Posts Tagged ‘instagram’

I already cried like a little girl with a skinned knee to my Instagram followers about this. Maybe you don’t follow me on there, so I’ll whine about it here too. Below is my actual IG post. Be sure to click on the photo to scroll through the entire 10 image series.

My YouTube dreams are shattered. Unless I get an exorbitant amount of “watch time” in the next 30 days. And when I say “exorbitant” I mean practically impossible based on my current YouTube stats. Scroll through all the images on this post for a comprehensive explanation. Then click the link in my bio, @jeffclaassen, to check out some videos. Thanks, guys! I really appreciate it.

A post shared by jeffclaassen (@jeffclaassen) on Jan 20, 2018 at 8:25pm PST

The coders at IG are very smart and I can’t seem to edit a single thing in the above image/post. I’m no computer whiz, so maybe it’s possible, but I can’t figure it out. Why am I mentioning that? Because I wasn’t able to put a direct link in the above image to my channel (which is the whole point of this post), but I can do it here.

Please check out my YouTube Channel and subscribe to it (if you’re into subscribing to things. Or subscribe even if you’re not. Nothing bad will happen to you if you do.) Anyway, I know it’s a long shot to get 4000 hours of watch time on my videos when I’ve never averaged more than an hour of watch time a day, but whatever. I might as well try. I am happy to report that since the original IG post a couple of days ago I have earned some new subscribers, which is amazing. Thanks, guys! I now need 483 more. My views and watch time also increased quite a bit, but we have a LONG WAY to go before hitting the 4k mark.

I don’t honestly expect anybody to play my videos on a loop 24 hours a day, but it would probably take a lot of people doing exactly that to even get close to the goal here. So, here a few places to start. I’ve made some playlists you can check out so you don’t have to scroll through all my random videos looking for something interesting.
1. Time Lapse Paintings – This is self-explanatory.
2. Vlogtober 2017 – This is when I dazzled the world by posting one video a day for the entire month of October. I thought for sure this series would gain some traction (meaning views/subscribers), but Buzzfeed never gave me a shout out.
3. Viva Paso – These are all videos having something to do with my retail shop in downtown Paso Robles, CA.

And here are all my videos listed in order from most popular to super sucky.

With all the shit going on in the world thanks for taking the time to read this and watching a couple videos.

But wait…
there’s more.

On the real, the amount of money I’ve made from ads running on my videos is so miniscule it’s too embarrassing to say, BUT I will say this. I think it would be absolutely amazing to make money on YouTube. The amount of time it takes to record and edit a video is crazy. Seriously, I’ve probably spent a good 4 hours to make a 3-4 minute long video. By the time I set up the camera and record multiple takes because I suck at talking to the camera and then looking through all the footage and editing it into somewhat of a story…well, getting a little something back would be so cool. Maybe I’ll start a Patreon page? Anyway, thanks again for taking the time to read all this. If you don’t want to click any of those YouTube links you can just stay right here, sit back, and watch my most recent video without even leaving this page.

Here ya go! Enjoy!

Yesterday, I uploaded a video to my YouTube Channel. Not a big deal when you consider the fact that 60 hours worth of video are uploaded to YouTube every single minute. That’s a pretty staggering number when you think about it. With that much video to choose from it seems virtually IMPOSSIBLE to get anybody outside of your direct circle of friends and family to watch anything you put on YouTube. In fact, it’s even hard to get those people to watch a video. Anyway…that’s a whole other post that I will probably never write.

So, this video I posted took me forever to finish. It’s the editing and my inner struggle with overthinking, which I guess is not really “inner” since I’m talking about it. I bet there is a lot of people out there that struggle with overthinking, but that’s such a broad term. To really get down to the heart of the matter I’d say the real issue is choice paralysis. You might be familiar with that term already, but if not here is what Wikipedia says about it: “Choice paralysis is the state of over-analyzing (or over-thinking) a situation so that a decision or action is never taken, in effect paralyzing the outcome. A decision can be treated as over-complicated, with too many detailed options, so that a choice is never made.”

I take pride in my spontaneity and often think of myself as the type of person that jumps off a cliff and builds his wings on the way down. Despite that philosophy, there are some things that creep in under the radar and wreck me. Editing this video was one of those things. Allow me to take you on a journey inside of my head. This will be a glimpse of the inner dialogue I have with myself. Of course, I have it with myself. It’s not like you can have “inner dialogue” with others, but you know what I mean and since I already typed that I don’t feel like crafting a new, more appropriate sentence. Also, the last three sentences were just a way to prepare you for what’s coming ahead. Ok, here we go. The inner conversation I had (with myself) about this damn video.

Just make a video about spray painting the floor. Plain and simple. No, there’s an opportunity here to make a “how to” video and “how to” videos can get lots of views. What am I going to title the video so it gets the most views? Should I talk in the video or keep it strictly just a video of me painting the floor with stencils? Maybe this could be about Instagram. Am I supposed to include a slideshow of what used to be painted on the floor? I should probably not talk. I sound like a total douche nozzle when I talk to the camera. Why am I so awkward in front of a camera? Ok, no talking. Just turn this video into something that is 60 seconds long so I can put it on Instagram. Or toss it into some sort of compilation video like I did at Christmas. Who is this video for anyway? If it’s only painting the floor then maybe only fans of my artwork will want to watch. And if it’s more of a how to video then fans of my artwork will probably have no interest in watching, but it might get some views from people that are totally outside of my circle. Shit, man…I really have no idea what to do with this thing. It’s not like I can upload 4 different versions of the same footage just so I can attempt to please every possible person that might click the play button. That would be stupid. Why can’t I just decide?!?! ARGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

So, that is what was going on in my head every single time I sat down to edit this thing and it reminds me of this painting I made back in 2001.

(This dude’s head is about to explode with all that stuff going on in there.)

I’ve been attempting to edit this video since February. Despite how long it’s taken me you would expect a masterpiece, which it is clearly not. If I could just manage to harness the spontaneity I have with painting and apply that towards video editing, then this would have been uploaded months ago. In the end, it worked out fine and that delay in editing gave me the opportunity to collect photos on Instagram that people tagged Viva Paso on. Because of all of those IG tags and shout outs something really cool ended up happening and that became the deciding factor on what direction to take this video. Well, if I haven’t bored you to tears yet here is what this blog post is all about…sharing this video with you. Enjoy!

If the video doesn’t play for you then try this link.

This is the part where I ask for a little favor. If you know anybody that might find this video interesting or helpful in someway, please share it with them. You can copy and paste the following link into a text message, email or even paste the link onto their Facebook page.

https://youtu.be/y-dQ8ZrAr0w

Any of those things will help spread the word.
Thanks for watching! And reading.

– Jeff

In this episode Coral and I discuss Instagram, Facebook, and my extreme awkwardness in front of a camera. Coral also admits that she thought Instagram was strictly a photo editing app the first 10 months she was using it with no idea that people could see the photos she was posting. Hopefully, we say something that might leave you with an idea or two about your own social media/marketing efforts.

Be sure to subscribe and leave a review on iTunes. It helps Live Work Love get noticed in the iTunes store. And it gives our egos a little boost.

Stream or download from the following places:
iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/05.-social-media-originality/id1159309526?i=1000377310368&mt=2
Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/jeffclaassen/live-work-love-podcast-episode-5-social-media-and-originality-versus-playing-safe

Happy listening!
– Jeff

If you are not yet following my lovely lady on Instagram I suggest you start.

Where we live happens to have a huge deer population and I don’t mean Goliath size dinosaur deer. I mean “huge” as in there are A LOT of them. A few of months ago Coral started deer hunting. With a camera, not a gun. And I’ve got to tell you, they are a bold and brazen bunch. So much so that we caught one on our porch late one night and I know you might be sarcastically thinking, “Big deal!” I’d think that to if the deer just strolled through our front lawn to get to our porch, but no no no. To get to our porch means you have to climb 21 steps and make your way past a baby gate. Now, if you’re thinking, “must be a pain in the ass when you have to carry groceries from the car or take the trash out,” you are exactly right. But I digress…

as I often do because…who knows? Anyway, as I was saying…

A few months ago we decided to take a leisurely drive through the neighborhood just to find some deer and on our first outing we caught a baby deer, no bigger than a foot tall, walking across the street about 60 seconds from our house. Don’t get me wrong, deer are total pests and have literally eaten enough of Coral’s plants that she’d need to apply for a loan to replace them. I’m talking a lot of plants here, people. However, seeing the baby deer walk across the street was incredibly adorable. And, in a way, so out of place. It sparked an idea for Coral and she started documenting the deer we find. Coral came up with the “You don’t belong here anyway” series based on the contrast/contradiction of seeing the deer (nature) mixing in with the neighborhood (civilization).

Coral is much more eloquent with words, so I’m giving her the floor here:

We discovered that the entire west side of town abutted a vast hill country. The result of which is wildlife intersecting with civilization. Deer, rabbits, mountain lions, wild boars, skunks… For better or worse, the line between nature and neighborhood is indistinct and very blurry here. And though the deer particularly have been a nightmare for me as a gardener, I can’t help but be in awe of them- impressed with their bold resilience, and a bit confused by it too. I’ll be forgoing fashion for a bit to post a series of photos documenting the deer throughout my neighborhood; it’s called You Don’t Belong Here Anyway. I hope these photos and their title encourage you to consider whether it’s the deer, or the suburban sprawl that remains out of place, and I hope you enjoy!

– Coral

I couldn’t have said it better.

If you can please picture us in Safari outfits cruising around Paso Robles in a 1976 Scout, it would be much appreciated.

It’s not Coral’s first color choice, but as the driver on these urban hunts I get to choose the color of our vehicle.

Be sure to follow Coral on Instagram: @slomygosh

Enjoy!
– Jeff

If I attempted a stage dive at my next art opening it would simply be labeled “performance art”. There would be no viral pictures or videos of it because who wants to see some art nerd dude belly flop straight onto the floor.* I might get a few claps afterwards. Oh, and a broken front tooth.

*Actually, that could totally go viral on youtube. The clip would at least show up in one of those millions of “Fail Compilations”.

It’s kind of slim pickins on my Instagram favorites this week because I didn’t take as many photos as usual. Here we go!

Just three this week. Hopefully, next week I can sneak out of the house for a bit and go on a little late night photo adventure.

See ya!
– Jeff

Instagram is an iPhone only app, so for those of you that can’t follow me using the actual app you can now see all my instagram activity at http://followgram.me/jeffclaassen/.

Here are my favorites from the past week.
Enjoy!

Check out all my iPhone photos!

Enjoy!

I’ve recently become addicted to Instagram. It’s fun stuff. The last two weeks have seen me upload 37 photos. Here are my favorites from the past week.

Enjoy!
– Jeff