need to walk up to the speaker say nope that's definitely, you know, coming from there right that makes such a difference to be able to walk up to the speaker and and know that.
But yeah, Laura was talking about the way we tested which is pretty funny because we put on our VR headset but we close our eyes and we spin ourselves around.
(24:17):
And then we try to locate the voice. And with videos that actually do a good job. Yeah, sure enough.
When you locate it with your ears and spin to the right location you're like, and open your eyes you see the person talking to you from that direction and you know, okay, they have their directional audio correct right with ours sometimes I end up looking up when it's supposed to be to my left or right and go, okay, I know for a fact that person is not up there in the sky talking to me.
(24:53):
So, so we still have some work to do there and yeah that's what we're trying to figure out and again this is our topic it's like we spend so much time trying to figure the actual mechanics of.
And one of it is learning curve and one of it is we need new gear or a new plugin or whatever it's every time we buy something this is a side note but every time we buy something that's supposed to fix a problem.
(25:24):
We spend about a day and a half regretting the purchase until we figure out how to use it. And then a lot of times you're like yes this is helping but that first day and a half is like, holy crap this does not do.
I told all the same that if, if I went by my first impressions on anything I've bought video or audio.
(25:48):
I would have returned it the next day. I have learned enough to say, okay the frustration I'm having today.
This is temporary, I know they wouldn't sell me this thing, if it didn't at least do the thing that I, you know, for the most part that is true, and I once in a while you do buy something that is, you know, it just doesn't work.
(26:11):
I have learned that if I go by that, I would have returned every single thing, you know, because I buy something with the idea. Okay, well it said it does this, and it takes me always the videos and stuff like oh you plug this in.
Yeah, you do this, you do that, boom, it works. And then you go try to do it. And you have to take your time and say, I'm going to, nope, I'm going to learn it. This thing says it can do that.
(26:42):
I got to figure out how it's, how it's going to do that. And, and then you finally, you know, figure it out and you go oh okay that's that's cool. This is what we need it.
Exactly. But yeah, it's like different categories. Does it speed up your workflow.
Does it improve it, you know, final product, your final product.
(27:07):
Or is it just an excuse to not create not create. I think, for the most part we really do want to create. So I'm hoping that that doesn't happen as often that we're trying to like, you know, I think we honestly do have problems that we have to solve so.
(27:31):
And that may be the same for you so out there. So give yourself, you know, don't be so hard on yourself.
All right, well, sadly I think we have to get back to work.
All right.
Hey, Laurel.
(00:02):
Yeah.
I don't feel like working today.
Then let's talk.
All right.
Today is September 19, 2024.
Okay, so I'd like to start by talking about gear.
And is this not going to be a techie talk?
(00:24):
It's mostly about, I don't know how to describe this, but I'm going to try anyway.
It's like how sometimes you get caught in this idea that in order to create stuff, you need better stuff.
(00:45):
And the danger there is the things you hear all the time about somebody who wants to get into carpentry, for example,
and they buy like the top of the line stuff, but then they never like do anything with it, you know,
(01:06):
as opposed to you're trying to do something.
And you buy the tool you need for the job.
Because you know that's what you need.
But there's this danger.
Now, there have been times, you know, where we have bought something that at the beginning didn't seem like it was going to add anything too much.
(01:33):
I remember how we were trying to do green screening before.
We were doing green screening and we just tried everything.
And it was always a nightmare because the lighting and removing green from people's hair and stuff like that.
(01:56):
And I mean, you could never, yeah, the lighting, you can never light it well enough that it was one shade of green.
It was always showed up as about 19 shades of green.
And then, yeah, then you had to like try and find pixels in the middle of people's hair.
And the problem with green screening is that if it's not done properly and there is a reflection of the green on people's skins and things like that.
(02:24):
And if the lighting is not even what happens is you tell the software remove what I think is green.
But then the software gets confused and says, oh, well, this also sort of looks green and that sort of looks green.
And you end up removing. There's holes in your picture. Yeah, there's there's holes on the person and things like that.
And so we were like, OK, you know, we we had we got it to a point where it was OK.
(02:52):
And then what happened was we upgraded our camera.
We upgraded our camera and we thought, OK, you know, we don't I think at the time maybe we thought, well, we don't need a new camera.
We don't need a better camera. But but it turns out that we were like, oh, now we can green screen.
(03:17):
Like because the new camera had more color information and so it was easier for the software then to interpret what green was.
It could tell subtle differences between shades of green that our previous camera could not do.
And so because of that, it turned out that, yeah, in this case, we didn't have the right tool.
(03:44):
Right. And by upgrading, we actually got a better tool.
But yeah, sometimes you're buying something and it's expensive.
And then you're like, oh, my gosh, that was so worth it because it changes your whole process in ways that you maybe hoped,
(04:07):
but maybe didn't even guess that it was going to do you thought it was going to give you a better picture.
And what it gave you was a better workflow. And we just had a similar thing happen with audio because, you know, for a long time we were trying to, you know,
(04:28):
we're doing this animation. So we're trying to put audio. And I thought, you know, listening to the professional ones versus ours just seems like our audio is not very good.
But we kept buying different microphones that were the budget microphones, even though they were still in the three hundred dollar range and below.
(04:51):
And all of a sudden, you know, I'm trying to buy another version of the cheaper microphones.
And the person that we helps us a lot from Sweetwater said, you know, you should try this one.
And actually, it came if I can back up a little bit, it came about because I was like, I'm often doing this.
(05:16):
What does Pixar use? You know, what does you know, if you're into cinematography and making movies, you're like, well, what do the Hollywood movies use as their cameras and sound equipment and microphones and stuff like that?
So I just happened to see in the realm of voiceovers, I was like, well, Pixar is really good with their audio.
(05:42):
And I saw a picture, I think maybe a video or a picture, and I sent it to our sales rep at Sweetwater and said, OK, well, that's this microphone is actually called a Newman U87.
And it costs an arm and a leg and two teeth.
It costs. Yeah, I think like three thousand six hundred as of this podcast. But I but then he recommended another microphone that was really good. And we had to choose between the cheaper mic again and this mic that was still out of our price comfort zone.
(06:20):
Right. So the cheaper one would have been back down in the three hundred range. And then the one he had recommended was between that and the price of the Pixar mic.
Yeah. And I think it was on sale for a thousand or something. And we just took a chance and said, yeah, let's do that.
And it literally changed our audio workflow and how we do audio, because once we heard how could that sounded much better than what we had, we basically stopped looking for other mics.
(06:55):
We consolidated to one microphone and then we started thinking about preamps and, you know, how do we make this sound the best and.
But it also. Yeah. And I mean, it's simplified that, too, because at one point we were using so many plugins trying to make things sound good.
And, you know, now it's like, oh, OK, now we don't have to worry about modifying it so much that we ruin the sound.
(07:22):
Now it just needs a little bit of tweaking to really, you know, take sound that was good to start with and make it really shine.
And the topic that I wanted to talk about is like, when do you stop?
Because I have to tell you that once I go down in that direction, it's really hard to hit the brakes because I'm like, OK, well, now we have this really good mic.
(07:51):
But in order, you know, if you follow the audio chain, the next step, the next piece of gear is usually a preamplifier.
And, you know, there you can like get, you know, spend easily two thousand dollars if you get a high end one, you know, maybe even more.
(08:13):
If you get a low end, you get, you know, we're talking maybe eight hundred dollars, but you're like, well, is it going to make that big of a difference?
Is it not? Is it, you know, is it going to be an improvement?
And neither of us has a really good ear. Neither of us have done audio enough to have a really good ear for it.
(08:35):
So we're always worried that, you know, so if we get the whole chain top end, I mean, the bottleneck is us.
So at what point should we not spend more than X amount because we can't get it to sound better than that anyway, because we can't hear anything better than that.
Right. And then there is a point also like where other people will not notice a difference, you know.
(09:04):
And, you know, maybe some people thought our audio was fine before, but we can definitely tell it's much better now.
Like we are very happy with how it sounds and things like that.
And if you're a real audio person and you're out there and you're laughing your head off because you're like, no, it doesn't, then give us a call.
Because, you know, could you help us out? Help us out. Help us out.
(09:28):
But the same thing happened. But there comes a point where like the platforms you're releasing to, like we're releasing our videos on YouTube and we're putting videos, you know, we're hoping to make apps for Unreal Engine and stuff.
At some point, the added benefit is not even something people can detect, you know.
(09:49):
The same thing happened with us with our movie, our live action movie, where we really found a nice camera. It was a really, you know, nice camera.
And we, of course, you're making your first feature film and you're like, oh, yeah, I got to get, you know, Hollywood quality.
And then you realize Hollywood quality is like mortgage level, you know.
(10:14):
And not on our house, on like a really nice house mortgage level.
Yeah. So you're like, OK, well, what can I get that sort of looks the same?
And I might go in a tangent here after this because there is a whole market for that.
For people who are like, you know, these companies are so funny about that.
There's a whole market for this is what you want, but this is what you can afford.
(10:41):
But we will sell it to you as if it is the other, you know, sell you on the dream of stuff.
But anyway, that maybe next time we'll talk about because that was eye opening.
Yeah. Yeah. And that's the whole thing that I think would make a really good topic.
But the thing is that we have a really good camera.
(11:03):
We got, you know, lenses for it, and then it turns out that you're releasing it through Amazon Prime,
let's say Prime Video and the resolution there is limited to something lower than what your camera can do.
And people don't notice, you know, they don't notice the difference in like, oh, I spent this much on whatever.
(11:30):
Right. Now, when you do your writing, that is one market that doesn't have as much gear.
It doesn't. But you can sort of get stuck in the same mindset where you spend so much time prepping.
And so it might not be, you know, buying all the software or, you know, finding the right, you know, computer or whatever.
(11:59):
But it can be the spending all of the time, you know, the back sheets for the characters or the settings
and getting everything so organized and working out your outline to the nth degree that you've almost.
I for one of my stories that actually I was never able to finish because it just sapped the creativity out of me.
(12:22):
I was going to be I had just come off of a story that I had loved and that I could not figure out an ending to.
And I it's actually now a trunk manuscript, which is one of the ones you throw in a trunk for later to try and figure out.
And so I wasn't going to do that again. I was going to be organized. I was going to have the outline.
I was going to. And oh, my gosh, I organized the heck out of this thing.
(12:47):
And then I just there's nothing to write. It was no, I felt out of it.
And just. Yeah. So I lost another story. That's another trunk story.
And so, you know, trying to find it's still about trying to find that balance where you're you're not losing your creative energy into.
(13:13):
You know, just trying to find the balance. And so I was just trying to figure out how to do that.
And I was just trying to figure out how to do the side things. Yeah. Straight of things. Yeah.
But I can I can see that because even as we're getting better gear for audio, let's say, let's say we notice a problem.
(13:34):
OK, we have an audio problem. We need to improve it right away.
You know, which is which is the actual thing.
You know, so you're like, oh, I have joy now because I am sort of doing my creative thing.
But this is a lot more relaxing.
(13:56):
But then even worse is when you do buy the gear and you get it all set up and you have.
Now it's time to do the creative thing. And, oh, boy, I don't know about you, but I get so nervous then because it's like, well, now there's this like really good microphone staring at me.
Like, I got to do something worth, you know, having the microphone for.
(14:22):
So it gets it gets a little bit scarier.
But there's also that, you know, the push and pull right where you feel good during that week where you're getting everything set up and you're doing the research and you're buying the stuff and you're connecting at all.
And then the next week, you're like, I wasted a whole week and created nothing.
Yeah, that is also a painful thing because you're buying gear and you're like, you're right.
(14:48):
And every gear that we get, I don't care what it is, it could even be a microphone stand. It consumes time trying to put it together, finding the right spot for it and all that stuff.
And you get that depression afterwards. Like, I wasted a whole week.
And what I really wanted to do, what I really needed to do was to put content out there. And I didn't do it. So anyway, you know, if you're feeling the same way, let us know we don't have an answer so much.
(15:25):
I'm not sure there is an answer, but you do, you know, you do have to find a balance. Obviously you need gear that you can afford. That's good enough that it's not getting in the way of your creativity.
But you also need to make sure that you're not obsessing about the gear or hiding behind acquiring the gear. Make sure you're still being creative.
(15:49):
And that's the thing. I obsess over it. I have that tendency because I go, okay, now we have this microphone that's really good, but what does Disney, what does Pixar use again?
What was the one I couldn't afford?
And if I got that, would I notice that big of a difference from what I have? I think at some point you really do have to say it sounds good enough.
(16:19):
Like, you know, lately when we hear our videos, I go, oh, you know, that sounds good. That sounds clear.
And actually we had the ultimate, oh, what do you call it? Compliment. Compliment. Yesterday when one of our kids came in and heard through the speakers.
(16:42):
And I think the compliment was something like, this sounds even better than you guys sound when you're actually recording.
I think it wasn't even that specific. It was just, hey, this sounds better than your real voices.
Yes. So we did all right with the audio, you know.
Or we sound terrible in real life.
(17:04):
And I still, you know, it's funny because I think part of my therapy during the week is just searching gear, watching videos on the gear, feeling like, hey, if I don't, if I'm sitting here having to do my day job to pay for the dream of us having a business doing our creative thing,
(17:29):
at least I can search gear and feel like I'm actually being able to do it. To invest in the business. To invest in it. Yeah.
But yeah, it is, it is interesting.
So,
and just if you hadn't been listening to our previous one, the reason we went from green screen to Pixar mics is because we switched from live action to animation.
(18:04):
And so now we, we don't need green screen and we don't need to hide little lav mics. We don't have to worry about mic noise or, you know, frequencies, you know, EMF stuff getting in and ruining our sound recordings, but we do want something that sounds really clear.
Yeah. And so if you picture, you know, again, Pixar, the voiceover, when they're doing their voiceover, that is kind of what we're attempting to do. And there's a lot more to it because our room is not treated with, you know, whatever.
(18:42):
And we have sound curtains that we've sort of made a booth out of, you know, we're trying to do the best that we can with the resources we have.
But, you know, there are limitations to what we can do in terms of both money and space and, you know, having to live in the space.
(19:07):
And here's a pro tip, I guess, if we have a tip to give out there. If you are doing audio and you're trying to, audio is different from video in this one aspect, I believe.
The microphone does matter, you know, like, people tell you in video. Oh, the camera does not matter. It's how you frame is how you light is how you use your phone.
(19:36):
You can use your phone, you know, that's not necessarily true all the time. But they do say in that world in the video world, the camera doesn't matter. Well, let me tell you something about the audio world.
The microphone is probably the most important thing, you know, other than your talent and your voice in the room or whatever. The microphone is very important. Like if you have $1,000 and you're trying to figure out preamps versus, you know, should I get a good mic or should I improve my preamps or should I do this?
(20:15):
You should look probably at your microphone first because that is like microphone and either headset or, you know, monitoring speakers because I mean, it's almost the same as saying I want to be a filmmaker.
Your camera obviously there's parts of it that do matter. There's a minimum you need to get. But also, if you need glasses, make sure your glasses are, you know, the right prescription. And that's kind of what having the right headphone or monitor is for audio is if you, you know, if you can't hear it doesn't mean it's not there.
(20:53):
You are so right because we are, you know, like we said at the beginning, we are not audio people. But let me tell you that there's, if you watch videos on YouTube where they say, okay, now I'm going to play this microphone.
And now I'm going to play this other microphone. And now I'm going to play this preamps and these other preamps. Could you tell the difference? Our answer was always no. I have no idea. They all sound the same to me.
(21:23):
But yeah, good point there. We had to upgrade our mic, our headsets, our headphones, to be able to tell the difference. And, you know, and we're glad we did that. So we upgraded our microphone. That was a big, big step. We updated our headphones.
(21:44):
That's also a big step. And the other stuff, I think it adds definitely to it, but it's, you know, it's not as big of a deal.
I mean, I think in some ways, the things that we've added are more about workflow than sound since we, I mean, there's things that definitely help with the sound, but switching over to a Dante system, because we are, you know, on two different computers and working on stuff at the same time or different times or, you know, if I'm working on stuff, I want him to hear it. If he's working on stuff, he wants me to hear it.
(22:21):
We've got spaghetti all over.
We were spending a lot of time reaching behind the console rewiring cable so we could reroute the audio to different things.
And in fact, we're having an issue right now where we're trying to figure out how to hear our surround sound, because our mixes for VR for they need to be so that you can tell the direction in which the audio is coming.
(22:54):
It's called spatial audio and spatial audio and bisonic is another type of audio that VR uses.
And because of that, that is so hard to monitor, because if you put headphones on, I don't know if it's coming from behind me or next to me or above me or whatever.
They try to simulate that on different headphones, right, they try to simulate it and to some extent.
(23:21):
You can tell but not. You can tell well enough to judge the final project, but you cannot tell well enough to make it yourself is what you know we're kind of realizing is that if we listen to somebody else's, or if we listen to ours that's already up there we can say
every time I close my eyes and spin around and try and point to the thing I am three feet to the left or yes I'm dead on. But in the process of trying to create it.
(23:52):
You really need a surround sound in your room so you can, if you need to walk up to the speaker say nope that's definitely, you know, coming from there right that makes such a difference to be able to walk up to the speaker and and know that.
But yeah, Laura was talking about the way we tested which is pretty funny because we put on our VR headset but we close our eyes and we spin ourselves around.
(24:17):
And then we try to locate the voice. And with videos that actually do a good job. Yeah, sure enough.
When you locate it with your ears and spin to the right location you're like, and open your eyes you see the person talking to you from that direction and you know, okay, they have their directional audio correct right with ours sometimes I end up looking up when it's supposed to be to my left or right and go, okay, I know for a fact that person is not up there in the sky talking to me.
(24:53):
So, so we still have some work to do there and yeah that's what we're trying to figure out and again this is our topic it's like we spend so much time trying to figure the actual mechanics of.
And one of it is learning curve and one of it is we need new gear or a new plugin or whatever it's every time we buy something this is a side note but every time we buy something that's supposed to fix a problem.
(25:24):
We spend about a day and a half regretting the purchase until we figure out how to use it. And then a lot of times you're like yes this is helping but that first day and a half is like, holy crap this does not do.
I told all the same that if, if I went by my first impressions on anything I've bought video or audio.
(25:48):
I would have returned it the next day. I have learned enough to say, okay the frustration I'm having today.
This is temporary, I know they wouldn't sell me this thing, if it didn't at least do the thing that I, you know, for the most part that is true, and I once in a while you do buy something that is, you know, it just doesn't work.
(26:11):
I have learned that if I go by that, I would have returned every single thing, you know, because I buy something with the idea. Okay, well it said it does this, and it takes me always the videos and stuff like oh you plug this in.
Yeah, you do this, you do that, boom, it works. And then you go try to do it. And you have to take your time and say, I'm going to, nope, I'm going to learn it. This thing says it can do that.
(26:42):
I got to figure out how it's, how it's going to do that. And, and then you finally, you know, figure it out and you go oh okay that's that's cool. This is what we need it.
Exactly. But yeah, it's like different categories. Does it speed up your workflow.
Does it improve it, you know, final product, your final product.
(27:07):
Or is it just an excuse to not create not create. I think, for the most part we really do want to create. So I'm hoping that that doesn't happen as often that we're trying to like, you know, I think we honestly do have problems that we have to solve so.
(27:31):
And that may be the same for you so out there. So give yourself, you know, don't be so hard on yourself.
All right, well, sadly I think we have to get back to work.
All right.
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