Stop Making ‘Pretty’ Videos! The Strategy That Landed a $30K Deal

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Vipul Bindra (00:04):
Anthony, my friend , thank you for taking time
coming out to talk to me.
Um, you know, it's always anincredible pleasure and, like
I've said many times on thispodcast and to you, we have such
incredible conversations, um,and all I wanted to do for years
was just record them and letpeople listen to it, because
there's so much knowledge.
Obviously, there's a lot of fun, but there's a lot of knowledge

(00:24):
in it and I know it would havehelped me, uh, in the past, and
it still helps me now.
So if anyone can benefit fromit plus, you know, or at least
get some entertainment on a longdrive or flight, why not, right
?
hopefully it's entertaining Ihope so I don't know, uh, but yo
, how have you been, how'severything been?

Anthony Rodriguez (00:42):
man, it's been good.
Uh, 2024 has been the most wildyear for my business how do you
say?
That.
So it's been.

Wow, there's a crazy noise gate I know, yeah,
yeah, I like talking like yeah.
So sorry, we're going auto onseason one.
If this goes well, we'll get aproducer you bring like
filmmakers on here.

They're like I noticed that noise gate is
really strong.
Exactly nobody would ever saythat we are working
professionals there's no, we'renot peddling anything.

There's nothing to gain here.
This is free knowledge, but yes, if it does work out, we can
have a producer season two untilthey're sponsors yes, I mean, I
don't know.
I mean, as long as there's noconflict of interest, I want to
to give no courses, no courses.
We're saying free knowledge here.

So, yeah, no, 2024 was crazy for me because I
did start this as an artist,you know.
So for me it was just a lot oflike making the coolest videos,
most cinematic looking things,and I think I've pretty much
achieved that.
You know, I like the way myvideos look.
I, yeah, I would look at otherpeople's work and be like man, I

(01:47):
wish it looked like that, andnow my, my work does look like
that, which is crazy.
Obviously, a lot of practice, alot of trial and error.
But in 2024, my mindset I thinkthe actually the end of 2023,
my mindset shifted from makingcool videos, higher production,
charging a lot of money becausethe videos are good, to charging

(02:11):
because I'm making my clientsmore money.

Yeah.

So it turned into like strategy and like
figuring out social media andmarketing and running ads and
all of that.
So it was pretty cool.
That's awesome.
I think it was your best year.

Cool, that's awesome.
I think it was your best year.
You're obviously beyond sixfigures.
You're doing really good, yeah,right.
And so, um, let's break it downright.
I mean, you brought to where Iwanted to be, so how were you
able to charge your clients uh,more in 2024?
Like, what did you have to sayor do, um in your meetings or
whatever in your process to beable to charge higher prices?

(02:46):
Because that's what mostfilmmakers are trying to do yeah
, it was funny.

You mentioned that.
That's like, probably mybiggest message is like charge
more and like the things.
When I talk to my filmmakerfriends like, bro, just charge
more money, dude, like your,your margins, but the reason why
I was actually charging a lotprior anyways, and that's just
because of quality and all ofthat which a lot of production

(03:11):
companies, they sell, quality,that's just like what you do,
like.
I'm really good at videos, solike, and I make good ones, so
give me your money.

But that's what we've been saying on this
podcast.
I've had multiple people whoare like stop selling.
You know not that qualitydoesn't matter, like you said it
doesn't matter you have to haveyour craft be good or hire
people whose craft is good.
Yeah, but at the end of the day, clients at least business
clients, the people that we workwith, corporate and commercial
clients for them it's not aboutquality.
Most of them don't even carewhat camera you bring.

(03:42):
Probably they care about thesize.
Size, but they don't care aboutyou know like what camera it is
.
It's the size yeah.
And that's just because they'veseen, you know, tv crews with
big cameras, not that theyobviously small, middle-less
cameras have come along.
Yeah.
But at the end of the day, theycare about its ROI, their money,
what they're going to make outof it.
Right, and as soon as youfigure that out and you stop

(04:06):
selling good looking videos youshould already be making good
looking videos.
As soon as you start sellingthem, a better result, right,
you, you can just start chargingmore and they'll happily pay it
yeah at the end they, they're,they're just looking at a, at an
roi factor.
It doesn't matter what they pay,as long as they get their money
back yeah, well, for me it wasweird.

I had this like turning point, because I
would see people whose videoswere not as good and I'm like
how on earth are they able tocharge this?

much money.
Like how on earth are they ableto do this?

probably you think getting roi to their
clients is that it oh 100 andtheir videos suck, but they,
like, they're strategic and theyhave repeat clients.
I'm like, how does that keephappening?
Yeah, like, how do they keepgetting clients?
Yeah, um, so for me, that thatwas the shift.
I started talking to my clients.
Honestly, this was kind ofcrazy.

(04:55):
So I had a mentor I still havea mentor, he's still my mentor
but, um, he tried shifting mymindset after one meeting and
then, right after that meeting,I ended up closing a 30K deal.
Look at that which I've neverclosed a 30K deal before.
So for me it was like whoa, andit was solely based off of I

(05:19):
need to know your number.
I had just asked a ton ofquestions.
So the client knew that I cared.
I didn't fully know how to helpthem, yeah, but well, I did
well, that's part of the process, right?
yeah, figuring it out, uh yeahand I did know how to help them,
mostly because it's like what Ido yeah, like literally what I
do but, um, like, and that'slike what I've done my whole

(05:41):
life, like just selling, buyingand selling and marketing myself
, and I just never done it forother people that much besides
making cool videos.
So, um, yeah, even just thatmindset.
I remember that that specificclient was like hey, we had, uh,
we were looking at a ton ofdifferent people and normally I
hear, oh, we hired you becauseyour colors, your colors are

(06:03):
great, your videos, whatever.
And they said we hired youbecause we know that you really
care and you asked us questionsthat no other of the 10
different, 15 differentproduction companies that we
talked to asked us as manyquestions about our company as
you did.
Look at that and he's like alot of them were cheaper than
you.
Production companies that wetalked to, uh, asked us as many
questions about our company asyou did.

(06:24):
Look at that and they had he'slike a lot of them were, uh,
cheaper than you.
You weren't here.
The one of the more expensiveones, and one of them was they
had a led wall.
Look at that Like they had awhole video wall they were going
to do this whole virtualproduction thing and I Well, it
doesn't matter does it.

At the end, you got the client and they chose
you after reading a bunch ofother people and I think you're
saying it perfectly Like what Iwould say is this you care?
It's simple.
I know sometimes and obviouslythere's extensive business
analytics and strategies that wecan go into, but at the core of
it all, it's just be good Care,make good content and think

(07:08):
people, people will get resultsand if they get results, they'll
come back and then they'll telltheir friends and you'll get
more and more money yeah and andthen the other thing I wanted
to talk a touch a little bit on.
You brought a great point andyou know you look at other
people's content and I've saidthis before.
You know you people can getenvious, like, oh, their content
either is really good I don'tknow if I can ever make it or b

(07:28):
it's it's bad like I know I canmake 10x better.
And you know you get into thatrut of them but you're not
actually out there gettingclients.
Just know that you don't knowthe circumstance they were in.
I've had clients go okay, we'llhave 30 minutes for setup,
which is is already too low.
And then you show up they'relike, oh, the CEO is here and
he's leaving in five minutes.
So it's like, oh, so you don'thave any time.

(07:50):
You either get the content oryou don't get the content.
So you may not know the otherside.
And you look at the content andgo, oh, that sucked, but you
didn't know the circumstancesthat the content was got in.
So what I'm saying is, ratherthan worrying about other
people's content, just make yourcontent good and you, and if
your content is actually better,you'll get more work and

(08:12):
especially if you care like youdid.
So talk me to be about that 30grand client.
Um, yeah, because that soundsincredible.
By the way, that's whateveryone's looking, that's the
type of clients I'm chasing too.
Uh.
So what were the deliverables?
Did they come with a?
Did they already know what thedeliverables they want?
Sounds like no.
You had to figure that out.
So what were the deliverables?

And yeah, talk to us talk to us a little
more.
So this was interesting.
It started off as like thiswhole thing.
They came there like, oh, we,this whole thing.
They came there like, oh, wewant to be on retainer.
Oh, that's great.
They ended up not.
This is funny.

Not funny.
This is kind of sad.
That was a good emotionalrollercoaster.

It's funny.
It's a little sad, because theywere supposed to be a long-term
client and they just didn'treally know what they wanted.
That's okay, I'm stillfollowing up.
I believe that they're gonnastill come back to me and they
were happy with the content.
They haven't hired anybody else,but this was a larger project
to get their pillar pieces ofcontent, which is like who we
are videos, what we offer.

(09:16):
Um, it was like three separatedays of shooting.
Um, it's some like bannervideos because they do a lot of
trade shows.
So here's the thing when I askthem questions about their
business, I want to know okay,where is the majority of your
profit coming from Not profitrevenue coming from, where are

(09:37):
you getting the most sales?
And they said word of mouth,trade shows.
And I was like, wait, no, okay,you're like a multi-million
dollar company yeah, why the?
heck.
Is it just word of mouth?
And trade shows like it.
100 should not be.
This is, this is I don't.
I don't want to sound likearrogant or or even ignorant to

(09:59):
the situation, but like evenknowing their niche.
I'm like.
I've definitely seen ads relatedto this, you know so I was
trying to get them on that and acouple different things.
So what we ended up doing wasbuilding their social media more
so that, when, uh, they sell toschools, all these other
different entities like doctors,all these places, and we built

(10:23):
what we're, what we were goingto build their social media.
I said we built, we were goingto build their social media and
we ended up just getting acouple pieces of content in the
end.
I mean, I still got paid, butdo you ever have that situation
where it's like a client paysyou and then they don't even get

(10:43):
the full package that they paidfor?

Yes, I've had that happen so I don't want to name
them, but you know this clientfunny enough.
Remember that project youhelped me on, yeah, yeah yeah,
so we did incredible work.
So funny enough again talkingmy style.
So you know I always bringextra.
So I promised them you weren'tpart of the package, right?
I promised them like threepeople, four cameras, whatever,
whatever the package, and Ialways bring extra.

(11:06):
Plus, we had been talking aboutthis Ronin 4D and I'm like I
really want to try it especiallyfor crowd shots.
It'd be incredible Anyway.
So you helped me on thatproject and we went above and
beyond.
The funny thing is, the projectrequirements were record a
speech, right, a live speech, alive event speech.
So we're just a video part.

(11:27):
We have nothing to do with, youknow, production aspect of it
Anyway.
So I did that and I made ithappen.
You were there.
I think we killed it all.
Funny enough, midway through orsome point, you know, the person
who's speaking got their pocketout and you know, like, inside
out from their suit, jacket, andobviously we knew that.
We, I noticed that at least andmaybe camera operators not

(11:49):
because we get so hyper focusedon framing and color, you know
all that anyway.
But there's nothing we can do.
There's three, four hundredpeople watching I I'm not going
to interrupt a person who's in azone getting, because that's
far more important than whatwe're doing, as far as I know,
but anyway, they were, uh, they,once they got the video,
they're like this is incredibleand obviously I knew that

(12:10):
there's no way to hide it.
You know, like we have to havewide shots anyway.
Point is, um, and then, funnyenough, they didn't even notice
it and then two days later,whatever, some client was like,
hey, what happened to yourpocket?
That was it.
And then they were like wecan't use this piece of content
anymore.
And I was like, come on, I meanI get it.
I get it At the same time, youhave a brand perception.
But on the other side.

(12:30):
You know it'll never be perfect, especially if it's live,
because if you want to beperfect, we can do it.
We do it all the time.
You know that that, yeah, wecan't do that.
The point is, we filled therequirements it just wasn't it

(12:54):
was an external factor thataffected the, the end product.
But yes, so it has happenedwhere we all that effort,
obviously we got paid, so I'mnot complaining, yeah, but at
the end of the day, them notbeing able to use the content
kind of hurts.
As a creative person, I'm likecome on, we put a lot of effort
into it and they can, they couldhave gotten huge business out
of that because that was thegoal of the company.

(13:16):
But yeah, so that's kind ofannoying, right, when that
happens.

Dude, we didn't even make the content.
Oh really the content?
Oh really, yeah, they didn'teven.
Did you get any deliverables to?
Them, yes, yes yes, so bannervideos um, so you got majority
of the content.

No, not even a majority majority.
Okay, so what did you end updelivering for 30k?

so it was, uh , banner videos, some tutorial
setup videos, um, and then Iended up just giving them the
raw footage because they askedfor it.
Okay, and here's the thing.
Normally that's like a red flagfor me, cause I'm like all
right, they're going to.
They don't like the editingstyle, they're going to get
someone else to edit and stuff.
They never edited it.

Yeah, never did anything.
I mean, and for the right price.
I mean it depends.

It sounds like I was like you can have it.
I was like you could take itall.
No, that was an interestingclient.
But going back to the originalquestion, that was what changed.
I asked a lot of questions.
I cared about my clients.
It's not that I didn't carebefore.
It's just that.
Now I cared about the reasonwhy they came to me.
It's like a relationship, atleast that's how I see it A they

(14:25):
came to me.
It's like a relationship, atleast that's how I see it.
A lot of client relationshipsare kind of like a marriage,
especially if they're long-term,where it's like if my wife
comes to me and she's like hey,anthony, I really want to be
listened to.
Can you hear me?
I want to tell you about my day.
Don't give me a solution.

I'm just getting personal.

No, tell you about my day, don't give me a
solution getting personal.
No, it's true.
It's like yeah, because she'slike I mean I'm a man, so
normally I'm like okay wellhere's a solution.

This is what we can do.
This is how we can like yeah, Imean get better fake, but
that's not what they're lookingfor right?

yeah, I can fix this problem that you're
coming with me with and she'slike I just want to listen, but
that's what a lot ofvideographers do.
Yeah, it's like we're thehusband.
Uh, there's no like gender,whatever, whatever the heck but
like there's like we're thehusband that's saying, oh well,
I can give you this video and Ican give you this video and I

(15:15):
can like make it look reallycool, and they're like I just
want to be listened to, I justwant brand awareness, I just
want this, or I.
We don't have enough lead flow,we need lead generation.
So in your, in your head,you're like ads, ads.
You know, like all these, likelittle things that you can and
sometimes they don't.

They tell you it's completely off.
I've had clients.
They go we want a recap videoand you're like, okay, you know.
And immediately you know I'vedone hundreds and hundreds of
those.
But then you start to dig.
And this is why it's importantto ask questions, because if
they just said, said that andyou ran with it, they would have
been very disappointed becausethey didn't know the lingo and
they were just saying the wordthat they knew you would have
never gotten exactly yeah, andso so you, you ask okay, awesome

(15:55):
, where are you gonna share it?
right?
You say, oh, you know great, so, where you can share it, who
you're gonna what, the platform,so I can make it better, right,
I know, know the targetaudience and all that.
And then you slowly find, oh,okay, so you're going to post
here what's the purpose of it.
Oh, we want new clients.
Well, recap videos.
And how you get new clients,recap videos is just how you
show how great you are, anyway.
So then you start to figure outand they're like oh, we want

(16:16):
this.
Oh, so what you're talking?
I and I, and I won't say that,let me clarify, okay.
I won't say, oh, you mean mini,and I'll say, oh, I get what's
the video you're talking about.
Okay, so here's what we'regonna do.
We're gonna come, you know,record all this for four days,
whatever, and we'll make a 15,20 minute video.
A recap video would never bemore than 190 seconds to two

(16:37):
minutes.
But you know, I wouldn't haveknown that and I'll generally
stick with the lingo thatthey're comfortable with,
because no point me trying toeducate them on the lingo.
I'm more interested in gettingthem the video that's going to
help them.
So I'm like okay, so we'regoing to make a recap video
that's going to be like morelike a documentary, it's going
to be about 20 minutes andthat's going to cover all these
aspects.

(16:58):
That sound right.
They're like yes, exactly, letme even find a video that shows
it's similar.
So I know 100, is this thequality?
Because you know we can makethis for 100 000, we can make
this for 5 000, depending on youknow what, how we're shooting,
the level of equipment and then,once I get, gauge where they
are.
Now I'm like okay, now we'regood, now we're good, and then
plus they appreciate it becausethey got the content at the end

(17:19):
what they wanted, and they'remore bound to come back.
And you and I are here, realproduction company owners.
It's unrealistic to be able tofind 10 15 new clients every
month.
You're far better off keepingthe clients you have and have
them keep coming back that'swhat I'm working on new clients,
man, that's that's.

That's somewhere where I'm trying to
shift more towards.
I still have repeat clients,but they're not on retainer and
they would benefit from being aretainer.
They probably pay me less yeah,exactly, clients save money.

They don't realize that.

Yeah but it's something that's crazy that you
said and one thing that Inoticed with videographers that,
uh, are able to charge a lot ofmoney, and that separates them
from the ones that are like,yeah, I'm charging whatever,
this much and that much, andthey're like I'm starving.
I say starving videographersand I don't mean that in a
negative, condemning tone, Imean that in just it's like I

(18:12):
don't have any work this month.

No, starving artists is a real thing,
especially in a town like this.
We have like three collegeschurning hundreds of people
every year into the market andthey walk out, especially with
like full sale.
They walk out with an FX sixwhich is a good camera to to, to
, to work on.
So so yeah, they think you knowand then they start.
I've seen so many productionscompanies open up, at least in

(18:33):
our area, and then they closebecause it's a common thread,
because they, they learn how tomake a video.
Let's not even go deep.
If they do learn that, thepoint is, at the end of the day
they are, they don't know anybusiness knowledge.
They don't know, what theclients are looking for.
So they either end up in themusic video market, which is
horrendous for paying very lowand they want editing in the

(18:56):
whole world, and then or theytry to enter into indie movie
world, which is way moredisrespectful even worse, even
worse and so, and when they try,obviously what we're doing
where there is money, uh, theydon't know any business things,
so most businesses aren't goingto take them seriously.
Or they end up at that two,three hundred range where you
know you can find work, but thenyou can't pay your bills, you

(19:18):
can't cover your costs I'll dowhatever anyone pays me, exactly
.

But the one, though, like the one thing that
I've noticed that separates, uh,those videographers, which was
me, that was me being completelyhonest, so that me in the past
to me now is you're playingalmost like a doctor and here's
what I mean by that.
So you, as a videographer, youare asking questions.

(19:43):
Hey, how do you feel like adoctor?
Well, let me then.
What about this?
Oh, you have a pain here, okay,well, I think that might be.
You have no brand you know it'slike yeah, is it?
you're, you're, you'rediagnosing your patient exactly,
um, and I obviously we have tobe careful with that, because
we're not positioned as likefinancial advisors or business

(20:04):
consultants or whatever, orwhatever the heck.
But that is what separatesthose that do make a lot of
money and are trusted by theirclients as opposed to those that
don't, because you're not just.
Oh yeah, let me just take anorder.
You want this video?
You're literally me just take anorder you want this video

(20:28):
you're literally uh well, I'mnot a, I'm not a clerk worker, I
I help businesses make moremoney.
So why is this?
Why is that?
How about this?
Well, what about this?

that's that's invaluable.
Yeah, don't just be an ordertaker, or I mean, because some
people will do some extra andthey'll say I did it.
No, you asked them if theywanted mayo and ketchup with
their burger do you want atestimonial with that too, do
you want to uh, I don't know.
Do you want a social mediavideo too?
Then you're not actuallydiagnosing anything, you're just
order taking like a restaurantdo you want some fries?

when really you should be saying, hey, do
you want a gym memory?
like do you want supplements?
Yeah, yeah.
Do you want some?
something you want some vitaminslike and you're trying to give
them more fries.

We're going deep into this metaphor, but but
anyway yeah uh, but anyway,point is, I think there's um,
it's just a mindset changethat's the bottom of it and and
it's okay.
The thing thing is it's not toput anyone down.
It is especially like I said,when I started, I had moved away
from Orlando, I was in themiddle of nowhere and there was

(21:32):
barely like one to twoproduction companies there and
they were those old school, nogatekeeping.
I'm genuinely like, hey, I wantto reach out, I want to learn
more.
I'm starting this massiveproduction company Because, you
know, when I started I was likeI'm going to be huge, like
bringing in friends and familyand everyone into it.
Uh, point is I'm like, hey, Iwould love to get some guidance
or just talk in general, learnsome, you know, because what
you're trying to figure out atthat time is pricing, strategies

(21:54):
and deliverables and, uh, allthat you know, stuff that people
want to gatekeep and.
And so I had no knowledge.
So I had to stumble my waythrough freelancing what people
were paying me to, you know,think what their initial price
was, and then figure that out.
And luckily I was able to.
But at the end of the day, itwould have helped so much with

(22:15):
someone either being able tomentor me or at least being able
to listen here and now go, oh,I can charge $30,000.
And this is what thedeliverables I can anticipate
being able to having to provide,and it would help a lot, and so
I get it.
Not having the knowledge, butat the same time, you have to
change the mindset first.
Yeah.
All the knowledge can be gained.
There's enough people willingto share who are actually in the

(22:38):
industry, and not people whoare trying to, you know, make a
course, who have never run avideo production.
Please don't do that.
Yeah, there's so many of them.
Please verify who you'relearning from.

Yeah, make sure they actually have a
production company.
You will become who you listento.

A hundred percent exactly a hundred percent of the
time because because my wholething is and there's nothing
wrong with a production companyowner also trying to teach you
but very few production companyowners have even time to make
courses, because that becomesanother business.
You have to now market it anduh you know promote it, and all
that.
Now you're taking time awayfrom production.
At the end of the day, ifyou're learning from someone,
you want the latest and thegreatest knowledge on how to run

(23:16):
this video business yeah, youknow that the field that we're
in, so something that's like Iwas thinking about when you were
.

You were talking about that was as a
production company owner.
Like I don't just do this year,this year's actually gonna be
crazy.
Sorry if I go all over theplaces, because I'm just, yeah,
I am all over the place, that'sokay.
I mean, we can go anywherethat's like who I am, but like.

I don't even know who's listening to this.
I hope somebody is, yeah,somebody's listening.
I mean, there's already so muchknowledge has been shared, so
hopefully they can benefit fromit.

So this year I'm learning because you brought
up something that was reallyinteresting.
You said, oh, a productioncompany owner, like running
running courses, is a completelydifferent thing.
But something I learned whileasking my clients a ton of
questions like who's your idealcustomer, like who's all this?
I'm like who's my idealcustomer?

(24:15):
what are their pain points?
What are the?
Because I and this was given tome by my mentor and someone
probably gave gave it to him, um, but there was a whole list of
questions that I now ask myclients that are so
thought-provoking.
For me they werethought-provoking I was like so
I started answering them formyself and I would.

(24:35):
It was nuts, because I was likewait, I know how to target my
target audience yeah I knowwhich kind of client I want.
I know all this different stuff.
My target audience yeah, I knowwhich kind of client I want, I
know all this different stuff.
So, on the flip side, I had todo content for myself, because
I'm offering my clients all ofthese different packages on how

(24:56):
to target their ideal audience,ideal customer, and I'm like,
wait, their ideal customer iskind of close to mine.

Yeah, and you're not doing it for yourself and
I'm not doing it for myself.

So one thing I'm only one person, so I only
have enough time to do a couplethings and I'm not even that
competent.
You're being humble.
So I do get overwhelmed prettyeasily, like on a real level,
even if someone's hearing thisand it's like, oh, someone's
hearing this, you know, and likeit's like, oh, he's making over
six figures and whatever theheck, and which isn't a ton, a

(25:30):
ton of money as a videoprofessional, I think you can
make a lot, but it's.
I was just yeah, I'm not the,I'm not the most, most I'm
pretty scatterbrained, like I'mnot super organized, like all
that stuff.
I'm now hiring somebody to editall of my content everything so
I can post it but,I, here's the thing it's, and

(25:53):
thank you like, yes, it it doeshave some level of intelligence,
but all I'm doing is exactlywhat I'm doing for my clients,
like I'm, I'm taking all thestuff, all the bts, all that
stuff, and I'm because I don'tedit everything that my clients
give me.
I have an editor that I'vetrained, that I've made sure

(26:14):
he's as close as possible to myediting style, and then I, I
finish it, but my editor is nowjust editing my content.
Yeah, yeah.

I mean, hey, that is very smart, Take credit,
because the best thing I everdid is guess what?
Yeah, same thing.
I started video company rightand again, to be real, people
were so cynical.
You know I'm in the middle ofnowhere.
And then first week, when Iclosed 3040 and business three
days, not even a week.

That is so not normal for anybody listening
.
That is not no, if you do, ifyou do the right thing.

It is possible, but anyway, coming back to what
I'm saying is so initially,guess what?
It was my plan to editeverything.
Right, because that's how weall start.
And then I go crap, I can't dothat.
I started to edit first videoand I'm like, uh, now I'm not
selling anything, I'm notworking on the business.
You know, we do a lot more thanjust just making videos.
You have to be you knowaccountant, you have to be your

(27:09):
PR person, you have to be yourown I don't know marketing
person or whatever, whatever,whatever.
So, anyway, point is, the bestthing I could ever do was,
initial I was like oh no, I haveto let go, and I'm a control
freak, you know.
So it's like I want to controlthe edit.
So the best thing I could do,like you said, is find an editor
, make sure they they do exactlywhat I want to do, or at least
as close to it, and then let go,because otherwise I would have

(27:32):
never been able to scale.
At that point I would have justflattened or even gone down now
you're stuck in days and days,you know, editing something,
yeah.
So that's very smart that you'redoing that, because now you can
free that time to be far moreeffective.
Oh, absolutely.

And I've something I've seen as a video
business owner, as a businessowner in general, I've and it's
crazy, Cause now I talk likethis, like it's really, it's a
real thing.
Like who?
No, no, no, no no, not this.
I've always talked like that,I've always used my hands, but
like, really, who you listen tois like who you will become

(28:06):
period, like that is just.
You might not think it, butyou'll slowly but surely so.
I do listen to, uh, businessowners and entrepreneurs, like
like alex harmosi and differentpeople in that genre and stuff,
and they talk about their timeand how much your hour is worth
and how valuable your time is.
So I've noticed how much more Ican do in four hours of

(28:32):
building my business, whichsometimes seems like monotonous,
it seems like stupid work.
Honestly, at the end of the day, a couple times when I was
doing this out of discipline, Iwas like I didn't do anything.
Today, yeah, and like four hoursof building my business, I'm
like setting up a couple systemsand like different things.
Like that I'm like this is thedumbest, like I could be.

(28:54):
I could have finished a wholeproject, you know and like.
But I've seen over the it'salmost like working out or
eating healthy.
Eating healthy is probably abetter, better analogy, because
working out you see a pump, butlike eating healthy, you don't
initially, initially like youactually you feel after a week?

yeah, you initially don't.
You feel it after a?

week, but immediately after eating, like,
while you're eating, uh, junkfood, you feel so it's so much
more enjoyable.
Yeah, but over the long, overthe course of time, it you get
so much more results out ofeating healthy, and that's what
building my business was.
So I've seen the value of myhour increase way more.

(29:35):
Actually, building my business,setting up systems, doing a
couple different things thatseem really annoying.
I'm not, like I said, I'm notan organized person.
I'm not super attention saidI'm not an organized person.
I'm not super, uh, attention todetail in that way.
I'm more so attention to detailcreatively.
So when I figured that that wasmore important, I was like all
right, let me delegate this, letme delegate this, let me let me

(29:57):
spend two hours teaching myeditor how to do this specific
thing so I'll never have to doit again.

Exactly, no, that's smart and and and once
you get, obviously if you'restruggling to pay your bills,
obviously focus on that gettingthe clients but once you're
there, absolutely we don't valuethat immediately.
Yeah, and I get it because I'mlike I want to go get out more
clients or I want to make morevideos.
But if you look back, the besttime spent was always anytime
automating or streamlining aprocess in the business, because

(30:23):
now you don't have to do thatagain.
Like, for example, I'll giveone is for me, proposals.
Initially, you know I wouldspend so much time creating a
proposal and then and I hadthose fancy and again, nothing
wrong with them.
You do impress the client, youknow making fancy proposals.
But then I was like, if they'rerepeat clients, why am I

(30:46):
spending this much time?
So I built templates Iliterally have and then now all
I do is, if I have a templateand again, at this point I've
done majority of the things so Ijust literally go copy paste,
or sometimes I even have themfully created like packages,
right, and it saved me so muchtime.
But when I was doing it I waslike this is so tedious, this is
so boring, why am I wasting mytime, my time?
But at the end, now that I'veused it because I've had the
same proposal software at thispoint for three to four years it

(31:08):
saved me so much time.
Yeah, um, so, anyway.
So working on your business isactually very essential, but
then it gives you more time inthe future and to do stuff like
at the end of the day, I'm nottrying to work more yeah, plus
you've got a kid and yeah, I'mnot, I'm not trying to.

Honestly, I'm not trying to.
I do hustle and I guess mybrain's always working at.
My wife tells me like, oh, youwork so much.
I tell, I tell my wife I'm like, oh man, I'm so lazy.
And she's like lazy, are youcrazy?
What's wrong with you?
Like you're, you're literally,you're always working, you're
always thinking about your work,but at the end of the day, I'm
trying to free up my time, yeah,like my time with my.

(31:45):
I don't want to get emotionalon this podcast.
Every time I talk about my son,like it's, like I've, I've, I.
I don't even want to say I'vebuilt a business.
I'm still building it becauseit's like I.
I may seem like I have a lot ofstuff together, but I don't
really have like every none ofus have it all yeah I'm I'm
figuring a lot of these thingsout, you know, and and I'm

(32:06):
completely okay with it, butI've built this business and I
don't.
I didn't build it so I can workin it.
I build it so I can have timeto like go out sorry, I'd tell
like go out with my son and likedo whatever my wife and go to
the beach on a Tuesday, you know, and like all these different

(32:28):
things.
And where I can shut, I want tobe able to turn off my phone.
Right now I can't turn off myphone because if I miss a call
from a client, I'm like screwedor like whatever.
if I a closing call and I wantto be able to do those stuff
where I have people in the backend like working it, yeah.
I want to be able to do thosestuff where I have people on the
back end, like working it yeah,I want to be replaceable, you

(32:50):
know so for me, obviously,that's like that is a couple
years down the line, but that'smy goal, that that's something
that that, uh really helped me.
I mean, actually I I do want tomake a whole video on this, but
like knowing my why as abusiness owner was huge, yeah.

Huge, huge, and that's a huge motivation factor,
believe it or not.
It was very similar motivationsfor why I started it.
Because I was.
I had a kid.
Right, I had one kid at thattime and I'm seeing her growing
up and I'm like you're tellingme I have to be miserable, I'm
going to get up in the morningand money was good the job I had

(33:27):
and I was doing video on theside.
So you're telling me I have togo get up in the morning, go to
this stupid job, go be miserable.
Come home at night I'm soexhausted and all my daughter
wants to do is play with me andI'm just like let daddy go to
sleep.
And then, sure, you're like, oh, you have the weekend.
But now I'm like I want topursue my passion and go film
stuff.
And it's like, uh, so I and Ididn't want to make that choice.

(33:50):
I didn't want to make thatchoice with family, um, and
between family and fun and orwhatever.
Whatever gives makes me happy.
And then the other thing was, uh, what ends up happening is, um,
lost my train of thought.
But yeah, no, anyway.
So and then I was like I, Idon't want to be miserable a
doing this.
And then I want to do what Ienjoy, uh, but on top of that, I

(34:11):
don't want my daughter to growup and be like my dad wasn't
around and you know and I knowsome kids respect it obviously
like my dad was working all thetime.
You know he had a business.
So I'm like, oh, you know he'sworking, but I was like, uh,
anytime you want to take avacation, like you said, you
have to not go to your boss, butlike, can I get pto?
I still remember being like,hey, I need to take some time,
and they go no, you're verynecessary, and you know what I
mean.
Like you care and I'm likeyou're essential, yeah and I'm

(34:34):
like I can't, I can't go to youknow, like you know to any.
Just I can't be spontaneous,that's my style yeah and you
know what I love.
Like now I can just hop out todisney world, let's just go to
magic kingdom, let's do whatever, right, we can't, we couldn't
do that.
So, anyway, the freedom that wehave with what we do, we make
our own schedules.
Man, that was game changing andthat's why, to be real sure, I

(34:55):
worked miserable hours and Iworked my ass off.
I work harder now, I work waylonger hours now as a business
owner, but it doesn't feel likeit Because guess what and that's
why I've had this happen wherebuddies are like they need help
on a project, like, can you be aDP or whatever they're like can
you manage this?
I'm like, yes, as long as yourproject sounds fun, I make my
own schedule.
I can absolutely clear threedays for you.

(35:18):
You know, you see what I'msaying.
And the same time, with my kids, if my, my kids are like, dad,
we want to go disney, it's likehold on a minute, let me see my
calendar.
Obviously some meetings youcan't change, but most times I'm
like sure, let's go right, or,or let me clear up my schedule
anyway, or we could do the nextday, yeah, or whatever, but that
being able to like or beingable to go on vacation.
So we hadn't been to be real.
I was so focused in business.

(35:38):
I'm taking them on a realvacation because to me, disney
world is whatever, but it's nota vacation when you live here,
right?
So I finally took my family ona cruise earlier this year
that's such a that's such avipple thing to say.

I'm gonna just be honest, I'm gonna keep
going, keep going.

I don't mean it.
I don't mean to throw you off.
I was able to take them on acruise and I love that being
able to.
Which crazy I still worked.
It was so funny.
I thought I was going to beable to take a week off or
whatever, but I was stillgetting client calls and emails
but I was able to just take thetime off.
I'm like okay let's go on aninternational cruise for eight
days, so anyway.
So I completely feel you, man,that to be.
That was my motivation too, andI'm not.

(36:16):
I'm not trying to.
You know I love this, obviously.
I want to do this, but I don'twant to sacrifice family for
this.
You know what I mean.

Yeah, Well, that's this.
So I hear people it's funnywhen you're not making money.
You think the things thatpeople that are making money say
are stupid.
Does that make sense?
Like, and that was like themost podcasting yeah, that was

(36:48):
the most podcasting, but it'strue's true.
Like I used to hear people thatlike make a lot of money.
I used to hear that they wouldsay about time and reading books
and all that stuff and knowyour why and and like have goals
and just like whatever.
And I would hear that I'm likeyou're a tool yeah, but here I
am making like 40k a year, 50k ayear because I didn't get it,
and the people that are there,they know what it takes to get

(37:09):
there.
I think it's very, very, veryimportant for videographers to
know their why, because thenthey'll at least have direction
on what to do to get there.
And then at that point it'sactually your fault if you don't
get there, like it's eithernegligence or whatever.
But a lot of times and this isI'm speaking from experience a

(37:30):
lot of times videographers don'tdo anything because they either
don't know how to do it or theydon't even know what they need
to learn to do.

Yeah, and a lot of these courses are just telling
them one strategy, and even ifthat works.
There's so many different ways.
Just on this few episodes thatI've done, you've learned so
many different ways of beingable to market yourself.
Yeah, so, from all the way toboots on the ground, shaking
hands you know coffees toautomating your ads, there is

(38:02):
not just one strategy.
And you said it perfectly youhave to first know what to do.
Second, I think you have tohave the desire to want to do it
.
You know it takes, because a lotof people tell me and it's a
common thread, you know NewYear's resolution people go I'll
do this and people don't do it.
The truth is, there's never theright time right.

(38:23):
Something is always going wrong, either in your life or the
world.
So don't wait for the perfectmoment.
Don't say, oh, in three months,in six months, this will be
better or I can start If you'reready.
Start Now.
That doesn't mean quit your jobcompletely and you know if your
bills to pay, but nothing stopsyou today from registering your
LLC or whatever however youwant to legal structure your

(38:44):
business you're starting that.

You know you want a crazy like vulnerable
thing yeah so I just started myllc like three days ago enough.

So are you sole proprietor?
I was a sole proprietor, funnyenough, I did that.
So, and and again, there's thefour years, yeah, no, three
years.
Three years, no, four yearsrunning a business so here's my
side I did this well, not for 40bro, it's crazy bro, but here's
the other side.
There's nothing wrong with againnot doing an llc.
The opposite side of thisbecause I had done many.

(39:13):
As you can't tell, I'm anentrepreneur, so I was always
doing businesses and then Ilearned my lesson because you
know, obviously some work, somedidn't work.
So when it came to video thiswas first time doing something
I'm passionate about I was likeI'm not even going to take the
risk, because as soon as you dollc, you have so many taxes and
processes and procedures andminutes and stuff that you got
to take care of.
I don't even know that, but Idon't want to talk exactly no,

(39:34):
no, that's okay.
And then people don't know, itdoes hit you the first time I
purchased my llc.
It was so cool.
I have a company and then youstart getting with these taxes
and and rules and minutes and,like I said, things that you
have to follow through with, uh,you don't do that anyway.
Um, and that's what I'm saying.
My first llc, I immediately dids corp and, because you know,
that's the cool thing, and thenI'm like I'm not paying myself,

(39:54):
why am I doing s car anyway?
so I was smart about it becauseI I was like testing it.
So first six months, uh, I onlydid sole proprietorship, and
that's okay.
When I knew cause you know,obviously he'll live with the
revenue I was like duh, I got tomake this into an LLC and
obviously the LLC bought the.
You know the legal structure.
But the point is that's okaytoo.

(40:16):
I'm saying it's it's long.
Obviously it's not legally best.
I'm not a lawyer, not legaladvice, but it's okay again,
it's better to just get started.
Yeah, just do it.
I think that's the main thing,and you're gonna fail.
It's okay, as long as you keeppushing through it and you make
an effort to actually go out andtalk to people who are where

(40:37):
you want to be.
I, I don't think this is hard.
Let's be real.

It is hard, but it's not that hard you need
you really do need to know whatyou need to learn, like you need
to know what to learn that.

So what do they need to learn?

let's go deep into it, because again, people
are listening yeah, yeah.
So I think, well, one you, youneed to know your why.
First, that that's as a humanbeing you need to know your why
and you don't need to figure itall out in its entirety.
But before you do this, or ifyou need to know your why and
you don't need to figure it allout in its entirety, but before
you do this, or if you want tobe successful in this and you
don't want to ruin your actualwhy, because I feel like your

(41:12):
why is like deep in theresomewhere I'm, I'll get into the
heart stuff of all this butlike your.
Why is somewhere in there?

yeah, it's like a deep desire and it can be money.
I want you to know because ifthey just want to make money,
there's hundreds of businessesthat are easier to make money
than video.
Please do that In video.
You have to have some sort oflove or something, some reason
to just want to pursue videofirst.
And here's the thing.

If you're wise just to make money, that's
okay.
But I would just like I wouldask a client a little bit more
questions and be like I wouldask a client a little bit more
questions, like and be like heywell, why do you want to make
more money?
Or like what's good money goingto buy you and why is that make
you happy?
Like I would ask yourself thosequestions because then you can
know okay, this is actually thereal thing.
Yeah, cause sometimes it mightnot be money that gets you there

(42:00):
, it might be something else andyou'll know how to pivot.
Whatever that gets you there.
It might be something else andyou'll know how to pivot
whatever.

But I think that's a big thing.
Second one is learn your offer.
It's important to have a goodoffer.

You need to have a good offer and you need
to learn how you're going tohelp your clients, because if
you don't, if you don't know howto help your clients, listen,
now I'm hiring people for mybusiness and to help my business
and structure and get thingsorganized.
I drill them.
I'm about to give them my money.
I worked hard for this stuff.
Like they need to prove it.

(42:33):
They need to prove to me thatthey're going to help me and
they need to have a good.
It needs to be persuasive,exactly, and they need to build
confidence with me.

No, I think that's great get get your, get your uh
offer, then get your also getyour social proof and if you
don't have it, that's okay.
In the new, when you're new, youdon't have it.

Do you do s free?

yeah, exactly, there's nothing wrong.
People get a very gung-ho aboutfree stuff yeah now I have very
strong feelings as in I'm allfor if somebody says, come work
for free for me.
Don't do it, because then therelationship isn't great built
up free.
Yeah, but there's, it's thefunny enough, it's just slight
change of dynamic.
If you say, hey, anthony, letme come work free for you,

(43:18):
that's okay because you're uh,and then offer them something in
return, hey, can I come work onyour set?
You don't have to pay me.
How about I do BTS for you?
Right, and obviously Anthonywill vet you first, but as long
as he feels comfortable, I'msure you're okay bringing them
on.
Just get a camera and get BTS,exactly.
So, yeah, I would saydefinitely, there's nothing
wrong with working for free.

(43:38):
Go out, find the people thatyou want to be with but also
offer some sort of value to them.
And then you offer that that wasthe dynamic in the relationship
is great.
Where you're like look, I'llcome work for free and I will
offer you ABC, whatever.
So they are also gettingsomething out of it.

Yeah and okay .
So the cause, that's actually.
I love that.
That second question, rightbefore this one that you asked
like right before this one thatyou asked like okay, well, what
are, what are things that youneed to learn?
I think I could list them out,maybe in like four.
Okay, so if you're avideographer and you need to
take oh well, I don't even knowwhat to learn, it's overwhelming

(44:14):
Like one.
It's definitely not the nextcamera and next lens, but, uh,
know your why, like why you'retrying to build a business, know
how you're going to help yourclient, which means get good at
sales period.
Just go courses, get on salescalls, like just get good at

(44:39):
sales.
Whatever you have to do, youwill think you won't thank me,
because you're probably notwatching this podcast but just
get good at sales.
Do whatever you can to get goodat sales.
And the last one is obviouslyperfect your craft, but I think
that's the last one.

Exactly Because here's the different way I'll
tell you.
Obviously, generally, peopleget into this fail love video
and they want to perfect theircraft.
But you are better off learningsales than perfecting your
craft, because here's one wayyou can make good money today,
as long as you go out, followthese strategies that Anthony is

(45:15):
giving you and go find a client, and obviously you have to be
confident because they can seethrough you.
But if you're genuine about it,because you genuinely have a
plan, if you go there, you sellthem a solution to their problem
.
Guess what you can do?
You can find the right videoperson in your town, in your
community, and hire them toactually provide the solution.
And you make money today.

(45:36):
That's crazy.
Whatever they charge.
You charge your 20%, 40%,whatever your profit range is on
top of that and you make moneytoday and obviously, if you love
video and if you don't, thereyou go.
There's a business.
But if you do now, you can payattention and you can learn what
they're doing, how they'redoing all of that on the spot.

Those are business and life skills.
Those are things that you'lltake forever.
It's like communication andsales, like if you have those
two things and then you knowyour why, you know what your
offer is and then you perfectyour craft.
Like what you were saying, Ididn't think that way.
What you're saying is like Ididn't even.
I just started thinking aboutthat, like that probably two,
three months ago, where I couldjust hire someone.

Yeah, I make most of my money no, not most, a
decent amount of money, andhere's the reason.
Okay, I want to answer that,because a lot of people then go
oh then why wouldn't they justhire that person or that person?
Yeah.
And that's that low level right, that you're not thinking like
the business owner.
They're not hiring me becausethey, like I don't know my

(46:37):
camera operation better than theother people they've added
they're hiring me becausesomebody told them usually at
least for me that Vipple orBindra Productions made us money
, right, their videosrepresented my brand better, or
whatever ABC, or they helped myrecruitment or whatever.
Whatever they were looking for.
But they come as a warm lead sothey want to work with me for

(46:58):
reliability.
When clients hire me, they knowwe're going to show up rain,
tornado, whatever.
Then they know the footage isgoing to be captured.
Nobody's going to accidentallydelete it.
They know it's going to bebacked up.
They know the video is going tolook like I promised them what
it's going to look like, despitethe challenges on set which
will happen, you know, arepeople calling in?
There's going to be enoughcameras that I promised they're

(47:20):
going to have.
I hope that makes it.
It's the reliability, yeah soso don't get into that mindset,
because but a lot of times I'mthe producer, right, and if they
come to me and they have abudget and I'm like, well, I
don't have a budget for me tofly in, or I have a bigger
project that I need to be at, soguess, what.
I'll do.
I'll find another owner,operator or a buddy of mine and
be like look, this is what therequirements are.

(47:41):
But obviously you don't have tobe this much.
I'm more pre-production.
So I'll even tell them I wantthis settings, this frame rate,
this, this.
And then you just go capture itand they're happy because now
you're helping the economy andthe other creator community.
But then on the other side, I'mobviously taking a cut because
I did work on it and I'moffering my reliability Because,

(48:01):
guess what, if this persondoesn't show up, it's not their
head on the table, it's mine,and that is why clients would
work.
So get off that thought processthat clients will directly work
with them or whatever.
That's the low level, I think.
Think mindset where you're,like, so afraid to lose clients?
No, and plus most of my friends, I know.
I'm happy to do it, I've doneit for adam, I'm happy to put on

(48:22):
other person's shirts and gowhy wouldn't I man?
I want to help my friends growso most people are okay and it's
extra.

I mean, at the end of the day it is extra
money without the headache ofclient.
Exactly.
You've done it for me, you'vehelped me out, so everyone will
do it.

I mean not everyone, but most people will.
Plus, it's a collaborativeindustry.
Anyway, you help me, I help you, right, and we all grow
together.
So, anyway, we need to just getagain coming back to what we
started with, get out of thatmindset.
We have to change that andthink like a business owner and
not, uh, not think like thatscarcity mindset that you know,

(48:59):
oh, if I lose this, I'm notgonna have any there's enough
work for everyone there's somuch work, yeah, so what were
the four things?
let's uh quickly go over them,so the know the why yeah, so.

So if you're a videographer, you want to
start, or if you you need toknow what to learn to build your
business, I would say know your, why, the core of your being.
Know your why while you'redoing this.
Know your offer, meaning howyou're going to help your
clients.
That means, learn what yourclients need and build an offer.

(49:32):
Get good at sales whatevercourses, whatever the heck.
Get good at sales practice.
You find someone that's goodand convincing.
Tell them to teach you, or tellthem, or try and sell to them
and say, hey, uh, can you tellme how much I suck at sales?
They'll tell you.
And communication, and then Ithink the fourth thing at the

(49:57):
end is perfect your craft.
You know that's something youcould do along the line
throughout the entire thing.

Biggest thing.
Most filmmakers are cameranerds People.
You know how much I lovecameras.
Lighting and sound makes abetter video than any camera.
Nowadays, almost cameras aregood enough, unless you're at
that high level.

But even then , it's a given what camera
you're using.

Please learn lighting.
And again, which is what I wantto jump into next.
This is perfect segue, becauseyou have a YouTube channel, sir
yeah, and you are teachingpeople how to light.
Yeah so first, I want to let'sstart at the beginning of that.
What made you want to startyoutube?

uh, I love youtube okay you're like me, I
just I love.
I love youtube.
I love watching youtubers talkabout stuff.
Um, honestly, it's funny.
My my biggest dream startingyoutube was like I would love to
get free gear.
That was just because everyonethat I talked to about my

(50:56):
youtube channel they're like, orabout gear that they sent, or
or like oh that's so sick, howmuch did it cost?
Like I don't know.
They sent it to me.
I like their.
There was like.
Their first response is oh mygosh, you're so lucky.
I need to start a youtubechannel because I love free gear
.

Holy smokes, there's nothing wrong with free
gear, dude.
I bought every single thing Ihave on with my own money and
I'm over half a million dollarsinto it.
So, please, free year would benice, but go ahead I don't.

I don't know if you can get half a million,
but I listen.
I love free gear super excited.
But I'm so glad my, my, Isurpassed that dream because I
would not be doing it.
I would not be doing youtubenow and even times I want to
quit if I was still thinkingabout free gear, because it's so
much work and so many peoplewant to send you gear.

(51:49):
A lot of times you don't needthe crap that they're trying to
offer to send you.
So why I started YouTube wasfor that.
Why I'm doing YouTube now isI've noticed it build my brand.
I've noticed it make more, makeme more money, and it's what I
would do for my clients.
People listen to me Like they.
They.
They watch the behind thescenes videos, they watch all
these different things andthey're getting value from it.

(52:11):
And they're getting value fromit and they're immediately
trusting me, before they evenget on the phone with me.
Yeah, so then, by the time Iget on the phone, even though
they're a cold lead no onereferred them they're a warm
lead yeah, because they alreadyfeel like, they know, like they
trust you.

Video works, they know me yeah, and and um, which
the parasocial relationship thatthey build with you.
Right, anyway, uh, which I knowsubscribers is an arbitrary
number, but it does make youlook like an authority.
How many subscribers do youhave on there?

yeah, I was.
So we're close to 8 000 rightnow.
Look at that 8 000 people andby we I mean me.
I don't know why I said it waslike like I have this whole team
.

It's literally just me but hey, you're, you're
doing great, you're givingpeople advice, and what I love
about you is that you're you'renot, um, uh, peddling you know
the same nonsense I find, uh, onyoutube because you know
there's there's a lot of goodcontent, but you have to pass
through a lot of nonsense.
You're like you said, you'reactually testing, you're
practicing your craft and nowyou're just sharing what you

(53:06):
learned.
Obviously you get some goodfree stuff out of it.
Why not, right?

yeah, I get paid for it too, like there's
sometimes sponsors too rightthere's sponsors.
Um, honestly, I wouldn't beable to invest as much time like
I would hear this phrase thatyoutubers say a lot.
They're like, oh well, use thelinks down below, like it really
supports this channel and helpsit going.
So we could keep making videoslike yeah, yeah, now I get it.

(53:31):
Now I'm like, okay, well, yeah,actually it does, because I'm
not gonna invest 15 hours fornothing yeah and when I say
nothing I mean like no immediatereturn, because that 15 out now
that I think about my hour evenmore so than before like my
hour is no longer 200, 250, itis no longer worth 200, 250.

(53:54):
Like when I'm just a DP or I'mjust a camera operator.
I would never charge that for acamera operator, but like
that'd be very high.

It's like, just like as a.

DP or something, or a director or
whatever the heck it is.
It's no longer that.
It's much more Cause I could beusing that to build my business
or spend time with my familyyeah exactly that's.
That's priceless.
So, uh, yeah, I do see the, the, I do have sponsors, I do have
ways of generating income, uh,from youtube and I'm, I don't

(54:26):
know, I, I, it makes sensesometimes.

I want to quit, bro, I'm gonna be honest,
because it's a lot make youmoney.
Is it good money or no, or isit just paying for itself?

well, last year, well, no, no money really
goes into it, besides time,which time is?
Money, but the biggest yeah,you can't get it back um, but
last year I think I made 23 24000 from youtube, that's still
some plus year right.

Are you counting?

yeah, oh my gosh, I did not count, because I
showed up, okay.

So this happened, what?
Not even a couple weeks ago, Ineeded to buy something from you
, like a road, uh, transmitter,whatever, either way, and you're
like, hey, look at this lightbecause and I'm genuinely
considering infinimat.
So it was very similar to what Iwas thinking about anyway yeah
you're like it's a four by fourinflatable from Godox and I'm
like that sounds really great.
Anyway, point is, and then I'mlooking up I'm like, oh, that

(55:16):
may interest.
And it's like five grand andyou're like, yeah, they just
sent it to me, or four grandwhatever.
But I'm like that's incredible.
And again, there's more to it.
Obviously you're putting yourtime and energy, it's not
technically free gear, but what?
But what I'm trying to get tois that's still incredible for
somebody who has to buy everytiny thing with their own money.

That was one of the largest items that I've
received.
I just want to say it's notusually, it's funny that company
I'm not going to say who it was, but that company.
They initially reached out tome offering me these tiny lights
, like 60 watt lights, and I waslike no, and they wanted a
dedicated video.

(55:55):
We want a whole dedicated video, which for me that means a lot
more time and it means moreexposure to my audience.
So if I'm like each video thatI put out, I want it to like
bring value to my audience.
If I'm just making videos aboutevery stupid little piece of
gear, like whatever chinesecompany reaches, out to me.
Then I'm like my audience isgonna know this is crap, you

(56:15):
know, or so every time I put outa video that might not bring
value, it's a risk for meexactly.

You don't want to alienate your audience so you
will you know work so hard tobuild so?

all these yeses that I had to say, they
were trying to send me a 60 wattlight and I was like now, uh,
they're like, oh well, we havethis other light.
It's like, is there anything onthe website that interests you?
And I noticed that they hadthat.
They just came out with thislight.
Man, that's a lot of money,it's like 3 500 bucks tax, and
I'm like it's a lot, it's gonnabe a lot of money for that.

(56:47):
And they like sent me a coupleother attachments and then, um,
they said, yeah, they're like,oh yeah, we actually needed uh,
yeah, because I didn't knowabout it.

No, and I'd like to very much keep up with the
most of the gear that comes outnobody knows about the site so
when you did I was like, oh,that's incredible, because you
know it's, I would call it veryclose to an infinimat, at least
competitor in that four by fourrange and uh, my issue with
infinimat is just how bulky itis to carry the whole oh my god,
the balance is huge, yeah and Iwas like the whole point is to

(57:19):
carry a 4x4, foldable,inflatable light is to be light
and small.
And I saw and I was very muchinterested in the 4x4 and the
8x8.
But when I saw I was like thisballast is massive, the case is
massive, the whole I I don'tknow they were.
They were not trying to targetme, they were trying to get
rental houses.

Yeah, and even then, as somebody who does
rent from rental house, I'm likethat is too big it would take
too much space on the van so Imean, I would think it would
make sense if you need it forlike a tight space, because it's
beautiful that, like using thatlight.
Did you watch the video?

yeah, yeah, I saw the video and then I also saw it
in person.
But the other thing is um here.
Here's the funny, that thisother one is similar.
Uh, obviously I didn't.
I didn't put a color meter toit, so I don't want to comment
on it, but your video lookedgreat, but also it's so much
smaller, like, oh yeah, compactand and I thought I thought it
was huge.

Yeah, I like no in my, I thought it was huge,
but then when you startcomparing it to other things,
yeah, and you actually had spacein the case.

So I'm like, oh, you could throw a couple more
lights.
Yeah, here's your lighting kit.
Yeah, and one case you now havea massive, a four by four key
light.
That that's incredible that youbring.
You could just roll into yourtesla whatever and just go to a
shoot like that's incredible.
I have to bring a freaking vanto be able to, to bring four by
fours, you know, yeah, yeah no,I mean it's cool.

So youtube has has been like obviously
beneficial.
Um, I've been trying to shapemy voice on youtube.
I don't think I I'm gonna saythis like for me's.
I'm like a little brash ingeneral, like my person really
I'm a little, I'm a little uh uh, I wouldn't say abrasive, but

(59:02):
I'm like I I do like telling ithow it is, because I like being
told how it is, you know, andand no, I like real people.

That's why we, but we clicked immediately.
I was like, I like.

I'd rather you be you than some fake no and
and it's it's annoying whenpeople I don't want to get into
this too much, but it's annoying, like when I have to like cut
through fluff.
I'm like all right, well, tellme how you really think, like
well that's probably why I'm aperson.
But I'm Like just tell me whatyou're thinking Like all that
stuff.

(59:31):
Like sometimes I like that withclients and I need to learn, I
need to learn.
There's a nicer way to say it,but the same thing Not like that
.

The real deal, what you think I need to learn
from you on that.

You said something earlier, I was like I
would never, say that.
What you said but it was sonice.

I was like what, what did I say?
Now, I don't know about theirdocumentary thing.

You're like yeah I don't want to tell them
the term and that.

No, that's just because to me, and I'll tell you
why- there's beautiful tryingto be nice that be trying to be
fake.
That's me just trying to notsound condescending, because to
be real people have done that,let me be real, obviously.
Um, you know, I'm indianoriginally and people speak, um.
You know english fine in ind,but English is not my first
language, right?
It's my second language, sosometimes some words are

(01:00:16):
pronounced wrong or whatever andI hate it when people go now
it's one thing you don'tunderstand, it's okay to be like
, hey, what do you mean?
But if you get it, and then Ihate when people correct me, I'm
like if you understand it, ohit's not this, it's this.
I'm like like so you understoodme then shut up.
You know what I mean.
Like let's move on.

(01:00:36):
We're having a conversationhere you just destroy the whole
flow.
So anyway, coming to this, Igenuinely care about my clients
and I genuinely want to helpthem.
Otherwise I wouldn't.
This wouldn't be.

Anthony Rodriguez (01:00:46):
This would become a job immediately
otherwise you're a peacemakeryeah, at the same like you're.
You're not trying to to to stirthe boat while at the same time
directing.
You're like you're a peacemaker.
Yeah, at the same like you're.
You're not trying to to to stirthe boat while at the same time
directing.
You're like you're creating.

Vipul Bindra (01:00:56):
At the end of the day, my goal was to make them
the video they wanted, and if itwas a documentary or or
whatever corporate documentary,whatever we're going to call it,
me teaching them the lingoisn't going to solve the
solution at the end day.
What I wanted to do was figureout what they wanted.
Now, where I would have failedwas if I'd made them a recap
video.
And as soon as I figured it out, I could approach it two ways.

(01:01:18):
Right, I could either go into awhole spiel on uh, you know
what the correct term is and Ithink, no matter how deeply uh
good place I come from, it'sgonna always sound condescending
to them, because they don'tgive a crap what I'm making,
they just want what they want.
It's like, you know, you go toan apple store and they give you
hey, here's the laptop.
Right, you're like I want the15 inch m1, whatever they're

(01:01:40):
like.
Here you go.
Imagine they went on a 20minute spiel on no sir, it's an
m1 max and it's a retina display, you know whatever.
And you would be like stop,stop condescending me, just give
me the fucking laptop anyway.

So that wasn't me being nice, but I do
see what you mean, yeah, I needto learn, like I need to learn
from that man and like, becausesometimes I'm like yeah, it's
just a little abrasive.
And and like I, I do need to tobe nicer because Because

(01:02:13):
sometimes I'm just like no.

And I've said it.

I've had clients.
Yeah, excuse me, I've hadclients that have asked for this
.
It's like oh well, I want this,this, and that we could do this
right, and they've already paidme for something.
I'm like no.

Oh really.

Yeah, I'm just like no, no, we can't like,
here's why.
But what?

are they being unreasonable?
Yeah, oh yeah, then I get itsee that see, that's not to me.

Rude, that's you but I want to be nicer
though.
I want to be like how would you?
Say it nicely though oh, iflike a client's asking for two,
well, I don't know, okay, I'mnot nice, I would say it.
I'll say and tell me if that'stoo extra nice.

I would say that that's outside the scope of the
work we discussed, but I'm happyto see how we can amend the
scope of work.
That's all I would say.

It's kind of like being political, oh my
goodness, don't call mepolitical.

I don't think I'm at all political.

Well, that's what politicians do?
They get a question, they getsomething that's like a little
whatever reporters trying toknock them off and they're like
look, they say what they'retrying to say, but they make a
big bush around it.

And then and then they like oh my goodness, I feel
a little attacked, but it'sokay, that's what.

That's what I do.
No, I I do that with my clients.
Sometimes I'm getting better atit.
I I don't want to paint thepicture that I'm terrible at it,
but like sometimes I have tosay they ask for certain things
and I'm trying to keep themhappy.
So I'm like, hey, look Well, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no
.
And then I'm like lightlytelling them they're wrong and
they're not going to get whatthey want.
Yeah, but in the nicest.

(01:03:49):
But sometimes you just have tobe clear about it.
Yeah, yeah yeah.

That they're not going.
I've had that Because you know,let's be real.
These are business ownersespecially the bigger they get
they want to push you around.
You have to set a fine linestand.
That's why I'm like I always docontracts.
Day one, I'll tell you thisYears and years ago this is
freelancing days Somebody.
And years ago, this isfreelancing days somebody wanted
to, and obviously I lovefilmmaking, right then time I
would have done anything.

(01:04:14):
Yeah, come film this for me.
I was like, absolutely, andmoney's not even a thing, right.
But I was like, okay, here'sthe contract and they go what.
We just want you to hold thecamera, whatever, whatever, plus
, it's free, like what.
I was like no, sir, I am notcoming, and I stood my you know,
like I put my foot in theground no, if you don't sign the
contract, I am not coming,because I want legal protection
that this is my footage.
You can just license it anyway.

(01:04:36):
Sorry, point I'm trying to makeis that you have to like go
this is it anyway, I don't usecontracts.

I don't use contracts, but literally on the
way here today I messaged callattorney no I messaged a buddy
of mine and I'm like, becausethere's there's a 15K deal on
the line.

Yeah, I know you mentioned it, so you may be
getting that call yeah, I wouldlove if you take it live.

Yeah, let me see if they called.
I actually haven't reallychecked my phone.
I've been trying to.
No, they haven't called.
I'll leave it here.
Is that on frame?
No, is that on frame?
No?
Okay, but I, I have that andI'm starting to get into more
retainer.
I'm trying to head towardsretainer.

(01:05:22):
Yeah, and I don't have acontract and that's impossible,
that's that is the dumbest thingyou could possibly do.
So, uh, I don't want to be thedumbest person, so I messaged my
person, all the person.
So I messaged my person on theway here.
I messaged my friend.
I was like hey, bro, can yousend me that contract which I'm
probably going to talk to youabout?
contracts like I'm probablygoing to get some of those, but,
like I, I don't have a contractand I'm.

(01:05:45):
These are the systems gettingin place right now of like how
to pay on retainer, how to doall these different things,
getting automated proposals andstuff.
Like I really do want to beautomated.
And like hire VAs.
I definitely think you shouldhave a couple of VAs.
Yeah, no.

I'm telling you no , I have looked into WordPress.
I actually have a system now,so I have.
Tiffany.
So yeah, and I have a realassistant.

She's a real life one.

A real person.
But no, I mean yes, no,definitely that was necessary.
But coming back to it, yeah, Iwanted to talk about no, clients
will push you around.
Let's be real.
I don't want it to sound like,yes, clients, the more they pay,
they do get.
I find easier to work withbecause they let the expert be
the expert, but on the otherside, they will push you around.

(01:06:34):
I've had people actually andthis is why contracts are
necessary because I've hadclients sign contracts and then
pay.
You know, let's say I'll givethem the option hey, pay 50% or
whatever, and then not pay theother 50%, and then when you go
ask for it, they'll go, they'llmake up their own rules.
No, no, we were supposed to payper event, like we'll pay, like
they'll make a yearly contractor whatever.

(01:06:56):
I've had this happen recentlywhere they were like, oh, we'll
pay you, we pay before everyevent and I'm like here's the
contract, there you go.
This is what you signed.
It clearly says payment now andthen immediate due on.
You know this If you're notpaying, technically the
contract's not valid right yeahyou're not going to make
anything.
I mean that's just what it is.
I mean at the end of the day, uh, I mean, obviously I could take

(01:07:19):
them to small claims and allthat, but that's not worth it
for me, uh, but because wehaven't done any, uh, any work
towards those events, I'm notlosing anything.
Point I'm trying to make isthat's why, a I always collect
payment up front and, b I don'twant to even deal with the
payment issues which I want toget to, because I know you've
been talking about a paymentissue.
But anyway, we'll get there ina second.

I have a spicy story.
Yeah, I want to know the spicystory.

But same thing.
Having heard stories and thisis not just you, but from a
bunch of people, and, like Isaid, that's how I learned.
You know seeing, oh, thishappened to someone or whatever.
I don't want that to happen tome.
So it used to do 50 up frontand then 50 at delivery.
Then I changed that.
Now it's just either allhundred up front and, funny
enough, the bigger the contract,the easier, I find, the people
pay and then 50 at the time orno before to the shoot.

(01:08:07):
Otherwise we don't even show upfor shoot because I want to be
able to cover my costs I I'm notfloating money out of my pocket
for all my contractors and myeditors and stuff like that, and
I've had no pushback because,again, people who work with you
typically know that that's justhow it is, because it's in the
contract.
So I would highly recommend it.
But also, here's the othermistake I think people are

(01:08:28):
making nowadays They'll go tochat GPD or whatever, and it's a
good starting point.
There's nothing wrong withgoing to chat GPD and getting,
but I would highly recommendwork with a real attorney,
because there's clauses that youmay not even think about, like,
for example, one of the bestones that I have is called
artistic release.
Cause, let's be real, what we'redoing at the end of the day,
I'm giving them a video which isart.

(01:08:50):
Right, what I make is differentthan what you make, than anyone
else makes.
That's just what it is.
I mean, if same script we'llmake a different video and I
don't I've never had that happen, but I just don't want that to
happen they go.
I just didn't like that becausethat's just not the style, even
though we made sure, obviouslyupfront, that that's the style
we were going for.
Having that in there justclearly says like look, this is

(01:09:10):
artistic expression.
You know, you have seen ourprevious work, so you know what
we're going to create Cause, atthe end of the day, that could,
that can be an out like for notwanting to work with me or
whatever.

So do you have revisions?
Do you have like a a thing withlike revisions on your contract
?

What, how many revisions?
I only offer one revision.
But obviously there's clients,like government clients
especially, that want becauseyou know with them signing a
contract is such a process.
They're like you know, justgive us three revisions, that's
fine, we'll just add the cost.
I just don't like so.
Initially I used to do morerevisions and I find most people
do two or three revisions.
Here's what I found A that addsextra cost for no reason and B

(01:09:49):
my style is I'll call it.
Most people, you know, send adraft and a you know draft video
and then go from there.
My thing is, when I call it adraft, it's already fully done.
I don't send a video until it'slike I'm ready.
I'm okay if they publish it onthe internet and then I'll send
it, but I'll say this is mydraft.
And then here's, and now youhave one revision and you can do

(01:10:11):
whatever changes to it.
And that's my standard format.
And if they want obviouslyanymore they can buy them after
um at the hourly rate or theycan, uh, which, again, my
editing rate is very low.
We only charge 75 bucks an hourfor editing, which is very low,
in my opinion, for them to do.
Yeah, that's what I'm saying,that, yeah, I pay good rates to
my editors, so that's what it?
is.
It's just very good Anyway.

(01:10:33):
But again, most clients don'tdo, come back.
And actually, funny enough, Imake so much money from post
because here's the advantage ofbeing a production company.
I don't know if you've noticedthis yet.
You own all the data, right?
So client obviously hired you,let's say, for 10K project, two
deliverables.
You made the videos, you'redone.
Two deliverables you made thevideos, you're done.

(01:10:54):
And guess what happens?
Six months, 12 months later?
They always come back.
Hey, we want them captioned, orwe want to make social cuts out
of them, or we want to make arecut, or we want to update our
logo.
And now you can just build themfor the, for the editing hours,
75 times, whatever yeah and nowthat's extra thousands and
thousands of dollars that youcan keep making.
And I've had clients come backyears later and they'll stick
with me because, guess what, wehave their full archive.

(01:11:14):
So if they want to make anencompassing video for the last
three years what they've been upto, know their company and do
that because we have thatarchive.
So we can pull from our archive.
So, which is why I'm so againstselling um, you know, raw
footage, because a most peoplecan't work with.
I find log footage and stuff inthe corporate world.

That's why I always shoot in log.

Yeah, and so I'm like this is 10-bit log footage.

I mean I shoot in log for the image, but
I also shoot in log because well, no, I do mainly for the image,
but a side benefit is nobody'sgoing to use this footage.

So, if you want, somebody you're going to have to
have to I've had clientsliterally, and this is funny
again smaller guys go, pleasecan you not show it and log.
And then I'm like but then whyare you?
Because they want to use thefootage.
And I'm like but why are youthen hiring me?
There's so many othervideographers, just go hire them
, like yeah, you know it's notgonna do.
You want it to look as good yeah, that's what I'm saying, the
whole reason to hire us andagain, I personally am like log

(01:12:11):
and 10-bit gives you so muchflexibility in post.
My colors can't do anything ifI record already with you know,
709 baked in Anyway, but to mewhat we record is also an asset
that will come years and years.
It'll pay off, and it can't if,obviously, you just give it
away or also you don't store itor you lose it or whatever.

(01:12:32):
So anyway, at least that's thestrategies that I've been I've
been following, but anyway, Idon't want to backtrack because
I know you have that spicy story, but before that, would you say
, because there's something youare doing that I'm not doing.
You have a YouTube channel witha lot of following, do you, and
that builds credibility.
Do you think that's helpingbusiness?
Would you?
suggest other people do that.

Oh, this 15 K deal today is uh from you.

Look at that man.

It's, it's somebody that they've been, uh,
following my content.
I don't know why, cause theydon't do video, but they've been
like watching it.
And then, ooh, I have a.
This will actually be kind ofcool to listen to, this will
actually be kind of cool tolisten to.
And he said I could share this.
But someone, literally I metthem.

(01:13:19):
I sold them a lens they werebuying it for their kid and then
they were like man, I've beenwanting to do and I, whenever I
sell something, I'm always likehey, what do you do?
What do you do so I can closethem?

I'm just kidding.

So, I can just whatever.
Maybe I could help them or not.
But this one guy, this causethis is actually and it's crazy
cause this is live, like this islive, live.
Let me see if I can find it.

(01:13:52):
Maybe I'll find it at the endor something okay if you find it
, but the guy the guy literallysaid.
He was like oh man, I've beenlooking to do this myself and
and blah, blah, blah and I'mbuying all this gear.
I'm like researching what gearto buy because I'm like
videographers are expensive andI have this project in mind.

(01:14:14):
I want to do all this stuff.
I'm trying to learn it,whatever, because I always send
my YouTube channel.
When they're like hey, can yousend me your portfolio?
I send them Instagram websiteYouTube.
He's like, yeah, he sent meback the video and he said I
can't do this it was abehind-the-scenes video.

(01:14:37):
He's like but this is exactlywhat I want to get done for my
business.
And after watching your video Irealized there's no, I need you
, Exactly I need you to do this.
And I was like, oh, makes sense.
And he was like, yeah, Did helose the lens sale.

No, no, he bought the lens.
Oh, he got the lens.
This he bought.
He bought the lens.

Oh, he got.
This is this is after.
This is after.

He bought the lens , but he bought it for his son
because son is passionate and hewas like I want to no, that's
incredible and that's see,that's what I'm saying and I'm
so glad you are doing thatbecause, uh, and you could tell
people that I think it's alsookay to you know something like
that.
I'm not doing this in analternate way is to build an
audience because it builds yourcredibility.
It's a lot easier, especiallywith new clients.

(01:15:17):
Right, I'm relying on the thatwarm refer lead, which is harder
when it's new clients now,versus you, on the other hand,
have another way to be like look, here's the credibility piece
that you're looking for yeah sothey're more.
Uh, you know, okay with, becauseyou know let's be real, even
for a business, 10, 15, 20k is alot of money to spend,

(01:15:37):
especially with a new recordthat they don't know yeah, so so
that's great.
So I'm glad that's working outfor you.
Um, all right, let's move on tothat spicy story I want to know
on why you should havecontracts and payment terms in
place.

Uh, legally speaking anyway well, imagine
you spending 10 to 15 000 to$15,000.
I'm vetting the crap out ofthat person.
The water break, yeah, but yeah.
So the way I do my paymentstructure and I will never do it

(01:16:12):
differently unless it's alarger client corporate there is
actually a system in place.
Their butt's on the line isactually a system in place.
Their butt's on the line I havea contract in place Is 50% up
front and that's just to lock inthe date.
We're like, oh well, I'd liketo talk about the project, I'd
like to brainstorm and come upwith an idea and I'm like, yes,

(01:16:40):
after the 50% deposit, becausethat's part of my packages, it's
brainstorming, coming up withthe strategy and a plan to make
you more money, or or not justdirect money, but like generate
more awareness leads, whateverthe heck.
We end up coming up that youwant um, and then it's 50%, the
rest before the day of the shootor I'm not showing up, yeah, or

(01:17:02):
or if it's if, if, like, we'reclose and it's like some kind of
relationship, I will say it'sokay and I'll do it on the day
of blah, blah, blah, but nothinglike nothing else that the
first time I ever did not holdto that.
My client uh didn't pay me theother part, so I I, thankfully I

(01:17:24):
still held.
How much is it?
Uh, $4,500.

Wow, that's a big one yeah.

So the whole project was 11 K.
Oh, no, no, no, no, it waseight K.
Um, I, probably.
Oh, no, no, no, no, it was 8k,um, I, probably.
How much is it?
So they paid me the deposit,because I'm not even going to
put it on my calendar without adeposit, uh.
So they paid me 2000.

(01:17:50):
Uh, it was even less than 50,which I I don't have done that,
but they paid me the $2,000 weget all up until the shoot I
have.
I paid my person already.
Like this was a larger same dayedits for a conference, like it
was a whole thing.
I had to go to Tampa like I wasbringing my wife to the hotel

(01:18:11):
because thankfully in thisbusiness like.
You go places, you go to nicehotels you could bring your
family, and then it's like avacation for the family, um, or
at least it's vacation for mywife, without me because I'm
working.
But, um, so the literally she'snot answering calls a week
before and I'm like, oh my gosh,so it was two days before.

(01:18:36):
Finally, and I'm calling her,I'm calling.

At least they booked the hotel or you had to
expense the hotel later.

No, no, no, they were booked.
I never expense.

Yeah, okay.

I should, now that I'm thinking about it, for
like flights and all that stuff.

I mean that's okay if they're doing it, I'm okay
either way, as long as itdoesn't come out of pocket.
Yeah, I don't know, At thispoint they're going to have
small claims.

I don't care, I'll pay the cost of the hotels
.
But what was I going to say?
So this person didn't answer.
I reached out to everyone.
I started reaching out to herteam because I'm like no way.
And she messaged me sayingdon't reach out to my team.

(01:19:18):
I'm like, then answer the phone.
I'm like you don't want me toreach out to your team, answer
the phone.
Uh, she calls me and crying,and it's like a whole thing, bro
okay I don't want, I don't wantto get too deep into it.
Sure, I mean yeah, because she'skind of kind of stills dang it.
We can't edit this.

No, oh yeah, Don't say anything you don't want to
say, but I mean I get it.
So she had some emotionalissues.

Her mom was in the hospital.
Okay, it was a whole thing.
Yeah, like it was a legit thing, an emergency, I get it, yeah,
but then legit things happenevery time she didn't pay me but
so and I actually cared aboutthis client Like, and I was like
she's like, please can wefigure something out?
So I'm like you know what.
I'll do this this one time.

(01:20:04):
I will never do this again.
I will show up.
You don't have to worry aboutpaying anything more.
Just I will not.
And it's the same day, edits.

Oh so she wanted to reschedule, basically, the
shoot.
No, no, we shot the same day.
Oh so we shot the same day.

Yeah, everything was good, but it was.
They were same day edits.
So I'm literally giving her thedeliverables on the day and
there is a larger video, like astory brand video that I'm
making out of the content.
I even upsold her.
On the upsold, like, Iconvinced her that she needed
interviews done likeprofessional interviews.

(01:20:44):
So that was an extra 2000 ontop of whatever I was already
doing.
So it was.
It ended up becoming a bigpackage and she was paying it
off after very slowly, like shewould randomly give me a 2000 or
she randomly gave me like$3,000.

(01:21:05):
Okay, I'm like, oh, cool,awesome, bro.
I never heard from her again.
It's been like it's been likeeight months, wow, no, no, no.
Yeah, it's been eight monthsand I reached out multiple times
there.
There were some times where shewould say, yeah, I'm paying,
I'm, I'm gonna pay you today.
Uh, didn't happen, I'm gonnapay you.
Uh, in two days.

(01:21:27):
Uh, didn't happen, I'm gonnapay you this.

Like that's happened, like at least she's
communicating now, becausesounds like she can ghost you on
the phone too yeah, well, Ihave, yeah, I have like
connections to her whole networkat this point yeah, I'm like
integrated.

So like you can't run from me, but like, but
, uh, I don't have a lawyer, soI'm gonna.
Well, now, now I do.
But, um, so this lastconversation, uh, before she was
, literally she sent me ascreenshot and she, cause, she
randomly sent me the money.
It wasn't like I asked for it,she did it on a random day, so I

(01:22:04):
don't know.
There's probably a bunch ofstuff happening.
I don't know those situations.
But she sent me a screenshot ofher Zell, like trying to Zell
me, and it said could not likesend money, whatever?
Uh, and I'm like what?
She's like I'm going to try tofigure it out, I'm going to get
to the house and then I'm goingto send you the rest of the
payment.

(01:22:24):
This was like three weeks agoand, uh, she didn't respond, she
didn't send the payment.
I messaged her the next day.
I'm like what happened?
She's like, oh, I accidentallysent it to my landlord, who's
also named Anthony.

I'm like what, whatever At this point the
amount of hours, like we weretalking about time earlier the
amount of time you spent on justtrying to recover this payment
is crazy.

It's crazy.
So I sent her a whole textmessage that was just like hey,
this needs to be done by the endof the year.
Uh, I ended up doing my taxes.
I made a lot more money than Ithought I did.
It'd be better to defer thepayment to this year because I'm
not an escort.
Now I'm an escort, but likebefore I wasn't.
So I'm like, oh you know, it'sprobably a good thing, it's
probably god or something, likenot wanting me to pay all the

(01:23:16):
taxes on that.
So I deferred it to this year.
I sent her a text message onthe first and I was like hey, I
know you didn't.
She didn't pay.
She didn't even reach out topay.
She's like I'm going to pay bythe 31st.
I reached, I reached out and Iwas like if this does not get
paid by the first week ofJanuary, I'm going to send you
to collections.

(01:23:37):
You're going to pay theattorney fees and late fees.
I was like I don't know.

All right, so you're waiting on it, let's see.
Well, yeah, so that's crazy.

But if I had a contract, it'd be a lot easier
to win that case honestly.
So, I don't know how I'm goingto win it.

Yeah.
But if I pay enough money, yeahI mean, that's how it works,
right, it's the person with thebigger stick wins.
But that's exactly what I'mtalking about.
It's the power of contracts.
I personally would never workwithout a contract.
Now here's the other side of it.
To be real, I do help otherbuddies with DP stuff and stuff.

(01:24:15):
Now, that's different.
If you were like, if we'll comeDP this project?

I don't need a contract for that.

Like I'm going to come help you out.
You're going to pay me.

We're done Like we don't need contract for
that and you could ruin my lifeif I didn't pay you.
But I'm not going.
Yeah, no, no.

And it's.
It's okay because that's just asimple day rate thing.
But now, when you're doingdeliverables, when you own their
assets, when you own theirvideo, when you own their I
don't know the raw files and youown the deliverables and stuff,
I think it's very important todefine specialty deliverables
Because, like I said, clientswill come back and say I've had
this happen.
So I did like a live stream ayear ago, whatever where I
offered them a live stream ayear ago, whatever the where, um
, I offered them, you know, tolive stream the event and then

(01:25:01):
give them a copy of the video.
That was the the simple deal.
But then I was like, hey, hereon the top of that, uh, we can
make you an incredible recap andwe make great recap videos and
the good thing is when we'realready out there, it's not that
much for me to make a recapvideo, so I'm like, hey, we're
gonna be already out there, yeahexactly right, um, and maybe
getting a few extra shots thatnormally we wouldn't get.
But again, no, no extra humancost, you know yeah, so anyway,

(01:25:25):
I was like, hey, let me makethis uh recap video and it's
gonna be very useful becauseyou're gonna remember this event
forever yeah right.
And then they wanted ateleprompter, both thing.
They said no.
They said, uh, because I,because you know you need a
teleprompter operator, it's alive event, you can't just have
one of those other telepromptersanyway.
So I said okay, and then theyrejected the teleprompter

(01:25:46):
because they didn't like theperson cost and equipment cost
was fine, uh, and I was like,okay, well, that's fine.
Then they said we'll get ourown teleprompter.
And then, uh, the other thingthey said was, yeah, we don't
want the recap video because wedon't want to take this cost,
all done.
Guess what went without ahiccup?
The live stream, perfectly fine, they loved it.
Guess what didn't work?
The teleprompter they bought onAmazon, anyway.

(01:26:10):
So they had to like the wholething was a disaster because
they had to, like now, read offpaper or ipads.
You know, whatever done, theevent is done, that the response
is incredible.
After the event they emailed methat this was the you know
incredible live stream.
Our audience loved it.
Blah, blah, blah.
Yeah, when are we getting therecap video?
I'm like, uh, hey, you guysdidn't pick recap video.

(01:26:31):
They said we're sure we did.
Here's a copy of the agreement.
It helps a lot.
I said, yeah, I wanted toreally make it.
I was excited about itgenuinely and I'm like but you
didn't pick it.
Here's the contract, here's theoption that you didn't check
and you didn't pay me for thecost yeah you know, what I mean
that what ended up happening?

nothing, that's it.
They said there's no, no, yeah,okay because they, they,
there's no nothing.

The argument that's what they did.
Same thing when I was talkingabout payment terms.
That happened.
I was like look, here's yourcontract.
You're not supposed to pay mewhenever you want to.
You're supposed to pay me whenyou sign.
It is what it is, you know yeahand if you don't pay me, we're
not gonna be filling your event,you know yeah yeah, what it is,
I mean yeah so I mean, yeah,well, we'll talk after this.

I need I need some like contract templates
and stuff.
Uh yeah, I was thinking aboutgetting like an ironclad tense
thing, but I don't know.

I mean, at the end it's a negotiation.
My advice is and we can likesay, talk off this.
What I suggest to people isnowadays we have access to chat,
gpd and stuff like that is justgo in there and generate
something like give it obviouslydetails the type of work you do
do and you'll get a goodtemplate out of it.
Obviously, don't use that again, not legal advice.
I would then take that to anattorney and be like hey, this

(01:27:43):
is what I have now.
Can you find loopholes andstuff and or fix this or make
this legally, because you knowthey have to be able to defend
you with it too, so so, so theyneed to check it and and I'm
pretty sure I would not use ajust chat gpt you want it to go
to a real attorney, who, who'sfamiliar with litigation.
All that because that again hireexperts the whole point of this

(01:28:04):
is you want to be an expert invideo, then please hire experts
in other fields.
Don't cheap out, you know.

Otherwise the result is not gonna be good
because like you're stilllearning that yeah, and and to
be real, most people don't evencare.

I mean, we do it every day and I hate that.
About everything Like software,you know, you just check,
accept terms and conditions andthen you know who knows what
you're signing your life away to.
But people are so used toaccepting terms and conditions
at this point it's not that bigof a deal in my opinion.
The only time time here's thething I and I work with very
small to very large companiesnever had issues.

(01:28:38):
The only time contract issueever even comes is government.
I work with a lot of state-owneduniversities, state governments
, and they will always have astate attorney and who will go
in.
And the biggest thing that theyremove or want to negotiate on
is liability.
They're like we're a governmentof united states, of florida.
We cannot be held liable foranything or something, something

(01:28:58):
, something.
And at that point I'm just likeI'm gonna let, because usually
those are bigger contracts, I'mgonna let the lawyers handle it.
It's not, it's beyond me.
I'm like, okay, here's this,here's this at that point
somewhere.
But there's an advantage now,at least for some of the
universities I worked with wehave a vetted already contract.
We're a vendor.
It's a given and speeds up theprocess.

(01:29:20):
So much Cause I I use thatcontract that has been edited
and filtered out for them.
It makes it a lot faster, causenow I already have one I'm like
, and I know the attorneysagreed on it so, but I'm saying
that's the only time I'm willingto like, because again it's the
government they're gonna paytheir bills.
Yeah, so I'm not as worriedabout it, you know what are you
gonna do?

send them to collection?
It's like good, I'm justsending a government entity to
the collection yeah, but I'venever had that.

Now they're slow, but that's and that's the only
time I'll do net 30, net 60,whatever.
I'm okay with that becauseagain, I don't know about other
people I trust governments topay, that's.
I've never had that default soI'm not worried about it.
But any private company signingthe agreement it is what it is
it has late fees.
I've never had to charge latefees, but again because I don't

(01:30:07):
even show up until they sign it.
And then the other thing iskill fees.
To me that's very important.

A lot of people don't think about it.

I had that happen with a buddy, which it was a
buddy, so it wasn't a big deal.

That was part of this client's.
Oh, really, it was acancellation.
They canceled on the day beforeto fly out.

Yeah, that's not acceptable because you've
blocked that day out and mything is obviously things change
.
I want to be reasonable, but atsome point it's like it's too
late and you gotta have killfees.
So one, but again, I find mostpeople when they have kill fees
in the contract.
They don't want to cancel thethe thing I had had.
Same thing.
I was helping a buddy, uh, on ashoot, like I was gonna be a

(01:30:47):
gaffer or whatever.
And I'm literally and I preppedthe whole date before like I've
already done the work, you knowI loaded, I showed up and I'm
literally pulling into the venue, like here's me turning into
this to where we're filming, andhe's leaving and I see him.
I'm like what's happening?
Like he's waving at me and he'slike, dude, uh, the person's
not okay with us filming inthere.

(01:31:07):
It was like a documentary typeof thing.
I'm like what, the team,whoever scheduled this, didn't
vet them, which is fine.
Not, he was obviously verydisappointed.
But at at that point I'm like,well, I'm here, you know what I
mean.
Like I better get paid becauseI made the effort.
I'm literally at the location,I spent all the time prepping,
but of course he's a buddy onthe other side.
I'm like look, if it's your owncost, I don't know.

(01:31:29):
At that point I didn't knowwhat the I was.
Like I again, that's okay, it'snot that big of a.
Yeah, yeah, but obviously it'sa client.
If it's a company, then no, likeyou got to pay me again they
have to pay me yeah, but, andthat's why it's so important to
have contracts and things likethat- yeah in place anyway.
Um, all right, let's move on tothe next topic, my friend doing
it oh my gosh, that's what's.

(01:31:49):
It's already been an hour and ahalf.
We haven't even freaking mycamera's dying oh really do.

You know it's funny.
My, my, uh.
So I'm filming content rightnow for my own thing.
I try to like differencebetween youtubers.

Other people just came sat down and talk and
you're like, hey, where can Iput a camera?

yeah, I'm like, I'm like trying to,
because it this is your, youmight say something good, you
know yeah, I mean, hey, I'mhappy for you to get content out
of it, why not?

and um so, my camera's dying.

Well, it's gonna die yeah yeah, sorry, this
is live.

There's no stopping, there's no changing.
Do you know what?

happened the the?
I hate wireless mics oh I'vehad issues with the freaking.

Which one is the?

dgi.
Yeah, it's stuck.

It did disconnected halfway through oh,
my goodness, is it at leastinternally?
I just recorded.

Yeah, so whenever I remember when I
pulled something out of mypocket that was me noticing it
didn't record and I was likedink, and here's the good thing.

I do want to talk about this.
So I'm very much about usingthe right tools for the right
job.
Yeah.
And so I own, you know, kostinkand Kost11Ds, because those are
the, I think, the standard lavmics that people should use and
and then you know Shep'smicrophones, good Sennheiser
microphones, but at the end ofthe day.

(01:33:01):
Here's what we also use, whichis a funny contrast Rode Pro 2,
or Rode Wireless Pros orwhatever, and it's so funny.
On one hand you can know it'sprobably one of the most
expensive mics, like the C-Met5U.
And then now here it is A couplehundred dollars, you know, or
what $300, $400, whatever theprice of the road wireless pros
is.
But there's a right tool forthe right job.

(01:33:22):
Whenever conferences we have toget you know, otfs on the fly,
interviews, and we cannot havetime, especially these people in
their massive gowns.
We don't have time or theenergy or, like I said, the
manpower and willingness ofthese clients, especially there
to the guests, to go run wiresand and all that and plus we
need a quick soundbite.

(01:33:42):
So road wireless pros are thesedjis would be great for that.
Because, uh, because you canquickly use a magnet, and I'm
trying testing out the new larkm2s too, because they're so much
tinier, um but anyway, theyjust came out with the ones what
m3s?

m2s dude I just got m2 I'll show them to
you after this.
See, this is the thing likejust talk to talk to your
youtuber friend anyway, but I'mtexting because they were.

They were around and I was like, oh, this is
smaller.
But the thing I liked aboutwireless pros was they were also
recording 32 bit floatinternally and my main thing was
, you know, it's live eventtransmission, whatever.
So anyway, it's not that thequality is the same, it's just
it's the right tool for theright job.

So I don't think, uh, they're actually
pretty good, yeah, and I meansurprising yeah surprisingly
good.

Obviously I wouldn't compare it to like a
cost 11d with a electro or somedeity or whatever some kind of
transmitter system, but I dothink for what it is it's
incredible and for a job like uhconferences, I think it is uh
incredibly powerful tool.
Do you have any equipment likethat?
You say it's considered lowerbudget, but in a professional

(01:34:52):
world it can actually be usefulBecause that Justin over he's
making a full living from justan Osmo, osmo Pocket 3.
Like his entire, he's makingsix figures Justin Mark.
Yeah, justin, the guy who doesthe Kel-Tec stuff, you know.
No, anyway, he was at the event.

(01:35:13):
But what I'm saying is he's ohyes, oh Justin, yes yes, but
what he's doing is he is makinga six-figure living, making
videos with osmobocket 3.
Isn't that crazy, yeah?

that's his camera of choice, because I am
thinking about social media solike my, my, I think.
Well, actually my cameras, mycameras are not expensive.
I I use Lumix S5 IIs.
I could get those used for like$1,100.

What's their love with Lumix?
Now, as somebody who loved, bythe way, gh4 Revolutionary,
that's, made me so I startedwith Canon T4i, whatever,
whatever, and before that wastape, and then I switched to GH4
because it was in first 4K.
It was such a massive jump andI went to that system with that
sigma 18 to 35.
You know that was a killercombo with the metabones anyway,

(01:36:04):
uh, but then obviously I leftand then I went to gh5s or
whatever for a while and then Iwent to c200 and never looked
back.
But you're still using, uh,obviously, lumix cameras
different than what I was using.
What's your love with lumixcameras and why?

I mean, I'm a , I'm a new lumix shooter,
probably like a year and a halfmaybe.
Maybe not two years yet it'llbe two years in april but the
image, the image is great.
The autofocus is pretty good.
I mean, it didn't miss until itdied, but um, the autofocus is
pretty good.

(01:36:38):
Way more video features thanany sony mirrorless camera or
canon or any other one but startshooting starting controversy
yeah, open gate, yeah well whatdo you?

use.
See here's another thing.
As somebody um you know who'sdoing client work, do you
actually use open gate?
All the time huh, you're thefirst one, so what?
What's the?
Uh, how are you finding extrause out of?
I get more vertical resolutionso you're trying to make both
vertical and horizontal.

Yeah, so right there I can use it for
horizontal and I could actually.
This is a.
This is me confessing.
I did not shoot an open gate.
No, like, I noticed it halfwaythrough this and I could
actually.
This is a.
This is me confessing I did notshoot an open gate now like I
noticed it halfway through thisand I'm like oh no, I can't get
up I was like I can't doanything at this point.
But uh, yeah, absolutely,absolutely.

(01:37:30):
I use it for client stuff umthe ibis is the best ibis that
I'll give it to you.

GH5 was a really good IBIS back in the day
whenever I had it.

It's so freaking good.
So when I'm shooting, I shoothandheld a lot of times.
I just it helps me keep itsmall and the image is reliable.
So I'm not trying to like digat, but like every time I had
Sony, I always like cameras thatjust look different.
They're organic.

That's why I loved the c70 it was just oh yeah,
that's one of my favorite imagesit was just a beautiful image
and I was really snobby aboutthat stuff.

Uh, I'm not snobby, I was just particular
like I would use sony camerasall the time and I'm like
shadows on the C70.

And that's why, when C80 came out, people were
like are you going to switchback?
I was like A no, because thedemand is for Sony.
So obviously I'm makingbusiness decisions I don't care
about.
You know, sony, canon, whatever.
And then B, the truth being isthe C80, again goes great,
camera, whatever.
Fixed a bunch of problems I hadwith the C70.
But c80, again goes great,camera, whatever.

(01:38:39):
Fixed a bunch of problems I hadwith the c70.
But what it didn't fix is itnow doesn't have the djo sensor.
And the reason I like with c70wasn't the form factor, whatever
, it was literally that image.
It's the closest thing I'veseen to an alexa.

Uh, without paying alexa, yeah yeah, and I
had a komodo at the time, so Iused to have a c70 komodo or red
komodo and the image was likepretty close, like both of them.
You know, the komodo image isgreat.
I love the komodo image.
I think it looks great, uh.
But then I got a lumix s52 atthe same time and I use them all
in conjunction and I was like,oh, oh, this is good this is a

(01:39:14):
really, this is a really goodimage and yeah, it was a little
bit more digital than I'd likeit to be, but I can easily fix
that with digital diffusion orjust some.
It's so easy to fix that.
But it just looked good and thedynamic range.
It just had a lot of hole inthe shadows and the highlights
and I'm like this.

(01:39:35):
I can rely on this.
I can trust this image.

So here's what I want to talk next, and I'm like
this, I can rely on this, I cantrust this.
So here's what I want to talknext.
Then that and I'm glad you likeit, because at the end day,
initially when I started, I wasclient you know, direct client
only and I quickly realizedcamera doesn't matter, right,
it's what you want to use to getthe result that they want.
But then, when I startedworking with the agencies, I
realized camera does matterbecause you, you know the
requirements and then rules andblah, blah, blah.

(01:39:59):
Coming back to you, have youseen any camera perception issue
?
Because, let's be real, clientmay not know Lumix from Sony,
from whatever, but guess what?
They do know Size, right.
So obviously these are tinylittle cameras.
So do you like to build it out?
I'm saying, is it necessary?
Obviously these are tiny, I canbuild it out.
So do you like to build it out?
I'm saying is it necessary?
Have you find at least yourclients, especially the ones

(01:40:19):
that are paying eight, 10, 12,15, 30 K?
Do they care or do they notcare?

So a lot of my, so I I do three months worth
of content in one day, which islike a.
I shoot for one day and I maketo $15,000 and which is like
nuts.
And then the back ends editingcosts and on the front end it's
a pre-production, a lot ofpre-production.
Yeah, um, so that stuff, socialmedia nobody cares.

(01:40:46):
Nobody cares about that stuff.
When I have a high paying, likeone off, which I do have a
couple, um, they care, they care, and especially if, if it's
somebody that's like, oh man,this is a lot and I'm like I've
never paid this much money orwhatever the heck, then I want
to show up with a fully riggedcamera one.

(01:41:09):
It's easier, it makes my lifeeasier in the sense of like I
don't haveto switch batteries and all that
stuff so you'll build it out,you'll put rails on it and
madbox and vmount, vmount andall that, all that stuff.

But so you'll build it out, you'll put rails
on in my box and the v?
Mounts and whatever and allthat.

Okay, all that junk, but I yeah, it
matters then, um, but I alsohave a ronin 4d that I bring for
those shoots and that's amonster.
Yeah, that looks like a chickenyeah, exactly they have that
little head thing and they justthey, uh yeah, that, that's a
talking point itself oh yeah,they're.

(01:41:41):
They're always like whoa whatis that?
Like I'll be shooting aconference or something and
everyone's like yeah they shouldmake like a like an instagram
reel where everyone's like ohlike watching something, or
anyways.
Yeah, no, it's cool.
So which one do you like better?

so what's your preference?
You like the, the ones whereyou have to, you know, build
your rig out or whatever orsocial media, where you know you
don't have to do that.
No, I just like showing up.
Oh, you just like showing up,you'll make anything I like
showing up with a tiny littletiny camera yeah, tiny little
camera.

Uh, it's not the smallest thing, but just
getting the job done, like Idon't even.
I don't have crazy primes.
Yeah, I, I the only primes Ihave.
I actually have like ours,which are nice.
I'm trying to sell them but,but um, the only primes I have
are anamorphic.
I shoot with the zoom lens.

(01:42:36):
It's just 24 to 70.
That's all Like I don't needanything.
I can make the image look niceon the backend, you know.

And and you're also trying to innovate, so
things that I've noticedwatching your videos now that I
am subscribed, uh, that, thankyou.
Yeah, of course.
Hey, I want to watch, I want tolearn, that's my.
I'm obsessed with this stuff,right, yeah, so I I want to
learn.
So here's something I knew, Inoticed.
So I was very bullish in, youknow, 360 cameras years ago when

(01:43:03):
they came out.
But then I had an Insta360, Ithink it was like X or whatever,
the first one, the one X,whatever and then I kind of
didn't find a use.
The only use I found initiallywas location scouting, because
you know, I don't have to likelook around, I just walk around
and then in the, when I go home,I can actually 360 it and be
like, oh, what was that, thatcorner or that corner?

(01:43:24):
But then eventually I did thata couple times.
I was like you know what, thisis not necessary, and I
obviously sold it, uh.
But then now you know, lookingat you, you were actually very
you know using 360 cameras inyour shoots.
So a what, what makes you wantto use them?
And just tell me your process.

So I there's a lot, a lot of other people
that are doing this nowadays, soI'm trying to find out things
that are like different, andthere are a couple of people
that I've seen them do certainshots like crazy hyperlapses and
like adding emotion and blahblah, like it's like this whole
thing, and I'm like, oh my gosh,that's cool.

(01:44:03):
How do they do that?
And then I found out it was a360 camera, so that that's why I
wanted to add it, and I'vegotten great feedback from my
clients on the fact that, okay,these shots look different.
They're like can I?
Get those shots, I'm like, yeah, it's an extra 500 bucks.

Exactly there you go, hey, extra revenue but now
here's the other side of it thatworries me.
So in my experience, assomebody's tried everything
right, I've tried making fancytransitions and whatever the
trending thing then was.
But here's what I found.
My client at least for me, myclients love making content that
lasts them years to come, andwhat worries me about that is it
looks good now because it'strending.

(01:44:40):
It's cool in three years.
What if this is not cool orit's been overdone or whatever?
And then the content is notgoing to be evergreen or
whatever, and um, so anyway.
So that's why I haven't usedany of that.
But I did see your shots andI'm like, yeah, that's actually
innovative, that's cool do youhave?
any thing with that?
What if that's?
Like reservations yeah, or justin general it starts to look

(01:45:00):
dated because you know now it'sbeen used.
Not now, but yeah, yeah so it'sbeen overused I, I'm not.

I'm not sure, because I do think it's um,
it's fairly timeless.
Obviously, if you do it alittle too intense, it'll be too
much, but they used hyperlapsesback then.
They just didn't look that good.

Now it just looks better.

It's more seamless and stylish.

I like that.
You can do it with this tinycamera and a stick.
Yeah, you just get a stick.

I also use it for drone stuff.
If I can't fly a drone, I'lljust pretend it's a drone I'll
just and just like pretend it'sa drum um, but no, I'm not too
concerned is it too unwieldywhen you're at that height?
No, no, it's just a stick.

I gotta, I gotta, come test that out it's just a
stick.

Yeah, you're just coming around.

I was like hey the only other guy I've met.
So I am usually the guy who iswho's all the gear you are.
I think the second guy would belike if I don't have anything I
know, so who the guy who doesyou know?

but, uh, yeah , I mean it's, it's, it's pretty
simple to use, um, it's just alittle time consuming.
So, like on like one of myyoutube videos, I'm just like
walking around and it wasliterally a four minute clip
where I'm taking slow stepsaround the thing and sometimes I
usually just send my assistant,like when we were actually

(01:46:23):
shooting during the event, I waslike, oh hey, camera one, you
could lock off, get it on widemanual focus, set the focus.
Can you grab the, the inset,360 the stick and just do a
really slow walk, make sure thebulb is towards the center of
the stage and then, uh, yeah,then I got the shot.
So I don't even film it, butit's cool.

(01:46:44):
I do think it'll be timeless inthe sense of, uh, the way you
do it, if it's too much andweird and tacky, then there's a
lot of, there's a lot ofmarketing that that has stuff
right now.

Yeah, no, it is very popular and, like I said, I
liked it watching your videoand I don't do it for every
client.
Yeah, I definitely don't do it,so that is definitely an add-on
.

Yeah, and well, yes, but not every client.
That style fits clients.
It fits speakers really well.
It fits events.
It fits events perfectly,perfectly.

That doesn't need to be evergreen either, because
it's events so you are more andagain, you don't have to tell us
anything.
You, you know about a productthat's not released yet, but I
want to know more.
Um, what do you see where theindustry goes?
What type of products are goingto come out to help us?
What do you see happening thisyear, in 2025, 2025?

Just with everything.

Yeah, just in general.

Yeah, um, so I think I think the industry as
a whole is getting more compact.
Everything lights, cameras,lenses, like the different
iterations of lenses areslightly sharper but smaller,
like everything's just smaller,more compact.

(01:47:58):
So I just smaller, more compact.
I do think the industry ismoving more towards content
creation or focusing.
Bigger companies are focusingon content creation.
Obviously there's a cinemaaspect, but even the cinema
aspect lights are gettingsmaller and brighter.
Brighter Flags are getting morecollapsible quicker quicker.

(01:48:18):
I think speed.
All this stuff is there.
There's not huge there's.
I'd still see a necessity forlarger crews, but also people
are doing it on their own andsmaller crews.
So I think companies arerealizing that they're seeing
that at the end of the day, it'smoney like people are.
These companies are trying tomake more money, so yeah, there

(01:48:41):
was the highest cost, so yeah,yeah so these content creators
or these one-man bands orthree-man bands, whatever
they're trying to sell to them.
So I do see that being a thing,obviously I.
I think the best camera outthere that's going to come out
is it's not the client, I wouldhave answered that, but I think

(01:49:03):
the best camera.
I hope that DJI comes out witha 4D mini.

Yeah, I don't know why they couldn't and it would
be successful.
Well, they're having currentissues just bringing their
products into the country.

The drone yeah.

But they could easily make you know like you.
You said a 4d without just thegimbal part.
I think that would sell or evena tiny one, just make a smaller
4d yeah, that's 4k really goodyeah and just has like a crispy
image, like and then I'm prettysure again I don't want to.
I'm pretty sure they buy theirsensors from sony so they could
easily source the fx3 or the fx6sensor and put that into a into

(01:49:41):
a mini 4d or whatever I think,it would sell.
Like I said, I was at first likeyes, it's a one trick pony, but
after having seen you use it, Iwas like you know what?
I see it?
A purpose, but it would need tohave an a and b to complement
it.
It would make a good c camera,as long as we can get one
without the gimbals and I think,um, they just need to, and
maybe they are.

(01:50:01):
I mean, we, we don't know,obviously I, I, it does make
sense because everyone likedthose cameras.

They're the apple they're the apple of the
camera industry.
I'm telling you so after usingthat camera, the, the menu
system, the integration, howeverything just works.
There there's the best.

Even the LiDAR autofocus they came out with the
LiDAR is cool.

They need to get things better, they need to
get it together, I mean at leastthey are somewhat, I see
starting to show up on main sets.

Like I said, I'm very bullish on like Teradek,
for example.
Very rarely do I've been onbigger sets where they wouldn't
be using teradek, but here'swhat I found.
I've actually started to seesome dji transmission and stuff
on on bigger sets and that wascrazy to me to see that a
company can come in and start tolike cut some market share and
dj has been able to do that oh100.

I was on a, a larger live production shoot
and it was a-list celebrities,like it was a whole thing.
Um, it was a very large liveproduction, like, and the
director of like the onewhatever calling shots and all
that and he was the videodirector, so he was helping with
the engineering and whatnot.

(01:51:13):
He said after this show I willnever use teradek again.
We need dji's next year look atthat because it was so reliable
.
We rented the 12g yeah,expensive um teradeks, yeah, and
we use them alongside eachother and they're like this was
seamless wow this was so good.

(01:51:34):
We never had a drop out.
It was, we didn't even have toput it super high and it didn't
drop out, just the signal sostrong.

There is a little bit more latency, but I need to
do some more tests, because myexperience is with teradek
though I have tried all theother systems and has been that
I'm very bullish.
That's what I'm saying onteradek, because personally, um,
I have never had issues withteradek, and what I do like
about Teradek was or is becauseI still use them on my live

(01:52:01):
streams is it's either there orit's not there.
I don't want the compressionbecause at least and again I'm
not saying DJI does that becauseI haven't personally tested it,
but a lot of wireless systemswill compress the image and
still try to keep transmittingand I don't want that.
I'd rather just switch to adifferent camera and I need to

(01:52:24):
know if it's good or it's notthere.
I don't want half compression.
But again, if you're using itnot for live, then I guess that
the other way is better.
Either way, I found Charadex tobe very reliable and also very
good for what I'm trying to usethem for.
I did switch over for regular,which I've shown you earlier, to
this new Holly land pyro sevensystem, and only because on my
director's camera we can switcha button and they can go and see

(01:52:44):
a, b and that's what thesebusiness clients want to do.
But I don't think I have donethat for live or am interested
in yet.
But who knows, this makes mewant to still try the DJI system
.

If you need latency, I would.
I would stick to teradek still,yeah, yeah, the latest live for
live.

You know, that's what I'm saying, that's what's
important, that and then thatimage quality doesn't drop,
because I don't want people onlive to see compression
artifacts or whatever yeah, wellI've.

I haven't had too much compression.
Well, I'm pretty sure teradekhas a patent on uncompressed
yeah latency, so like nobodyelse can really even yeah,
exactly it's like some, that'sstupid these patent things, man,
the whole zach's phone I'mthinking about that.

Let me not get started.
Which is why I think nikonbought red just for the back
well yeah, that was stupid yeah,so same thing with zach's come
so in the sound industry, ifyou've noticed so in a lot of
the equipment will come out likeyou can record and transmit
everywhere but the US, becausethis company called Zaxcom on
the high end.
I've used their equipment,which is good equipment.

(01:53:48):
I don't want to say anythingagainst.
But this patent is stupidbecause it restricts other
companies from being able tooffer just a feature.
You know so.
Now, that's why a lot of theseproducts can record and transmit
at the same time in us, but youtake it outside or you buy it
literally outside the countrywhich is why we were talking
about the deity theos thing whenyou were in europe because

(01:54:08):
they'll restrict them, uh, frombasically working properly in
the us and which is kind of, Ithink, stupid.
But again, I'm not a patentexpert.
It's just annoying because itrestricts our ability to do and
and create content that we wantto.
At the end of the day, yeah, itdoesn't make sense.
Yeah, the same thing with uh red.
I think they have a.
That's why all these companieshave had to go, like canon

(01:54:28):
especially has to go and uhlicense the, the, I think,
patent from them and nikon,which is why I think uh nikon
bought them, which I wassurprised.
80 or something million dollars, it wasn't a lot of money
that's not a lot yeah, that'swhat I'm saying.
They got red for like basicallynothing, it's just well, I'm
thinking, I we don't know theirbooks.

Yeah, we don't know.
We don't know how, like howmuch money they were actually
making red nikon doesn't careyeah, no, I got nothing.

I didn't buy them, I'm pretty sure, sure it was
for patents, because there's noway.
It's like not even a drop in abucket for Nikon.
Yeah.
What's also crazy, though, is Idon't know if you've noticed
that at least for me, assomebody who's owned Monstro and
Helium in the past, andV-Raptors too I owned two
V-Raptors for a little while.
The thing is, I found that thedemand is just gone.

(01:55:18):
I mean, while the thing is, Ifound that the demand is just
gone, I mean outside of musicvideos.
I'm still seeing them used onmusic videos, but it immediately
um or not immediately, but atleast the last couple years I'm
seeing less and less productions.
Uh, demand reds, you know.
I mean I'm camera agnostic.
I'll use it if that's thedemand is there which is why I
was so lucky I'm.
I'm glad I sold my V Raptorsbecause it was like nobody cares
.
Either they're like we don'tcare, or we want FX6s, fx9, fx3s

(01:55:42):
you know that level of cameraor we want Alexa Mini and Mini
LFs.
I was not even getting singlerequests where somebody wanted
RED, which used to be a thing.

You noticed that, like less and less people
are using reds in theirproduction, especially, you know
, like companies yeah, I mean, Ithink we're in different,
completely different industries,but, um, yeah, I think, I think
it's sort of not really matter.
I had one inquiry where theywere like, do you ever use red?

(01:56:13):
And I was like, how do you evenknow what that is?
Yeah, yeah, I'm like how do youeven know?

what that is.

Yeah yeah I'm like how do you even know what
that is like?
Oh well, we could probably rentyou one and I ended up not
landing the job.
But like, yeah, so I, I don't,I don't think, I don't think it
matters.
I I do think our industry isleaning more towards content
creation.
You're gonna see it, morebusinesses are starting to
realize, oh, evergreen content,or or just, uh, ugc content.

All that stuff is like starting to make more sense
in this social media age and Ithink we're going to start
seeing that, especially withlike ai and all that um yeah,
with all these cell phones andosmo pocket 3 is like making it
easier to make that content andthat's's why I don't at least
for me, I don't see myselffitting in there.
I know a lot of people like Iwas talking about.

(01:57:02):
I've had people on podcasts whoare making a living just making
social media content.
I mean, you've had huge successtoo, offering it.
Obviously, I try to stay inwhere you know we're offering
like real world solutions andtelling those stories.
I see myself being doing morewhere I see going mini
documentaries, corporate docsand stuff like that.
But you're right, social mediais huge and obviously it's only

(01:57:28):
going to grow and it's going toeven need more attention because
as soon as more people do it,more noise, more.
You know more.
You have to be even moreinnovative to stand out in the
noise Right.
Yeah, well, you know more.
You have to be even moreinnovative to stand out in the
noise right yeah, well, I dothink that documentary thing
that's never going to go away.

Yeah, social media content might.
I don't know if you've seenlike google ai just making ugc
content yeah, like out ofnothing from, I think, open air
to bro, literally making basedoff of marketing research,
content for a specific brand.
But I think the one thing thatwe're not going to lose and we

(01:58:03):
can't lose is, like personaltouch, um.
But then you could say hey look,here's a video of me can you
make videos of me talking aboutmy company, so I I do think
there's going to be a play onego thing and that's how we can
find the future.

Mini docs is cool like that and that's what I I
was talking with adam I've had,like it went from nothing.
No company wanted to do longform to one.
Then last year I did three orfour.
So I think companies arestarting to recognize that it's
all about the storytelling right, and sometimes long form is the
right format to tell thatlonger piece of story and I love

(01:58:41):
, obviously, producing thembecause that's a documentary
style.
You get to be more of afilmmaker, get to take, you know
, have time and space to be ableto tell that story.
Uh, obviously it's almost timeto wrap up.
Before we do that, um, anthony,I do want to ask you so for
2025, tell me your ideal packagethat you would love to sell.
If you had a hypothetical likeyou write your client, what,

(01:59:05):
what would your dream package belike?
Hey, this price point, thismany, with the deliverables, um,
you know, whatever, what, whatdo you try?
What?
What would be ideal for you?

honestly, it doesn't have to be crazy, I
would love to.
So I have like a 12K package.
That's three months worth ofcontent from the one day I don't
do anything besides help script, shoot them, edit them and I
deliver.
I think 40 pieces and 40vertical social media content.

That's actually pretty good for 12K 40 pieces
yeah, 40 vertical social mediacontent.

That's actually pretty good for 12K 40
pieces.
Yeah, well, that's the wholepoint.

Yeah, and you're doing what Three day shoot you
said.

One day.

One day.
Oh, that's even better for ROI.

Yeah.

Are you bringing any assistant?
So it's you and an assistantmaybe.

It's me, I'll bring some people, so like, if
I I need it, I might starthiring a producer, just somebody
that can like keep us on track.
Are you scripting?
these or you're going off thecuff chat gpt oh, look at that
man, look at that so, uh, nowthat I have a whole template
where I ask the client a bunchof questions about their ideal
yeah, exactly, and then, um, Itake their answers and this was

(02:00:14):
given to me I take their answersand I put it into chat gbt.
I say, hey, make uh 50different content ideas.
I go through the content ideas.
I'm like, oh, this is good, thisis not good, this is good look
at that and then I give it tothe client, say, hey, can you
pick 30 that you love and thenpick 10 that you are meh, and
then half of our day is filmingthat.

(02:00:35):
I try and not have them readoff a teleprompter and then, um,
which I might have to startdoing, but the second half of
the day, half of the day, or atleast two to three hours, is
b-roll, b-roll.
Maybe we make some funnycontent it all, depends it all
depends with every single client.
So none, nothing's the same.

(02:00:55):
I don't wish it was the same.
Actually I was going to say Iwish, but yeah, I mean, if I
could, I did my numbers and if Ihave 12 clients I can make half
a million.

That's pretty good .

Yeah, if I have 12 clients.

Because you're going 12 times four right,
because three months of content.
They're going to come back toyou four times 48, 48 times 12,
half a million is a very verygood-sized production company.
And then the thing I like aboutthis package that you're
building costs are low.
Because, unlike typical,production.
A 12K production would only netyou 2, 3, 4k at most profit.

(02:01:34):
But it's just here.
Now you can pull in a hugeamount of profit, right?
What are you thinking You'retrying for what?
Seven, eight, nine, maybe evenmore?

My profit margins on this will probably be
let me do like some roughnumbers.
Editing costs would probably benot that much.

You have your social media content.
Yeah, yeah yeah.
So probably media content yeah,yeah, they're probably, I'm
probably looking at uh 10 000profit on that.

Look at that look at that, that's a very good
profit.
Yeah, so you're telling me it'sa lot of it's a lot of work?
Yeah, obviously.
No, I don't want to take thatsocial media content.

It's not easy, so yeah and plus 40 delivers is a
lot, but let's also look at thebright side 12K 10K profit one
day shoot.

Oh, that's why I'm doing it.

This is incredible , but now I want you to think on
the client side.
They're going to get.
They only have to put up oneday of their time because these
people are busy.
And they get three months ofcontent.
They're getting 40 deliverablesfor 12K, which are very well
done because they'reprofessional doing it.
So I think there's a win-winsituation.

Oh, it's a win-win all around.

It's very smart that you're doing that, man.
It's so great to learn I can'tbelieve.
Two hours is over.
I would love to keep talkingtalking, and that's why I love
this format.
The good thing is, if this goesgreat, nothing stops us from
continuing this conversation inseason twos and threes, and if I
can do this, remember there'sno roi here.
I'm not trying to to getanything out of it, but all I
just want to have these greatconversations.

(02:03:07):
I know I learned a lot, sothank you again for taking your
time before we go.
Anything else you want to add,say do they do no well, I was
gonna make a joke then I decidednot to, but why was it not pg?

it was uh political.
Oh yeah, let's, let's stay outof.
I'm just kidding with morecamera.
All right, uh do you want totell people where to follow you
instagram, youtube, probably foryou yeah, so, uh, you could
find me on instagram uh tailored, uh like a tailored suit dot
films, and then on uh youtube.
It's anthony rodriguez with twoz's two z's.

Yeah, the onesie wasn't available my, my onesie
wasn't available dude, again, Ireally appreciate you.
You're an incredible person.
I'm so glad I met you and it'salways a learning experience, so
thank you and again, you'rewelcome back anytime.
Thank you, dude, I loved it.

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