Going Places

Yesterday, I had another chance to get out the house and create some content with Joshen, and to my surprise, being out and about resulted in gathering much attention. Throughout the day, we've been approached by multiple people, including an influential community leader who invited us to speak to some young people around our age about alternate career paths outside of "basketball and rapping." It made me feel good because I rarely consider what I do to be an alternate career choice; just something that I decided to do with my life. It's like my camera is Mjolnir (the hammer), and I am Thor. My camera basically gives me my power.

I've said that I should carry about my camera to more places to get attention and after yesterday, I realize that if Youtube were real, I would have gotten about 3-4 subs by people just asking what I do. Joshen and I are constantly figuring out ways to expand our audience and sometime we forget that the biggest social network is right outside our doors. It's funny how everyone who approached us asked if we were students working on a project because it seems the only accepted way you can be involved in videography is if you're a film major at a fancy film school (no offense to any film majors in any fancy film school/programs). One idea we had was to shoot our weekly shows in different locations to gather an audience and generate attention, which I will definitely keep in mind in my future video endeavors.

I know not everything I produce is going to be a hit or any idea I have won't be executed well, but I can succeed at getting my face out there and making people notice me more, so when I do make good videos, people will look out for me. Everyone else seems to be going places, I just have to go somewhere close by to make a huge difference.

-Video Vix[o]n

We Are Not Musicians

My latest video was inspired by well-known Youtuber, Mystery Guitar Man. The idea just came to me and the song was inspired by the rain, just a way to make sense of it all. Granted, I'm not musical prodigy, but in some ways, music has had a small, but intricate part in my life.

Most of you don't know this, but I had a small rap career back in my freshman year of college. My roommate and I formed the rap group, "New Playas," and to us, we were a hit (well to us, at least)

My rap name was simply "V-Jay." Me and him came out with a rap demo and everything. We were proud of our success rapping off of my microphone and laptop. My biggest musical inspiration at that time was Kanye West. I was all Kanye everything when I started college and I tried to emulate that through raps and poetry. I even tried going solo and tried making my own album. After some more episodes of rapping glory with some other friends, I put up my musical boots and got more involved with my passion of video-making. I knew my days of my amateur rap career was over.

Fast forwarding to last year, when I started making videos on Youtube, I realized that in order to make my channel more interesting, I would act as my favorite artist. By throwing on some shades and a cardigan, I became Kanye West, which lead to creating my first music video ever.



After working with Joshen, we realized that making music was the way to go in order to go viral on the internet. Parodies were the name of the game and that lead to other hits such as "Ball In A Cup" and the "H.A.M." parody





With these musical pieces out in the universe and more to come, I realize that my early rap career may never be relived, but through Youtube, there may be a way to live up to my musical roots and make them flourish. Until I pick up the mic again, you'll have to stay tuned.

-Video Vix[o]n

Switching It Up

It comes a time in every person's life when change is mandatory. For me, hopefully, that time is approaching soon. I am currently unemployed and that equals not having any money. On Tuesday, I had an interview for a Video Producer position at a business technology company and I hope that works out. Ironically, I don't like working because it takes away from my video-making process, but I need money in order to produce better videos. Outside of that, when it comes to Youtube, I'm constantly thinking of ways to optimize my content and gain more subscribers. It isn't easy because it involves reaching out to multiple avenues and sharing what I produce. Thanks to Google+, I have another medium to share my content (If you're not on Google+, let me know and I can send you an invite with your email).

In the spirit of switching things up, I made a new segment on my channel called "Vdeo Clips."



I thought that a weekly show should keep people watching my channel and hopefully, I can gain more subscribers and exposure. A good Youtube buddy of mine advises to be active in the community and that's what I plan to do. I have a new weekly schedule of content production that I followed this week and it seemed to be a good work flow. I know it's a slow road to success, but I have no intentions of getting off at any exit anytime soon. These days, I have no other choice but to make it and organization is key to making that happen. Things have been at a low point and they're gradually coming up. I just hope that momentum keeps going.

-Video Vixon

"Blog About It..."

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of being invited to a blogger's networking event at the Broadway Comedy Club...


It's one of the first real events I have been to in a long time. These days, I have encased myself in a nonsocial bubble where I felt like the Wizard of Oz; working from behind the curtain, but never actually interacting with the real world. I base most of my social interaction through the internet, which is one disadvantage to social media. Most of the people at the event were there to boost the influence of their blogs and themselves through their digital footprint. Most ranged from performers, to comics to general bloggers who were looking for some advice. This a couple of key items I got from the event...

-Keep fan/personal pages (Facebook) separate, in some cases: I currently do this now on Facebook. As much as I would like to spread the word to all my friends about the videos I create, I still want Video Vix[o]n to be separate from Vixon, mainly for employment reasons.

-Edit your "digital footprint" well: Your digital footprint is everything that encompasses your presence online. Making sure that all of the facets to your social media realm are up-to-date, not incriminating and clean is crucial.

-Put out your strongest material: Nobody wants to see your worst work. Putting out content that is sub-par is not only going to drive people away, but it will help influence others not to share your content for any reason.

-Blogging is a huge undertaking: I should know this very well. My blog has evidently devolved throughout the years, and in my efforts to restructure it, it is hard work. Blogging definitely takes a lot of effort.

-Identify people you like and talk to them (Twitter) to build following: I've been trying to talk to Kanye West for the longest, lol. But seriously, I think this is a good tactic in getting noticed and building up your visibility online.

-If people are talking about your content, they don't necessarily have to "like" it:
"I saw your video and it was funny"
"Did you like it?"
"Yeah, I liked it..."
"No, I mean did you like it on Youtube?"
That's usually how most of my conversations go with my close friends, but now I realize that it doesn't matter if they don't hit that "like" buttton (thought it would be nice to see), but as long as they're talking about it.


-Make good shit!: Pretty self explanatory.


With all this good advice, I should be blogging myself to success in no time right? Not exactly, but I will keep these lessons in mind as I continue to shape my "media empire." My blog my not go back to what it was, but at least I can make it evolve into something better. Lesson learned.


-Video Vix[o]n

Inspired By You[tube]

In my many journeys of being on "the tubes," there are a couple of people that have different functions in my internet viewing; to entertain and inform. Recently, I have been making videos that have been inspired by some of my favorite Youtubers. My first video was inspired by a cool Tuber named Onision.

Onision (or Greg, for those who feel more comfortable with him) is known for his crazy, psychotic and sometimes genius-like videos. He's funny, emotional, serious and down to earth. I thought this video would be a small ode to his randomness. Another Youtuber who I am informed and entertained by is Philip DeFranco (aka Sxephil). You may notice in some of my vlogs that I mention Phil a couple of times because, to me, Phil represents a voice on Youtube, a standard of success, in my opinion. I have made videos in response to Phil before, but this one was definitely his style and was successful, for the job that I did.

I'm hoping that either one of these two got to see what I did and the main goal was to get some recognition for it. Even if they saw it and kept it moving, it's better than nothing. As I continue creating content online, I have to give credit where credit is due and find other people that I can be inspired by (and no, it's not copying, lol) and try to match close to their awesomeness. In the meanwhile, I'll just be...

-Video Vix[o]n