Hey! I just wanted to make a quick post because I'm finally on SPOTIFY!
It's still just the one song so far, but I figured I'd share the link if you want to follow:
open.spotify.com/artist/4oi0KMI5pbxLYl1Wi8n0My?si=…
Hopefully it's only another month or so before I have the next song finished(it's reaaaal close, but a stubborn one), and hopefully a new video maybe in a month and a half or two. Every time I make hard promises life throws me curve balls, so tentative promises are all I've got, but I think those estimates won't be too far off and I'm excited for you guys to see and hear what's coming next!
Anyways, I hope the new year has been good to you all so far, I hope you're all safe and well, and I'll see you soon.
-Daniel
17 - 1
New profile pic, same me. Just wanted to announce the change here in a community post, and also give you guys some updates, with sadly some bad news. So if you're already depressed you might want to skip this one.
A few weeks ago, me and my girlfriend found out that our dog has cancer. Right now she still seems in good spirits, still loves napping and getting table scraps, but we're heartbroken, and scared out of our minds because we don't even know how much time she has.
So I just wanted to to keep you guys posted because it's certainly going to slow down the videos, and I also just wanted you to know about her. Her name is Panda, she's a 13 year old Pomeranian that my girlfriend adopted as a puppy, so she's only been in my life since this relationship started a few years ago, but she means everything to the both of us and we're just trying to shower her with love for however much time she has.
I know there's already so much shit going on in the world and I hate that I'm always coming here with such sad news, but sometimes that's just life, and I always want to be honest about my life with all of you. And I do believe that posts like this can be a good thing, they certainly were for me, I just hate that now I'm the one making this kind of post. But I think it's always good to remind yourself to appreciate the time you have with your little ones. They are just pure souls of love and light, and I think they're one of the best parts of life. So hold yours close, love them fully and try to give them the best life you can, because they all deserve it.
-Daniel
31 - 2
Hey everyone, just making this post to let you all know that it might be a while before the next video. Yesterday there was a tragedy that I'm still struggling to even process, so I just need some time. We'll see how much YouTube punishes me or how screwed my finances are about to be, but I'm just in no shape to even be thinking about videos right now and I hope you can all understand.
148 - 15
Hey everyone, hope you're all doing well.
So my last video really didn't perform well, I'll admit I got a little optimistic after seeing the reception to my video on Doctor Sleep, even those weren't the same kind of views that I used to get, but it felt like things were moving in the right direction, and now it's just clear that my plan for the channel is not going to work out.
I'm not entirely sure what to do moving forward here, but suffice to say I've got to come up with something new, and I don't know how, but I think I just have to start getting videos out faster, even if the quality suffers.
I never wanted it to be like this, I only wanted to make the things I was most passionate about, and take as long as I needed to make the best video that I could, but it's just clear that quantity will always reign on YouTube, and unless I want to be a starving artist or give up on the dream entirely, I have to accept that, and play the "content" game like everyone else.
I kept telling myself I could be a channel that would be able to make it on quality alone. To be a channel like ContraPoints, Captain Disillusion, Joseph Anderson, who can spend several months crafting these incredible videos, but that strategy only works because people actually watch their videos, and almost no one is still watching my channel. I don't know if it's the algorithm, or if people who are still subscribed to me just don't give a shit about what I do anymore, but views have been at an all-time low for me, and my channel is just not sustainable in its current state.
So who knows what's going to happen from here on out, I'm done trying to plan for anything, commit to any one strategy over another, and I'm certainly done trying to make the "best videos, because clearly no once cares but me. I'm still going to stay authentic, cover things that I'm interested in, and I'm obviously going to do my best to make high quality videos, but I expect the quality will suffer, I just don't feel like I have a choice if I want to have a space on YouTube. It's been too many years and I'm getting too old to still be living in poverty, uninsured, with practically no savings, so I hope those of you who have been enjoying the latest videos don't hate whatever comes next, you guys are the real ones and I love you for sticking with me, but I don't feel like I have any other choice but to hang up that dream, at least for now. If everything starts picking up, I'd love nothing more than to return to some form of that vision, but I guess we'll have to see what happens.
80 - 28
Hey everyone, I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season! As we’re gearing up for the new year, I wanted to give some updates on the channel.
New videos will be coming soon(ish), there was quite a build up of freelance work leading into the holiday season, and I’ve admittedly been taking some needed time off as well. But I’ve got a lot of exciting projects that are coming together, a video on Under the Silver Lake that has been a mammoth undertaking. A video on the video game Fable, and plenty of other things I’ll announce as we get closer to their release.
I’m only going to announce proper release dates when I actually know I can meet them. But I expect it to be finished by the end of Janurary/mid February just so you have a rough idea, and I think it’ll be worth the wait.
Transparency is really important to me, and the last thing I want anyone to think is that I’m just disappearing again, so rest assured that I’ve been working hard these last few months, and I hope all of that effort is evident in the videos I’ve made so far since coming back, and certainly for this next video as well when you guys see it. Each video is truly a labor of love that I dedicate a huge chunk of time to getting right, and I wouldn’t spend so much time on them if I didn’t think it made the video better.
So thank you guys for being patient with me, I know I’m much slower than what most expect from a YouTuber, but I truly believe this is the only way for me to make videos that I’m proud of. Again, things will get faster and more consistent as soon as I’m working full time, faster still if I make enough to hire people, so this is all still just the beginning, and I know it’s slow right now but it will get better.
And on that note I just wanted to say thank you, to all of you who are still here, and all of the new subscribers who’ve found me recently. My last video did better than anything I’ve made in a long time and the reception to it was overall really incredible, so thank you. I really appreciate all new and continued support, because it isn’t easy to take your time on YouTube, but the more you guys watch or comment, the more support I get on Patreon, the more than I can work towards making the best content that I know how to, and I couldn't do any of it without you guys <3
Anyways, I’ll post more concrete dates when I have them, and I can’t wait for you guys to see what’s next!
All the best,
Daniel
33 - 0
Just your reminder to hop in the premiere for my *new video tomorrow*! I'm trying something new here with the premiere feature, but seeing as I had the video finished a tad earlier than expected(when normally I'm running grossly behind) I thought I'd give it a shot! I think this might be my best video yet, and I can't wait to hear what you all have to say about it. Looking forward to seeing some of you there, and I hope you all enjoy the video! -Daniel watch video on watch page
17 - 0
NEW VIDEO RELEASE DATE:
My video on "Grave of the Fireflies" is on schedule to be finished and ready to go LIVE on August 31st!!! I think you guys are really going to love it. This video has been on and off for like a year at this point, so it's going to feel really good to finally have it uploaded! I definitely want to try and be as consistent as possible from here on out, maybe that means a new video every two months, hopefully every month, but in the meantime I aim to post more often on here just to let you guys know my progress with everything, and you'll be happy to know that this video has been coming along pretty smoothly and I think it's some of my best work yet, so stay tuned for that.
NEW CHANNEL ANNOUNCEMENT:
While making videos here on this channel is easily my number one priority, I thought it'd be fun to start another channel to post content I can't imagine that everyone here would be interested in. Lately I've been playing a lot of Valorant, so that's what the channel will likely be for a while, but I plan on posting all sorts of gaming content down the line because frankly I've always been an avid gamer, and I figure I might as well try to turn all of those countless hours of playing video games into something slightly more productive, plus, they're much easier videos to make than anything I'd post here, so I'll be posting weekly over there and it would mean a lot if you guys would check it out! While they're not nearly as time consuming to make, I'm honestly proud of how the videos are turning out so far, they're just silly and fun, but I had fun making them and I hope you guys have fun watching, and a huge thank you to anyone who subscribes!
www.youtube.com/channel/UCMn_...
GENERAL UPDATES:
Basically I'm back into the swing of things and that means trying to make more of a presence online and diversify even more. I like watching all different kinds of content and I feel like I should try to make all different kinds too. It won't really effect my productivity for videos here, so I think that's an important part of it, but it's also just fun to dip my toes into something I haven't done before and we'll see where that leads! I also just wanted to say thank you to everyone who watched my latest video. I know it was a weird one to come out with after such a long absence, but it felt good to get a lot of that off my chest and you guys were so wonderful and supportive in the comments, which I always appreciate. Hope you guys have a great weekend <3
47 - 3
https://youtu.be/I7ge7QP20tA
I’ve been away for a long time. It was never my intention to disappear, but it’s been a tumultuous
road. There’s a lot of story to tell, and what started as a long blog post, then turned into an update
vlog, has now become a full fledged video essay about everything that’s happened over
the last seven years since starting this channel.
I wanted to tell my YouTube story. Everything from why I started
making videos, to why I stopped…and why I’m coming back.
52 - 1
Still hard at work on some upcoming videos, but I ended up having a little fun with this video in the meantime. watch video on watch page
7 - 0
It’s been a long time and I think you all deserve an update. I’ve even thought about making an update video to talk about everything, but as I’ll discuss things have been quite rocky for me lately, so rather than worrying about having to film something right now, I at least want to write some things out for those who are wondering where I’ve been.
I haven’t really talked too much about what these last few years have been like for me, but they’ve been hard. In 2019 my financial stability through my channel had already begun to plummet, and 2020 the pandemic and everything else just killed whatever was left, along with a fair deal of my mental health. I did my best to keep an active presence despite having to spend a lot of time working on other projects, and despite being in quite a dark place. But the videos I did make never got enough traction to allow me to even remotely consider going full-time again, so I was still spending a lot of time doing freelance work.
And then, last year around the time of posting my video on HIMYM, even the freelance stuff had started to get really slim and I genuinely didn’t know what to do anymore. Luckily things are changing soon, I’m packing and getting ready to move within the next week actually, where a lot of things are going to be much easier for me; but a lot of that time was just me cobbling life together day by day, losing god knows how many hours to pure catatonic stress.
So the videos I talked about before, one on Grave of the Fireflies and another on Doctor Sleep, are definitely still happening, but it’s hard to say exactly when. What happened with the Fireflies video: it was actually nearly finished but I hit a creative block that I can normally just work through, but then the aforementioned stress-hell was happening, and working on that video was the last thing on my mind, and the Doctor Sleep video I had barely started. So I’m actually easing back into the process of making videos again by working on something new about Elden Ring. Working on something fresh is just helping me exercise those muscles again, and I've actually been wanting to make a video about FromSoft for a really long time and it's been feeling really good to write, so we’ll see what eventually comes out first, but all three are definitely happening and I have plenty of planned videos well beyond just those three.
I think there’s still some rough road ahead for me, but overall I’m really excited for what’s in store for the future and this channel. I'm done trying to guess what timeline these things will actually happen in, but more videos will always be on the way, and all I want is for that to be a more consistent thing in the future. But the rest of this year will certainly be better than the last few, and I think it’s going to mean some real change on this channel before the year is over. You know, where I actually post videos at least semi-sort of regularly again, which is all I really want.
I hope all of you are doing well <3
50 - 6
I'm Daniel Netzel, previously known as Film Radar. I have a lot of artistic passions, and I try to share that here.