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Ann & Jim Ruel | Episode 702
Ann Ruel started creating pottery as a tribute to the traditions and dynamics of the “family” as witnessed from her own experiences and acted out on the pottery through symbolic images found in nature including birds, flowers, bees etc. As Ann has grown, she now does custom work for other people who relay their own experiences and trust her to illustrate their stories for them.
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Is it important to have a why before you start a video channel?
Jim: I think yes, you have to have a vision and we certainly tried to form one in the early stages and that is what we focused on, the experimentation, the sharing of knowledge, from that perspective. So we make sure that our ideas fit into the practical nature of what we are trying to use these for. We want to have something that is kind of entertaining and at the same time informational and useful for potters. So yeah, we try to have a vision around that but it has been an evolution as well and I don’t know that we are fully formed as we are still pretty much in the embryonic stages in a lot of ways. It takes time to find your voice and I think Ann has found hers in her style of pottery. I don’t know if we have completely landed on our voice with regard to through video yet.
Do you ever feel protective over your work and techniques because people can easily “steal” your ideas?
Ann: I have never had that attitude. In fact, when I was in Texas in my first pottery classes, I took some classes and the professor really felt strongly that you should pay things forward. And his philosophy was that the pottery community had been so good to him that he was so generous that he wanted to share and pay it back to the community and it really resonated with me. So that is basically what I try to do as well. I am more than happy to answer questions, I have lots of people contacting me with questions or asking for help and I love it. But to me it is that same philosophy that resonated with me years ago that the pottery community has been so good to me that I am hoping to pay that forward to them.
Do you give more information behind the paywall than you do in the free format that comes through YouTube?
Ann: Yes, very much so. In fact usually our videos on YouTube are between five and ten minutes long on purpose. Because we figured that is how long people want to sit and watch a YouTube video. But if they want to learn how I paint and they want to learn my theories on color pallets, color theory , and recipes for my glazes, and the brushes I enjoy working with and anything I can think of, you will have access to that.
Do you see your YouTube channel as a springboard for the paid for content?
Jim: I would say it is somewhat of a gateway. The videos on Vimeo are very detailed and is much more of a production. So when we charge we are just trying to recoup some cost. They are very detailed and they take a long time to film and we try to film them in such a way that you feel like you are there.
Do you take advantage of the monetization that goes on with hitting that one thousand followers mark on YouTube?
Jim: We are not monetizing at the moment and YouTube has changed that a little bit. You have to have a thousand subscriber but you also have to have four thousand hours of viewing time in the course of the last twelve months. So we haven’t been up long on enough. We are on track to achieve that but at the moment no we are not monetizing because we haven’t reached that four thousand hours.
Is your dream to be able to monetize that way?
Jim: I don’t know if it is something we are planning on to fund our retirement but we probably won’t turn it down, let’s put it that way.
Ann: Well, it helps to supplement. I have had my pottery business for over ten years and the thing about doing pottery is that I am just a one man band basically, so I only get paid for the production that I can complete in the studio. Even though I have lot of constant business every month, I can only do so much because my work is so detailed. So the workshops have helped a lot as far as adding a little bit of business there.
Why is it important for a YouTube channel to have at least two cameras for their video content capture?
Jim: I think especially for things that are instructional in nature it is important to have a wider shot so you can get a sense of the size and space that the person is working in. But then a second camera that is really able to get almost a macro look at the fingers or sgraffito, you want to be able to see that needle pick up that clay dust. It’s important to get the camera where it needs to be so the person can understand what’s going on in the video.
Book
Mastering Cone 6 glazes by John Hesselberth and Ron Roy
Contact
Instagram: @littlestreetpottery