Vlogs and the Hyperreal
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 18 ก.ย. 2024
- Clickbait Title: Warning Don't Use Dialectic Analysis Before You See This
While meta-discussion of TH-cam is hardly lacking, I think there's a lot of room for more serious analysis of TH-cam as a broad subject and all the myriad subcultures in specific. Every time I've attended VidCon I've been as surprised by the subcultures that are represented as I have by the ones that are absent. I think it would be utterly fascinating to see an ASMR panel at VidCon 2018, to hear a bunch of ASMR creators talk shop about the specific nuances of their genre, the common needs and wants of their audience, what makes a successful channel, and how the genre is evolving. The other day I saw a five hour long, multi-part ASMR choose your own adventure. you always think you have a handle on what's out there, until you realize you really don't.
Unrelated: Idea Channel is Ending • Idea Channel is Ending
Mike and the crew have been a huge inspiration over the years, and I've made many good and proper changes to my own work in order to try to rise to the bar they set.
Written and performed by Dan Olson
Twitter: / foldablehuman
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Pillage away, my dude
RIP Idea Channel. Fuggin awesome work. You will be missed. :(
DOOBLIDOO WILL LIVE ON
Six seconds before you explicitly called it out I was like "This video was very Idea Channel"
Press F to pay respects :c
So here's one thing about jump cuts, they're more than just an aesthetic convention, they're a necessary tool. If you're going to make a 5 minute video, unless you have a teleprompter and a LOT of skill / talent for reading off of one well, you're going to need cuts. And hanging a lantern on that cut by changing shot size or body position says "Look, I know, there's a cut, I'm not trying to fool you" in a way that is pretty necessary.
Of course, how the jump cut functions has changed a lot over the years, mostly by getting tighter (at least in my stuff.)
But it's very interesting (as others have mentioned) to see the blend of sketch and vlog that people like David Dobrik are innovating right now. That blend between fiction and reality where you're not actually 100% sure which bits are Dobrik's life and which bits are sketches or even dramatic fiction is very interesting. It's been very hard to figure out how to tell stories in online video, what we did with Lizzie Bennet, bringing the story 100% into the vlog, worked, but it was a baby step. I'm very interested to watch this new style evolve into what will probably become the actual way that fiction and the hyper-real finally meet. My guess is, whatever figures that out is going to be extremely successful and powerful and influential.
Liam Stanley expands on some of this in another comment you should read.
One last note: The "vlog" is not necessarily a genre anymore, but more of a tool that can be used in many genres, whether that's commentary, education, comedy, or reality. Every genre is going to use it differently because it will work differently and fit better with the format. I would be very surprised if jump cuts go away, I think they're too necessary and too ingrained, but other than that, there's no way I'm going to predict 10 years into the future of TH-cam.
- Hank
HANK IS EVERYWHERE
My gut reaction to Dobrik's work is to assume that it's all scripted, or at the very least planned and coordinated if not literally word-for-word scripted, and merely uses the aesthetics of vlogging as a convention, no different, really, than the vlogging segments of The Guild. The key difference, however, is that The Guild started from the assumption of being narrative fiction, while Dobrik's videos embrace the ambiguity of the framing device.
This reading dovetails well with your point about how the "vlog" isn't strictly a genre anymore.
I also 100% agree with the permanence of jump cuts: they simply solve too many logistical issues for solo-creators to ever go away.
Thanks for dropping by, Hank!
thank you both for this awesome conversation
So, PBS Idea Channel isn't a vlog, & cuts out ums & pauses. But there's one episode that was vlog-ish & very quiet. 'Not the video you were expecting...' And it's a video that sticks with me. It was a reaction to a specific moment in time, but instead of more talking, debating, a 30 minute video manifesto about the then current political climate, it was a break. A small moment of someone saying, "take a break, breathe." And that was very unique.
I also find it interesting because of how thoughtful & even uncomfortable he looks at times. Blinking excessively, nervously scratching his face, it's not the polished script-reading, jump-cut persona of the normal videos, so in some way I think it might be a very authentic 'vlog' while being in a lot of ways the antithesis of what we've come to know as a 'vlog'.
It's all about shitting out the most amount of footage, with the least amount of work. Got it.
"This is all written. And this. And this. And this. Eaeah. This was also written." - Stewart Lee
I sincerely hope that the "What's up guys, it's your boy [name]" intro format dies out.
You don't care what's up with me, and you're probably not my son.
There's only so many ways you can greet your audience. With thousands if not millions of channels you're always going to here the same things.
I don't know, there's something about the mix of canned spontaneity with real genuinety that's really charming. Whenever I saw a pewdiepie video I couldn't help but fist bump him.
Ryan George the thing is that normal greetings often include phrases like "how are you?" or "what's up?" but they aren't actual questions, they're just formalities. In British high society, the correct response to "how do you do?" is not "I'm good" or "I'm doing well", it's "how do you do?". It's a rhetorical question, you aren't supposed to answer it.
So when someone says it in a video, it's just a similar formality. It's how you talk normally so it carries over to the video.
I'm fine with a "what's up", it's just another colloquial "hello", it's the "It's ya boy" that drives me crazy.
I've noticed a trend that's making me very uncomfortable - and that's referring to male creators, by their fans, as "daddy".
One trend I've started seeing in many "vlogs" is the blending of an authentic portrayal of day-to-day life with improv and sketch-style storytelling. David Dobrik, Steven Suptic and to an extent Anthony Padilla create vlogs that are less like young people with a webcam recording their life and more like self-aware reality shows. Unlike "The Real World" in which it tries to pass itself off as authentic, these vlogs' "authenticity" is merely a thin dressing over an apparent creative process. Many of these vlogs start out showing actual events like David Dobrik getting breakfast and then he proceeds to have conversations with his friends many of whom are skilled in improv and intentionally say jokes with the intent of building on top of them as the vlog progresses and finally the vlog crescendos into fiction with David's friends doing cocaine with Spongebob or Carmelita the Prostitute journeying around L.A. It's as if within these vlogs, they're moving down the spectrum from realism to formalism. Their personal lives are still there, but they are merely a foundation for a hyperreality.
I've got really into Steven Suptic's videos recently. I can see that kind of semi-scripted faux-reality becoming a thing. Someone from IGN even got accused of lifting his style for some E3 coverage.
This reminds me a lot of the channel Seventybroad, except instead of comedy it goes for horror. It flip-flops between realistic and fictional so many times it's hard to tell where the character ends and the vlogger begins.
I'm not sure if I can sure if I can summarize the plot very eloquently, but Nightmind has a very good analysis of it.
I believe Suptic refers to them as "alternative lifestyle vlogs". In any case, as a writer I'm fascinated by it, as genuinely think it could be the next big thing in online entertainment.
Goddamn I love this man. Please never stop making content.
I wonder how the focus on livestreaming is going to change this cadence. There are many, many livestreams that have several minutes of literally no action, no sound, nothing until there's a chat stream discussion.
In terms of vlogs, I think that creators like Casey Neistat have changed the visual language quite a bit. Vlogging now also includes setting cameras down and walking past them (but not showing going back and picking them back up), smash cuts from one place to another while a piece of dialogue continues, etc. So it's ever-evolving, for sure.
xingcat I'm not sure if livestreaming will effect vlogs. They serve similar purposes of personality and genuine human-ness, however livestreams are long and live usually with chats to talk to the creator as the content is being streamed. Vlogs are stuck in time and the audience can not engage with the creator during the video. Therefore vlogs need to be short and actively engaging while livestream will stay more slow paced.
xingcat the rise of livestreaming is actually really annoying to me at this point my attention span is so shot they're almost unbearable lmao.. even when youtube dropped the 10 minute limit i was uncomfortable. idk how much is from being raised on youtube and how much is adhd or. how much those are linked
But what works with livestream doesn't work with vlogs. Vlogs require lively energetic people doing a bunch of stuff, while livestreams require low energy and high foccused people. The one thing that would be more unbearable than a v-sauce Joel vlog would be a Casey Neistat four hour arcade emulator stream.
Something I've personally noticed regarding the culture of affect in online circles, is that originally when I used the internet, I felt superior and like 'one of the few smart ones' when I used proper speech and grammar - whether that was actually true or not, I felt like "I'm better than those chatspeaking idiots who use 'u' and 'r' instead of the real words!", and this slowly transitioned as I got older, into often intentionally speaking to friends in all lowercase, with very little affect, intentionally, to be more 'casual', you see this style of speech on places like Tinder - obviously different depending on the person, city, and primary language, but I've found in the young adult crowd the profiles and chat tend to be dry humor, low effort, short sentences, in an attempt to seem cool and genuine and not spend too much time writing out long messages on a shitty phone keyboard. Because being a tryhard is equated with being too clingy, and that's not attractive. Caring too much is a negative thing because it means you're not emotionally mature.
The other day I went to go write something online and I started with proper grammar - then I stopped and erased it - I went to write it in all lowercase - then I stopped and erased it. They both felt 'contrived' - they both felt inauthentic. I had no idea what I was 'supposed' to sound like on the internet anymore, I didn't want to seem like a tryhard by being too 'proper' and I didn't want to speak too casually and come across as fake. It feels like the first 2 waves of internet speech have gone by and I have no idea what the third is. A level of intentional irony so deep it's impossible to even tell if it's ironic or not?
The culture of an affectation of irony, of 'don't try at all - don't give the impression you're trying - nothing matters- everything is a joke' is something I think originated a lot on places like 4chan- maybe GameFAQs or Neogaf- but particularly Something Awful's FYAD, because there's no anonymity there, which I feel helps to create a more consistent culture among the users, as well as the mini-subcultures that spawned from those sites and exploded across the internet - the main element is that if you show people that you 'care', you aren't even allowed to stand in the presence of the other users without being socially lampooned without mercy. You have to remove every ounce of 'care' from your affectation before they accept you as one of their own - creating a culture where anything is OK to say as long as you make it clear that you give absolutely no fucks, because that is what is cool.
The main goal of that sort of community is to remove anyone who isn't 'hard enough' to deal with the fact that everyone on the site is ironic and also hates them and that's completely acceptable by the rules, rather than most sites which have stringent rules against trolling or harassing other users. "If you aren't cool enough to be ironic, to be intentionally stupid, then get out. Im gay."
I think this culture that I can only describe as 'no affect who give a fuck' has shown through on TH-cam in videos like, most recently in my memory, "MEME Theory: How Behind The Meme is Ruining the Memescape as we Know It" - which is a video about meme culture and youtube poops that is simultaneously written from the perspective of "I am an informed person doing an informative video essay on a complicated subject" and "fuck you lol i dont care loud noises distateful jokes weird comedic timing", which is a really unique thing when it comes to the 'texture' you describe - it blends the informative 'video essay' style that's become common with channels like this, with the aesthetic style and delivery of the 'zero affect' subculture that tends to be much more casual,. conversational, cool and ironic.
Hope some of these points make some amount of sense or at least provoke some thoughts/discussion! Jesus christ sorry for all those words. I might be totally on the wrong track here but I figured it was worth mentioning.
I think not caring started with nihilism. Alan Watts once said that the debate between religion and atheism can be boiled down to "I am a big boy, you're still an innocent kid". Indeed, proving that you're a big boy is a big part of social interaction. My dad gets shit at work because he likes Marvel movies. Kids constantly watch shit on television because it's "adult stuff" (the way they talk about sex too). There's this whole industry based around discussing "actual science" and exploring "real evidence" and engaging in "discourse and reason", and "disproving the opposition with facts". They never arrive at an actual conclusion, and the conversations are mostly one-sided. Pierre Bourdieu has this theory about the elite deciding what is art in order to stay relevant.
Hell, I even used the names of two big boys instead of just speaking my mind, just to show how much of a big boy I am.
I believe we need more total, naked, unironic sincerity, without self-conscious conformity to social standards. Or getting closer to it.
I wonder if there’s an element of ableism in there as well. I’m autistic, and while I’m not unable to detect irony and sarcasm at all, the extent to which it’s part of online vocab makes it sometimes impossible to tell what I’m supposed to believe. I’ve noticed when people communicate with blunt sincerity in spaces where irony is the norm, there is an interesting disruption where the usual users seem to short circuit and respond nonsensically with huge misreadings.
@@alisonpurgatory85 You should look up the discourse around metamodernism - the post-postmodernist style of expression that's become more prominent in recent years. It describes what you're talking about pretty aptly: oscillations between and mixtures of postmodern irony and modern sincerity. It's very descriptive of the internet, but it's also started to make its way to more traditional media - Bo Burnham's Inside being the most prominent/clear example I can think of.
Interesting, and definitely something I've noticed too. Anytime I'm chatting in a Discord server I always feel kinda sheepish with my proper grammar being alongside everything else.
And it definitely is connected, as there is undoubtedly a lot more thought going into ironic, "low-effort" messages than people would like to admit - there's a "right way" (a grammar, in fact) to write them, and you know it when you see it.
The next wave is 100% genuine down to earth honesty without a trace of irony. It's the natural cycle of subversion.
2017 Dan: "I want to be less cynical."
2023: "Hey Dan, have you heard of NFTs?"
I think it's about rhythm/consistency. If you use jump cuts in a way that makes the viewer able to anticipate/make sense of them, they become almost invisible. If/you just randomly/have them all over, they distract from/the message you're/trying to get across.
The fate of all authenticity is stylization. The fate of stylization, obsolescence.
That's not entirely true you know
Maybe it's not entirely true (what generality is?) but it's pretty true. I have a spiel I could get into, but counterexamples would be appreciated first.
Sounds pretty spot-on to me... did you coin that phrase? Google seems to think that you did... :P
@@MrKubahades whether it’s true or not, it sounds good. In the ‘style’ of a ‘wise quote’...
I love that you ended with asking the audience to comment about what vlog style will be like. It felt like a vlog-style ending about vlog styles.
love the positive edge. it makes it more powerful.
Doobly-doo, haha. It's really really interesting to watch this, and your jump cut video, after being introduced to you through a long binge of your editing videos. I love how seriously you take the subject at hand and the depth you dive into with the grammar of not only vlogging, but TH-cam as a whole. I also love how you open every time with an attempt to bring us to a shared vocabulary. Thanks for all of the takes and re-takes to get this right!
I listen to you (and most videos) at 1.5 speed to bring them up to the Vlogbrothers pace I grew up on, and suddenly having John come on - sped up - really highlighted how fast he talks. Jarring!
Baudrillard, the hyper real? Holy shit it's the year 2000 and I'm back in university again.
Thanks for this video. The jump cut format of many TH-cam videos is something I've thought a lot about and tried (and I think failed) to parody myself, but it's extremely eye-opening to hear someone as accomplished as yourself talk about it with real insight.
I wish I had something more to contribute to the dialogue, but I don't. So instead I'll simply say I found this incredibly interesting and it's given me a lot of fun things to think about. Thanks :)
I've hosted a couple of radio shows -- neither successfully, I should mention -- and I deliberately avoided the tropes which have come to be regarded as "professional." I spoke slowly and deliberately, I deliberately avoided scripting anything I planned to say, and would take pauses to collect my thoughts. I would sometimes inform listeners of minor problems going on in the booth regarding the nuts and bolts of broadcast, and I always addressed the mic like I was talking to a single person across a table from me over a cup of coffee.
I don't think it's a coincidence that I was concerned with maintaining the legitimacy of what I was doing, since I also live a life of voluntary simplicity: everything I own can fit in a single backpack, I haven't worn a watch in 30 years, and I not only don't own a cellphone but I have never even _used_ a cellphone. In fact, what I've noticed is that my lifelong effort to maintain the authenticity of my personal experience has become so contrary to the everyday life of the so-called "ordinary person" that when I mention anything about my personl life -- and I mean _anything_ -- on the Internet, I'm invariably called a liar and an obvious troll. Just the idea that a person would deliberately avoid convenience and comfort in order to keep a visceral connection to the immediacy of one's existence, the be-here-now of which Buddhists speak, is seemingly beyond credibility now.
One of the things I've noticed over the course of posting a lot of long, thoughtful commentary to TH-cam (like this comment) is that it's generally completely ignored. The vast majority of people on TH-cam have become so conditioned to quick, simple to digest, uncontroversial views that they become blind to anything outside of that experience. It's like a deliberate inversion of Debord's detournement where only the orthodox and expected is visible and everything else fades into an indistinguishable background.
(Incidentally, when they cancelled my radio show, the board compared the sound and tone ot it to "the crash of the Hindenburg." I know they weren't trying to be flattering, but I take perverse pride in scandalizing them with the visceralness and rawness of my program.)
NoJusticeNoPeace The format of your comment is the perfect grounds for comparison and a call to find a happy medium between pure authenticity and compounded(staged) information. By including details about you personal experience as a radio host and down-to-earth lifestyle, you have achieved your goal as presenting yourself as a whole, real, interesting person, which lends you credibility. Great! However, one reason people are quick to bypass longer comments are because they also often include a lot of irrelevant information.... like the fact that you've never owned a cell phone. Not to be harsh, I mean this in a strictly academic sense: Who cares? Some people do. Most people don't (but assuming your intention isn't to appeal to the largest crowd possible that's okay). I guess what I'm saying is there is an argument to be made for sacrificing intimacy for efficiency (I hope you never do!!) and that it all depends on who you're trying to reach.
I like your radio story. I actually deliberately had no cell phone for four years in college. It’s honestly not as inconvenient as people think. I even managed to meet friends for dinner or movies etc. You use the old ways of meet me by the door for so and so time, if I’m not there check back in 15 mins. Everyone thought I was crazy for not wanting to be eternally accessible. Wish I could have that mindset today but work makes it impossible. As to your note on long comments, I’m wary of long comments generally because, a few paragraphs in, they often devolve into hate spewing or conspiracy or fallacious arguments. So I approach them gingerly, read about five lines to determine tone and then decide to continue or not.
@@SSurel-fo9hz most people dont care about anything that isnt engaging or relevant to their entertainment.
caring about that fact too much led me to destroy my social complex entirely, to the point where I could never actually deduce what "someone cares about" and what someone doesn't.
even while typing this i have to rationalize actually posting this comment instead of deleting it like most of my other comments.
"why would i post this? nobody cares."
eh
i wanna leave a mark on a 4 yr old comment section.
"so obviously synthetic that it becomes authentic"
Steven Soderbergh's THE LIMEY is loaded with temporal and spatial discontinuity, to a similar effect. We are presented with the grammar of memory - a scrapbook of blurry details and a man trying to assemble a coherent sense of where he went wrong, instead of the conventional conception of naturalism.
(though Soderbergh says in the commentary that he made this while thinking of French New Wave films, a chunk of film history I'm still not terribly familiar with, so that level of discontinuity may not be as original and refreshing as I felt it to be back in 1999...)
Others have stated much more eloquently why I think the vlog and jumpcuts are here to stay. Hank even uses a wrestling analogy that I've used in real life before!
What I'm curious about is the future. You mention Marshall McLuhan and his "medium is the message." With AR and VR only starting to bubble into the popular culture there will be different visual languages that will be invented that we simply cannot envision yet. Possibly crafting entire worlds for our personal online audiences.
I also believe, much like movies and other entertainment, that online video will eventually see itself having cycles. Like how the 80s aesthetic became vogue for many years. Or like how every TV show from the 90s seems to be getting rebooted.
Whatever comes I'm excited! Can't wait to see future videos of yours.
Just want to say I really enjoy your videos. I don't even realize how much time goes by when watching. About six minutes into this video you make reference to something that happened about 6 minutes ago, and I had to check the time to verify it had been that long, because it seemed like no time had gone by at all. So kudos to you! :)
Hopefully more long form content will become the norm. Editing speach seems like its here to stay as most viewers dont seem to like pauses however your particular brand of video is something i have grown to enjoy over time. Your video "line goes up" is absolutely outstanding and i hope long form video essays become the norm.
Things change, language and the delivery of it also changes. I dig the jump cut if it's done well (insert subjectivity here) Perhaps everyone will sing and none of us will talk, my two cents any way. I love how you were able to dig down into such micro-niche topic thats so relatable to everyday life...Kudos to you sir.
Interesting stuff, Dan! Digging these meta-analysis videos, I don't seek out videos "about" TH-cam so a lot of this is fresh to me.
You're killing it, dude. Love your content.
I'd love to hear more of what you have to say on this topic!
And personally, it's fascinating to see how the inauthenticity/perceived authenticity of the vlogging style has been used to create full narratives (i.e. most of the youtube's home grown horror genre where a narrative and its horror elements are delivered via vlogs and other youtube-originated video styles, such as tutorials) that the audience only knows is a created story because of the fantastical elements, and otherwise may as well be a "normal" non-fiction style narrative vlog series.
I think the existence of these series extra affirms that a vlog is its own style with its own grammar and language because these series would not exist in the form that they do if "vlogging" wasn't a defined kind of video. The amateur feel of vlogging lends these series an air of believably instead of making the whole thing fall flat because of how ridiculous the plots of a lot of them can get.
Amelia Huff
it's even more fun when it's almost indistinguishable what is part of the "game" if the video and what isn't. The TH-cam channel seventybroad (which I've seen mentioned in the comments elsewhere) is a great example of this, where an unfolding horror story is told through the lens of a vlog in a way that makes it unclear whether what is being described is real or not. Instead of delving further into fantasy as it goes on, it becomes more like a typical vlog, and the creator/main character even hosted livestreams which became part of the story. It's just great. I think everyone who's interested in this type of stuff should watch it for themselves, though.
I'm in the camp of doing outlines when I make vlogs (which are usually shorter, more personal, more relaxed than my scripted videos) I'll have my points set out, maybe a turn of phrase I liked in the writing, but not much else.
I'm not sure how that plays into the hyperreality of watching it, but it makes me more comfortable performing it, so it counts for something.
I am so with you on studying the craft involved in different genres on youtube. Like how cooking shows manage to riff on an already set template, or how Charlie and Tony's videos straddle the line between video essay, comedy, and narrative. It's all fascinating.
Very well articulated. Even if I don’t agree I always appreciate how thorough and thought out your videos and thoughts are. Props man.
Tl:dr- vlogs move twards fast, funny edits
From what I've seen, I think the near future of vlogs will be inspired by supermega. The fast paced talking talking and cuts will be amplified by editing jokes. Editing can be meticulously crafted to make jokes where there were none before. Super deluxe does a great job at this by taking relatively unfunny segments and remixing them to create jokes.
Editing can add so much personality and as more people start vlogging. People with more professional editing skills will rise to the top due to more engaging content.
Great video
I think the bit that's really interesting for me to think about is the kind of feedback loops the TH-cam style will create with actual authentic real life, like John Green just talking fast as an acquired habit of blogging for so long.
I remember reading something by David Foster Wallace once where he talked about how television in the 90s was getting to this weird place where TV was starting to cannibalize itself, that the culture of watching TV was becoming so ingrained that you started to see these disgustingly self-aware shows coming out, all TV shows became about watching TV. My guess is that the TH-cam house style will start to do something similar, assuming it hasn't already.
I wonder if the compulsive cutting of silences is an illusory pressure TH-camrs feel, and people would enjoy the videos in a different way without them.
ohigetjokes I know it is not VLOG related but I don't watch many of those.. but here is my convoluted hot take:
I found that as much as I would like otherwise, a videoessay in their current form are a hard for me to learn anything from. My own attention can't compete with the next point the video will throw at me a few seconds later. Due to editing avoiding dead air like a plague.
videos like Lindsay offers buffers between with comedic skits or reflections that try to tie up what was previously said is the most refined form of editing in the videoessay.
to areas where I can't stand nerdwritter earlier work or KapitainKristain even if their work is prettier than Lindsay's. Because i always find myself not remembering what they were about, they made me feel good about watching them but not remember anything, instead I can recite from Memory the main points of any points made in "Hercules a hot mess"
What you're describing I think must boil down to learning styles... Because in a vlog I feel like I want to slow things down, hear what people are sincerely thinking or feeling, but in a video essay I often want to play it on fast forward because if they go too slow I tend to forget what the point was.
ohigetjokes
I found myself thinking back before I started academia (Medical), probably shifted at some point during the training. realized at some point my mental capacity can not hold enough information at once. Perhaps I got cognitively worse but I found out that a condensed video that gives breaks for thought (attention spans are short, any metanalysis on the matter will give out the 2-5 minute mark for most students to tune out, I imagine its even shorter on new topics) works many times better than simply spewing a stream of 10 minute filled chunks.
don't get me wrong I know the frustration of feeling an "over explanation" and if I was smarter i would honestly be furious even. But hot damn do I learn a lot more.
servandot I feel you, I've recently unsubscribbed from 80% of the video essay channels I was subbed because I could retain little to no information, to the point where I'd watch the same video multiple times and still forget that I watched it. Ultimately I'm going back to text posts, even the ones that are more complicated to read, because in text format I can stop reading and make a quick search and then come back.
servandot you know, Egoraptor's Sequelitis essays have been a bit controversial, but they genuinely do a great job at actually conveying a point that you won't forget. It's a shame he never made more, but maybe the fact that they're rare is what makes them memorable. If he had to pump out one a week they might start to become more forgettable. I do think that happens with a lot of Nerdwriter videos. I enjoy them but a lot of the time I couldn't explain what point was made just seconds after watching it.
I feel silly for first now realizing the connection between the old 10 minute video limit and jump-cuts.
Flavius To my mind, Ze Frank pioneered the time-compressed-vlog aesthetic - and it wasn't even on TH-cam.
You'd make Hegel proud with how you explain dialectics.
When it comes to the shift in language and cadence of TH-cam, and to a large degree Social Media in general, in recent times, this Orwell quote just becomes more and more ominously relevant.
*"It's a beautiful thing, the Destruction of words. Of course the great wastage is in the verbs and adjectives, but there are hundreds of nouns that can be got rid of as well. It isn't only the synonyms; there are also the antonyms. After all, what justification is there for a word, which is simply the opposite of some other word? A word contains its opposite in itself. Take ‘good,’ for instance. If you have a word like ‘good,’ what need is there for a word like ‘bad’? ‘Ungood’ will do just as well - better, because it's an exact opposite, which the other is not. Or again, if you want a stronger version of ‘good,’ what sense is there in having a whole string of vague useless words like ‘excellent’ and ‘splendid’ and all the rest of them? ‘Plusgood’ covers the meaning or ‘doubleplusgood’ if you want something stronger still. Of course we use those forms already, but in the final version of Newspeak there'll be nothing else. In the end the whole notion of goodness and badness will be covered by only six words - in reality, only one word."*
I was just discussing this in the editing room of a project I'm working on right now (it'll be released tomorrow... yes, though, on TH-cam). I think the jump cut is here to stay. I don't think it'll become the DEFAULT style forever thankfully. But it'll have a place in the editing vernacular for sure. And it can be very useful. I've been editing for a while, and jump-cutting was a thing that you used to have to bend over backwards to avoid. Unless you were portraying some kind of chaos or panic. But I appreciate it for the very reasons you mention here. It has a hyper-reality to it that can be very effective, especially in calm scenes. Or reflective moments. I've even used it, unceremoniously, in a feature film (albeit, one targeted to young people). ...Now that I think of it, I use it a lot actually... hmmm...
Halfway through this video I suddenly realised what Dan's diction and delivery style reminded me of
The Architect scene from Matrix Reloaded.
Concordantly.
Great video folding, always super interesting
7:24
This is an extremely good point. Another way in which vlogs acknowledge that they are fake is in having the person speaking actually hold the camera. One is always very aware in a vlog that the person speaking is speaking into a camera.
God I was thinking about those PBS idea channel videos while this video was going. It's been years since I've watched any of the videos and was surprised when you mentioned it at the end because yeah. This does feel a lot like them.
Other people have mentioned livestreaming putting a new influence on vlogs, but I've been thinking that the growing popularity of livestreaming's leisurely format must be a reaction to the extremely tight focus of the vlog. It's not necessarily an intentional thing, since streams are intrinsically unedited, but a lot of people have been ready for it.
Twitch, recently purchased by Amazon, seems to think this is fertile territory and is making a huge effort right now to push "IRL" streams into the mainstream on a platform previously known only for video games. TH-cam is historically not a great streaming platform, but I expect they'll try to up their game soon. Personal livestreaming isn't new (Periscope has been around for years now), but the big players are starting to throw a _lot_ of money into this arena.
Streaming will probably exert a stylistic pushback of sorts on the vlog (and is apparently already doing so), but the hyperreality is so intrinsic to the vlogging format now that it won't be able to reclaim this space in the "slice of life" ecosystem. Meanwhile, it'll be very interesting to see what sorts of weird artifices grow onto streaming over the next 10 years.
also haha "main stream"
Thanks. I'm not into vlogs, but at least this answered one question I had, which was: why does everybody on TH-cam videos always talk continuously without pausing (even for breath)? I even see this in live interviews, which are clearly not cut together. So much of it is one giant run-on sentence! It's like listening to a 5 or 6 year old try to tell you a "story"! tavi.
Your eyebrows and video are very interesting, bravo!
In another decade, TH-cam will sound 'modern day presidential'
I love the idea of a vlog dialect. This was so interesting
Vlogging is now a visual representation of the Hyper-real Simulacrum
"In this essay, I will approach the aesthetic language of vlogging with a Baudrillardian analytical lens-"
Sample comment, do not copy.
Do not steal. Trademark.
Last time I was this early Foldy was still alive...
Press F to pay respects.
F you Foldy.
Foldy's still alive, he's just in a coma. One day he shall awaken, and it will be glorious!
F
F is for Foldy :(
God, I can't even remember the first Folding Ideas video I watched. I know he was on Chez Apocalypse at the time. It was before his Gamergate video, if that's any indication.
Dan, this is such a fascinating video! One question about authenticity though: I've recently started vlogging and I find myself reshooting a lot to get a performance I'm happy with. That being said, I do that a lot in real life, too! A LOT when it comes to work (I'm a musician so I practice hours every day to make things seem like they flow when in fact they normally wouldn't), quite a bit while learning foreign languages (when I was 10-15, I'd lock myself in the bathroom and say things in English just to hear if my pronunciation was convincing), or even while just running through scenarios in my head before important events / meetings. Is there any difference between reshooting / caring about the final product and this? And if there is, what is it?
I guess some of what I'm thinking of with the signature vlog tics--jump cuts, "Real" settings, etc.--boils down to accessibility. I've made a handful of videos (not on this account), and I've inherited a camera and a basic lighting rig from my photographer mother, and shot myself in a corner of my living room with a tripod. I did all the scripting, filming, and editing myself--and egads. While I've learned a lot and grown in my ability to script, plan, and overall raise the production quality on what I make, it is still super amateurish. And I have a reasonable beginner's kit of equipment, AND a big enough living space to set up an okay looking shoot in it. I rely on jump cuts far more than I would like, especially since it is really, really hard for me to set up alternate filming angles when I can't be behind and in front of my camera at once, and don't have any kind of external display for it (and also kinda have only half a clue what I'm doing).
People with an iPhone and a dream are going to have to rely on "Real" backgrounds, because they don't have a studio. They may as well keep the "walking around and jumpcutting" format, because it's obvious they're filming something fast on their phone. And I suspect that if this is what The Little TH-camr has to do when making their videos, because they are just a young pup with an iPhone and a dream, then it will continue to read as an "authentic" format.
I *love* Idea Channel, and this channel, and other vlog-ish video essay kind of videos, and I want to see a lot more room on TH-cam for that sort of calmer, more scripted, polished, high-quality videos, in addition to filmed-on-my-phone-in-the-park videos. I don't think the latter is ever going away, but I would like to see people with the means and the knowledge to do so to continue to push for a bigger variety of videos (including higher production value), even within the broad genre of vlogging.
When was the last time you were foldable? I kinda miss the puppet.
This video deserves a follow-up, & this is an amazing comment section
You've just described my thoughts on vlogs in 9 minutes!
I always assumed ZeFrank was the daddy of what ended up being the youtube editing rhythm. Like, "I have one afternoon to cut this and I NEED A NAP."
He didn't start on youtube but he sure feels like he's everywhere. And nowhere.
I miss you sportsracers.
AdaptiveReasoning The League of Awesomeness is not dead, it's just gone underground to concentrate power. Keep your power move charged up and ready to deploy on a moments notice. You'll know the signal as soon as you see it.
As if every video wasn't ripe with information, we get icing on the cake by having them always end with an adorable critter. Thank you, Dan.
i remember seeing someone walk off frame and mask themselves walking on starting the next line, that was kinda funny and alt from jump cut, but maybe not that much.
also there was a guy (kai wong) who recently did a thing where he swivelled the tripod head around and transitioned to the next scene/dialogue with a swivel, that was pretty cool too.
they're probably more like stylised versions, more fluid, of the jump cut, still kinda the same. maybe disguised more? ooh, now that i write it down, I'm thinking of montage vs silent editing stuff
The whip pan is an old technique, glad to hear more TH-camrs are playing with aesthetic.
Glad to hear you are taking the channel in a more light hearted direction (if that vlog section was serious), I feel the synacism and a bit of the hitting out could sometimes take away from the top quality content.
Haha, links in the "dubli doo"
When it comes to Vlogs, I notice a strong parallel to sound editing on news radio pieces, such as those produced by NPR. Perhaps this is just me, but I don't always watch the Vlogs as they are being expressed, but rather listen to them in the background of my other activities. This makes them somewhat of an audio medium with a video component only as essential as the producer wishes it to be. I'd therefore hazard that unless active viewing of the Vlog is necessary to fully comprehend the material being expressed, Vlogs will continue their trend towards greater audio editing polish.
TH-cam is one of the few video players that has a speed-up in the options. Many authors I can't stand unless I put them at 1.25x speed, and a few videos need to be at 1.5x speed. Yours is one of my favorites, where 1.0x speed brings ideas at a decent rate.
Watching this and becoming aware of the techniques that you are using as you talk about them and talk about them as you are using becomes... kind of surreal. I cannot tell how much of the video is meta
I'll write a longer reply when I have better time, but please, please, please do more of these and explore the other parts you mentioned in this video. I find it highly interesting :)
2:26, you channeled V-Sauce so hard in that question, I got chills. 😅
I found it interesting that Graveyard Girl recently started a new channel (partly) intended for her to upload unedited vlogs. In one of the videos she spoke about how it made her feel comfortable to not have the expectation of "perfection". So, are content makers feeling like they are forced to produce highly edited work to satisfy the audience, when it isn't what they really *want* to make.
I'd love to see more discussion on the rise in popularity (and even perceived necessity) of the second channel, or vlog channel specifically. It seems like everyone is very inclined to segment their content this way, which I suppose makes sense from a marketing perspective. I recently started making some gaming videos, and I decided to keep them on my main (and only) channel even though they're totally different content, because I suppose I think of my channel as a hub for whatever I want to do. I heavily use playlists to organise my different types of videos and the idea of using a second channel seems kinda odd to me because I just don't have one concrete style for all my videos to fit into. So idk, it's really interesting how creators kinda streamline themselves into one easily recognisable style and then end up having to go somewhere else (or feel like they have to) to experiment with other things.
mothcub This is very similar to how a lot of "younger" people, especially those with more than a handful of followers, approach instagram.
mothcub i understand this separate channel and prefer it from a user perspective. I have notifications on for very very few of my preferred channels and I’d feel like they were an annoyance if I got notified of content not aligned with my expectations. It’s like Ryan George for eg. He does Pitch Meetings on screenrant, I like his bit but subscribing to screenrant would drive me crazy because of all their scattered sometime puerile content. I wish the series had its own streamlined channel.
Please tell me you have experienced Ze Frank's "the show". hopefully during 06/07 when it was ongoing.
Aside from being a trail blazer it had something that most of the great vlogs have: a functioning and relatively healthy community with excellent feedback between the vlogger and their audience. It's interesting to see the influence on vlogbrothers in both how they perfectly capped some of the best essences but also made the format their own.
I was an avid sportsracer back in the day. If this were more of a history then I definitely would have included The Show. Pretty sure I still have a whole bunch of episodes saved on an iPod, lol.
I've noticed this trend of cutting out pauses in my speech when I edit my audio for my videos though I keep trying to leave more of them in (assuming they don't have any annoying sounds that comes from the act of speaking like pops, lip smacking, unintentional heavy breaths or background noise) just so the my videos sound more like myself and natural despite not sounding like a professional public speaker. It also forces me to get better at speaking, enunciating, and think about what words to use in order to better press my thoughts and emotions in a way people won't misunderstand me. I really having thought about how I speak since taking public speaking in college and that was more for a necessary communications credit than interest and I've always had issues with my speech since English is my second language (though primary.) As much as I want to express as clearly as possible, I also want my personality to show through what I say and sometimes my flubs can lead to some hilarity.
I'm wondering if you'd ever do a video about your take and understanding of the Hyperreal, in terms of Eco, Beaudrillard, etc. I've read "Travels in Hyperreality" and "Simulacra and Simulation" but I'm always curious to hear differing perspectives on the subject.
So here's the thing 5 years later its only been more evident and content consumption is at an all time high, our attention have evolve to be so short that vlogs and contents are presented in such a absurd pace just to keep us watching. But this does not applies to all but it certainly does happen especially with the advent of tiktok and short form videos. Maybe a video about how youtube went from short form to long form only to be back again to compete with tiktok with youtube shorts.
The TikTok short wannabe bullshit is only because TH-cam itself is pathetically pushing hard on it to try to make more profits. You've every form now going on and Dan himself can make hour long videos with massive success. And you've people like Perun who makes literally hour long power point presentations that garner a million plus views
i get so pumped when i see a new vid from you, keep it up
I think the absence of silence in vlogging is largely due to the fact that the medium is almost entirely treated as an auditory experience, little more than radio with window dressing. The same as you would almost never see a book with blank pages, never see a movie with silence and a blank screen for multiple seconds, never have a radio play without silence, any medium abhors a vacuum of the way in which it communicates.
Ways around this would be either vlogging develops to involve more visual components than just the emotions displayed on the speaker's face + body language or potentially silence itself becomes used as a tool. The most obvious example there would be Orson Welles in the legendary War of the Worlds radio broadcast demanding complete silence between for multiple seconds between a scene change, adding a weight of emotion and verisimilitude unknown in the medium at that time.
I remember in like 2012 when videos had the really weird cadence where they did jump cuts between every single sentence so it produced this very jarring staccato and that's honestly why I didn't get into TH-cam until like....the pandemic. Plus I didn't know video essays or this guy's words were a thing and this has some great words.
I am late to the game here, but appreciate these videos even just as a consumer of the media. So, thank you.
It's almost creepy how accurately you simulated a vlog! Amazing analysis as usual.
TH-cam may have fast speech and very brief pauses, but that doesn't stop me from watching almost everything that isn't a comedy video at double speed. Even when the content itself is explicitly rapid-fire (like when Caddicarus would make "Current Quickies," I would watch it in fast time. It's quite comical; I've made myself to be obsessed with efficiency in my TH-cam consumption even though TH-cam is primarily a time waster for me.
Yay! Folding Ideas is back!
that's super interesting to see how the TH-cam environment shaped the evolution of content.
I feel like there's a case to be made that live streams and unedited videos can compliment the already defined fast-paced and/or staged nature of so many daily vloggers' videos (which more often than not feel like shows to me, and maybe that's the whole point). Some youtubers I watch, namely grav3yardgirl, have recently started to post "casual/unedited chatty videos" as a way to feel less pressured to put out vlogs that are what you mention is the popular way of recording and editing vlogs nowadays, while still uploading vlog-like content to their channels and, hopefully, helping create a bond with their viewers that feels more authentic in nature in the meantime. And although these unedited chatty videos are nothing new and could potentially be staged and rehearsed as well, I've found myself liking them quite a bit. Are those a more accurate depiction of the true lives, feelings and personalities of youtubers than, say, the more stylized vlogs? Maybe, maybe not. But they definitely SEEM more realistic in a way.
Cool observations. Now some scales are off my eyes.
I think it’s a fad that will bring it’s own counterreaction. For the last decade or two documentaries have been trapped in a ”super-honest filmmaker shows his own work, including rambling mistakes and uncertain flailing about”. I assume that it started as a reaction to overproduced voice-of-god perfectionism and pretense of inhuman objectiveness in earlier work, but now it mostly fels like empty mannerism. Or worse, as lazy timefilling excuses by teams that haven’t been able to come up with a full hour of actual material.
Another case in point, podcasts. The first ones I tried listening to a couple of years back (all of them popular and well reviewed) all sounded like the vlogs you describe. Spontaneous ”natural” dialogue, with rambling and hemming and hawing. Or maybe they were really unscripted and unedited because the people making them were too lazy to prepare talking points beforehand and actually edit after. Anyway, now I listen to podds with script and editing and I cannot imagine going back..Or maybe I’m wrong. Maybe the increasing chaos of authentic looking fake news, sneaky infomercials and other highly produced content will only increase the hunger for stuff that feels real and unedited.
I noticed your idea-channel-esque dialect and I approve of you becoming its successor. We need an idea channel of some kind, even if by another name. let us continue to have Foldable Ideas™!
(Off topic)
"and gonna get out this cars way".
So ponder for a moment how with a simple sentence and a brief scurrying action, viewed by at least 70,882 people you propagate society's motor-centric bias. Rather than expect the 'driver', yes the driver, the human operator of that car, to pause for a brief moment while you cross the road, you assume that drivers right of you for that space.
The other point already covered. You de-humanise the interaction. Human vs machine, not human vs human, by not saying "gotta get out of that persons's way"
How has it come to this? Perhaps a look at how movies (and advertisements) cement the hegemony of machines over people. You touched on this in your transformers vlog.
Love your work :)
that's right, you're my boy. glad we have this understanding. keep it up!
I have grown to hate watching vlogs. Every vlog now is a montage of people walking in the city or where ever they are. They are getting boring and because the lack of authentic communication, as you said. since the "youtube is over party" thing started happening more and more people have started moving to other websites like twitch. Streaming, for me, has become way more enjoyable to watch because you get all of those silences and raw moments of authenticity. In the future we might be watching more twitch for the more real feeling interactions on the internet. And its fun listening to someone you watch say your name and read your questions.
The selfie stick will disappear and be replaced by a drone, set to follow the face of the Vlogger.
Really interesting how you have that confrontation about not needing to be too cynical to talk about something with depth. John Bain aka TotalBiscuit is said to have gone thought something similar.
I’m trying to edit down my own gaming streams into gameplay videos and trying to work out my own internal editing language to make them more than just “stream highlights,” but rather to make a similar product that might be a better alternative for someone who isn’t interested in hanging around for a 2-6 hour livestream, and I keep coming back to things discussed in this video. it’s interesting to try and figure out how and when to use jump cuts, how to use zooms effectively, how to manage where the eye is drawn into the frame, stuff like that. (also yes i’m plugging myself pls)
nobody’s really talking much on youtube about the editing language of gaming content (at least not that i can find), so i’m trying to see what i can gather from watching other gaming videos i’ve enjoyed and stuff and idk. it’s interesting to see how film grammar is going to evolve with livestreamed content.
for me, my model seems to be a combination of vlog editing (or even just commentary youtube editing) and reality TV. i’m trying to figure out, for instance, how to use zooming and panning to emphasize speech and stuff and a lot of “rules” like “maintain the location of the eyes in the frame when zooming in on a jump cut” or shot-reverse-shot simply can’t apply, because i have webcam footage, a chat, gameplay footage, and the disembodied voices of my discord friends.
i wonder if you’ve really delved into many gaming videos and what kinda observations you have on their editing? i mainly model my style kind of based on simpleflips’ videos or monster factory. i haven’t really been able to find any videos talking about the film grammar of gaming stream-based content, but i think i’m figuring out a grammar for myself.
To me I feel when people cut out dead air or any vocal ticks can be directly compared to a writer cutting and arranging text for a final draft. Given that vlogs and video essays are someone's medium to convey an idea, the same way an author or editor would cut down anything that would distract from the main point. The attention span hasn't shrunk, but more like the rate at which we can take in information has reached a pace that a few frames of silence can seem like a lifetime. For the jump cut it's form follows function. If dead air is gone then so are cuts that don't serve in the efficiency of conveying information. Even when you look at the vlogs that don't follow this format completely like travel vlogs will often jump cut to scenes from the place and music to try and convey an idea of what it's like for them there.
The authenticity and reality comes in, for vloggers not dramatic video makers, that their epiphanies are seen in a real a time as possible. In the future I don't really see this trend slowing down. The intonation might change much in the same way old Hollywood did to modern cinema.
The content and message of this video has caused me to miss Dan's occasional quips of hyper-awareness of TH-cam Culture, like "In the name of like share subscribe, Amen." I appreciate those more than I bristle at TH-cam tropes and tics.
You mispronounced "it's ya boi." It's ok tho, just a rookie mistake ;)
It's my boy foldable human doing his thang 🙌🏻😂
In general, people will always prefer polished art over unpolished art.
Vloging hasn’t quite gotten there yet, but in 20 years an unpolished video with the pauses left in, with no second takes or editing to speak of will be considered in the same vein as an essay with typos. At best, a rough draft. At worst, a sign of laziness.
Audiences like polished work, and they love authenticity. It’s why kayfebe was in effect for so long.
Polish is keeps the viewer engaged with what the person is saying, and not on all the little things that could and maybe should, be edited out. If a typo has ever distracted you from the point of an essay, then I think it's easy to see why vlogs will continue to be polished productions.
Always interesting, thanks.
The "Get ready with me" genre of video somewhat eliminates this. Because the person's 'visual performance' is progressing, it's inherently harder to go back and reshoot or make extra cuts. It's obviously still edited and selected and often there are fun/fancy cuts in there but I think it ma be an attempt on the TH-camr's part to push back. I imagine those videos not only add to authenticity but are easier to edit because they require less script writing and planning of 'verbal content'. A thought anyway. It also seems to vary wildly by person.
Personally, I think that the future of TH-cam videos will move more towards a collage feel to editing. Not a staged monologue, more a montage.
Check out the Doctor Who Fan Show. It's a semi-professional web show by the BBC that flirts between being a vlog and being a zero-budget David Letterman show. The contrast, the editing and sensibility of the host, makes for an interesting watch. Especially if you watch an episode with the old documentary behind-the-scenes Doctor Who Confidential. TH-cam changed a lot.
I think this is also one of these 'life imitates art imitates life' concepts. I think the faster way dialogue is delivered on TH-cam, and all the dead air is cut out because in real life many of us hate meandering conversations that never get to the point, and long awkward silences.
Being able to deliver lots of information in a short amount of time, with no time wasted has been the dream for ages, and with TH-cam that luxury exists. It's not because it's hyper-realistic or unrealistic. It's because TH-cam is a mirror of how we want the world to be, and to some degree, once you create it here, it influences the physical world and those interactions.
It's hard to create the world you want until someone gives you an idea of what that would look like. TH-cam content creators speak in the way we want the world to sound, then we take that existence out into the physical world and emulate it.
I have learned many things from this, thank you!
I have a question though, I am trying to work out why some bushcrafter's videos (basically like a vlog but while camping over night or hiking) are easy to watch for 2 hours and why some are boring after about 10 minutes. Perhaps its because of the types of cuts they use or editing style?
I would really like to hear your thoughts on this, maybe you can do a video on it considering its an up and coming style of video making?
Speaking of the Vlogbrothers (as an excellent biopsy of vlogging trends over time), I noticed that there was an affected accent that Hank in particular used much more in the 2010-2013 era. I also recall Tobuscus using a similar pattern of speech. I used a similar accent for awhile during that period. I think the prevalence of internet communication initially amplified some regional or culturally affected accents, but then subsumed them into the broader American accent as that accent became more standardized and pervasive.
Do you have any good reading about these ideas in a more abstract sense? I'd love to explore some of these for my university work in relation to older styles of performance from the 17th Century. It's a great video.
Rip idea channel, I love that channel so its sad to see it go
It'll sound like "Hey what's up guys?! It's your boy ___ here back at it again! Don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe! Merch and Patreon link in the description!"
Regarding jump cuts and time: I've noticed that my own video consumption patterns really prefer videos with the absolute minimum of time. I like jump cuts because it makes watching videos faster. I even tend to watch everything at 1.5 or 2x speed these days to get through more in less time and if a transcript is provided in the description, I will just read that instead of watching the whole video.
True, I might not be watching the most authentic and real thing when it comes to vlogs (made even less real by my meddling of the playback speed), but it's not like I'm here for cinema verite and even that, by virtue of a camera recording video and a necessary start and stop for the video, you are already watching something that is hyperreal in some sense. In some sense, I expect blogs to more resemble their semi-ancestor, blogs, in that I want authenticity in the message (insofar as it is the pure distilled idea/story) more than I need it in the medium of that message.
Folding Ideas, you touched upon an idea I struggle with this myself: performance of self. Is this a sort of artificial authenticity or the real deal if a person is playing as themselves?
Making videos has brought this up, especially as I am unsure of their "genre" so to say.
The videos I post are not quite "vlogs" as they take place in a study (mostly), but are barely (if at all) scripted. I make videos about my real life and experiences, but they are closer to memoir or educational than stream of consciousness. Where do I "fit in" in the TH-cam community?
Thank you for the video! Marvelous meta writing!