Website contents

A quick guide to what this website has

This cheat sheet can:

This cheat sheet cannot:

Dedicating time

One hour a week or one day a month.

If you want to work on a bigger, on-going project (writing a book, making a game, etc.) find an hour per week to work on it. That hour doesn't have to be at the same time on the same day every week, though that helps. But make sure you schedule that time in advance. ("Wednesday 4-5pm is writing time" or "I've got a day off on Friday, I'll spend 9-10am editing" etc.)If you're looking to do something much smaller (draw an art piece, edit a video, etc.) you can instead dedicate one day to a more self-contained project ("Tomorrow I won't play any games until I've drawn something" or "I'm going to write a song on Tuesday.")

Start small

The key to activation energy.

Whether you're starting a new project, or going back to an on-going one, it's best to start with a very simple task, something super easy and fast. Doing that can help give you the momentum you need to continue, rather than looking at the project and giving up before you even begin.

Accountability

Invite a friend!

Personal accountability is hard, but social accountability is much easier. Instead of facing the creative process alone, challenge a friend to go through it with you. Find a skill for you both to learn, or even different skills, and check in with each other and compare progress. If you both want to just make things more often, be that art, music, videos, etc. simply challenge each other to make things over a period of time.If you want to turn it into a competition, have all participants time the hours they spend on a given project or learning a skill. Whenever someone completes a project or tutorial, those hours turn into points. Whoever has the most points at the end of a given time slot (a week, month, or even year) wins. This makes ambitious projects more risky, incentivising smaller but more realistic scopes.

Working with a prompt

Probably the best way to find inspiration.

Prompts don't just inspire ideas, they also give you great guidelines to work with, but only if you come up with the right ones. I believe there are 3 prompt categories: Combination, Imitation, and Limitation. All prompts designed for open-ended creativity usually fall into one or more of these categories, so let's go over them.

Combination

Combining different concepts together is how a lot of people gather inspiration. Here are some examples of what you can combine:

Imitation

Existing media can be a great foundation to start your project from. Imitation often leads to learning too! Here are some things you can imitate:

Limitation

There are a few ways you can limit yourself, I personally like these ones, but I'm sure there are more out there:

Prompt examples

Here is a small list of prompts you are more than welcome to use for your own art projects! If you do use any of them, feel free to show me the results!

Input variation

Sometimes a change of scenary helps!

Sometimes when I'm stuck on what to do with a creative project, I find that it helps to look elsewhere. If I'm working on a D&D character, I'll look at characters in completely unrelated media and genres like action movies or sci-fi games. Sometimes taking a walk outside can help too, not just because touching grass is healthy, but also because there's just a lot of "stuff" outside; buildings, vehicles, litter, even people and their clothes can inspire ideas. If you do look elsewhere for inspiration, it's important to note that you won't just find it by looking, you have to actively craft yourself these prompts, and give them time to flourish into ideas.

Learning new skills

Learning a new skill is daunting. Here's my advice

When it comes to learning a new skill, I prefer to start with a single tutorial, learning the very very basics, and then do a process many refer to as "fucking around and finding out." I think the basics are essential to properly learn for most mediums, but there's a lot of value into translating those basics into things that interest you rather than committing all your time to studying and not learning by doing. Here are some things I've learned, and how:

If you've ever wondered why learning certain skills academically have been easier than self-learning, it's usually because you're given the basic fundementals in class, and then told to apply those to something more open-ended for an assignment. So next time you try learning something new, start with a basic tutorial and then apply those skills to something that interests you more than what the tutorial covers. As you keep playing around with those basics, you'll run into road blocks and limitations of those basics. That's when it's time to look at the next tutorial.

Think outside of the canvas

There are countless art mediums, including some you would never even think about!

I personally believe that art mediums exist on a spectrum. On one side of the spectrum are your "motor-skill" arts such as drawing, painting, and playing physical instruments. On the other side are your "cognitive" arts such as video editing and programming. This spectrum isn't clean as a lot of styles within an art medium sway it closer to one side or another, but knowing what clicks with you more can be hugely beneficial when thinking about what skills you'd like to try out!But don't forget that art exists everywhere, even where you don't think about it. Building in Minecraft, writing scripts for video essays, DIY projects or decorating your home, cooking and baking, they're all forms of art! If you have a big idea but are scared you don't have the skills to pull it off, start with what you do have the skills for.

My challenge to you

Welcome to Sat-art-day!

Every other Saturday, I participate in a little event I call "Satartday." During this day, I have to create something based on a prompt I decide on the day before and finish it by the end of the day. I spend that Friday evening coming up with ideas, but I don't plan or write anything down, I just let it marinate in my mind overnight. The next day I dedicate almost entirely to this project. I've learned new skills for it like pixel art, made some things that really connect with me, and some silly stuff too, and have had a lot of creative satisfaction from actually finishing these little side projects and getting to share some of it with others. I challenge you to partake in Satartday! Doesn't have to be Saturday specifically, but I want you to make a small thing every two weeks. If you do this, feel free to share it with me on Discord and tell me what the prompt you (and any other friends you invite) went with!

What is a YouTube channel?

It sounds like a silly question, but do you really know the answer?

I actually think that the word "channel" is a little misleading given how the YouTube algorithm opperates. I think it's actually best to view "channels" as programmes. A TV channel hosts an array of different content, but unfortunately that just doesn't work with YouTube. Creators are pushed to stay within their niches, and branching out is often bad for a channel. So what do we do about this?I personally recommend making your channel "topically diverse" while keeping it "genre consistent." (For example, if you're a gaming channel, try speedruns, challenges, blind playthroughs, play different types of games, but keep it to gaming as the wider genre. If you're an art channel, don't stick to digital or traditional art, try both, mix it up with other artistic crafts like sewing, crochet, and whatever else appeals to you, or make art about different media like games, movies, anime.) I've met so many content creators who get locked into one topic because they didn't allow themselves to branch out early enough and now it's too risky.If you fear you have been locked into a topic, or you want to do very different styles or genres of content, that's what second channels are for! Most second channels are lower effort, less grand, or just entirely different video genres altogether. There's no harm in making these and just having fun with them. I've even met people who've made secret channels they don't advertise at all and post super low-effort content just for fun.

Your content isn't unique... yet!

Realistically, your ideas have been done before. How will you make them different?

There isn't much I can say outside of "make sure whatever you're doing stands out in some way." It's advice every YouTuber can give but very few can really elaborate on. You don't have to be different to have a good video, but if you're looking to really stand out and have your channel perform well, you should consider how you can provide something a little more unique than other channels in that space.If you're doing something educational, look for topics that no one has a strong hold of, or a format that makes it fun and engaging. If you're a gamer, think about why people would choose your channel over the countless other lets-players out there. The only general advice I can give to this would be to look at your favourite YouTube channels. Think about what they do differently, what makes you enjoy them over the others, and what you wish they did more? Is it aspects of their online persona? Bits that they do? Specific ways they format their videos? If you need more inspiration, take the genre you're most interested in, and then merge it with a completely unrelated genre. That's what Game Theorists did with maths & science video essays on video games, and it's what Will McDaniel does with horror practicle effects and comedy skits.

Growing your channel

I can't guarantee you views, but a lot of this advice can help your channel avoid stagnation.

Keep your content flexible, but your style rigid.
Viewers won't care to subscribe or watch your other content if it's completely different, but they won't want to watch the same thing over and over and over. Even YouTubers who are super consistent in style and genre have very different audiences across different video topics. Take a channel like Game Theorists, for example. 7/10 of their most popular videos are Five Nights at Freddy's theories, but they know some of their audience doesn't care about those videos, and chasing those views will only lock them out of being able to do other content and gain different audiences.Collaboration should be a tool, not the whole brand
Collaborating with bigger creators is the best way to get new eyes on your channel, and they're usually worth reaching for. However, it's important not to let collaboration dilute your channel. A lot of YouTubers collaborate more than they post solo content, which causes that solo content to do significantly worse. Remember, every time someone watches your video, they're recommended at least one other video by you, if they don't click on it, less people will be recommended it.Only hop on trends if you can do it better
Using another gaming example, if a video game suddenly starts trending, like Lethal Company, REPO, Peak, etc. Only hop on that trend if you think you can do it in a way no one else has yet. Try thinking past what everyone else is doing. To begin with, everyone will be doing their first playthrough or just having fun collaborating. That's fine for streams or bigger YouTubers who have a more established audience, but for a video, you have to add a twist. Make a challenge out of it, make art for it, do something that no one else has had time to do because they're too busy focusing on the early stages of the trend.Content VS personality
This one isn't universal, it really depends on the style of content you're going for, but it's important to keep in mind that not everyone wants to just see the "content," a lot of them want to see the personality behind it. If you're an artist talking about the process of your art, don't be afraid to share the struggles, mention how you spent your breaks, bring up relevant annecdotes where you can. These are the things that make a viewer go from watching one video on your channel to watching a lot more.Don't clip farm - Different medium means different style
If you're going to post short-form content, don't just make it clips of your long-form videos. Instead, adapt your shorts to be different. NileRed posts super small experiments that aren't relevant to the bigger projects in his long-form videos. PhoenixSC asks a question about something in minecraft, explains the context, then answers the question at the end. Both of these YouTubers do short-form content about the genres and topics their long-form videos cover, but shift the style to something that works in short-form rather than clipping a single highlight from a stream or long-form video. These are both YouTubers I watch the long-form and short-form content of. Moarf, on the other hand, posts shorts of the collaboration videos he's in, using other YouTubers/Streamers to boost the views. This clearly works for short-form views, but I haven't once watched one of these and thought "I want to watch the full video now." I'm sure you can probably relate to that from your own experience too.

A-plots

I've heard the advice "you should have your YouTube title and thumbnail in mind before making the video" and I don't think that's entirely true, personally. I think what they really mean is that you should have your A-plot in mind. Your goal of the video. Here are some examples:

Continuity tip

I wasn't sure where to put this, but it's important!

I generally suggest avoiding doing video series, but if you want to do them, my best advice would be to make each video self-contained.How many times have you clicked on a video that says "part 4" in the title before watching parts 1-3? And how often have you bothered going back to watch the rest of the series?If you decide to do a series of videos, give the audience relevant context when needed, and let them assume the rest of the series is unimportant. For example, if you're on the 5th episode of a Sims series, "If you're new around here, this is my sim, [name], and he's [personality.] Recently he's [context that explains what's currently going on.] Until today! [Explain A plot - goal of the video]" is a much better intro than "Welcome to part 5 of this series, if you haven't seen the other videos, go watch them," because I guarantee very few people will.

B-plots

Some B-plots are obvious from the start, but some you have to find and latch onto as you create your video. Here are some examples:

Questions to ask yourself

When coming up with video ideas, here's a quick checklist of things to ask yourself:

Light Post-Commentary

Record, Edit, then Script last

Light post-commentary videos are the most common forms of gameplay videos, stream highlights, and vlogs. Usually these videos have basic planning, with and A-plot and maybe B-plot in mind before recording. Once a video in this style has been recorded, it will then be edited with basic post-commentary notes in mind. Then, finally, the post-commentary notes can be scripted and read aloud. The post-commentary of these videos are often short and informative. An intro to hook viewers, summary of things that aren't explained well in the video, maybe an outro.In summary, your workflow should be: basic planning (what's the point of the video, making sure it's logistically do-able etc.), then record the video itself, then move onto the editing, and finally focus on post-commentary parts and add them into the video before posting.Examples of YouTubers who do light post-commentary: Markiplier, AstralSpiff, How Ridiculous, More WillNE

Half Post-Commentary

Record, then Script and Edit together

Half post-commentary videos work in quite a unique way. Not only should you have an A-plot in mind, but you should actually be more focused on the B-plot as you do your live-recording. This is because your post-commentary should be carrying the A plot along, whereas your live-commentary works as a refreshing break from the "point" of the video, and instead focuses on the emotional investment side. Reactions to funny moments, on-going jokes, challenges you face, etc.You may choose to save the scripting and post-commentary recording until after the rest of the footage has been edited, alongside the editing process, or before the editing even begins. This is entirely up to you as they all have their pros and cons. If you record too early, you might have to re-record for the sake of pacing or for continuity's sake. If you have a dedicated video editor, recording post-commentary alongside the parts of the video they're on is tedious and requires a lot of communication. If you save it until after the edit, you may find your post-commentary ruins the pacing.Examples of YouTubers who do half post-commentary: Michael Reeves, William Osman, Max Fosh, DougDoug (sometimes)

Full Post-Commentary

Record, Script second, then Edit

Full post-commentary is exactly what it sounds like. You do all your planning for the A and B plots, then record the content, before finally doing the post-commentary.Most people choose to do the post commentary as they watch the video back. For those who are editing the video themselves, they might do the post commentary as they edit a given section of a video. Those who have dedicated video editors may record all the post-commentary before sending it all off to be edited.Examples of YouTubers who do full post-commentary: Any Austin, Nile Red, I Did A Thing (mostly)

Pre-Commentary

Script first, Record, then Edit

Pre-commentary videos are where you have a full scripted layed out before you've recorded anything. This is extremely common amongst video essayists and educational channels.The process of this usually goes: plan & research, script the video, read the script, and then edit it before posting. Gathering B-roll during this time can range from during the researching and scripting process (theorists channels do that a lot) to during the editing process (video essayists usually opt for this.)Examples of YouTubers who do Pre-Commentary: Ryan George Extra Plus!, Tom Scott's older videos, Game Theorists (and most theorist channels)

If you have a team

If you're in a team

Recording a video

Read this before you hit record!

Scripting a video

How to write goodly

Beginner's guide

Don't know where to start? Start here!

General editing tips

Your future self will thank you.

How to sell a video

Most guides can be condensed to these points

So you've finished editing the video, now it's time to sell it. Here are some critical pieces of advice that apply to nearly every video out there:

How selling a video works

How do videos actually draw viewers into watching them?

Learning what makes a good title and thumbnail also requires learning why viewers make the decision to click on videos in the first place:

Your first "clients"

Your first clients don't need to be people who have officially commissioned you. If you have a friend you want to make art for, make art for them and add it to the portfolio. If your family want to edit a video of their cat, edit it and add it to the portfolio. I personally started with a portfolio entirely of videos I made for college assignments and a couple meme edits I made in my free time. Creators are human; they want to know you are too, so make human things.

Creating the portfolio

You don't have to start with a crazy portfolio and you most certainly don't need a professional website. Eventually these things are nice, but you can also just start with a YouTube playlist of videos you've edited, or an Instagram account of art you've drawn. If you do want to make something more professional, I personally recommend the following websites:

Make fan content

Fan content is actually one of the best ways to build up a portfolio. Draw art of your favourite streamer, do covers of your favourite music artists, take things that exist and put your own spin on it. Not only do these have a pre-established audience who can see your work, but there have actually been whole careers built from people just making fan art. Video editors and artists espcially get seen by YouTubers and streamers they make fan content for and get picked up to do official work.

Network!

A lot of people enter the content creator space trying sites like Fiverr. I personally haven't bothered with that, and have only looked for work via YTJobs a few times. I actually mostly recommend against these sites for commission work unless there's a specific job listing that appeals to you.Instead, the majority of my work has come from networking. Most creators know someone with more followers than them, and most creators are happy to vouch for you if you do a good enough job. If they don't know someone with more followers, someone else they know might. So the next time you're looking for work, start with someone you've already done work for (including friends) and ask them if they know anyone who'd be interested. Look at people they collaborate with, creators with shared audiences, ask members of their communities.

Building rapport

I cannot overstate how valuable it is for you to build a strong relationship with your clients. Many YouTubers and streamers have a passion for the creative process and making things they're proud of, not just for the business aspects. If you don't share that passion with them, and show them that passion, they're less likely to keep you around.A lot of freelance-client relations stay strictly professional, but they don't have to. I've made friends with some of my clients and it's improved communication, workflow, and financial stability for me. Obviously don't be weird, but remember that they aren't your boss, they're your co-worker and you likely have the same goals - to make quality content you can be proud of.

Integrate yourself

Creators don't just settle on specific editors and artists because they're lazy. These editors and artists learn the style and then add their own subtle spin to it. Lixian, one of Markiplier's editors, has literally added himself into a lot of Mark's videos. Long-term viewers can tell when Lixian has edited a Markiplier video, even if he isn't in it. Lycel does a lot of thumbnail work in the Mario Odyssey community, her style has become a brand of a specific style of content shared across a few channels. In summary, make it difficult for clients to find someone who can do what you do!

Cut your losses

Sometimes your skills, passion, and time aren't valued. I've worked for YouTubers who've just stop replying completely after a commission is complete. Friends of mine have had the same too, with some even being scammed out of money. I highly recommend watermarking your commissions until you've been paid in full by the client as this avoids the awkwardness of asking for a deposit and allows you to prove that the work is done without them stealing it.In addition to that, sometimes you have to consider how much work you're putting in and whether the money you're making for it is actually worth your time. As you keep working in this space, your experience adds up and your time should be financially valued higher. I started out at just $50 per video, with some videos taking me a whole week to edit. Now I ask for $35 per hour worked minimum. Remember, there will always be a cheaper freelancer, but they won't have the experience, communication, or style that you bring to the table. Every addition to your portfolio is another quest completed, and every client is another level up the content creator ladder.