2024 Heartland Emmy Nominee (& Marketing Efforts)

Back in early July 2022 I got to work with the Cherokee Nation on a project about one of their citizens being awarded the Medal of Honor. I've already posted about that trip, but I did find out this past week that the project was nominated for a 2024 Heartland Emmy award.

From OsiyoTV's YouTube description:

A hero to countless people, Dwight Birdwell sees himself as just a former strawberry picker from Stilwell, Oklahoma. He is also the only Native American recipient of the Medal of Honor for his service in the Vietnam War. We hear his story of heroism and the selfless actions that led to him finally being awarded this prestigious honor.

It's been a hot minute and an entire graduate business degree since that shoot, but I'm still thankful for the opportunity and I look forward to the next one.

Normally I shy away from straight-up self-promotion, but that's probably not the most ideal marking strategy. I've also got mixed feelings when it comes to participating in awards like this. This is now my second Heartland Emmy nomination and I've got a handful of Telly Awards.

We're told those accolades look good on a resume and I'm sure those statuettes would look good on a shelf, but they should also come with some kind of asterisk saying you paid for the attention. If I were to have a local project I wanted to submit to the 2024 Heartland Emmys, the entry fee starts at $135 for the primary entrant, and then $85/person for names 2-6, and $135/person for names 7-12. That doesn't include the $65 yearly Heartland Chapter membership fee; Non-members' entry fees start at $235/person. If you get nominated, congrats, but then be ready to pay the $125/person early-bird ticket price to the awards gala. We're talking $450+ to be a member, one named person on an entry, and tickets for St. Anne the Wife and I to go to this year's Heartland Emmy Awards Gala. It's hard to look at that cost and not think about how else that money could've been spent, e.g., additional on-set production assistants, a month of health insurance for me and my two kids, 100+ cups of coffee, etc.

2023 Heartland Emmy Nomination

Cost Breakdown of
2024 Heartland Emmy Nomination
Entry Fee1 $135
Yearly Membership Fee2 $65
Gala Tickets (two tickets at $125ea.) $250
TOTAL $450

1 Fee for one name only
2 Heartland Chapter Yearly Membership Fee

This is where my business school nonsense starts to kick in and I'm reminded of my marketing and strategy classes.

A quick Google search would bring back the idea that a business-to-business (B2B) marketing budget should be around 5-10% of its yearly revenues. For example, if my yearly revenues are around $100k, that should have me budgeting $5-10k/year in my marketing. Suddenly that $450 doesn't feel so bad – roughly 0.45% of my yearly revenue and just 6% of a $7,500 yearly marketing budget – and it also includes a networking opportunity with some of my target audience and a fancy date with my wife. All that said, it's worth keeping an eye on whether or not your marketing efforts are actually working. I'd be hard-pressed to tell you one client relationship I've earned thanks to the awards I've won over the years.

Dang you business school for actually helping me do what I'd hoped you would.

OU Grad and Resident Drunk Toddler

It's been a hot minute since my last check-in. I'd wrapped up with my actual grad school classes and got started on two different work projects. One had me on an ad campaign for an OKC non-profit I've worked with for years. The other had me out in Los Angeles on an industrial piece with a group based outside Boston. Both projects are now in the later stages of post and will be finishing up soon.

This past weekend I graduated with my Master's in Business Administration (MBA) from the University of Oklahoma. The week before all the pomp and circumstance had plenty of events and opportunities to meet some of my online classmates in person. It's still wild being on this side of a personal goal I'd had for 15+ years. My mom busted her tail in getting her master's degree when I was young and St. Anne the Wife has two graduate degrees of her own. Education has been important in our lives and we're trying our best to model that nonsense for our two house fires.

Another big deal that's happened since mid-March is my dealing with some health issues. Obviously, the last few years have been stressful – grad school, work, family, and generally being alive – but it seems to have finally caught up with me physically. Since early April, I've been dealing with dizziness and at times nearly debilitating Vertigo.  

My resting heart rate had been around 50 BPM and a few low-40s, but my doctor wasn't concerned since I'd also been training for the OKC Memorial Half-Marathon. The doctor had me wear a heart monitor for a couple days, but nothing was out of the ordinary. While I was out in LA, I got wildly sick after what I'm assuming was related to caffeine, but thankfully that nonsense didn't flare up during my client shoot.

If you've ever dealt with legit Vertigo, you know how debilitating it can be. It's almost like a switch gets thrown and your sense of balance just stops working. My inner drunk toddler seems to spin up when I'm dealing with loads of stress and – unfortunately – coffee (caffeine). It's too bad those things have essentially fueled the last 20+ years of my life. Being in the dark and dealing with lots of motion can also throw me under the bus, so again, good thing I make a living behind a camera and I'm constantly paying attention to light and motion.

It sucks thinking about health concerns interfering with what you do to provide for your family. It's scary. I'm intentional about my health and I'm planning on being around for quite a while. I'm also excited about the potential of my newly minted business school degree. I promise you I'm trying to end this post on a positive note, but I don't have a neat bow to tie to what it's been like the last few weeks. Still, I'm okay with that.

See you on the next one.

Data-Based Insights & Decision Making as a Creative

It's not difficult to track data, but effectively using it in decision-making is something else.

Since late 2015, my Filmsupply stock footage portfolio has generated 1,276 individual licensing fees. As a Contributor, that revenue gets split with me (currently 45.1%). 2020 and 2021 saw my revenues up 150-200% compared to previous years, but those two years were outliers due to COVID-19 turning live production on its head. There was a solid period in that mess where my cut of that revenue was $6-7,000/month, but those days are long gone. 2023 was a dumpster fire and my average monthly licensing revenue was roughly 47% below my 2022 numbers. So far, 2024 is looking up, but I'm hesitant to be holding my breath.

The chart below helps me feel somewhat better in terms of trying to explain the significant swings in my licensing revenue. As the U.S. Federal Funds rate decreases, it becomes cheaper to borrow money. As that rate increases, borrowing becomes more expensive, making it harder for businesses to finance their operations. That said, I wouldn't say I'm qualified as an expert in this nonsense so I'd take this chart with a grain of salt. If you've got the time, go check out Tyler Vigen's Spurious Correlation where he features charts of correlated data that actually have nothing to do with each other. "Correlation is not causation."

Having a solid understanding of this nonsense has helped me to make better-informed decisions when it comes to investing in new film projects and/or equipment likely to contribute to my stock footage portfolio.

 

Investments in Projects & Equipment

As of last month, I've made a 13% return on the actual money I've dumped into my unfinished rubber stamp project. Based on my previous data, I was confident I'd make a decent return on the licensing fees from the raw footage. My film has elements of small business ownership and the existing clips in my portfolio around a similar theme have done well in the past. I also know I'd be traveling quite a bit while making this film and I've had a good experience with drone footage of city skylines.

Keeping my fixed costs low has certainly been helpful; I own the gear I'm using and I've kept my additional crew expenses to a minimum. Still, I've had major expenses including a week-long road trip to Washington D.C., a couple NYC shoots, and a trip out to Amsterdam with a couple local crew hires. This project still hasn't been released and could honestly be a hot turd, but the reality is that it's been profitable and will continue to generate revenue via stock footage licensing.

Another example is looking at the licensing revenue generated by my DJI Mavic 2 Pro. Currently, I'm not tracking the revenue generated by each piece of gear with my client projects, but I do know what gear was used for my stock footage clips. There's been a 53% return on investment (ROI) with my Mavic 2. In April 2022, I crashed that flying chainsaw to death and I replaced it with a Mavic 3. I do have some stock footage sales connected to that new drone, but considering I don't have as many clips associated with that gear yet, I can imagine it'll be a hot minute before I see the same types of ROI via licensing fees.

 

Forecasting

As an MBA student we learned how to use different forecasting models and I've done some nonsense with my existing licensing data, but it's nothing I'd lean too heavily on. It's important to remember that it's impossible to forecast with zero error, meaning forecasts are always inherently wrong. My stock footage sales haven't been exactly stable the last few years and a level of data stability is necessary if it's being used to forecast. Still, I have a good idea of where I'm at and what to expect.

 

Cool, So Now What?

Do realize that none of this nonsense is directly related to generating additional licensing revenue but simply tracking what's already happening. It's possible to increase the search visibility and potential sales of each clip through search engine optimization (SEO) tools, but I didn't talk about adding more assets to my portfolio. Now that I'm wrapped up on my MBA, I've got the additional margin to go out and create new works that could generate additional licensing revenue.

All this nonsense is helpful in gaining insight and making data-based decisions, but at the same time, I'm fully aware of the fact I'm still a self-described "art kid" out here trying to make creative work. It's a fine line trying to convey a feeling or tell a story while still being profitable.

Got my MBA. Now What?

Oh man, if only I had an actual answer to this one. The whole reason I went to business school was this idea that as creatives, we cut ourselves off at the knee because we don't understand the business end of the creative work we do. It's not like business school was a golden ticket or anything, but now that I've done the thing, I've got a diverse set of new business tools that'll carry me through the rest of my career. At least that's the plan – and what I told St. Anne the Wife.

Being the analytics nerd that I am, I kept track of my time as a graduate student in fifteen minute increments. I'm proud of those 1,700+ hours of class and studying these last 18 months though I'm still bitter about that one B I got in Managerial Accounting.

About two years ago I got serious about pursuing this MBA nonsense and it's been a dead sprint ever since. I finished my last classes this past week and it's now the first Monday I've had in 18 months without a load of classwork. It's wild trying to realistically get my footing again as a working professional now that I'm not also a full-time student.

In addition to wrapping up my graduate work at OU, I was in the DFW area this past weekend with the OU MBA program. We heard from a handful of Dallas-based businesses like Texas Health Resources, 7-Eleven, and PepsiCo. I headed down early and got some face time with a couple of my contacts in the DFW area. Sai Selvarajan is a documentary filmmaker and an editor with Camp Lucky. We had lunch Thursday and talked shop about a few of his recent and upcoming projects. In 2021 he released The Unlikely Fan, a short documentary about his mom and her wild love of basketball. The film got accepted to the 2021 SXSW Film Festival and landed Sai some additional opportunities. He's got another film in the works and I'm looking forward to seeing what that leads to. I also met with Micah Austin who's been my go-to at Filmsupply over the years. Seem's like he's just as much an analytics nerd as I am, so we got deep in the weeds with that nonsense.

There are several creative works I'll start spinning back up this week in addition to pre-production work on a couple of client projects. Surely I'll have more updates on those as they get going again. Since I don't have any of my own nonsense to share at this point, here are a few recent podcasts and news articles I've gone through that are worth your time:

Phoning in Last Week's Highlights

In the time that I'd be normally working on a weekly blog post, I was instead getting my tail handed to me in finalizing last year's tax prep and the homework for my last two MBA classes. So that looks like me sorta phoning this one in and sharing some of highlights of last week.

Anne and I got to watch American Symphony, the documentary film by director Matthew Heineman that follows musician Jon Batiste and his wife Suleika Jaouad as he's having an incredible period in his professional career and she's once again battling leukemia. Filmmaker Magazine has an interview with the film's director and the wild lengths they went to in creating the work. If you've not already seen the film, make sure you do.

This past week was bursting at the seams now that I'm back in full-on MBA mode as well as Anne and the boys being back in school as well. They've had an unusual amount of "snow days" in getting started with their spring semester, so that's certainly smashing into the idea of me working from home. I'm also training for the OKC Memorial half-marathon, which is the first one of those I've done in quite a while. The weather hasn't been kind considering the deep freeze we're thawing from this week, so I've been dodging ice, sub-30° temps, and generally rough conditions. On Saturday I got in a six mile run, which is the furthest distance I've done in years. This morning I got in a short run before starting the day and felt like a sack of potatoes trying to be a real boy.

There's also a couple podcasts from this past week that I'd pass along. The episode about The Hybrid Worker Malaise from The Daily by the New York Times was an interesting one, especially considering how I've worked from home since 2011. There were quite a few issues discussed that I've personally had to work through myself.

There was also the "Surviving Our Lowest Lows" episode from The No Film School Podcast. Filmmaking isn't for the faint of heart and it felt like the two episode contributors had been reading my mail.

The third one I'll leave you with was from the Harvard Business Review's IdeaCast episode "Making Peace with Your Midlife, Mid-career Self". I'm in my early forties and certainly never made it into the cool kids club during Vimeo's golden age. There was also something in this episode about exercise and "how much more expensive a six-pack is" now.

If you've not noticed a theme, it's the first of the year, seasonal depression is a real thing, and from personal experience, I know things get better. Hence me training for a half-marathon this April.

I'll leave you with this last one just drilling graduate business school and the recent flood of MBAs. If nothing else, I'm totally at peace with not taking myself too seriously. Crazy thanks Good Work.

So, Marketing huh?

It's been slow AF the last few weeks. The last few months. The last few years. It's been a rough few years thanks to covid interruptions, entertainment industry strikes, global economic uncertainly, etc., but just knowing that doesn't make it feel any better. If you're reading this and I've worked with you before or you're looking my direction as a potential vendor or crew member, know I'm crazy grateful for those I've been able to work with and look forward to more opportunities with you down the road.

This past week I've been thinking quite a bit about marketing. My Instagram feed has been flooded lately with sponsored ads from photographers, cinematographers, and production companies. While I'm not here to dump on other creatives trying to claw their way into our attention, I'm certainly not the target audience for what I've been getting – unless it's a Machiavellian attempt by Meta to get me to spend my own money to advertise on their platform.

The professor my Strategic Management class this past week mentioned that "You can have the best product [or service] in the market, but if you're not spending any money on marketing, there's a direct correlation to not selling any products [or services].” As a small business, I don't have a set percentage of my revenue I'm spending on marketing, but there's no reason I shouldn't be considering it.

Right now my obvious marketing efforts include my website which I can put an actual dollar amount to, as well as the networking events I attend and my public facing social media accounts, both of which are much harder to account for. Those social media accounts are free to have, but I do go through financial resources in producing some of the content. There is some strategy involved with what, how, and when I post, but not to the extent of an actual marketing plan. There's also these blog posts, but considering my website traffic, let's just admit they're more of a welcomed distraction from doing actual work that'd advance my professional life and increase my revenues.

Back when I first got started as a cinematographer, demo reels were where it's at. I've still got a handful of my 2006 demo reels on burned DVDs. Pretty sure the only one of those demos that actually got sent out was when I applied for a video producer job at Life.Church at the time. Never got that job BTW. My current demo is the same one I've had since 2018 and made up primarily of personal work. There's footage from a couple paid gigs buried in there, but it's just over 10% of the total edit. I do a great deal of "talking head" type shoots, but that kind of footage doesn't seem to add anything to a demo. For that kind of nonsense, I've got a dedicated page of screen grabs and details that I send out to clients. I know my demo reel should be updated with more recent content, but it's hard to look at the last few year's worth of work without being impossibly critical knowing how slow things have been due circumstances out of my control.

You'd need to speak to someone who's regularly hiring new DPs and cam ops, but I couldn't tell you the last time I seriously paid attention to someone's demo reel let alone sit through the entire thing, especially if it's longer than 60 seconds. I've hired DPs and cam ops over the years for different projects, but it's mostly via connections I already have as well as referrals from the network I've developed. Those connections lead me to that individual's website and at least their Instagram account if I'm not already aware of their work.

Lately I have been more interested in other types of marketing material. One idea is putting out a printed promo of some kind. Possibly something like a photo zine of my still photos and frame grabs from my motion work that'd get sent out to select agencies and creatives. I've been following aPhotoEditor for years and love seeing the photographer promos that get sent in and shared. Can't say I've seen a ton of cinematographers do something like that, but it could be an option. Honestly I'd never heard of zines till I got started on my rubber stamp project a few years back. If you're interested, I've started a YouTube playlist with some references in putting one together.

There's also the idea of a YouTube series that's been bouncing around in my head now for weeks. There's still quite a bit I'd want to flesh out before doing a show, so that's certainly a long ways out if it were to ever happen. I do already have bits and pieces that I'd include in something like that, so it's not completely out of reach. It'd be partly a marketing effort seeing as how it'd showcase the kinds of work I do, but I'm hesitant to be the center of attention like so much of the YouTube content out there; surely there's ways around that.

Can We Talk About YouTube?

This past week or so I've been trying to justify the last 500+ days of my life and my shiny new student loans. In March I'll be a self-proclaimed creative with an actual master's degree in business and instead of being productive and furthering my professional life, I've been digging into YouTube and trying to smash together the creative work I do and some of what I've learned in business school.

No question, I spend far more time consuming video content on YouTube compared any other the other streaming platform (Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Amazon Prime, etc.). We've got an antenna connected to our TV to get the basic channels and it's been at least a decade since we've had any kind of cable subscription.

According to November 2023 Nielsen data, streaming made up more than 36% of the total TV usage with YouTube alone claiming 9%. Having been around before the internet was a thing as well as essentially growing up with it, seeing traditional network TV be eclipsed by streaming is bonkers.


There's also the ginormous advertising revenue YouTube brings in. Back in August I'd posted an MSNBC video here on this blog that went on about changes in TV viewing and advertising revenues amongst some of the social platforms and traditional media outlets. In 2022, YouTube brought in $29.2 billion in ad revenues, completely dwarfing their competition.

So why bring any of this up?

After the boys went to sleep on Christmas Eve, Anne and I wound up watching some old videos of us on my YouTube channel. Before each video started, we'd have to sit through one or two ads on the work I'd created and I'm certainly not seeing any of that revenue. YouTube is a free service and I know they cover their expenses and make a profit from advertising dollars, but dang I'd have liked to pocket even a sliver of that ad revenue.

Right now my YouTube channel is swimming in old videos from 2006 till 2013 when the cool kids left for Vimeo. The golden age of that video platform is way gone, but somehow I'm still paying them $59.95/yr for a Vimeo Plus membership.

If you've been paying attention, you'll know there's some independent YouTube channels bringing in some outrageous revenues. There's a financial YouTuber I watch with 833k subscribers who laid out his numbers and revenue streams recently. That video sent me down a rabbit hole of similar ones from other independent creators: the productivity dude with 5.1m subscribers and the millions he earned in 2022; a music composer with a PhD and 4.71k subscribers; this dude talking about how much money his wife's fitness channel makes.

In considering what it takes to get monetized on YouTube, it's something like 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 public watch hours in the last 365 days. Currently I've only got 310 subscribers and 120 public watch hours. Needless to say, if I'm ever wanting to see a dime from those ads in front of my videos, I've got quite a hike ahead. That said, I'm not opposed to the idea.

I'm clear-eyed enough to know this isn't a "get rich quick" thing, regardless of what the YouTube algorithm has fed me. Turns out there's also business models built around buying monetized channels, but from what I've read it sounds like a bad idea. There's so much information available on how to get started doing this nonsense, and plenty of it has got to be just hot steamy trash. Thursday I spent 45+ minutes listening to two art YouTubers – of course that's a thing – with their aptly named "How to Avoid the Artist to Content Creator Pipeline on YouTube."

Surely the world doesn't need another YouTube channel, let alone one with my face plastered all over it. Considering how long it takes me to write a single blog post, would I actually have the bandwidth to keep feeding the YouTube beast? Being on the tail end of my MBA and the 1,600+ hours of studying I've logged since fall 2022, what I know now still seems incredibly small compared to what I know I don't know.

Still, I like the idea of sharing some of the conversations I get to have with people who are much smarter and more interesting than I am. I'm also a fan of attending film festivals as a networking opportunity, but questioning the value of paying film submission fees when instead I could post my project online and use that festival submission budget on a promotional campaign.

Staying self-employed, providing for my family, and helping others are still the main goals. The fact that I've been able to make a living in part due to passive income streams seems like a magic trick compared to the alternative. The tremendous time and effort I've dumped into business school was meant to be a long-term investment instead of simply buying more gear I'd end up replacing a few years later. Surely I can position some of what I've learned in a way that legitimately helps others, covers my expenses, and turns a profit.

Surely the world needs more of this kind of nonsense though:

 

UPDATE: March 2, 2024

The fact that our six-year-old could barely leave the room as I'm writing this because there's an image of MrBeast on my screen is telling.

Wisecrack is one of the YouTube channels I've followed for quite a while and recently they released a video titled MrBeast and the Toxic Culture of YouTube. It's a long watch and goes deep – it's a philosophy channel after all – but certainly worth your time considering this post. The video goes into depth about a recent Times article, "In the Belly of MrBeast" written by Belinda Luscombe.

One quote from the Times article that I don't remember from the Wisecrack video but is wildly alarming goes into how much time this dude is spending on set.

It all requires an enormous amount of time and effort, especially for someone with a finely tuned need for quality control. Donaldson has 15-hour filming days 20 to 25 times a month and devotes the other days to Feastables. But he’s always been a guy willing to knuckle down if he thinks the payoff will be there.

20 to 25 15-hour filming days a month. For anyone working in production, that's insane and not at all healthy let alone sustainable. It's certainly not an example to follow.

More importantly, there's this line that should raise some major red flags:

“These algorithms are poisonous to humanity. They prioritize addictive, isolated experiences over ethical social design, all just for ads,” he says. “It’s not MrBeast I have a problem with. It’s platforms which encourage someone like me to study a retention graph so I can make the next video more addicting."

I'd mentioned my six-year-old earlier. That 40lb house fire thinks this YouTuber hung the moon. "He helps people." He went on to tell me in detail about several different videos he'd seen where MrBeast gives out life-changing amounts of money to people who could honestly use it. Surely that's a good thing, but how do I approach telling my kid about all the other nonsense involved with making that happen let alone some of the ethical concerns?

Short-Term Investment Returns as a Freelancer & Small Business

So, checking in on a certain blog post from January 2023. That one where I rambled on about short-term investments for freelancers & small businesses. It's been a full year to simmer on and experiment with this nonsense and wanted to share where I landed.

First off, it's worth mentioning that financially, 2023 was a hot mess. Those interest rate hikes intended to cool inflation seem to be making for the soft landing the Fed was hoping for, but the process still felt like riding an unfinished roller coaster in the dark. Higher interest rates made borrowing more expensive, and that certainly meant it was harder to finance production budgets. That squeeze showed up in my stock footage sales which were down about 48% from 2022 and down 51% from a five year average. Then came the entertainment industry strikes. Serious kudos to both the Writers Guild and SAG-AFTRA for holding out and getting good deals, but the process and industry fall out wasn't pretty, especially for those working in production. Thankfully I wasn't directly impacted by the strikes and personally can't blame it for a slower year – my labor income was actually up 6% from 2022 and up 12% from a five year average. That said, I have plenty of friends in film production who are seeing their revenues be well below normal.

I'm not here to whine about a genuinely rough year, but did want to share one of my wins. Last time I'd mentioned it, U.S. Treasury bills (T-Bills) were sitting at just north of 4%. Around the end of May 2023, the 4-Week T-Bill peaked at a 5.9% coupon equivalent. These nearly risk-free short-term investments weren't a bad place to park your short-term money, especially considering the alternative of just leaving it in a basic savings account which as of Dec. 18, 2023 is 0.46%. I'll not go into the details about T-Bills here, but if you're interested, go back to that previous blog post where I dig into that glorious bond nonsense as well as high yield savings account options.

Part of the way I track my financial nonsense is based on the gross profit of each project. From that gross profit, I set aside 20% to cover end of year taxes and tax prep fees. For example:

MathJax example

\[Project\ Revenue\ - Project\ Expenses\ = Gross\ Profit \] \[$1,000 - $100 = $900 \]
\[Gross\ Profit * 20\% = Set\ Aside\ for\ Tax\ Purposes\] \[$900 * 20\% = $180\]

Instead of just parking that cash in a savings account like I'd normally do, this year I bought U.S. Treasury Bills directly from the U.S. government at treasurydirect.gov. You can only buy T-Bills in $100 increments, so my individual purchases ranged from $100 to $7,500 throughout the year.

This is where I'm supposed to talk about how I did everything according to plan. Instead, for the first few months of the year I used a good deal of that tax money set aside to pay down business related debt from 2022. The return I'd have made in those short-term T-Bills making 4-5% wasn't worth the interest I would've been paying on that debt with its 15+% interest rate. Once I got that debt paid off I returned to my short-term investment plan, refilled those cash reserves spent to pay down debt, and kept at it throughout the rest of the year. I also planned it out so that those purchased T-Bills would all mature by around mid- to late-December, allowing me to cover my business taxes and tax prep fees.

I experimented with buying different lengths of T-Bills throughout the year, but for the most part just stuck with buying the 4-week option which is the shortest period available. There's a difference in the interest rates for each of the other options and the longer term ones generally earned a higher return, but I calculated everything out and with the amounts I was dealing with, it didn't make a considerable difference. At first I was buying the T-Bills in one-period increments, but then started setting them up to where at maturity they'd automatically reinvest for another period at the current rate.

I'm a big fan of financial transparency. As a household, statistically we're in the top 20% of income earners in the U.S. according the U.S. Census Bureau. St. Anne the Wife is a public school teacher with two masters degrees here in Oklahoma, which according to USAFacts ranks 35th in the nation in terms of teacher pay. I'm a self-employed creative with a bachelor's degree and will finish my masters degree in business (MBA) this March. Currently my take home pay is less than half of the the average MBA salary here in Oklahoma and I'd honestly prefer to keep doing my own thing after graduation, so take that however you will.

Could I be earning more than I am? Yes, I believe so.
Am I primarily motivated by how much money I can make and having more things? No.
Do I enjoy the work I get to do? Most of the time.
Am I doing the right thing and providing for my family? I sure hope so.

I feel like if we were more open about our finances it'd help others in figuring out their own financial nonsense. It's one of those "rising tide lifts all boats" kind of thing. There's a Planet Money podcast with comedian Maria Bamford and financial transparency that I'd recommend if you're interested. With that in mind, by the end of November 2023 I'd done about $111,000 in actual revenue had a gross profit of $82,000. That left about $13,000 set aside for end of year taxes purposes. That number is a bit off from an actual 20% due to one of my larger clients this year requiring me to be hired and paid for my labor fees as a W-2 contractor instead of a typical 1099 S-Corporation and they withheld those taxes on their end.

Below is a line chart of what my actual cumulative U.S. Treasury Bill earnings looked like compared to what that same amount of cash would've done had it just sat in my savings account throughout the year. Here's a line chart of what my actual cumulative U.S. Treasury Bill earnings looked like compared to what that same amount of cash would've done had it just sat in my savings account throughout the year. You can tell I had some small successes and got more confident during the summer, then got serious about this hot mess starting in the fall. It's worth noting that the returns are directly related to the amount invested, hence that bar chart above. Like I said, I stopped jacking around and got serious in the fall. My cashflows are typically very low in August, but ramp up considerably right after that.

Let's be honest: $150 extra isn't all that much, especially considering the infrastructure and spreadsheet work I put in to track all this nonsense. That said, no question I'll take that return over that $13 I'd have made otherwise had I just left that cash sitting in a basic savings account. Let's not get into the fact that I'd have had a $335 return had I stuck with my plan through the entire year instead of paying off that business related debt those first few months. Will I continue doing this in 2024? Yep, and I've already started. As of the end of December 2023, those four week T-Bill rates are still up in the 5.4% range.

Maybe the biggest takeaway was the fact I wasn't freaking out the last few months of the year. Normally I'll end up digging into that financial cushion more than I should to cover other expenses, leaving me scrambling for cash at the end of the year. This short-term investment nonsense put just enough room in-between me and that cash reserve to keep my hands off it.

Another takeaway is the fact that I saw positive gains with little to no risk and without putting myself in a bind. Again, an additional $150 return isn't much considering I spend about that on coffee each month. Previously I've justified digging into my cash reserves to buy gear I'd assumed would pay for itself, but it doesn't always work out.

I'm also avoiding the fact that the small stock market portfolio I'm actively managing – not our retirement accounts – is up 40% year to date compared to the S&P 500 being up 24% this year. Me being greedy is thinking about how I could've put that short-term cash into the stock market and made a much heftier return, even after paying the short-term capital gain taxes. But then there's the scars from last year and the S&P 500 having been down 18% in 2022. I'm considering putting a small amount of my profits into the stock market via my S-Corp and actively managing that portfolio as well, but haven't started just yet. For sure that'd be a long-term investment decision and one outside my regular SEP IRA retirement contributions.

Polishing those Steaming Piles

So we're nearly halfway through the second module of this fall semester. The amount of MBA classwork this time around hasn't been as thick and I've had more margin for things outside graduate school. This past week had me mixing up new batches of film developing chemistry and processing six rolls of film I'd put through my RB67. I've yet to scan in all that nonsense, but I did find a few images I felt were more than just hot turds.

It's kinda wild to think I'll be wrapping up business school soon enough. I'm on track to finishing up my master's degree in late March and then walking across the stage in Norman for an awfully expensive piece of paper. Seeing as how I've not been drowning in classwork these last few weeks I've had more time to consider what's next (potentially). You'll notice I'm not laying out some grand business plan nor am I moving into consulting or investment banking like some of my freshly minted MBA peers. I honestly did consider jumping to that seemingly greener side of the fence though, especially considering how bad it's been in the film industry this past year.

A few ideas are banging around that I'd like to pursue once I'm done with this educational self-abuse, but they're still cooking. That rubber stamp documentary needs to be cut and there's a bit more content I'd like to include in it. There's already been a decent amount of licensing revenue coming in from some of the footage, so if nothing else that film project has already been financially successful.

What's been incredibly humbling lately is the idea of "It's not what you know, but who you know." It's much easier to be critical of what others are putting out than making your own hot mess or even partnering with others who're much farther along than you give them credit. I feel like I've got ideas and approaches to the kind of creative work I'd like to be doing, but then get butt-hurt seeing those little darlings crumble under the weight of reality. Still, if this is the professional choice I've made for myself and my family, I'd better be prepared to be sitting on one of those inflatable donuts more often than not.

Ideally, the goal would be to continue following some of those shiny things that keep my attention and share them with others in a meaningful – and profitable – way. Right now that looks like developing new projects, partnering with others and their existing assets, and using what I've learned to improve the financial health of those who are better at the art kid side of this creative work.

Strikes, Skaters, and Street Photogs

This starts week six of the fall semester's first class module. It's early still on Monday morning as I'm writing this and I should already be starting on classwork for the week, but here I am trying to force some kind of graduate student, family- and work-life balance. Honestly, I should be pushing for more of a focus on my work considering how little attention it's been getting since starting my MBA. With that in mind, here are a few hot takes from recently.

Huge news came out last night about a tentative deal being reached concerning the WGA strike. The New York Times reports that the screenwriters guild reached a deal with studios and that they got most of what they wanted.

“We can say, with great pride, that this deal is exceptional — with meaningful gains and protections for writers in every sector of the membership,” the Writers Guild’s negotiating committee said in an email to members.

Conspicuously not doing a victory lap was the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which bargains on behalf of studios. “The W.G.A. and A.M.P.T.P. have reached a tentative agreement” was its only comment. - nytimes.com

While this is great news, the industry is still being impacted by the SAG-AFTRA strike and there's not much happening on that front.

On a personal level, I can't point specifically to how these strikes have hit me directly, but by simply being in the industry I know they have. Friends of mine are on those picket lines in New York and Los Angeles, and the impact on the crew that haven't been working during this time has been rough. I had a phone call a couple weeks ago with the CPA we still work with in New York and he mentioned how this has been a terrible, terrible year for his clients in the entertainment and production industry – me and my family included.

Tying this nonsense back to my MBA work, I'm six weeks deep into a Negotiations course. We've yet to discuss these entertainment industry strikes, but I'm hoping our professor at least mentions it in tonight's class. My other class this module has focused on Marketing Management. That class in particular has been busting my chops about how little attention I've been giving to the customer-facing aspects of my own small business efforts. So with that in mind...

A couple weeks ago I snuck off to the Skate the Plaza event here in Oklahoma City. I'll mention upfront how it's obviously low-hanging fruit to snag photos at events like this. There were tons of people there and probably as many photogs as skaters all hoping to do something interesting and impress the right people. Still, super stoked about the few images I did make in the process. Again, I've been insanely focused on grad school knowing it'll help me on the business end of my creative work, but in doing so I've unfortunately neglected the actual creative work itself. At this point, I'm just happy to get some time in behind a camera.

The last hot take for this post is a documentary series on street photographers released this week, Wrong Side of the Lens. I actually reached out to the series creator, Josh Ethan Johnson, almost immediately after just seeing the trailer. Later that night St. Anne the Wife and I watched nearly the entire series and realized just how much bigger of a deal it is than I first expected.

Super excited to see a project like this, especially in how it was released on YouTube instead of one of the major streaming platforms considering how good it is. It's got my mashup of creative passions, fierce independence, and business school superpowers going nuts and hopeful for the future.

 

Updated: Jan. 31, 2024
Bit of an update on Wrong Side of the Lens. I've had a chance to connect with Josh Ethan Johnson on his project several times over the last few months and he seems like a good dude doing some interesting work. He's launched a GoFundMe campaign to raise some production capital for future seasons of the project that I'd certainly love to see. Here's his fundraising video and that GoFundMe link so you can help support the art kids making the work you enjoy.