Owner-Led and Human-Made in the Age of AI (ft. Blue Barn Creative)

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Dario00:00Hi everyone, welcome to another episode of Creatives Grab Coffee. This is one of the few shows out there that focuses on the business of video production. So basically, we're just bringing on a bunch of business owners from all the corners of the world and we're just talking shop with them. before we get into today's episode, just you know, please take a moment to like, comment, subscribe to this show. If you guys are listening on the podcast apps, please write us a review. It helps out immensely.

Dario00:28And yeah, I'll let Kyrill kick it off for today.

Kyrill00:32So welcome again. And today we are joined by Carlos and Stephen from Blue Barn Creative. Welcome guys.

Carlos Foster00:40Hey, thanks for

Stephen Alberts00:40Hey.

Carlos Foster00:41having us.

Stephen Alberts00:42Yeah, thanks.

Kyrill00:43So just before we kinda jump right into the show, why don't you give us a little backstory and who you guys are and who Blue Barn is?

Carlos Foster00:51Ooh, th that could take the whole podcast. There's all kinds of stories about how we came together. I could I could do part of it, Steve, and then you wanna jump on anything I miss. But so we're a San Diego based production company. we actually came together working in television. That's where myself, Stephen, and our third founding partner, Vic, who we can talk more about later, all came together working in TV. We all had different roles, but we all knew that

Carlos Foster01:18We didn't want to stay there. That wasn't a forever place for us. And San Diego always seemed like just this amazing city that it only had big studios at the time and a couple of shops. But like the boutique production company movement was only getting started at that time. So we saw that as kind of a an opportunity for us. And yeah, Steve, you can take it from there.

Stephen Alberts01:44Yeah, that's pretty much how we got started. We were, you know, we had v a variety of experiences, you know, from corporate marketing to Carlos went to film school. I was from New York. We all kind of met out here in San Diego. He was from Northern California. And we were all just transplants, found ourselves working at a TV station and we're just not really satisfied. We loved it for like learning and just doing like high volume work and just being under the gun, like a lot of pressure.

Stephen Alberts02:11But it was more of a quantity over quality mindset. And we were always sort of driven, just like, you know, we're trying to make a mark. We're trying to do films that actually mean something. We're trying to be proud of our work. And it just drove us to look outside and go, you know what? San Diego is like this, like the little cousin of LA, right? And it's or you know, it's just this place where there wasn't a lot of video production going on. There was a few notable things. But in terms of, you know, business, like commercial video.

Stephen Alberts02:402012 was sort of that like the birth of brand films, like really becoming a thing and brands getting the idea that, like, wow, we can use filmmaking to like drive our business forward, share our messages better, you know, connect with people better. And it was sort of a new idea. And we just saw kind of saw it as an opportunity where, like, well, we have all this experience in producing videos and films, but how do we now take that into the commercial realm? And working for ourselves was just really attractive. So

Stephen Alberts03:07We partnered up with our buddy Vic and we rented this little office. We've been here since twenty twelve.

Carlos Foster03:12Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts03:13and just cranking away on working with private clients and trying to just get repeat business. We were word of mouth for the first ten or twelve years. Never even did a Google ad until a couple of years ago. just because we were sorta, you know, the we saw the writing on the wall. We're like, let's let's do this. and San Diego's a beautiful place. We're never leaving, you know. We are glad to be here and

Stephen Alberts03:35We've been at it for a long time now.

Kyrill03:39Congrats on fourteen years. That's that's amazing.

Carlos Foster03:42Thank you.

Kyrill03:45so how did you guys go about doing that? Because back in twenty twelve, twenty thirteen, twenty fourteen, it was really it was so new to start your own production company. It was not like how it is today where, you know, you just buy a camera and go and start shooting, right? Like back then it was a lot it was a lot harder to kind of jump into it and it was a very new model for people to start their own smaller production company. So what were some of the first steps that you guys did? You know, aside from getting the office, because that's also a big step. But yeah.

Carlos Foster04:16Hm. Well let's see we were Yeah. Sh

Stephen Alberts04:17There's a few, yeah. Go ahead, Carlos, yeah.

Carlos Foster04:20sure. Well we were we were fortunate in that Stephen was the first one to leave the television station and you know, he was gonna do his own thing. He had like a a wedding business on the side and and photography and videography. And so he found the office. and so just one one at a time we left the the company that we were working at and just started growing into this space.

Carlos Foster04:46but getting it going was really a lot of trial and error, you know. Steve and I are about the same age, but our partner Vic, he he's he had like about twenty something years on us, so he had some business experience and he would gently, you know, give us some tips, but he he would also let us, you know, figure things out on our own, for better or worse. There were a lot of

Carlos Foster05:11His businesses that he did were totally different from video. So there was a lot of learning involved, a lot of doing something and then learning like, gosh, that w we should have filled out that form or filed that thing, like the super technical, unglamorous stuff that people never

Kyrill05:24Ha ha.

Carlos Foster05:25talk about when they start a business, regardless of what industry they're in. But like Steve said, a lot of it was word of mouth at first. mutual contacts that we had.

Carlos Foster05:37We even would bring in a lot of people from the television station that we worked with, 'cause we had now three years worth of working with like some of the best videographers and editors in town, and they were all in that place and all of them wanted to do stuff outside of that. So slowly i as they left, they would come over and work with us or do freelance stuff on the side. And I would say it was kind of like a glorified freelance outfit at first.

Carlos Foster06:06'Cause we just didn't really know like what's the real way to start a a business like this that that's sustainable. So a lot of it just came down from us like being extremely hard workers and just like almost willing it to to work. now Steve and I have like more of an operation down. We're always working on it and refining it, but those first few years were like really I think we were scrambling, right? Like just to figure out like can we even live

Carlos Foster06:36off of what we're doing, is this gonna work? And thankfully I I think that our work ethic and just the natural talent of the people that we brought in, like, kept it going.

Stephen Alberts06:48Mm-hmm. I would into it.

Dario06:49And a lot of the clients

Dario06:51sorry, go ahead, Steve.

Stephen Alberts06:52No no no please

Dario06:55No, I was just wondering, like at the beginning, like were you bringing on like the clients you were getting 'cause you said y you were doing you got you lasted on referrals for like a good ten years or so. Was it people you met through the TV station or

Stephen Alberts07:11Man, how do what some of the first clients were I mean, we had some really interesting ones, but I would say

Stephen Alberts07:22Carlos, I name I mean name a couple of our early, early clients other than like the the bigger ones.

Carlos Foster07:26Yeah.

Carlos Foster07:27Well, some of them we would just like call people old fashioned, you know, like like call like

Stephen Alberts07:32Yeah. Just outreach.

Carlos Foster07:35like a dental agency. I r I can't you know, I remember them in Sorrento Valley, that's a little zone in San Diego that were like, Do you need video? It looks like you do and they're like, Sure. That's kinda how those

Dario07:46Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts07:47Yeah.

Kyrill07:49Classic.

Carlos Foster07:50would go and the but it wouldn't work today.

Stephen Alberts07:51Yeah. Which wouldn't work today. Like you can't do that anymore. Everyone's

Kyrill07:54No no no.

Dario07:55Not at all.

Stephen Alberts07:55flooded with, you know, cold emails and I th it's interesting

Carlos Foster07:55Yeah Yeah. Yep.

Stephen Alberts07:59because there was a certain amount of like, you know, old school technique you could do back then because people would give you the time of day. But now everybody's so flooded, cold emails and phone calls, it's just like you you can't get through. so there's different techniques right nowadays. And I think so we had an interesting mix, right? He mentioned there was a the wedding videography business that that sort of like kept the lights on.

Carlos Foster08:20Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts08:20For a while,

Stephen Alberts08:21and it's something I had done since 2009, which is a very similar story to like a lot of the production companies that are in business for like 10 to 15 years. There's always this like, we started as wedding videographers, right? And it's tends to be this like there's a there's not much of a barrier to entry there, right? Like you can just go buy a camera and just call yourself a wedding videographer and then get people to ch let you try it out and see if you can pull something together, you know, and then develop your product from there and go.

Stephen Alberts08:49But with commercial, it's a little harder, right? Because you're dealing with brands who have marketing departments. They're savvy and they're like, you know, you can't just pick up a camera and pretend like, I'm a production company. And they're gonna be like, okay, great, what have you done? Let me see your stuff. Like, do you even know what you're talking about? Like, can we even do you even understand the jargon I'm throwing at you? You know what mean? So I think it's a it's a interesting beginning because it was a different time, different circumstances. We

Carlos Foster09:15Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts09:15funded a lot of it with little jobs.

Stephen Alberts09:17you know, like weddings and stuff. And then we started getting business clients because we could just approach them and be like, hey, you know, do you need a new video for your website or whatever you're trying to do? And just go from there. And then word of mouth, there was a lot of like events that we did that were doorways. Like we worked with like AIG at the Torrey Pines golf course doing a small town hall. And that turned into I'm sorry, the we worked with Marsh McLennan. That was AIG was later. But Marsh McLennan like a really big insurance company. We worked

Stephen Alberts09:47on a small town hall with them, which turned into doing a bunch of brand work with them later. You know, so a small like two or three thousand dollar job in twenty twelve, having lunch with the head of media for the company, and it's like a there's tens of thousands of employees at this company. They're like, we like working with you guys. Like, can you do some more video for us? And that was essentially what happened many times over. just being in pr in people's presence, doing quality work.

Stephen Alberts10:15They can see that you're really dedicated to getting the shot, to, you know, figuring out what kind of video is gonna really serve them. And then they kind of they read like, these guys are committed. These guys are quality. And then that just turns into more things. And and I love that. I love that about how business really does work. and a lot of our early opportunities, we've worked with brands like Victorinox Swiss Army, which started as a result of a girl I knew in high school, and she ended up in the marketing department in Connecticut.

Stephen Alberts10:43Was like, I've been loving all your wedding films and like your TV stuff. Like, do you want to do something for us? We're we're we have a trade show coming up. And that was like the beginning of a great relationship. We were doing like national TV ads with them eventually. fantastic. And then another one was I used to work and and live in New York City at a beauty brand called Bumble and bumble. The the creative vice president was a huge film fanatic and just you know, total creative.

Stephen Alberts11:12And we used to go out shooting like you know, New York Fashion Week and doing hair documentaries and doing all this cool and fun creative stuff. He ended up starting a brand in LA and between LA and Miami after he left Bumble, called R+Co. And that was like an amazing phone call to get because he was like, Hey, Steve, it's been a couple of years. I'm launching a new brand. I need you. And it was like, Let's go. And it's like we never left, you know, and it was just an old relationship that kind of came back around and started a whole new chapter. And

Stephen Alberts11:40So I think there's this cool dynamic of like, you know, the old school business practices really do matter, right? Like being a good person, looking people in the eye, doing quality work, showing up for them, being the hero, you know, is their job and being the helper is our job, right? Like the Donald Miller stuff, the StoryBrand. Like you're really not the superstar here. Like you're here to really help somebody get to another level. And if you if that imbues your work and imbues your relationships, then you're gonna be all right. And that's

Stephen Alberts12:10The story of how we got to where we are. We just tried our best and try to just be good people and run calm, cool sets where people can be creative and nobody's shouting at each other. And so I don't know. Like that's probably a long-winded way to describe how we got

Carlos Foster12:22Yeah.

Stephen Alberts12:23to where we are, but it's pretty essential. And now we're just trying to figure out how to play the game of like, now we gotta have a podcast and now we gotta like do social media and we gotta like comment on people's LinkedIn and do all that stuff too. Like, cause that's the language of business today.

Stephen Alberts12:38But we really enjoy actually

Kyrill12:39Yeah and

Stephen Alberts12:40like talking to people and doing good films.

Kyrill12:43Yeah, and what you described, like that's the baseline of what you should be doing. You should be providing great quality service that yields, you know, people recommending you, wanting to work with you. I because it's always a great feeling when you get callbacks with people that you've done work for already, and then you can kind of expand that and grow. But obviously, as you guys know, sorry.

Kyrill13:04It's hard to do that long term and build an entire business on just relying on only that. And you mentioned that you did that for a while until you started trying some new things, right? So what what was when was like what was like the moment where you realized you guys need to evolve and kind of expand and find new ways of generating business?

Carlos Foster13:24I don't know I I don't know if there's like a specific point in our timeline that that I could I could recall, but I do know that, you know, over the years we just got tired of the major fluctuations that like any freelancer would face. And and like I said, those early days we were kinda like a collective of freelancers, the three of us. Then we'd bring in people, but we were the partners. and we would just be so subject to those

Carlos Foster13:52ebbs and flows that naturally happen annually doing this kind of work. And, you know, it just would like affect our livelihoods. And or like, man, like how are we gonna keep the the the rent, you know, paid in this place or that that camera we want is now out of reach. so we said we gotta find a way to make this more sustainable. I mean, no matter what, this type of business has those ebbs and flows. But we knew that

Carlos Foster14:20We needed to go outside of the circle of clients that we had, if we were gonna get the kind of business that would, you know, just sustain it. And so I think that's it just came around that way naturally. It was more of like a numbers thing that like the three of us all knew that this wasn't like a side job for any of us. This we wanted this to be our main thing. Steve wanted to move away from the wedding films, and maybe only do like a handful a year, rather than having to do it to, you know,

Carlos Foster14:50keep his lights on. and like I myself am like, this is this is the job I want. You know, I don't want to have to do anything else but this. So it kinda came more just naturally from having those conversations, like, how much more business do we need to get to that point where it's just moving on its own without us relying on, you know, the people we already know. And and that pushed us to explore other avenues and we can get into that in a bit of of

Carlos Foster15:19you know, bringing in business to Blue Barn. But I w you think that's right, Steve? It like to me that's how I felt was like it was like a necessity, like, if we're gonna make this grow, like, it's gotta go beyond the circle of people we know.

Stephen Alberts15:33Yeah, and it did. And I I think there was a lot of like there was compounding of like relationships and relationships and like, those people

Carlos Foster15:38Yeah.

Stephen Alberts15:39really liked what we did, so they called us again. And then those kind of added up over the years. But I think after twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, San Diego

Carlos Foster15:47Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts15:47started becoming a more like the secret is out, like this place really is beautiful and lots of people want to be here. And then couple that with the realization that most businesses had is that wow video is really powerful. And if I'm using it for my business, I can

Stephen Alberts16:03really grow. And that just became more of a I remember thinking that along the way. Like when are people going to realize like how powerful this is? Like we should be telling your story, you know, whether it's your origin story or the customer testimonials or whatever kind of corporate videos like that might help you achieve your goals. Like people started getting it. And social media also like becoming even more just every everywhere, everything all at once, right? So

Kyrill16:30Competition.

Stephen Alberts16:32Yeah, and it was like kind of leading up to the pandemic, it was like we were actually like on a high note. We were like, Man, this is great, business

Carlos Foster16:37Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts16:38is strong. And Vic was still with us. we didn't mention Vic is no longer with us. He passed away last year, which is why we we mentioned him a few times,

Kyrill16:44sorry to hear.

Stephen Alberts16:45but yeah, no, it was unexpected. he was a little he was older than us and but you know, we're keep we're keeping the whole operation going and everything, just me and Carlos, but great guy, amazing, amazing person. And aside from that, so

Stephen Alberts17:01Up to twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, twenty twenty, like we're going coming along really good. And we didn't e we didn't even start advertising back then, right? Like we weren't even doing mu much in

Carlos Foster17:09Well, the one the

Carlos Foster17:11the only platform we were using which may age us is Yelp. We were like invested in Yelp. Yeah. We were putting money into Yelp at like not the first couple years, but we were like, man, these guys keep calling us when Yelp used to call you. Yeah, and so that Yeah. Yes. It actu

Kyrill17:18Yeah.

Dario17:18Yeah, that defin that definitely ages you.

Stephen Alberts17:19God. Yelp. Yeah. Twenty fifteen. Yeah. You would actually get work from Yelp though in the beginning in the old days, but then it turned

Dario17:30Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts17:35into this like,

Kyrill17:35Really?

Stephen Alberts17:36whoa. yeah, it actually worked.

Carlos Foster17:36Yeah, it actually it it

Carlos Foster17:38did help us, yeah, 'cause 'cause people would use Yelp back then. Like they didn't trust Google search results as much as Yelp results, which now we've all learned that Yelp is an absolutely terrible corporation and just extracting money from the businesses on there.

Stephen Alberts17:56Yeah.

Carlos Foster17:57But back then it like there was some truth to it and so we worked really hard with like those clients, like, hey please, please, please write us a Yelp review and

Carlos Foster18:06People would be like, hey, when I look for video company, like you come up first on Yelp and so we were investing

Stephen Alberts18:11Mm-hmm.

Carlos Foster18:11money there. And then over time, organically, our search results on Google started going up. And then eventually everyone kinda had that come to light moment when they're like, Google, I trust that more than anything else. And luckily by then, we had already been around long enough and established and had good word of mouth

Stephen Alberts18:29Mm-hmm.

Carlos Foster18:30that the switch was easy to make. And I don't think we've

Carlos Foster18:34gotten anyone from Yelp in in year I mean we stopped putting money into it a long time ago, but yeah. That so that that did help. Yeah. Exactly. It's still there. Yeah.

Stephen Alberts18:40Yeah, Go Google's been great. And we've been around so long. Yeah, it is.

Dario18:41Are they still around? Yelp's still around nowadays or

Kyrill18:42Yeah. I think it's still around, but I don't I I think it's like an archive,

Kyrill18:48I think. I don't think it's actually like it's the active people.

Stephen Alberts18:50Yeah. And now the end and the point I was gonna

Carlos Foster18:51That's that's pretty accurate.

Dario18:51It's like the Wayback Machine now. You just

Stephen Alberts18:54make earlier was that like

Dario18:54go find old companies.

Stephen Alberts18:55like now you have all these directories, right? Yelp is a directory, right? There's there's tons of directories that you need to be

Carlos Foster18:58Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Stephen Alberts19:00on. And now there's like all the LLM searching and answer engine optimization, like that you have to consider on top of your search engine optimization, right? Like, yeah, and it's it's real.

Dario19:06Well that's that's the latest one now. The LLM stuff.

Carlos Foster19:09Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts19:10Like we are hearing people tell us on the phone, ChatGPT told me to call you. Like I was looking

Dario19:15Yeah.

Carlos Foster19:15Okay.

Stephen Alberts19:15for the

Stephen Alberts19:16the best video production company in town. And like like we're like,

Stephen Alberts19:19Thank God it's working, you know, like because we are trying to, you know, format and organize our website so it is found not only by the search engines, but by the answer engine optimization. And so it's like it's a whole different game. And I think the point I was gonna get to earlier was that the landscape has changed. And you know, pandemic happened and that was just like shock to everyone's system. But the trajectory continued and the town got more saturated, right? San Diego's like a big town. It's kind of a it's almost a city.

Stephen Alberts19:49But it's like it's just a big it's a big, big town and it's really spread out. But it's more saturated now. And there's a lot of people who love doing films, and a lot of people are trying to make money doing films for businesses. And so it's a little bit different landscape. So we started doing like, you know, Google ads and things like that a couple of years ago after the pandemic. so that's sort of our trajectory. We do have the benefit of having been around serv we've survived a lot of our early competitors.

Stephen Alberts20:17we're one of the only ones that have been around since twenty twelve. there's a few and so that that helps us get found. but essentially like we were talking, it's it's a different game now. And you know, what AI is doing to business is is both exciting and terrifying and you know, we're still here, so we're still learning the game and learning how to play it. So it's been fun.

Carlos Foster20:41Yeah, I w I'd I would

Carlos Foster20:42I would add to that that part of our I think success formula has been the return clients is actually huge for us. we're really good at retaining clients and I don't mean necessarily getting them into a retainer. We we actually don't use those, but they just come back naturally. A lot of our clients almost like clockwork, we know at this point in the year they're doing their next product launch, so they're gonna need us you know, between these months and they they do.

Carlos Foster21:11or this event that we shoot always this time of year. I think we did s we did some rundowns of our business not too long ago where it was like seventy percent of our business is return clients. So it's like it's a really big base, you know, to to work from.

Stephen Alberts21:25Pretty high. Yeah.

Carlos Foster21:26It's very high. So it's it's a good spot to be in where we're not so reliant on like we need, need, need, you know, new ones. Like we still do need new clients to just to sustain

Carlos Foster21:36certain level of business, but it's nice to know like, hey, the the people are coming back, they're very happy, and we can count on that, you know, as we as we continue to grow.

Kyrill21:46The key is to

Stephen Alberts21:47Yeah.

Kyrill21:47find more of those clients that like it's not just clients that return, but clients that need more work need need videos more frequently to keep returning.

Carlos Foster21:59Mm-hmm.

Kyrill22:00Cause that's that's usually the the main key. 'Cause like we have a lot of clients that come back, for example, for an event that they do every single year, but they otherwise don't necessarily me need video content throughout the whole year. But

Kyrill22:15But it's good to hear that essentially you're able to keep retaining clients because it's a lot easier to retain current clients than to find new ones, as we all know.

Stephen Alberts22:23Mm.

Carlos Foster22:23Yeah.

Kyrill22:24but now you're mentioning though with all the with all the competition and everything that's now happening and all these changes that you've enacted, like what are you doing to kind of continue to di differentiate yourselves from everyone else in the San Diego market right now?

Carlos Foster22:40Well, actually we ha we had the

Stephen Alberts22:41Yeah.

Carlos Foster22:42con the the conversation not too long ago just about Steve's been just by coincidence reworking our website. but we've been leaning more into what we think makes Blue Barn special, which to us is the the relationships that we create with our clients. 'Cause we believe that anyone can buy the same equipment, you know, have the same camera.

Carlos Foster23:10do the editing style that's like trending on Instagram or wherever, you know. And it's like that's not really the reason we think that our clients continue to come back to us and and actually I shouldn't say we think we know 'cause we survey them quite often, just like to keep the relationships strong.

Carlos Foster23:28And it's really at the end of the day they said like, you know, hey, we booked this this event. Is Stephen gonna be there again and is he bringing so and so or Carlos, are you gonna be the one interviewing that you know, like they just get get into this groove where they're like they get to know us and we're super friendly on set and we're friendly even off the set with them and it just like it just keeps you know, it it like I think that more than anything else is like

Carlos Foster23:57what's been keeping us going. Like there there's the talent part of it, but there's the relationship side of it. And I don't think that side gets talked enough like when we're talking to up and comers who are maybe just hungry for like, I just need a gig, I need a gig, you know, is this gig gonna get me what I need for my real? And it's like, man, you know, like your client wants someone they can depend on and trust more than anything else. And like just you showing up on time and doing what you said you're gonna do, like

Carlos Foster24:27means a lot 'cause we we do have clients that have maybe like learned their lesson in a way, like Kyrill you were talking about the one that y hires you every year, right? Well we had a client early on that came to San Diego and we shot an event for them. That's how we met. The next event was out of state and they hired someone. Sure enough a few weeks later they called us and they're like, you know, we're gonna be in wherever, Louisiana or I

Carlos Foster24:57I can't remember where it was, another state, and we are willing to fly you guys out there 'cause this experience we had was just like roll of the dice. And every city we go to, we're like, I don't know if we're we're measuring them against Blue Barn, the experience we had with Blue Barn. Some of these guys were showing up for these simple corporate interviews with like freaking Helium, RED Helium cameras, if you remember those, these eight K things, and you're like

Kyrill25:21Ho ho ho.

Carlos Foster25:22And and and charging them for it, you know, and and like we're like, no, we're just gonna do the service to the best of our ability and get you what you actually need, you know, and you can depend on us for that. And and it's been now eleven years we're working with this client and they hire us on the dot every year for these events, but it's expanded into so much more. Now we have their complete trust, we're doing their promos, animations, leadership videos, so it's like

Carlos Foster25:50It can start, you know, anywhere but grow. It it but it we think it's our personality and Steve's been great about putting that forth more in in more in our materials that we put out there.

Stephen Alberts26:01Yeah, and I I I can add to that. It's sort of a

Carlos Foster26:03Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts26:03we had a moment this year, right, where we were like, we g we gotta gotta create a website that really reflects who we are. I'm sure you guys deal with this too, right? Like th there's a lot of ways to compete, right? But we're not out there to lie. We wanna be as authentic as possible. It's the advice that we give everyone. Like, this is why you should do films, because you wanna be authentic. You wanna put your real voice on camera, your your real stories, your real people. so a website really is kind of like it's a reflection. And one of the things we came up with was that we're owner led.

Stephen Alberts26:31You know, we're not like the type of producers that we'll just go and hire a bunch of random freelancers that are begging for work and farm it out to them and then charge a premium and deliver it and who cares? Like, no, we're actually we're on the calls strategizing and doing, you know, the initial like fact find with people. And then we we pull together the the proposal that sh that should be like it should fit like a glove, but we can't do that unless you listen really well to like what people's objectives are, you know what I mean, and like what they're really trying to get

Stephen Alberts27:02Through doing video content. and then into the shoot, Carlos is a director, I'm a DP. We we all wear many hats. We have all worn mini hats since the beginning. It's just the nature of filmmaking in the 2010s and 2020s. Like, I know how to run sound, I know how to light, you know what I mean? Like, I know how to frame a shot. So does Carlos. He hates picking up a camera, but he's a really good shooter. You know what I mean? Like it we

Dario27:24Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts27:26can do it, but it's

Carlos Foster27:27Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts27:27really like.

Stephen Alberts27:29You know, Carlos was saying it's more important like the soft skills, the peop the people stuff. Like, we can do all the things, but I forgot where I was going with that.

Dario27:39Mm-hmm.

Carlos Foster27:40Well adding on to what I

Stephen Alberts27:41Carlos

Carlos Foster27:41said, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I 'cause it

Stephen Alberts27:41knows what the owner led, the owner led. Sorry. Sorry, like I I

Kyrill27:41To to be adaptable and work with clients, yes.

Dario27:43Yeah.

Stephen Alberts27:46I get those rabbit holes. And it's the owner led thing. That's what I was trying to add on to Carlos's thing. Is that we

Carlos Foster27:50Yes.

Stephen Alberts27:52did this deep dive into our brand. Like, what is it about us that we should tell people? Like, is the reason why you should hire us? We're there. We're there on the shoots doing all the things. And we have great crew. We have we some of guys have and girls have been with us years on our team. And there's a lot of loyalty, there's a lot of like repeat people.

Stephen Alberts28:10so I think that would be part of what in a nutshell we try to, you know, promote about ourselves. But

Dario28:17one thing I wanted to ask was Steve, you mentioned that when you guys first started out, like well I guess right now looking back a lot of people that started out with you guys, other competitors, bunch of them aren't around anymore. wha do you happen to know why that would be? Like w the reasons why some of them didn't make it this far?

Carlos Foster28:39Well, we know for a couple of them, they were just too large. Like it's a model that really took a hit when COVID came around. like these they were more like studios. They had like a huge space, you know, with a staff that they had to

Kyrill28:55Right.

Carlos Foster28:56just, you know, sustain. And

Stephen Alberts28:59Mm-hmm.

Carlos Foster28:59sp when Covid hit they just simply could not. I mean, we we took big hits ourselves, but luckily we had enough

Carlos Foster29:09clients that just either made work for us or we found ways to do it virtually and got got through it because we we've always been flexible with Blue Barn and and thankfully we have you know a low overhead where you know if you're renting a huge studio space that's the size of a hangar like something like the pandemic hits, you definitely like you're not gonna be around. but as to some of the the other boutiques they just

Carlos Foster29:37had to change their models. we knew another one that had a studio that was a a modest size. We would shoot in it sometimes and they had to give that up. And the the guy just, you know, works out of his house now. a lot of them do. We're very lucky that we have a you know an an actual office we come to and work out of every day. like do we absolut do we absolutely need it? No. But Steve and I like having it. It's great for collaborating and bringing our clients here, keeping our gear safe.

Carlos Foster30:07But yeah, I think it was more of a size thing and and kinda just true with where the industry has been going, just naturally.

Kyrill30:17Yeah, you need to be adaptable. You need to be nimble. Like it's just you two guys, right? As full time. Yeah.

Carlos Foster30:23Yes, yeah. Mm-hmm.

Kyrill30:25That that's the main thing. And like we saw that with a lot of people as well before the pandemic. But actually we saw it in a lot of like marketing companies, especially where they were

Carlos Foster30:33Mm-hmm.

Kyrill30:34like like you said, either they presented too big, they they expanded and r relied on like really big clients, like or like one or two clients so that once those are gone, like the whole business model falls apart. And the key is to just

Kyrill30:47be as adaptable as possible. And I think more and more companies know that now versus back

Stephen Alberts30:53Mm.

Kyrill30:53then. And it's funny hearing like your guys' story, there's a lot of similarities in in your story, to like how Dario and I also started and how we grew and how we had to adapt and change. And it's it's an interesting kind of parallel progression that the that I see from that.

Stephen Alberts31:10Y yeah, tell us about yours. I mean, y you guys were starting what, ten or so years ago, twelve years ago?

Dario31:18Yeah, twenty fourteen.

Kyrill31:18Yeah, it was around twenty fourteen

Stephen Alberts31:19Yeah.

Kyrill31:20when we started

Stephen Alberts31:20Yeah.

Kyrill31:20and like like you guys, it was like we were a bunch of freelancers working together under the

Stephen Alberts31:25Mm.

Kyrill31:25same under the same name essentially up until COVID. And then COVID made us realize that okay, we weren't really a business, time to change. And so we did that, we made the f the switch, and then with more of a system and that kind of mindset, it's really helped us kind of adapt. And honestly, this podcast also helped a lot 'cause we've learned a lot from a lot of other production companies, like what works for them, what doesn't, and

Kyrill31:48And then trying to see what we can apply that works for us, right? And that's essentially what it is with everyone in this industry, right? And and yeah.

Stephen Alberts31:58Yeah, how's it been you guys are Toronto, right? So what's

Dario32:00Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts32:01what's the landscape like up there? Do you feel like the things that you find are working for you now are what have always, you know, kinda always been working for you? Or how how have you evolved? Like what's been your transformation?

Kyrill32:16Dario, do you want to take it away from here?

Dario32:20I mean for us we're still figuring it out. Like it's I don't I don't think we have like the formula locked in just yet. But we've gone through different changes, like Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You get the you get those ads too, right? I love that guy that

Stephen Alberts32:28But everybody on Instagram wants to sell you the formula. The the the guys with three years experience. Dude, all those guys kill me. Like d I've been doing this for

Carlos Foster32:31Ha ha ha.

Kyrill32:32Ha.

Carlos Foster32:36Yeah.

Kyrill32:36my god. Get you the ten K a month retainer dudes.

Carlos Foster32:40Yeah.

Stephen Alberts32:40dude, it's and it's like

Dario32:41Yeah

Stephen Alberts32:42I've been doing this

Stephen Alberts32:42for three years and I can sell you how to be a million dollar agency. Like I'm like

Dario32:45I'll sell you this

Dario32:46system that'll get you 30,000 a month and sales and whatever.

Dario32:50And I'm like, so why aren't you doing that? Like why don't you just like grow your business to the point where you're bringing in like 30 million a month? Like why would you sell this if it's such a good piece of knowledge? No, for us it's been

Kyrill32:50It's a five page PDF.

Carlos Foster32:52Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts32:52Mm, right? Mm-hmm. Mm.

Stephen Alberts32:58Right? Exactly.

Dario33:02like again, I I I don't even know how to answer that question to be honest with you. Like we've basically we were just freelancing till like working together with freelancing until 2020 pandemic hits.

Dario33:13And then I would say 2021, we kind applied all the lessons we learned from the podcast to the business, and then it started becoming a business. And then every year since then it's just been about like optimizing

Kyrill33:26Evolving.

Dario33:27and fine-tuning. And we go through different like periods where we're optimizing different things that help out with different parts of the business. This year I would say the theme, or since three months ago, I would say the theme has been.

Dario33:38very AI focused with Claude. Like I've we've been making a lot of improvements to the business from anywhere from accounting, like I mentioned last episode, to just redoing the websites. and yeah, it's I I feel like right now with with Claude it's like we have like a little advisor slash assistant that really helps out

Carlos Foster34:01Hmm. Yeah.

Dario34:04with with everything that we're deficient in.

Stephen Alberts34:07Mm-hmm.

Kyrill34:08A lot of the back end, you know, like the admin and like the the boring stuff as you

Stephen Alberts34:08That's yeah. Same.

Dario34:08Fine.

Carlos Foster34:09Yeah.

Kyrill34:11guys like to say, it's it's helped kind of make things a lot smoother and more efficient.

Stephen Alberts34:17Mm-hmm.

Kyrill34:18it hasn't like it like AI has kind of helped in some aspects of like the actual deliverables here and there, but it's not like we're creating a lot of content from scratch using AI for our clients. Like we're not focusing on that as much, like whereas

Carlos Foster34:30Yeah.

Kyrill34:30now Claude is helping just kind of make things a lot more efficient. That's what this year has been about, as Dario mentioned.

Stephen Alberts34:36Mm-hmm.

Kyrill34:36but

Kyrill34:37For one thing that we've always done and I think like you guys, focus on the work, focus on making it a great experience with the clients, and that's what's helped a lot of clients come back to us over time with our like not retainers, but like the clients that we've retained over the years and and then

Stephen Alberts34:52Mm-hmm.

Kyrill34:53as Dario mentioned, l also like focusing a bit more on Google, SEO and things like that. It's really helped kind of get our n our name out there. And so that's how we've been able to drum up a lot more, a lot more work.

Kyrill35:08like in in an inbound marketing kind of way, like a inbound lead generation way.

Carlos Foster35:14Yeah.

Stephen Alberts35:14Yeah, we're definitely on a parallel

Stephen Alberts35:15journey, I think, with the AIs. Just definitely all back a house stuff. Like we're just we're

Kyrill35:20Yeah, exactly.

Stephen Alberts35:21getting hours back, you know, from everything from, you know, the website work to the proposals to the, you know, researching clients, all that stuff. Like it's it's a it's everyone everywhere, right? Tuning up their businesses, you know. Yeah. And

Dario35:34We're just relocating ours, more like.

Kyrill35:36Relocating hours, yeah,

Carlos Foster35:37Ha ha.

Kyrill35:37exactly. That's a good way to put it.

Stephen Alberts35:38It's really great though, you

Dario35:39Yeah.

Stephen Alberts35:39know, and honestly, like we actually have more time to edit, you have more time to talk to clients and you have more time to be

Dario35:43Yeah.

Stephen Alberts35:43a human. And I think it's been great. And for us, we're also not really doing a lot of generative AI. Like I think it's great for certain things, you know, like if you need to change a background or add some people to something, or get this impossible shot that would cost too much money to produce. Like, cool, but it's an asset, just like a a B roll stock B roll is an asset, just like a drone shot's an asset. And

Stephen Alberts36:07Whatever specialty, you know, VFX you might insert into a piece for a certain reason. Like those are all assets, you know, but it's not the whole thing. We're not at that place where we can just like one shot this amazing video into existence and it's gonna do an amazing thing for some company. And the day that we are

Carlos Foster36:22Yeah.

Stephen Alberts36:23there, w they don't need us. because they can just one shot it themselves, you know. And I don't think that that day's coming soon. I think like there's a lot of people realizing, especially this year from when I listen to other people talk.

Stephen Alberts36:35that, you know, the human touch really is critical and whether it's the in the creative work or in the process of getting the creative out. You know, because how many times have

Carlos Foster36:43Yeah.

Stephen Alberts36:43you sat with a customer and they just like they come in thinking they know what they want, or they come in a little confused, or they come in, you know, and they really need that conversation with you to go, here's what we're thinking, like you and then you have to really creatively strategize with them. Like how is video going to help you achieve your business goals? Like that is the first intention that has to be clearly laid out because everything is downstream from that.

Stephen Alberts37:05You know, like what kinds of videos you can create, like timelines, deliverables, cruise sizes, budgets, right? Like everything's downstream from like what are you trying to accomplish? You know, and why? You know,

Dario37:16Yeah.

Stephen Alberts37:16and and and for us we've you know, sorry. Yeah, I'll leave you with that.

Kyrill37:21Sorry, I was just gonna say I like the little irony you you kinda just mentioned right there where you're using AI to be more human in a way. It's like using the AI to

Stephen Alberts37:29Yeah, it's allowing us the time.

Kyrill37:31Exactly. I I like that. That's funny.

Carlos Foster37:34Yeah, well it's it's

Dario37:34For stuff like

Stephen Alberts37:35Which is the good

Dario37:35that with the

Stephen Alberts37:35side of it?

Dario37:36with the like clients also like needing all that information that they might get from AI. The I find I find some of our clients this year have been coming to us with like scripts written with AI or details about the shoot that we would normally figure out. They're figuring it out with AI, but the issue I'm seeing with what they're doing is that all these AIs are trained on like how production day goes. All that information is from blog posts online.

Carlos Foster38:02Yeah.

Dario38:03that are probably written by guys like that are definitely written by guys like us that probably had to quickly write something for SEO and it probably isn't the most detailed piece of stuff. It's

Kyrill38:12Yeah.

Dario38:13probably very outdated. So then the AI is training on very outdated, sometimes it's informed information, right? So we still

Carlos Foster38:19Or yeah.

Dario38:21need to be there to kinda tell them, you know, in in theory yes, but in practice no.

Kyrill38:26Yeah, the the their

Carlos Foster38:26Well you know, w we

Carlos Foster38:28w we had a a a quick story. We had a client that we've worked with before and we shot a series of interviews that, you know, were all gonna be crafted together to make their brand n narrative. And, you know, like sent them the rough cuts and you know, they're like, yeah, this this is cool, but like give us a little time to like show it to the stakeholders and we're like, Okay, fine. So a week later they come back and they say

Carlos Foster38:55Okay, we have a new assembly edit we'd like you to create, and we think that we have found even better sound bites than that and so they sent it, and you know, I did the interview, so immediately I'm like, no one said that. Like this is not what anyone

Kyrill39:09Yeah.

Carlos Foster39:09said. And so so I I went back to

Stephen Alberts39:10Mm-hmm.

Dario39:10I just hallucinated it.

Carlos Foster39:12them and I said, This is no, this is where are these sound bites, first of all. Like, and they're like, we we put in the transcripts and the AI sent us, you know, like here's an assembly edit that matches

Carlos Foster39:25your goals and I said, no, no, no, but like where? Where's the time code? Have it send you the time

Kyrill39:29Ha ha

Carlos Foster39:30code. And then when it did that, that's when it they realized, it made it all up. And they're like, okay, let's go with your rough cut. And like, cool. Glad

Dario39:37Mm.

Carlos Foster39:38we all spent a week for you

Kyrill39:39Yeah.

Carlos Foster39:39to learn the shortcomings of what AI can do. But yeah, we we we see it a lot more and more. But I think for Steve and I, we feel like maybe I'm being naive, but I feel like we're a little protected from it.

Carlos Foster39:55just because of the type of work that Blue Barn is known for and what we do is the type of work that requires the most human touch. You know, like most of our films are interview driven or filming real people in in like situations that would be like, why would you AI that at all? You know, like an event. Like sure you can create it. I saw someone put a post saying, events are dead. Like, yeah, but that's not the point of why you make an event film.

Carlos Foster40:24You make it to be like this is what it was like to be there, not like this is an approximation of what it would be like to be there. You know, like

Dario40:31Yeah.

Carlos Foster40:32or like, yeah, your CEO could make an avatar, but and but like how would that land if they found out the new HR video he didn't even bother to sit down and talk to you, you know? Like those moments I think they're starting to realize like, man, there's a whole wealth of content that really should always be humans.

Carlos Foster40:53human led, human made, you know, people driven is what we like to say. and just we just kinda naturally went into that and have always done that. We I mean we'll dabble in all kinds of genres of filmmaking, but at the end of it, Steve and I realized like it's really like the stuff that requires the human touch is where we specialize. Like other production companies, you know, do animations, they do like products only, like e commerce video. Those ones I would say like

Carlos Foster41:21I don't know what's gonna happen as AI gets more prevalent. Like but the stuff where you're really like trying to get a story out of someone and you need it to be authentic, I don't see like where AI adds to that, you know, at least in the in in that process of capture.

Dario41:40I have a friend who

Kyrill41:40Yeah, I totally agree.

Dario41:41was telling me that you should we should take advantage of all these AI programs now because eventually it's gonna get to a point where they're too expensive to run or they're gonna cap

Dario41:52usage so not everyone has access to it. So he's like milk Claude

Stephen Alberts41:56Mm.

Dario41:57or

Carlos Foster41:57Yeah.

Dario41:59ChatGPT as as much as you can 'cause eventually it's just gonna be gate kept, right? So that's probably g gonna be very helpful for us in the future, right?

Stephen Alberts42:04Yeah, that's that's a good insight.

Carlos Foster42:05Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Dario42:07'Cause it's like great, now they do gotta come to us.

Stephen Alberts42:08But that's great advice.

Kyrill42:10Yeah, it might be

Kyrill42:10like a premium it.

Stephen Alberts42:11However,

Stephen Alberts42:12you know, like what what have you made recently that you could say like, this will be useful in five years? Like I haven't made anything with AI that I'm like, this is amazing. Like I'm always like, This is weird. Like, or that's that's a little off. Like I

Carlos Foster42:23Yeah.

Stephen Alberts42:24can't I can't see using that, you know. But you're right. Like I think the b the business model,

Kyrill42:26On the content side, yeah.

Carlos Foster42:29Yeah, on the content side. Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts42:29yeah, the content side. Yeah, yeah.

Stephen Alberts42:30Creating just creating like

Kyrill42:31Yeah, on the content side I agree that that that

Kyrill42:33area it's still like it can only keep getting better. Like I I rem like I remember the first time I did the extension AI tool on Premiere, it kinda

Stephen Alberts42:42Mm-hmm.

Kyrill42:42like blew my mind a little bit how like it was able to work on certain things, but only on

Carlos Foster42:46Yeah.

Kyrill42:47inanimate objects. The second I started doing it with people, I got the weirdest limbs moving. And it's like it it

Carlos Foster42:52of course. Yeah. And and the yeah. And

Carlos Foster42:56the and the demo that they send you is like this guy like walking out of a car and you're like, How did they make that work? Like 'cause yeah, you can barely make an orange, you know, roll on on a table with with

Kyrill43:06Yeah.

Carlos Foster43:07the with the tool. So I don't know. There's

Stephen Alberts43:08Mm-hmm.

Carlos Foster43:09a little bit of smoke in mirrors, I think.

Dario43:10Well unless they show the Yeah, I I feel like unless they

Dario43:13show like an actual clip of them creating it, I gotta call into doubt 'cause

Carlos Foster43:16Yeah.

Dario43:18some of it you're like, okay, but I

Kyrill43:19Yeah.

Dario43:19can't get anywhere close to this. Like it's not just a prompt. There's something here you guys did.

Carlos Foster43:21Yeah exactly.

Kyrill43:22Yeah.

Stephen Alberts43:23And to be to be fair.

Stephen Alberts43:25Yeah, that's it. That to be fair, like any of the like deep dives I've seen on something truly impressive made with generative AI, like the amount of skill and time and tokens that went into making it was just like

Dario43:39Yeah.

Stephen Alberts43:39this took longer than an actual production. Like or it was more expensive in the end. I'm

Dario43:43More expensive than an actual production.

Kyrill43:43Right, yeah.

Stephen Alberts43:45like, so it's not we're not in a place where it's an actual like viable option for lots of kinds of filmmaking. But like Carlos said.

Stephen Alberts43:51Things like product videos, e-commerce, like flashy visuals. Sure, of course. Like, and I'm and it's making its way into Hollywood and it's you know, it's making its way into all kinds of things. And it's gonna continue to do that. But I think in our little niche in our corner of the universe where we're doing story-driven films, people-driven films and videos for businesses, like we we do think the human experience, not only the experience of us producing content for them and the way we talk to them, the way we show up, the way we film.

Stephen Alberts44:21But also like the end result, like the film that comes out, like the whole purpose is to to lift a veil on the brand and on the people and the perspectives that drive that brand. And that's what people believe in. That's what people want to connect with. You're not connecting with, you know, fantastical AI driven stuff. You're you're just impressed by it.

Kyrill44:43Yeah.

Dario44:43I think

Dario44:43it's just gonna help us in the future anyways. Like I mean we've we've gone through so many different periods l like in our ten to fifteen years operating, right? Like this will just be another arc, essentially, right? And I can only s I I

Kyrill44:56An arc.

Stephen Alberts44:56Mm-hmm.

Carlos Foster44:57Mm-hmm.

Dario44:57see

Dario44:57it just like helping long term anyways. Like I'm ready thinking now, it's like I think about like for example with Claude, the context folder has so many different files related to

Dario45:09the businesses that like it it just knows so much that any time I'm doing something it'll already like

Stephen Alberts45:14Mm.

Dario45:15use that input, right? So I can see that also being useful for like let's say a client project. We just give it as much information as possible and then as we're crafting

Carlos Foster45:23Yeah.

Dario45:24the story for it, it'll say, Hey, you're going down this road, but really this was your original vision and this is how we can tie

Carlos Foster45:30Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts45:30Mm.

Dario45:31back to it can work out in in that type of way. Like even with the Gen AI stuff, like

Stephen Alberts45:34It does, it does. Like an assistant, yeah.

Dario45:38Yeah, ex yeah, exactly. And

Kyrill45:38Yeah, that that's how you gotta treat it.

Carlos Foster45:38Yeah.

Dario45:41and even with

Carlos Foster45:41Mm-hmm.

Dario45:41the Gen AI stuff, like it'll probably just help with like cleaning up stuff, right? Like let's say during a pivotal moment in the interview, the guy looks away or the girl looks away. We can just fix it back and now we can use that shot, right? Great, got it.

Stephen Alberts45:55Right. Fixing

Carlos Foster45:55Y you know what's

Carlos Foster45:56interesting you know

Stephen Alberts45:56things, yeah.

Carlos Foster45:57what's interesting about that is that with the generative AI becoming more and more prevalent, it's actually had forced Stephen and I to rethink some of the like classic film

Carlos Foster46:09Making techniques that we would use and any editor would use. For example, one of our clients, all we do is customer testimonials. We only shoot customer testimonials for them. They send us all over the country to film their clients and get their authentic stories. So, like a definite use of a people-driven production, not AI, right? You want to see the real person say, These guys helped me, my business is flourishing thanks to them. So early on in that relationship, we film our first interview, we're like out in Salt Lake City, come back.

Carlos Foster46:39the edit together. Guy was really nice on camera, but you know, he like he was very nervous so he would stumble sometimes in his interview. But as we all know, like we got B roll, we can cut that out. No one needs to see him make that mistake. or if I put this line here it's gonna say it better. So we show that first cut to the client and they go, no, no, no, we want to see like the mistakes because our potential clients are savvy enough

Carlos Foster47:05to know that you can craft whatever you want in film. And like w if he's saying something under B roll, they're gonna be like, nah, that's a Frankenstein soundbite. Like I I'm not buying it. And Steve and I were

Dario47:18Interesting.

Carlos Foster47:18like, holy like, wow.

Carlos Foster47:20They're right. Even before AI, where now you can just like type something into ElevenLabs, you know, train it on the voice and have say whatever you want. We were already doing that with filmmaking. So it kind of forced us to to tackle it more authentically. And now when I'm sitting in the interview chair, I used to like just be doing math in my head. Like if I move that soundbite to here, that one to here, perfect soundbite. Now I'm like, no, that's gonna I gotta show them on camera saying this. It's gotta it's gotta come out

Kyrill47:49Yeah.

Carlos Foster47:49of their mouth.

Carlos Foster47:50Someone's gotta see it or they won't believe it 'cause everyone's learning,

Stephen Alberts47:53Mm.

Carlos Foster47:53you know, these tricks. So we're like going

Carlos Foster47:56We're actually like moving away from like the AI correcting, you know, like that moment you said moving the head. But maybe he said the best sound bite ever and he just happened to do it. Like, too bad, man. Everyone's gonna believe

Dario48:08Yeah.

Carlos Foster48:08that more than, you know, us fixing it i in some way. Or if they find out, they're like, No, Dario's head was here, but I saw the raw footage, you know, and then they're like, I don't believe it. Maybe the whole thing is fake. So it's just kinda funny that like we've had to roll it back.

Dario48:22It's it's f it's funny how that's becoming a thing now.

Dario48:25'Cause it's like

Carlos Foster48:25Yeah.

Dario48:26I mean, even back when they started photography like over a hundred years ago, they would actually like fix they would do like I I know this because

Carlos Foster48:33Mm-hmm.

Dario48:35my great aunt or whatever had like a photography serious, they would after they would take your picture, they would like paint on it just to like clear up imperfections, like OG Photoshop. So ever

Carlos Foster48:41Yes. You're right. Yeah.

Dario48:46since like humans have been like

Dario48:48Capturing stuff has been faked. Nothing's been authentic. It's only now becoming a big deal.

Carlos Foster48:51Yeah, manipulated. Yeah. Yeah,

Kyrill48:51yeah.

Carlos Foster48:55now that you know like that it happens, huh.

Kyrill48:55You know, on the plus side. On the plus

Kyrill48:58side, if if clients are gonna I I mean if clients are gonna start going with those testimonials where it's the more real answer showing all the stumbles and everything and

Carlos Foster49:05Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Kyrill49:07they're happy with that, you know, on the plus side, editing is gonna be a lot easier, you know, you don't have to be chopping as much.

Stephen Alberts49:11Right.

Carlos Foster49:14Well yeah,

Carlos Foster49:14the the edits for these videos now have probably forty to fifty percent less B roll than we normally would, you know, like and it's just and and Stephen and I

Carlos Foster49:24advertise it, this is a different product. You know, your brand film is your brand film, and maybe you want that to be the most polished representation of you of you. But this testimonial, I think people want to see like I want to see that this person just sat down in a chair and started saying how great you were. I I don't need to see anything else. I just want the trust to be built, you know, and conveyed in some way. And so Steve and I are like we said, we're we're all our our own worst

Carlos Foster49:54enemy in a way where we're or our our harshest critic as we're trying to get ourselves in front of the camera more, we're learning like, man, maybe maybe we maybe it should just be a camera pointing at the two of us talking about, you know, like what do we do? Maybe it doesn't need to be as flashy. And so w we're constantly like striking that balance 'cause we also know, well, some clients want it to look that way, other clients don't. And like how do we appeal to both camps? So it's just an endless riddle. You know.

Stephen Alberts50:23Yeah, and I think

Stephen Alberts50:23on the theme of authenticity, right? Like there is this push, especially now, like it's like the anti movement to polished video is like, well, if it's polished, it's bullshit. It's like, okay. am I allowed to say that? Are we you bleep me out? I don't know if it's like a like I don't know. Okay, cool. I just sorry, I didn't know if our audience well who our audience was, but

Kyrill50:38Yeah, you're fine. No parental advisory warning. We're good. We're good.

Dario50:38Mm, no, we're not we're not monetized. I wish I wish we were we I wish we got into trouble for that. That means we had big sponsors. Nah go for it, go

Kyrill50:50It's all good.

Dario50:50for it.

Stephen Alberts50:51But

Stephen Alberts50:52you know what I Like there's like this push to be like as authentic as possible, right? Which is why UGC user generated content is so like been the thing for a few years now. Cause they're like, it's just I believe it more. It gets more views if it's like a guy on his phone, like showing me how great the car wash polishes up his car versus like a fancy commercial with beautiful shots and like, you know, all this amazing visual stuff to to sell it to me. Like, you know, and I I I get it.

Stephen Alberts51:17And with us too, like the authenticity is really key. And it was funny because we did get an education from our own client on like they didn't want the B-roll. They're like, no, we just want to see them talk and like say it. But it I think it what it does for us is it actually reinforces what we've known all along is that coaching interviews is like a really big skill. And Carlos as a director has really put puts a lot of energy into like walking people through.

Stephen Alberts51:45an interview start to finish, getting them comfortable, getting them to open up like about the things we need them to be honest and vulnerable about. Like that's a real soft skill. And you know, there's no robot that's gonna sit in that chair and do that well. And we even have clients that don't know that Carlos does that. And they'll be like, we'll do the interview. And Carlos is like, Are you sure? Like, you know, like it's kind of like what you brought us in to do is like get a really great interview and s and there's somebody at the marketing team at the in-house, you know,

Stephen Alberts52:13department of the client that's like, no, I'm gonna do the interview. And like a lot of times we're we're cringing because it's it's terrible. And there's a real difference between someone who knows how to do an interview on camera and someone who doesn't. And back to what I think over our trajectory of the last 15 years, we've definitely put a lot of emphasis on that, not only polished visuals, but like the experience of making the film, the experience of the interview. Like it just yields different results.

Stephen Alberts52:43That you then get to craft with and post, you know, and I think there's a lot of subtlety to this art, as you guys know. And and we've evolved from being filmmakers first and only filmmakers, right? Like content creators or video producers, whatever you want to call us. But over the years we've sort of seen that we've had to kind of become marketers and and some of our overlap is like we've had to really get into branding and marketing with people.

Stephen Alberts53:10At a deeper level, because the conversations go there. You know, what we're making for them really touches on like the soul of a company or the story behind it or the how the brand is to be presented. And these are not little decisions. and so when you're engaging a production company like ours, over time we just have gotten used to having those conversations. And and I personally enjoy those conversations. I really like talking to people about like, you know, how do we want to present this? because there's a million different ways. But I think the the the soft skills.

Stephen Alberts53:38theme and the authenticity theme, like that doesn't just come about easily. I you know, it's like a it's a skill you have to learn over time. Like I don't know, how do you guys feel about like that being a an important aspect of of the video production process? Like

Kyrill53:54Yeah, I mean it is you you're absolutely right. The skill the skill set is so important, especially for interviews. But I think also what people sometimes forget is also it's not just being able to ask client the interviewee certain questions. It's also connecting with them, like you said, but it's like that your personality. Everyone has a different way of also doing things that is different. Like the way Dario interviews someone on camera is gonna be different from how Carlos does it or for from how I do it or from how you do it. and

Kyrill54:24That becomes an integral part of the skill set. And 'cause like you see it with clients sometimes when they want to be the ones to, you know, ask ask their clients questions. You know, that does happen

Stephen Alberts54:35Mm-hmm.

Kyrill54:35a lot of the time as well. And you can see how it's it sometimes can be a little bit rigid, but also sometimes it makes sense because they also know the person. So there's that personality aspect that also kind of works in at play there. So that it's just kind of like knowing how to do that. That's what I mean. Yeah. Sometimes it works.

Stephen Alberts54:49Yeah, to be f to be fair, sometimes it's great. Yeah, sometimes sometimes it does work out. I'm not saying all clients

Stephen Alberts54:54are terrible at it. I don't mean to say that. I just

Kyrill54:56Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Stephen Alberts54:56but please continue. Yeah, yeah.

Kyrill54:58Yeah, yeah. Like that that's what I'm saying. Like with some it doesn't work because they w they wanted to be the ones to do it, but some it really works because they have the personality and they know the they know the the their clients a lot more a a lot better directly, right? So they're gonna be able to get yeah,

Stephen Alberts55:10Relationship.

Kyrill55:12they have that relationship and they're gonna be able to get better sound bites from it. So sometimes it's also a matter of finding the right people for it. And that that's that's another skill to know who should also be interviewing as well.

Carlos Foster55:25It's funny, we actually have a we have a

Dario55:26Carl sorry.

Carlos Foster55:28a policy where if we are editing the video, creating the brand film, we're like we're doing the interview. Like that's it. 'Cause it like when they do bring in other people, it's like, yeah, maybe you know each other, but you don't know how to make a story. So like you might get these sound bites that sound cool in the moment, but like where does that connect to anything else that was said in this whole interview? And so if they're like s insistent on it

Carlos Foster55:55Steve and I know sometimes they are for those same reasons. Like, I work with this guy all the time. Like, we're best friends, he's gonna be natural. Like, okay, cool, we'll let you do it. But I'm gonna be in the room and I'm gonna like have my list of questions, like that you can ask him if you feel it's better coming through you. But like, if my editor doesn't have this, you don't have a film. And then they usually understand that. They're like, There are certain building blocks that are not part of a normal conversation, but

Carlos Foster56:24create your story or craft the message you want. And just 'cause like you're having a great time talking to each other doesn't always yield a great interview. We've had those where they're like laughing through the whole thing and then we get it back and we're like,

Kyrill56:35Mm-hmm.

Carlos Foster56:36There's what you didn't even talk about like pillars

Kyrill56:38Yeah.

Carlos Foster56:38one through and three and like what do we do? So yeah, it's just but like you said, th there can be interesting results and we're we're we're not opposed to it, but we're always like, here's the hard line. We need these elements because you need us to have those elements, right?

Carlos Foster56:53So there's always that little bit of education. That's something that we notice to go back to the business side of it with some of these like our up and comers when they do their interviews or have an interview led film that they're almost like too what's the word, like permissive with the client. They're like, Well, this person's paying me money and you know, but they really want your expertise. And that's something that, like Steve said, we're owner led. So we try to have that expertise come through in every conversation. And it's like, yeah, you

Carlos Foster57:23You hired us, right? Not just to point the camera. You want us to make something that's special and unique. And so we try to lead with that rather than, yeah, w we'll be there, we'll capture it, whatever happens, happens. Like, no, we know what we need to deliver, you know, the video that's gonna work for you. And so at sometimes when people are starting out, I mean I I was certainly was guilty of it, where I'd be like, Yeah, cool, great idea But not thinking like, actually that's a terrible idea. I gotta say something

Kyrill57:52Okay.

Carlos Foster57:52So

Carlos Foster57:52over time we've gained the confidence to just be like, We know we know what you need, you know, don't worry. Like let's work together, but we're the ones that are gonna steer the ship. And that that's something you just learn over time how to handle that with with care, with the right gloves, as we say.

Kyrill58:13No, I couldn't agree more.

Dario58:13Nice.

Kyrill58:14Yeah.

Dario58:17I think we could probably end it off here. We're just at the one hour mark. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Kyrill58:22wow, already an hour. Didn't even realize.

Stephen Alberts58:24Sorry, w we're long winded sometimes.

Carlos Foster58:25There wa there was one

Carlos Foster58:27thing, Dario, only if you wanna get it, 'cause when we spoke to you at the pre interview, it was more of a nuts and bolts conversation about business. Did you wanna talk about the partnership? 'Cause you said we were the only people you had met where one of the partners actually passed away. I don't know if that's important to you or not, but

Dario58:40yeah. Yeah, yeah. I w I was gonna bring

Dario58:46it up but I was like as the conversation

Kyrill58:47They kinda did already.

Dario58:49started going, I was like, do we end on that note or we leave it on a more up eat thing? we can I think

Carlos Foster58:53Yeah. Well I don't know if you wanted to like put it put it in somewhere else, but it's up to you.

Dario58:57I mean we could we could bring it up. just cause

Dario59:02I d I thought it was interesting. Like I'm I've never run into like a company. I mean we've done over a hundred and I think this will be one twenty. So we've done almost a hundred

Carlos Foster59:10wow.

Dario59:10twenty episodes with guests. And this is a that was the first time I heard one of the partners passing away. So I guess two things that might be interesting for a guest to to listen to is

Dario59:23How important is it to have like a partnership agreement? And then I guess we can kinda go into like what happened when like your

Carlos Foster59:30Mm-hmm.

Dario59:30partner passed, now his responsibilities and duties got passed on to you guys, right? And then also I guess also the fork in the road that you guys were at, like, do you start something new or do you just you know do you know what I mean? Like if you guys wanna take it take it off from there.

Carlos Foster59:44Yeah.

Carlos Foster59:46Yeah, and the only thing th Steve and I mentioned it that we can't go too deep into is like the partnership shares, just 'cause his surviving family, his his kids are still working out like their probate and estate, so like we don't want to muddy any waters there. But we're happy to talk about like how we worked together and then like what the fallout was and the restructuring of Blue Barn and all of that's fine.

Dario01:00:09Y Yes. And

Kyrill01:00:10Yeah, yeah.

Dario01:00:11actually before you get into it, I'll let I'll let

Stephen Alberts01:00:13Mm-hmm.

Carlos Foster01:00:13Mm-hmm.

Dario01:00:13you take it off from there. But for those listening, I found this out last week as I was doing the accounting sheets with with Claude and everything. But when you start the corporation, you also have to buy shares from the corporation. I didn't know this, I found out recently, so we had to create

Kyrill01:00:31I didn't know it.

Dario01:00:33like a whole like certificate.

Dario01:00:35with Claude and everything because it it only figured it out because it was saying, based on your T5 or whatever documents like, it says you you haven't bought any shares. This is not something they teach you in school, all right. This is stuff you find out like with with an assistant. It's like, yeah, by the way, you gotta buy shares of your corporations. So for those listening, if you haven't done it, schedule it in sometimes all you gotta do is send some money to your corporate bank account and then just ask Claude or ChatGPT to create like the certificate thing that says you own so and so shares. So like

Dario01:01:05Kyrill and I we now each own a hundred shares. That way, if something happens to one of us, like we either wanna get out of the company or like pass, like the estate gets it, at least you have that thing that says you have that amount of shares. Because otherwise it becomes a big big issue. Cause then Claude was telling me, if you don't do that, then let's say you pass away or whatever, then you have to figure out what those shares were worth or something, and then it could become like a really, really big headache.

Kyrill01:01:31If they existed.

Dario01:01:33Yeah. But again, I found

Kyrill01:01:33Yeah.

Dario01:01:34this out like again, we've been corporated

Stephen Alberts01:01:35Mm-hmm.

Dario01:01:36for over three years now. I just found this out last week. I this is not something they tell you when you go on Corporations Canada and you're like incorporating the business. They should, but they don't sing.

Carlos Foster01:01:47Yeah, and it I think it may be a little different in in California, but you definitely do need here we have a certificate from the Secretary of State showing like your ownership s you know, shares, how that pie is divvied

Carlos Foster01:02:01up. So we we have that, you know, locked away in a safe signed by the Secretary of State, just showing like Blue Barn is thirty three and a third percent, me, Steve, and then our partner Vic. So I think that's where we could jump.

Carlos Foster01:02:16jump into it if you wanted unless there was anything else technical.

Dario01:02:17Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, go for it.

Carlos Foster01:02:19Yeah, so like we mentioned our our team was or Blue Barn was founded with the three of us, but we all met in television. And but coming up in March of next year, of two years that that Vic, our partner, passed away. so it was unexpected. He was a bit older than us, but you know, still a a shock to the system. we

Carlos Foster01:02:44We had always had talks about what Blue Barn would look like without him, just 'cause he was older and he was nearing retirement. and so there was always the vision of at some point the company is Stephen and myself and Vic's, you know, gonna retire, maybe stay on as an a consultant and just kinda like gradually just do less and less until he's like fully retired. But his death, you know, ex accelerated all of that and

Carlos Foster01:03:14Steve and I, I mean, like we were on a shoot when we found out. I mean Stephen actually Steve was deathly ill. I was on a production, I and you know, I got the news and had to call him and tell him this awful thing that happened and we just had to figure it out that week. Like, all right, no one's coming to to relieve us. I'm gonna stay on the shoot. Steve's too sick to come here. Luckily our team who are just amazing guys, a and women, like they're like, We got your back, you know, and like

Carlos Foster01:03:44helped us out like with even just transporting gear, you know, and so we made it through that week, like one of the worst weeks, darkest weeks in Blue Barn's history. And it just it took us a w we had all this stuff lined up so th there was time before s Steve and I could even breathe to like really process that our partner was now gone. And the way we had the company divided was I was always client facing after they had been

Carlos Foster01:04:14Brought in, contract signed, they're now working with me. I guide them through the process. I'm usually on the set. Stephen handles the capture, making sure everyone's in line there, and then the post-production. He touches every project that goes out the door. But Vic was the front-facing person, the very first person you would meet when you would call or message Blue Barn. So that was a huge hole that you know we had to now fill. Like that was the guy.

Carlos Foster01:04:43that was shaking hands and winning people over and he was amazing at it. That's all he did his whole life was win people over and make them his friend. And so Steve and I are like, Well now we gotta do that. You know, like we we gotta find a way to you know, not only process this, but like the business doesn't stop running. So we had to learn like to do it our own way. How much can we take on and those first

Carlos Foster01:05:12six to nine months we were just spending money just to like make sure the projects would keep going. It's like hiring our guys to step into roles they hadn't maybe been in, you know. and thankfully everyone stepped up and Steve and I were like, damn, we could have done this years ago. Like these everyone's amazing. They're they're helping us out so much. But it took us a while to like get the headspace to realize one this had actually happened, because that's just the way grief works.

Carlos Foster01:05:42And two, like w what do we wanna do? We thought we had three more years of planning and then starting to execute this retirement, but it's gotta happen now. And that was to be totally vulnerable is super scary, you know. Like we we've been in business twelve years at that point, going on thirteen, and we're like we gotta figure out what the new Blue Barn is l gonna be like now, you know, and that was

Carlos Foster01:06:11Terrifying, even for two people who had known each other a long time and worked together really closely, like what's the new dynamic gonna be like and yeah, so I think Steve you could take it from there, but that's kinda th the

Stephen Alberts01:06:23Mm.

Carlos Foster01:06:24that that moment that we were in, you know.

Stephen Alberts01:06:28Yeah, I mean, it kind of goes back to what we were talking about before being like flexible and adaptive, you know, to whatever the conditions are as like a business model for like a really good production company doing good work on a regular basis. There's a certain amount of adaptability, you know, that we have to have. And we've always operated as founders and then we contract our crews for the projects. our contractors enjoy being freelance and we enjoy

Stephen Alberts01:06:56Being able to call in talented folks at any given notice. So, you know, luckily we had 15 years of working together. And I read a book probably 10 years ago that was really awesome. it's called Rocket Fuel. I don't know if you've heard of it, but it's essentially like a breakdown of like really successful brands.

Stephen Alberts01:07:20There's two types of personalities that really work well together and it's the visionaries and the integrators. And most people are visionaries, like they can see the future. They love to try have a million ideas a day. And, you know, and then there's the other type of person who's the integrator. It's like keeping everybody rowing in the same direction. The person who's like the platoon leader can keep everybody glued together as a team, you know, and doing more logistical stuff and is not really like overly concerned about like what's next and like how can we do it this way? Like

Stephen Alberts01:07:50And so visionaries and integrators is essentially are it's kind of like what Carlos and I are. I tend to be a visionary, he tends to be an integrator. And there's a certain balance that's really innate to that you know, mixture that we've already worked together for so long as a as a trio. We're very much a democracy, you know. If we wanted to go one way, two two out of three votes gets the win. You know, like who if two people decide they want to do something, the third guy has to go along with it. We've always respected each other.

Stephen Alberts01:08:19even if we disagreed. So it it worked for a very long time, but now that's just fifty-fifty. It's like, business entity wise, that's a little scarier because there's no tie breaking vote, right? It's like, no, we have to figure out are we a good partnership? Luckily we are. but I could see like if we were too similar, or and I and I s I see this with other people that want to start, you know, companies and partnering up with people, like you gotta be careful. Like is if you you have dissimilar core values.

Stephen Alberts01:08:48Or if you're both too much of the same kind of person, you know, there's n then there's too much overlap. Like he and I overlap in a lot of great ways creatively, but he really loves the client stuff and the logistics. And like he's handling, you know, financial things that I just don't want to even want to touch with a 10 foot pole. I'm just like, just let me know if s something needs my attention. But like otherwise I want to stay over here in the edit. Like

Carlos Foster01:09:10Yeah.

Stephen Alberts01:09:11I wanna be color grading, I want to do sound mixing and design and

Stephen Alberts01:09:14Like I'm out there filming, like I love it. I just want to be working with colors and light and and and then business wise, like I really love building websites. I really love like the whole branding and you know, storytelling that goes along with like digital presence. So and he doesn't do it the anything on the website, you know. So it's like there's all these little niches that we find, hey, you love doing that, you do that. Hey, I love doing this, I'll do this. And then we have our overlap, right? We can go both go and DP direct produce.

Stephen Alberts01:09:44light, sound, operate, whatever we need to do. Like we've done it, we can do it. and let's just find the lane where we thrive. Let's be a balance to each other and let's always respect each other even if we disagree on like a certain way to go. And I think that so for me in my mind, I don't think it's been it hasn't been challenging. It was scary, like Carlos said, 'cause we're like, well, like we've never done this as two people. You know, but

Stephen Alberts01:10:12It's been great. And I think the fifteen years of experience, you know, respectfully working together and realizing that he's like this integrator type person and I'm more of this visionary type person, it actually has a really natural fit. so it works for us. But, you know, we're two, you know, unique guys in a unique spot in the world and it's not the same, you know. Could be, you know, the chemistry has to matter, you know, it and that's

Carlos Foster01:10:38Mm-hmm.

Stephen Alberts01:10:39what I think

Kyrill01:10:39Yeah.

Stephen Alberts01:10:39is keeping everything going.

Kyrill01:10:41The key is to trust

Stephen Alberts01:10:42And the way it is.

Kyrill01:10:42each other. And like you said, you have to be able to define roles, especially in a fifty-fifty type split. That's one of the biggest things to know what each person is responsible for. Yes, it's good that everyone can do a bit of everything because you never know when that adaptability aspect is needed. You know, like that's how it is with Dario and I. Like very, very similar to you guys. but I I think ultimately what also happens is because of also the experience that you would have, the important thing is always to make sure you

Kyrill01:11:10you can trust the other person that you know that you guys are both trying to make the best decisions, not only for the business, but for for each other as well. And that's ultimately what you what everyone needs to remember, especially in these types of partnerships where it's just two people, right? You know, and that's the only way you can amicably move forward. You know, that doesn't mean that you're not gonna have dis you're not gonna have disagreements or arguments on some things every now and then. That's normal. That's that's how it should be. There should be some friction to kind of help

Kyrill01:11:38push things forward. But the key is you gotta be able to also convince each other, right? And that's a lot of what the back and forth is between a a partnership.

Carlos Foster01:11:47Definitely, yeah. And I think just having it put in such sharp relief so fast is what like made it scary that we're like, man, we gotta do this

Kyrill01:11:57Yeah.

Carlos Foster01:11:58and our clients and the business and the bills are not gonna say, You can have your moment of grieving, you know, like that doesn't happen in the real world. So we had to grieve our friend and partner who passed away while also, you know, figuring it out, you know, like

Carlos Foster01:12:16And things that you would never think about, like like 'cause all three of our faces are on the website. Like, what's a respectful amount of time to leave that up there? 'Cause now clients are coming back and asking, like, hey, how's Vic doing? and by the twentieth time you explain what happened, you're just getting numb, you know? It's like stuff you never would think about 'cause it's just like like like Dario said, there's so much they don't teach you in business school. But it also I think in some ways Steve and I like

Carlos Foster01:12:46leveled up the business and in like boy, there's so there's real like vulnerabilities that we need to close, you know, like or real places where like why were we putting our time into that? Why don't we hire someone? like we have someone that helps like I used to do all the like the payroll, now we have someone that helps with that. 'cause it's like those are just numbers. It's not something that two creative minds need to like invest time in.

Carlos Foster01:13:15thing things like that or like we should have an actual business attorney 'cause like rather than Googling, you know, these questions, like let's have someone we can call and have a relationship with who knows us and be like, hey, like this this forum, blah blah blah, like we want to create a new agreement, like what do we gotta do? just like things like that that y you would never r really think about 'cause like when things are humming along, you don't have to think about them. But

Carlos Foster01:13:44as now Steve and I have learned in like the the harshest lesson, you know, losing someone that was important to us into into the business that we're like, man, there are a lot of things we really need to iron out if if this is truly gonna work. And it also I think made not to speak for you, Steve, but like I I think it just like reaffirmed the commitment that we had to Blue Barn. Like not

Stephen Alberts01:14:07Mm.

Carlos Foster01:14:07that we ever felt like either of us were leaving, but just going through something as traumatic as at that

Carlos Foster01:14:13And our our attorney saying like, Okay, legally you have this window where it's now or never. You can say, like, we're gonna dissolve Blue Barn and it's it's done. And you can walk away and do something else at no penalty. And you know, you're just like, have that moment like, do do we go through that door or this door? But both Steve and I saying, like, no, we're gonna make this work. We've invested the time, the money, the countless nights, like and

Carlos Foster01:14:43Blue Barn is our future and I think that just made the partnership even stronger, knowing that both of us were like, No, we're willing to walk through this door and we're gonna keep it going. So hopefully no one has to go through an experience like that t to get that level of commitment from your partner. But as Steve said, the the the partnership i is everything. Like who are you partnered with should be like top of your mind and and trusts, as you said,

Carlos Foster01:15:13cur cural and and not only trusting that person but like being a feeling like it's a safe place to have those disagreements that eventually lead to agreements. So yeah, I would say more than anything else when I see people form partnerships and like, well, who's that person? Do they compliment you? Do you compliment them? Does the work feel balanced? You know, it's it's so much to consider. But I I think that's like been the key to

Carlos Foster01:15:42our success I can't imagine Blue Barn handling the amount of clients and and work that we do without actually having a a a functioning partnership.

Kyrill01:15:53Yeah, there's there's a reason that you guys are there together, you know, and I completely agree. Like hopefully no one has to go through something like that to to figure things out for themselves. You know, our condolences again to you guys and to Blue Barn for for Vic's passing and but I'm very happy with Dario and I are both very happy to see the how you guys have been able to bounce back from something like that and even like figure out a way to to grow not only the business but also yourselves.

Carlos Foster01:16:23Yeah, definitely. And and I think and seeing our crew, how they stepped up through that whole time, like just really reaffirmed to us that boy, we really do have the right people under the Blue Barn tent, you know, working with us and and and everyone's always been close, but I think it, you know, just like I said, reaffirmed those relationships and and not that we ever took it for granted, but

Carlos Foster01:16:49We're just like, wow, we really did create something special that we're we're really proud of. I mean, just this weekend we took one of our editors who's been with us ten years out to dinner, he and his wife to celebrate like, Hey, you've been with us a decade, a decade of making videos and loyalty

Stephen Alberts01:17:07Mm-hmm.

Carlos Foster01:17:08and we're friends, you know, and and on the way home I was telling my wife, I'm like, God, that felt like such a grown up moment, like t taking our

Carlos Foster01:17:18our person out to dinner for like ten years, like but, you know, it it's I think those are those moments where you have to step back and reflect and be like, I think we are on the right path and it it's not just a like a revenue thing, you know, those it's those relationships you're creating as well.

Dario01:17:38Nice. Okay. let's end it on a positive note.

Kyrill01:17:42Yeah.

Dario01:17:43tell us a joke. No, I'm just joking.

Carlos Foster01:17:46Well, that that that would go so s you don't want to end on that.

Kyrill01:17:47Hm.

Kyrill01:17:52I guess maybe maybe yeah.

Dario01:17:52no no no. Let's let's do let's do the name. How did you guys come up with

Dario01:17:56Blue Barn Creative?

Stephen Alberts01:17:58man.

Carlos Foster01:17:58I'll let

Carlos Foster01:17:59Steve take that one 'cause he w he was there.

Stephen Alberts01:18:02Yeah, it was early days. We were all working at a television station and I had identified not only Vic as a as a really great potential partner, but another guy, Chris, and another guy, Al, who another another editor and another producer at the station. And that was like sort of like at a time we would all go to lunch together every day and have daydreams about like starting our own company and like, we gotta do this. And they were sort of on the fence about being original founders.

Stephen Alberts01:18:32alongside us. Eventually they didn't take the opportunity. It was a little too scary or or something. I d I I don't know, but they're great guys. We still know t today. they just went a different route. But we were having a barbecue and Al, Alan he he had a a beautiful home in a backyard area with a little blue shed with a big barn door on it. And we're sitting around at this barbecue going, Guys, we need a name. We need a name for our our new company.

Stephen Alberts01:19:01And Blue Barn Creative came out. just because I'm I'm looking at this beautiful shed, which is full of drum set, video editing workstation. It's like it was Al's escape, you know what I mean, to just do his creative stuff. And it was sort of this little metaphor for what we were going through at the TV station. Like, we just want to get out of here and do what we really want to do. And

Carlos Foster01:19:26Ha ha.

Stephen Alberts01:19:27this little blue barn was this perfect example of like.

Stephen Alberts01:19:31This is all the fun stuff you could do in a shed. And it was while we were having this naming conversation and Blue Barn Creative just kind of came out of that moment where we're like, that shed really represents like everything we want, which is to live a good life, do the things that we love and help people and get paid for it. So Blue Barn Creative was born in that moment, pretty much. And then Carlos and myself and Vic were the ones that really took it on and said, like, all right, let's quit our day jobs and go a hundred percent into this thing that we

Stephen Alberts01:20:00We see as an opportunity so it would probably scare a lot of people at the time that we started it because it was like, Can you even get work doing this kind of thing like around here? Like everyone always thought of all the good productions in LA, all the good productions in LA. And we're like, Well, let's make some good production in San Diego. Like, why do we have to, you know, travel for it? And now obviously the reality is great production is everywhere, all across the world, and everyone's got amazing tools from cameras and lenses to AI and all the all the things.

Stephen Alberts01:20:30all the tools that are disposable. It's in a huge industry and and it's a it's a beautiful life. I if you can, you know, find some clients and and make some good videos for people. Like I I we love it. We're not we're not changing. We're probably just gonna keep evolving in our little office here as long as we can and and go from there.

Carlos Foster01:20:48Yeah.

Carlos Foster01:20:49Well you know what's funny is

Kyrill01:20:49Love that.

Carlos Foster01:20:50what what's funny is now that it's you know fourteen years, almost fifteen years later, and Steve and I are are in our our forties, you know, so we're not the the twenty year olds that started this thing anymore, but and now w we go to like these networking events or just hanging with other filmmakers and we'll meet these younger ones that are starting out and they're like, Blue Barn like

Carlos Foster01:21:14I used to to watch your videos when I got my DSLR camera and study like how how they were framing things or telling their story and yeah, I mean like i it really ages us, but but we're also like, you know what, that's great. We're we're glad people were watching it back then, not just our our clients.

Dario01:21:33You got fans out there.

Carlos Foster01:21:35You got some fans.

Kyrill01:21:37I love

Dario01:21:37All

Kyrill01:21:38that. Love the I love

Dario01:21:40right.

Kyrill01:21:40the origin story. Well, thank you guys for joining us on the show and sharing your story. I really appreciate it.

Carlos Foster01:21:47Thanks for having us.

Stephen Alberts01:21:47Yeah, thanks for having

Stephen Alberts01:21:48us. Yeah. It's been a pleasure talking to you guys.

Dario01:21:49That's how you're gonna end it, Kyrill. You gotta

Dario01:21:51do the you gotta do their website, where to find them on social.

Kyrill01:21:53I know you I leave that

Carlos Foster01:21:54please

Kyrill01:21:54to you. I leave that to you, Dario. I knew you were gonna pick that up.

Stephen Alberts01:21:56Mm-hmm.

Dario01:21:57He was bugging me. He's

Dario01:21:58like, I gotta start this combo. You did the last two. And then he's like, he ends it on a note like that. Alright, guys, let me find your website here. Okay, so to those listening, it's bluebarncreative.com. And are you guys active on social?

Carlos Foster01:22:15We have at Blue Barn Creative on Instagram and you can also find us on LinkedIn where we we connect with a lot of people.

Kyrill01:22:24Spice.

Dario01:22:25Yeah you guys got got got good pictures on your on your Instagram. Yeah, this looks pretty good. I gotta I gotta update our socials.

Kyrill01:22:33We've been we've been meaning to do that for a while.

Kyrill01:22:35We'll get there. But

Carlos Foster01:22:36man. Yeah yeah,

Carlos Foster01:22:37it's a whole other conversation. Yeah.

Stephen Alberts01:22:38That's a beast.

Dario01:22:39Hm. If only Claude could take over

Kyrill01:22:40Yeah.

Carlos Foster01:22:40Well we're so gl

Dario01:22:42my Instagram account, that would be much appreciated.

Stephen Alberts01:22:45Well well it's the internet's just

Carlos Foster01:22:45Ha ha ha.

Stephen Alberts01:22:47becoming bots talking to bots, right? So thanks for the the human

Carlos Foster01:22:50Yeah.

Dario01:22:50Yeah, yeah.

Stephen Alberts01:22:51thanks for this podcast because it was a human talking to human moment. So we appreciate you guys. Right.

Carlos Foster01:22:54Yes. Yeah.

Dario01:22:56Allegedly this could also be created on what's that

Kyrill01:22:58Yeah, we could be AI

Carlos Foster01:22:59yeah.

Kyrill01:22:59people technically, right?

Dario01:22:59what's that

Carlos Foster01:23:00It could be avatars.

Stephen Alberts01:23:01Yeah. Yeah,

Stephen Alberts01:23:02c yeah, call us next year and what my avatar will talk to your avatar. We'll it'll be a whole thing. It'll be great.

Carlos Foster01:23:05Yeah.

Dario01:23:05I we have we have a

Kyrill01:23:05There you go.

Dario01:23:07hundred and twenty episodes. I can just easily train these LLMs to

Carlos Foster01:23:10Yeah.

Dario01:23:12create an avatar

Kyrill01:23:12Crazy.

Stephen Alberts01:23:12Dead.

Dario01:23:13of me and Kyrill.

Carlos Foster01:23:15On that on that dystopian note we'll we'll end the conversation

Stephen Alberts01:23:17wonderful.

Dario01:23:17Yeah. We'll end the combo

Dario01:23:19right there.

Stephen Alberts01:23:20Right.

Kyrill01:23:20Yeah.

Stephen Alberts01:23:21See you next time, maybe. Thanks guys.

Kyrill01:23:23See you next time, maybe.

Dario01:23:25Alright, thank you

Dario01:23:26guys.