EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:

OUR INTERVIEW WITH IAN

Nick Lange

Okay, well, here we go. We have Ian Sansavera, famous from the Learn How to Edit Stuff YouTube channel, here to talk about his amazing career as an editor.

Ian Sansavera

Thank you. You know, I think when I first got the invite, I chuckled a little bit because it says famous editors, and I was like, it’s kind of an oxymoron, right? Like, editors aren’t really known these days; they’re kind of the behind-the-scenes, guys. And so, thank you for recognizing post-production on this podcast. I appreciate it.

Nick Lange

Well, thank you for coming on. I would love to hear your amazing story of how you got – how you became interested in producing videos; how you found success on YouTube very early on; and how that led to your career today.

Ian Sansavera

Sure. So, back in middle school, my friends and I used to make sketch comedy videos, like little, stupid home movies, you know. Fake fight scenes in my friend’s basement, and all that kind of stuff. And so, it was me, my friend Aaron, and my friend Vinnie. And it was the three of us kind of like – at the time, we didn’t even realize that we were doing it, but we were like, pre-production, production, post-production, writing, directing, like, we were kind of doing all of it just because we wanted to make funny, you know, sketch videos. And at the time, like, Newgrounds, and like, eBaum’s World were the two places that you really, like, tried to find this stuff. And so, we, you know, started making these goofy movies, and all of us had to take different parts of the film process and kind of make it work. And so, my interest at that time was really the editing of it, you know? Like, doing a fight scene and knowing that when you throw a punch at a certain angle from behind a camera, even though you’re three feet away from the person, you can still make it look realistic, and you add a sound effect, and all of a sudden, people think that you’re like beating each other up, right? Like, I was super obsessed with that. And so, yeah, we started making these movies, and we just wanted to show them to our friends. And then, YouTube came around, like, you know, when we were sophomores in high school or something. And so, we decided to take all of these videos that we had previously made and put them up on YouTube because that’s the new hot thing at the time. And we were really fortunate enough to be like an early adopter of YouTube, and we were kind of the first channel that was really doing comedy, or like sketch comedy. And so, at the time, it was like us and Smosh – we were like, competing for like most subscribed channel but we were still in high school. Like, we had no idea what we were doing. And so, that kind of led down a path of really being super, super interested and passionate about specifically post-production for the rest of my entire life – was making movies with my friends in his basement. So yeah, it’s fun – born of passion.

Nick Lange

That’s great. So, you went to film school at Columbia College. Will you tell me what you learned there? And a question that people ask me a lot – and I’m sure they asked you all the time – is film school worth it? Is it worth the time? The years that go into that? Is it worth the cost? Or is it better to self-teach and learn how to produce videos yourself, and – or go work for a production company?

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, that’s a great question. I’m very much split on this, because to answer your first part of the question, what did I learn at film school? Nothing of value in my career, unfortunately. But what I did learn was just social skills right? Like, you meet people, and you meet other people, who are creatives and artists, and people who are like, you know, a little bit introverted, and these kinds of things, and you learn to navigate personalities. And, like, people really well in college, especially because it’s your first time out on your own, your parents aren’t there to save you; you don’t have a safety net, and so you’re kind of just like, navigating the world on your own. And then, you throw in like, you know, drinking a lot, or like, you know, smoking a lot of weed or whatever. And so, yeah, it’s – I think what I learned in college was, like, the baby steps into actually being an adult. And I think that experience is super valuable, and it’s the thing that I came out of college, like excited that I did it. Do I think that it’s worth $40,000 a year to be able to network with, you know, 20 year olds? No, I think it’s outrageously expensive; it’s super hard to manage; and like you said, before we started, you know, you come out of – out of school at the other end of it in tremendous amounts of debt, not knowing how to get out of it. And then, you’re kind of like back to square one, in a sense. And so, do I think that you should go to college? Yes, I think you should for the experience, if that’s an experience that you value, or that you want. Most people when they turn 18, they want to get out of their parents house; they want to like, go and do their own thing – I fully support that. Do I think that you’re going to learn the technical proficiencies that you need in order to survive in this industry? No. A lot of film schools are super antiquated. Like, I learned how to cut actual film like with an X-Acto knife and tape it back together. I’m like, what are we doing? Like, this is not – this is not what I’m gonna be doing, right? Like, I already knew at the time, having been on YouTube and had some success there, that digital video was like the wave of the future. And so, when I got to school, and they were having me cut film, I was like questioning my professors. I was like why are we doing this? Oh, you need to appreciate the art form. I was like, no, I just want to create like – this is silly. So, yeah, I think that you can self-teach – you can learn how to do anything on YouTube, literally, anything. There’s also like, Udemy and Teachable and Skillshare, and all these other places that you can learn stuff. If I wanted to learn how to like, tile my bathroom, give me like eight hours and three cups of coffee, and like I’m gonna be a professor at it, you know at the end of the day. So, yeah, definitely learn the skills that you want to learn elsewhere because then you also put like self-imposed deadlines on yourself. And when you have this, like, self-check and balance system, and you don’t have a professor telling you what to do, it becomes more valuable later down the line, because then you know how to set your own goals, and you can kind of like be a little bit more efficient of a – of a human being, you know? Not even just a creative.

Nick Lange

Yeah. Yeah. That’s great. You took the plunge of moving to L.A. after college, not knowing anyone here. What was that like? And do you think, today, it’s necessary for people serious about pursuing a career in Hollywood – let’s say editing movies in Hollywood – do they need to live in L.A. for that to happen?

Ian Sansavera

I don’t think that you need to live in L.A. The internet culture has kind of opened up this door to people who are doing really creative things, and really special things kind of come to the top very quickly. Things go viral, people share stuff, you know, you can create a Tiktok and Instagram or whatever – you can do your own thing. And if you’re good, and people like what you’re doing, the snowball will start running down that hill. That side of social media wasn’t fully as robust as it is now when I moved out to L.A. And so, I graduated from film school, and originally I wanted to edit movie trailers. Like, I wanted to do – like, that’s what I wanted to do. And so, I moved out here to kind of pursue that dream, and I knew that all the post houses were in Santa Monica, and like all the film industry was in L.A. And so, I wanted to do it for myself as kind of a challenge. At the time, right when I graduated, I had just broken up with like my long-term college girlfriend, who I was convinced I was going to marry, and it was a super painful experience, and I didn’t even want to be in Illinois anymore. Like, that’s how bad I wanted to get out. And so, it was either go back to Ohio and move back in with my mom, where there’s no film industry at all, or pack everything that I could fit in my car and drive to Los Angeles – and that’s what I did. I landed here. I had like $1,500 in my bank account; I put 800 of it down on an apartment, and I was like, okay, I don’t know what I’m gonna do, but I have like $500 left. And yeah, I just made it work, man. At the time, I was – I was DJing just as a hobby. And so, I started picking up DJ gigs on the weekends at bars and started just scrounging Craigslist for editing jobs. I got a job at the Apple store, just working retail where I met – even still today – some of like my best friends that are in the film industry; that we all just needed a job to get us to that first gig, you know? And yeah, you just gotta be – you gotta be scrappy. And so that’s going back to the other – the first question about college. I think without that experience of being scrappy and kind of like bootstrapping my education, in a sense, I don’t know if I ever would have like made it out here. I’ve known people that have come and gone in less than a year, who think it’s gonna be like all sunshine and rainbows and glitz and glam, and it’s just not, you know? If you’ve never seen Hollywood and you come here for the first time, you’re like, oof, God, this is depressing. I thought it was gonna be something different. So, yeah, I don’t think that you need to move to L.A. – that’s not a thing that you need to do. If you want to be here, and you want to be rubbing shoulders with whoever, and run into random people that might be able to get you ahead in your career, this is the place to do it. And there’s an unfortunate saying: it’s not what you know, it’s who you know. And in a sense, that is accurate. But, I am a firm believer in – if you know a lot and you have a really specialized skill, the people who you need to know will find you; they’ll eventually make their way to you. And so, it’s kind of a two-way street: you can run into them, they can run into you. But either way, I think the focus on the art and the craft is probably the most important thing – or should be the most important thing – instead of networking or who you know.

Nick Lange

Will you tell me about them Lost Boys and your foray into music? I think Anthony is the friend that you met at the Apple store, and how that led to where you are today.

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, so, taking one step back from that, I’ve always been involved in music my entire life. I was in bands growing up, like pop punk, emo bands, you know? Doing like Fall Out Boy and Paramore covers, and stuff like that. I played bass in our high school jazz band; I was in Show Choir; I sang; I – music has been a huge part of my life in general. And so, in high school, I ended up getting a job at a place called Rock the House. They did like birthday parties, bar mitzvahs, whatever, and I started DJing for them, which then led me to Chicago. I worked for a very similar company called Charisma, where I was DJing and emceeing. I interned at Kiss FM. I got super into like battle DJing, and like, you know, Red Bull 3Style, DJ Jazzy Jeff type stuff. And then, I moved to L.A., and I worked with a guy named Mark at the Apple Store. And his cousin, Anthony, was a music producer, like an engineer – a music engineer – and he had worked with Kanye West and like all these crazy people. He has, you know, a platinum record hanging on the wall for his engineering stuff. And so him and I got together, and he also scratched – and so we were just like scratching and DJing together. And then, that kind of led into producing music because at the time, you couldn’t just be a DJ – you had to make your own music. So, we started making our own music. It got picked up by, like, a smaller label at the time, and then we got put on tour with a couple people. One guy, his name is Singularity – he now goes by Grey – if you’ve ever heard that song, The Middle by Grey and Maren Morris and Zedd, and he has another Hailee Steinfeld-like multi-platinum track. And then, our other friends Candyland. And so, we went on tour with them; and we toured like pretty much every city in the United States; and we were producing music and DJing, and literally making no money at all. And it was just like this really fun passion project that I kind of got like sucked into and wanted to explore a little bit at that time. I think I was waiting tables, like, I was working at the Apple Store, and then I got a job doing some editing stuff that paid literally like pennies on the dollar per hour. And I had a job at a restaurant. And so, I was just like, you know what, let’s give it a shot. Let’s go on tour. Let’s do this thing. And yeah, it was – it was super fun. I wouldn’t – I wouldn’t go back and do it over in any other way. It was – it was very, very exciting.

Nick Lange

So, you had three jobs. You took this leap. Did you make money on that tour, or how did you pay the bills?

Ian Sansavera

Everything on the tour was paid for. So, like, all the gas, all the food, all the hotels and everything. And then, we were expecting to get money at the end; and then, we didn’t get money at the end. It was like a very – it’s still to this day – it’s a very confusing situation. And like, the guy who ran the record label at the time was like pulling money out of the tour fund to do something else. And then, he never recouped it. And so, it was like this weird thing. It sucks that we didn’t make any money, but we got back to L.A., and I didn’t have a job. I didn’t have any money. And so, yeah, I think I just went and got another job at a restaurant just to like keep the dream alive, you know? 

Nick Lange

Yeah. But you were famous. Skrillex was playing your songs at his shows.

Ian Sansavera

That was – yeah, that was a cool one, man. You know, at the time, I was on Facebook, and I was like chatting with all these people that are huge now – Getter, Dillon Francis, like, all these guys that wanted to work with us, because we had a couple like, yeah, Skrillex played out a couple of our remixes. And I remember very distinctly – I was at home for Christmas in Ohio, and somebody, like – all of a sudden, my phone started blowing up, and people like Skrillex dropped your track at this crazy, you know, festival in Sydney, and blah, blah, blah. Skrillex played your track here. And I’m like freaking out, and my mom’s like, who’s Skrillex? Like, what’s – I don’t get it, and she’s just like was completely unaware, and I’m like in the backseat of my mom’s car freaking out, watching some random dude at a festival take a video of Skrillex playing our music at this huge festival. I was like, oh man, that’s so dope. But, yeah, it was – it was cool. We just – we couldn’t keep up with the – or at least for me personally as I got deeper into the music industry, I think it was just something that I didn’t want to keep going with, you know? Like, it’s a lot of partying; it’s a lot of just like, oh, just getting like, absolutely tanked with people and it’s a lot on your body – all the traveling; all the drinking; all the, you know –  it’s – it was just too much. And here’s me as like a 23-year-old, I felt old already. I was like, I can’t keep doing this. Like, this is not what I want. I love DJing; I love producing music. I still to this day produce music. I’ll open up Ableton and make a loop, and then put it in a video that I’m working on. Like, I’ll just make my own music for my own videos, right? And so, I still really enjoy it. I just wasn’t – I don’t think that was the career trajectory that I wanted at the time.

Nick Lange

Okay. So, then, you – if I have this right – you found a job on Craigslist shooting famous MMA fighters. Tell me about that.

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, so, once the music industry thing kind of was panning – not panning out, I was just searching around on Craigslist, and there was like shooter editor wanted for, you know, sport – it was like super vague what it was. And basically, what it ended up being was a company called Shoot Media, and it was like three guys that ran it, and they needed somebody to do a lot of like the editing and shooting. And so, basically, what they were doing was they were traveling back and forth between, like, the American Kickboxing Academy in San Francisco and Randy Couture’s gym in Vegas. Like, that was kind of their two main spots, and me and this other guy would go to these gyms, shoot with these fighters, go and basically live at their house with them, right? Like, I was shooting with like Daniel Cormier and Luke Rockhold, and like all these like huge people that ended up being, like massive in the MMA space. And we’re shooting with them, and I’m like filming them do their meal prep. And then, I’m filming them, like, picking up their kids from daycare, and we were – we were editing together all these little, like, micro vignettes on these fighters of what they do outside of the octagon, essentially. 

Nick Lange

Oh, that’s cool.

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, so, it was – it was really interesting. Not my crowd; I was not into MMA at all. And the people that I was meeting along the way were like so stoked; they’re like dude, you – oh my god, you know – Anderson Silva. You got to shoot with, you know, BJ Penn? Holy shit. And I’m like, yeah, I don’t know. Like, they’re cool people, whatever. So, then, yeah, that randomly led – so, all of that stuff led to me getting my next job at a place called, Quest Nutrition. They found me on LinkedIn, or they reached out to me in some sort of way. I don’t even know how they got my information, but they were like, hey, we heard you’re doing this MMA stuff. We run a nutrition company; we make these protein bars – a lot of like fitness and MMA people eat our product. We like the work that you’re doing. We’re trying to start our own, like internal media production company – come work for us. And so, it’s like, yeah, cool, whatever. So, I left that job, went to Quest, was doing protein bar stuff, and at the time, Instagram had just released like 15 second videos. So, basically, my entire job became making super high-quality and polished 15-second videos for social media, and that became my entire identity for quite some time. And then, as it progressed and social media became more fluid, and like, YouTube came back, and things got longer, I started doing longer-form stuff for them, and kind of like producing, directing some things, writing some things. We had our own little mini agency inside of Quest, and it was pretty fun at the time.

Nick Lange

So, they grew incredibly quickly from, I think, when you joined, or several $100,000 of revenue two, three years later – several 100 million of revenue. How did video, and the videos you were making, play into that growth?

Ian Sansavera

It was just the fans. So, the growth of the company was purely based on they had a great product, and a lot of people in the fitness industry were like obsessed with the product. And like bodybuilders, CrossFit, all these people – Quest, Quest, Quest, Quest, Quest. Everyone talked about it. And so, the videos that we were doing just kind of like humanize the brand a little bit. We were doing things that made Quest fun, and we were bringing in influencers, and like doing cooking shows, and you know, all these like weird things that you wouldn’t think a company would be doing, we were doing it. And so, the stuff that I was working on was really just a touch point. For the fans of Quest Nutrition, that like – Quest wasn’t just this nameless, faceless organization that, you know, just made protein bars and nothing else. Like, we did fun stuff. And so, yeah, that was – that was really what it was. And honestly, the videos didn’t get very many views. Like, I would work for two weeks on a video, and it would get like 1000 views, and then we were just on to the next thing, and it was – it was kind of a little deflating at that time. But at the time, Quest was sponsoring an eSports team because basically, Quest was like, what’s the most unhealthy industry? Gaming. Cool. Let’s get into gaming. And so, they sponsored a team called Team Liquid, and I started – basically, my boss was like, hey, Ian, you’re the Quest gaming guy now. You’re gonna do all the gaming content. So, I was like cool. So, the first video I did, I produced and edited; it got like, I don’t know, half a million views in the first like, three days or something. It got – it got like so many more views than I was used to getting on stuff, and all the comments were like, insanely positive. Like, oh, my god, this video is amazing, and blah, blah, blah, the editing. This is – and like, such an outpouring of positive comments from this one video that I did. I instantly went to the owner of the team, and I was like, hey, I think I’m ready to get out of like nutrition and sports. Like, I want to get into eSports. Like, who do you know? Who can you connect me with? And so, basically, he just ended up offering me a job as director of post-production for Team Liquid. And so I was the second person into their content team. And basically, for the next six years, I was in charge of not only editing all of their content globally for the team but starting to pull people in and managing all the editors and kind of building out their post-production department within Team Liquid.

Nick Lange

That is awesome. How did that first video get so many views? Did Team Liquid have a huge fan base that was just waiting for that content?

Ian Sansavera

It was kind of a perfect storm. So, at the time, the video I did, it was called Piglets Christmas surprise, and they had a Korean player whose name is piglet, and Team Liquid had imported piglet from the Korean league, and he was the first Korean import to play on North American soil for League of Legends. And so, it was like a big deal in the eSports space. And so, he had come to the United States; he was kind of culture shocked; he didn’t know anybody; he didn’t know how to speak the language; and he was just like, kind of sad, right? And so the video that I did was, we’re gonna get the team together; we’re gonna go out; we’re gonna get a bunch of like, Korean snack foods that he’s used to; we’re going to put up a bunch of signs in Korean; we’re gonna get them presents; and we’re gonna like, surprise them on Christmas and try to make them feel like he’s at home again. And like, he came in and he cried, and it was – it was a really like, emotional video. And I didn’t know any better at the time, but all of his Korean fans, and all of his North American fans, like, thought that this was such a heartwarming gesture and such a nice thing to do for him. It just, like, kind of, you know, gasoline got poured on that one, and it just ended up being a really, like, wholesome, heartfelt video that did really well, and I wasn’t expecting it, you know? Like, the quick elevator pitch I got was, hey, they have a Korean player, he’s feeling homesick – we should try to do something nice for him. And I was like, okay, cool. Then, I start asking more questions, and like kind of, you know, figuring out the creative from there. But, yeah, it just kind of was a – was a weird, perfect storm. And I think at the time, it was the push that I needed to jump ship. And I’m sure we’ll get to it later, but I do want to say while it’s in my brain, the people that are listening, don’t be afraid to go and try something new. Like, if you feel like stagnated – if you feel held back or like, you’ve plateaued at a place, don’t be afraid to try something new and going experience something new, because a lot of the times, that’s the thing that you need to like, jumpstart the next step. And a lot of people stay in a job or in a place, even in a relationship, like, way longer than they need to, and they’re kind of just afraid to push past that. I’ve always been the kind of person that I want to prioritize my own learning, and I want to be like an eternal student. And if I ever feel like I’m not learning anymore, that’s always when I’m like, alright, it’s time to kind of pivot. So yeah, if you’re listening – if you take one thing away from this, take that away.

Nick Lange

Great advice. Just to finish on the – on the Quest period, or editors who would love to go work at a fast growing brand like that, what can they do to be noticed by that brand? And then, what are the skills that they can expect to develop while they’re there?

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, the biggest thing that I can say for any brand, is go and see what they’re already doing, and do it yourself. Even if you’re like ripping videos from their YouTube and re-editing them in some sort of way, do it, like – motion graphics, whatever it is, just do it. Post it on social media, tag them, like, try to find out who their social media manager is and just be like, hey, guys, I made this video because I’m a huge fan of the company or whatever. And if it’s good, you’ll get a message like pretty quick, right? Like, hey, submit this to HR, or hey, can we talk to you about future opportunities? And it’ll either be like a freelance gig – an ongoing freelance gig with them, or maybe they’ll offer you a full-time job, but you have to do the work. And I will say that nobody – and this is – I’m using an absolute – for me, as somebody that had to hire a significant amount of people, I never read a resume one time. I never opened a PDF of a resume and looked at it and went, this seems like – no, I watch reels. I go and watch work. I see what you’re doing creatively, because ultimately, at the end of the day, that’s what it boils down to. This is a very visual space, and a resume is not going to do any good. I don’t care that you graduated at the top of your class. I don’t care that your GPA was 4.2. I care if you know how to use, you know, certain programs, or if you have the creative bug that can push things to the next level. Like, that’s what I care about. And so, instead of prioritizing a resume, prioritize a reel and do a bunch of free work: go and see what – if you want a job at Nike, go and see what Nike’s doing and repeat it, or do better than it and just start tagging them. And eventually, you’ll – you know, slide into the DMS of the social media person and be like, hey, do you guys want to like, white label this work? Or if you guys want to release it, I’m happy to sign a contract or whatever. If you want to kick me some money, cool. If you want to give me some freelance opportunities – you have to be a little scrappy. You have to get in there and try to get what you want; opportunities aren’t just going to fall into your lap. A lot of people think that they will, or they’re like, I worked so hard, and, you know, I deserve this. Well, reach for it. Go out and do it, you know, like, just, yeah. And it’s also a really good way to learn. If you want a job at Nike, and you don’t have the skills to be there yet, try to recreate a video that they’re doing, an ad campaign they’re doing, a graphic that they’re doing – you’ll learn a lot. And then, it’ll send you down a rabbit hole of like, searching on YouTube, how do I do this? How do I do that? And then, you just start, like, acquiring all this knowledge. And then, that will level you up and eventually get you to the point where, you know, you could be ready for Nike. But then, all of a sudden, some other company comes out and they’re like, hey, we’re going to – we’re going to take you, right? And it’s, yeah – it’s a song and dance, but really what it boils down to is just doing it; and if nothing else, do it for yourself. And then, if something else comes out of it, then you win.

Nick Lange

That’s awesome. Okay, so you started at Team Liquid, and you were the first – you were the video department.

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, me and one other person. Yeah.

Nick Lange

And so, what was that like, when you had to sort of pioneer a video strategy and figure out probably, what the visual language of that team was going to be? And what all these videos were going to look and feel like, and how to be consistent. What – how did you approach that?

Ian Sansavera

There’s a saying: fail fast and fail often – and that’s what I did. I remember I spent like so much time on this one video, that I thought was gonna be a huge hit, and we put it out and everyone roasted me in the comments and said it was the worst video of all time, right? So, it’s like – it’s just about trial and error. And when I joined Team Liquid, eSports was like the wild, wild west. Like, there were no rules – there was nothing going on. And so basically, we were just doing things because we wanted to do them. And we started filming the League of Legends team like literally, every single day, day in and day out, every tournament, every practice, you know, going out to eat Korean barbecue at night, boba tea, whatever – like, we were just with them at all times. And then we decided to make a documentary series called Squad and it was like, we’re going to work – and we were the first eSports team to do this like doc series. And then one of the sponsors of the team, Alienware, was like, hey, we really liked what you’re doing, we’re gonna fund the continuation of this series, and we want it to be presented by Alienware. And then eventually, Alienware got acquired by Dell. And then Dell is now sponsoring content, right until, like the budgets kind of like exponentially grew for this kind of stuff, and we had to get more dialed in on the creative, and shows had to start having their own visual identity. And so it kind of just happened organically along the way. I would love to tell you that I had like this whole strategy in my mind, and I was like, super forward thinking about it; I wasn’t. I was just kind of – it was – it was touch and go for me. I was figuring it out as I went, and that’s okay to do, you know? And it’s like – it’s also okay to admit. I admit publicly all the time I had no idea what I was doing, but as long as you’re learning along the way, and you can take those failures, and you can turn them into lessons and then apply it to the next thing that you’re gonna work on, that’s the most important part. Don’t get sucked into a negative, you know, tailspin of negative self-talk, and like all this stuff. It’s like just use it as fuel to make a better decision next time, and that’s really what we did, you know. Alienware was like, hey, you can’t do this, or hey, we think things – think differently – do something different. And it was all those – they were a really good partner, to be honest. And so as Teamliquid started to get more and more sponsors, I had kind of already had these failings in my back pocket, and it was really easy for me to get a success when Honda came into the picture and I was like, oh, hey, Honda, this is what I think that we should do, or, hey, insert hyper X or whatever other sponsor of the team. It kind of helped pave the way there.

Nick Lange

Awesome. So, for editors who love gaming – love eSports, what are the opportunities for them today, and how do they get into working for a team like you did?

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, it depends on what you want to do. The easiest barrier to entry to a team is going and looking at like, a highlight from a tournament, and cutting together like a montage highlight reel of like, Team Liquid At X tournament highlight, right? And you just do it, and you tag them in it on Twitter – on Instagram, whatever. You put it in your stories, and you just do it for fun. And then eventually, somebody will notice you and they’ll be like, hey, we see that you’re doing this on your own, we want to do that for ourselves. Can you come and do that for us? Another really easy barrier to entry is Twitch streamers. Go and pull a VOD from twitch of somebody who gets pretty decent numbers, and just start cutting videos together for them and reach out to their, you know, their management email or whatever and just be like, hey, I’m putting together highlight reels – would love to work with you. And it’s that initial free work that will get you the prolonged work in the future. And if you’ve ever gone to a grocery store, and somebody hands you a free sample, and then you’re like, it’s actually pretty good, I’m gonna get that, it’s the exact same concept. So, yeah, I mean – and honestly, see what they’re doing already and just try to – it’s such a catch 22 – I’m gonna say fit in – fit into what they’re already doing, but also aim to stand out. Like, look at what they’re doing and try to elevate it a little bit, or do it slightly differently. But don’t go too far to the left, where somebody watches something, and they’re like, whoa, this is not our brand at all. Like, I don’t know what this is – this is wack. But like, do something that they’re already doing, and be able to provide value to the organization. eSports, a clothing brand, it doesn’t matter, like, the concepts still the same. But yeah, do your own – like, you know, they say in investing, do your own research, do your own research. And then just try to make a game plan from there.

Nick Lange

Awesome. And so what other opportunities in the gaming space do you see for editors, as someone who was in the trenches on the frontlines of that world?

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, I mean, honestly, the gaming industry in the gaming space has kind of evolved over the last, however many years, and it functions exactly the same way a creative agency does. If you want to do commercials – if you want to do ad work, there’s a place for you. If you want to do documentaries, there’s a place for you. If you want to do funny social media videos, TikToks, like, random – there’s a space for you. If you want to make GIFs – if you want to just do green screen – if you want to just do visual effects, there’s a space for you. So, my biggest advice is just figure out the thing that you want to do, and the thing that you want to spend the most of your time on. What’s the thing that you can put your 10,000 hours in that you’re not going to get sick of, and then try to find an avenue through that. So, if you are gung ho on visual effects, learn everything you can about visual effects; consume every Video Copilot tutorial that exists; look for plugins that are going to like help your workflow; do research; listen to podcasts; like watch tutorials on YouTube; and then go to Team Liquid or TSM, or 100 thieves or whatever, and apply all that knowledge to something that you think is really cool and then hand it to them, or you can even go to tournament organizers. Go straight to Riot Games, right? They have Valorant. They have League of Legends. They have TFT. They have all these huge titles. You can go to Blizzard. You can go to Valve, right? Like, whatever you want to do. There’s crazy tournaments and all this stuff going on, literally at all times. It’s super easy to look up the production company that produces for ESL, which is like a huge, like, Counter Strike and Dota like tournament circuit. Look up the production company – start emailing people, hey, I made this. Could you use my skills? Can I contribute to this next broadcast or whatever? So, yeah, it’s really about being diligent and understanding that you’re probably going to hear 1000 no’s before you hear yes, but all you need is one yes, because then that one yes becomes professional experience and professional quality content for your reel. And now, all the sudden, you have legitimacy. When it’s just like fan films, it’s not quite there yet, but as soon as ESL has paid you to do opening intro promo for their, you know, ESL cologne or whatever. Now, all of a sudden, you have this like, portfolio material that people aren’t going to be able to ignore because you got the one yes.

Nick Lange

Awesome. That’s great. Okay, so, if I have the timeline correct, you started your channel, Learn How To Edit Stuff, while you were still at Quest. And it was an MMA fighter who asked you for advice on how to make videos.

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, he was – so, we were working – at the time at Quest, we were working with just random influencers – fitness influencers, and this guy, John Glaude – his YouTube channel is Obese to Beast – he lost a bunch of weight and he’s like, super jacked now, and it’s awesome. Literally, one of the nicest dudes of all time. He was sitting next to me in my office at Quest, and he was editing his own video on his laptop, and he was like, hey, man, how do you do this? How do you do this? If I wanted to scale a clip, how do I – how would I do that? And I was just telling him all this stuff, and he was like, man, you should really start your own channel. Like, if I’m interested in this, I’m sure other people would be too. And so I did it because I didn’t want to have to keep like re-explaining things to him, so I was like, sure, I’ll do like a little course for you or whatever. And yeah, it ended up being – it’s so funny. I kind of started it as a joke. Even the name, Learn How To Edit Stuff, I was like, what am I going to call it, Learn How To Edit Stuff, you know? Like, it was – it was not initially serious. But then, I think I hit like the 10,000 subscriber mark, and I was like, okay, I should probably start getting a little bit more serious about this. Like, people clearly want to learn about this stuff, and I wasn’t taking it seriously until I hit that 10k subs. And then, after that, I really like got a lot more serious; I started being way more consistent. At one point, I was doing like a video every Sunday, like for two years straight, and that’s where I saw the most growth of my channel was just being consistent and looking at trends, and seeing what was like popular and what people were doing, and then teaching people how to do that thing. One of the best examples was Brooklyn Nine-Nine came out on TV, and the intro sequence was like – I just really enjoyed the show. And so I did like a how-to-make a Brooklyn Nine-Nine intro tutorial, and that was the first one I think I did, or maybe it was the shooting star meme – one of the two. I did something very specific of something that I liked and it did crazy well. And so I kind of knew that like, okay, like people are just wanting to learn how to do like really niche specific things, and I try to teach, don’t walk away from this, knowing only how to make the intro title sequence to Brooklyn Nine-Nine; come away with this, knowing the fundamentals of everything that got put into making that thing, so that you can apply it to the next thing that you make, because all of those things when you dissect everything down, you know, you can get super granular and be like, oh, those are bezier keyframes, it’s probably 12 keyframes long, and they’re using like 3% blur, and like you can really get super detailed. So, yeah, it’s just applying the fundamentals to new creative adventures. But, yeah, that’s the story of my YouTube channel. It started as a – as a joke, and as a way to have John be able to reference all the things that I’ve taught him again when I wasn’t sitting next to him; and it kind of blossomed into almost 300,000 subscribers now, which is – which is pretty awesome. So yeah, shout out the Learn How To Edit Stuff community.

Nick Lange

That’s awesome. So, for people that want to create their own YouTube channel, but are balancing a full-time job like you were, how do you know what investment of time to put into the channel? And at what point does it start paying you enough that you can make that your primary source of income?

Ian Sansavera

So, the answer to the first part of the question, is literally whenever you have spare time. My schedule was – I was working all week. If during the week I was working on a project that I could use as material for my YouTube channel, I would like screen record myself working all day, and then reference back to things that I did and like use it as part of my tutorial. So, that’s a good way to do it. But, literally, any ounce of free time that you have, you just need to be highly motivated to do it. If you need to pound a cup of coffee when you get home to like give you the energy to record at night, do it. My schedule was, I would wake up Saturday morning; I would make breakfast; make coffee; shoot and edit my entire tutorial; and then release on Sunday. And so I was working five days a week in my full-time job, and then a sixth day on the weekend just to like make this thing happen. And in order to make money on YouTube, it comes with views. It’s not the amount of subscribers; it’s the amount of views that you get on your video on a regular basis. And so, for me, the YouTube channel was never about money in the first place; it was just about having a place where somebody could learn and be a student, because I never had that. Well, I did have that. Andrew Kro – Andrew Kramer from Video Copilot was my north star, but I wanted people to have like, a destination that they could come and learn. And so it was never about money; it was just about taking knowledge and immortalizing it on the internet. And so money was a byproduct of it, but my channel isn’t – I’m not getting paid like 10s of 1000s of dollars a month like some of these guys are, because that comes from views – my videos initially don’t get very many views at all. But over the course of time they do because, it’s like people are searching for how to use a, you know – how to chroma key in After Effects, or how to rotoscope, right? And like my videos will come up, so they get views over time. And so if you’re starting a YouTube channel to make money, then I would prioritize, like, what are the things that you’re going to do to get the most amount of views all the time, because that’s how you make money. If you’re making a YouTube channel for fun or to provide knowledge, then you can slow roll it and kind of build it over time. And then it just becomes a really nice passive income stream, right? Like, I just get passive income every month, you know? And it’s kind of nice, and I don’t really have to do anything in order to get that, but I’m not like retiring off my YouTube channel or anything.

Nick Lange

What do you love about teaching?

Ian Sansavera

I love assisting in that like, light bulb moment for people. Something that I did – something that I said – something that I created give somebody else that spark to like, go and make something amazing – I love that. And like, it’s so funny, even to this day, I’ll get random text messages from people I went to highschool with, and they be like, search Google for how to make a reel and your face came up. Whoa, crazy. And it’s like, cool. Like, those kinds of things where – I have a really funny story about that, actually. So, a girl that I ended up hiring at Team Liquid – I was watching all these reels, I was watching all these reels, and they were all pretty terrible. And then, all of a sudden, this one reel was just like, showstopper. It was amazing. It was really well edited. The music was great. Everything about it was unbelievable. And so I reached out to her, and I was like, hey, I loved your reel – need to set up a meeting with you. Like, I want to hire you instantly. And she was like, okay, cool. Yeah. So, we get on the Zoom call and she like froze. And I was like, are you okay? And she goes, sorry, I’m just having like a weird moment. I watched your how-to-make an editing reel video before I submitted my reel to Team Liquid, not knowing that you were the person that was going to be hiring me on the other side. And so a video that I did inspired her to do something that like caught my attention. It was very full circle. So, yeah, just giving people that little moment to like, spark something new is the thing that I enjoy the most about all of it.

Nick Lange

I love that. That’s great. Okay, so, I’m very curious about Runway. I would love to learn about the technology, how you got connected to them, why you made that jump from Team Liquid to Runway, and how that’s gonna change editing.

Ian Sansavera

Deep question. So, as part of my YouTube channel, if you’re not making money from views, the other way you make money is sponsored videos; and I say no to like 95% of people that are hitting me up to do things, because I just don’t believe in anything that they’re doing. The CEO from Runway cold emails me and was like, hey, I saw your channel, really liked what you’re doing – we think that you’d like our product. So, I used it. I was legitimately blown away by how amazing it functioned. And so I did the video – I didn’t even charge them for it; literally did it for free because I was like so stoked on it. And then, at the end of it, I wrote like three pages of notes on how he can make his platform better – his software better, and I sent him the notes. And he was like, wow, these are really great notes – we’re gonna start incorporating these. About six months go by – didn’t really talk to him at all – and then the account that he had given me, like, lapsed because he only gave me six months free. And I wanted to go back and use it, and so I hit him up again, and I was like, hey, man, can you reactivate my account? And he was like, yeah, of course, like, I’ll reactivate the account. But out of curiosity, are you happy with your job? And I was like, actually, no, I’m at the point now where I’m looking to jump ship. I’ve been at Team Liquid for six years, like, five and a half – six years at this point. I just had a baby. So, like, I think I was at that point where I needed a life change – a little shift. And so I was like, you know what, no, like, I’ve actually – funnily enough, I’ve actually been interviewing in other places. I was on like, my third interview with Adobe at the time that he reached out to me. I was already interviewing at another eSports agency at the time, and he was like, well, can I – can I offer you a job? And this was over the Christmas holiday. And so like, within three days, I had an offer letter from Runway. Like, he was super serious about bringing me in, and I think it was because I provided him that value early on when we did the first initial video. And the company itself is incredible. Everyone who works there is incredible. The technology is unbelievable. And when I tell people hey, do you know that you can like, single click on a video and rotoscope somebody out without the use of a green screen, or like manual roto worke masks or anything like that? They’re like, shut up. No, you can’t. Like, yes, you actually can. And so how I think it’s going to change video editing, is it’s going to drastically reduce the time to money equation for people. And I’m actually going to put a video out on my channel about this. All these people always message me, is AI going to take my job, or robots gonna take my job? No, robots are going to assist you in your job. Do you think that somebody at a car manufacturing plant is like hammering the sides of the car to the wheel? Well, no, they have a robot to assist, but they need to be there to guide the robot, right? Like, somebody needs to be working with the robot, and I think that’s what AI is going to do. Initially, Runway got notoriety by making this single click rotoscope tool. But since then, we have built a fully functioning NLE, completely based on the web; you upload your footage there, everything is stored on the cloud, and you can edit video from your internet browser, which is going to do a few things. Mainly, it’s going to remove this, like, need for computer specs; you no longer will need a 3090 Ti; you will no longer need X amount of RAM; you will no longer need a crazy CPU; you don’t need to build a desktop machine. Somebody, on a Chromebook, sitting at an internet cafe, can do the same level of visual effects and editing that somebody, who’s on a $20,000 computer, can do. So, you’re removing this, like, technological like tether that you need; and all you need now is an internet connection, which is huge – massive. The second thing that they’re doing is they’re just removing the amount of time it takes to do stuff. Single click rotoscoping. We introduced a tool called inpainting, where you literally just brush over video; and you can just remove anything from video; and it tracks it automatically for you; and you need to do very little guidance; and it looks amazing. It works better than content aware fill almost every time, and it’s just allowing – we’re opening the fourth dimension for creativity, and that’s the thing that I’m most excited about. And so because Runway is built on this foundation of machine learning and artificial intelligence – that’s been our business model, right? And with machine learning and artificial intelligence, comes these time saving hacks, and these tools that have never been seen before. And so that’s really – we are – we are trying to pioneer and pave the way for like a new section of the video editing industry, and it’s super, super fun. My official title there is workflow architect. And so I’m, you know, working with the engineering team, the coders, the designers, the front end, the back end – I’m working with everybody. And we’re trying to build a better mousetrap, and I’m basically trying to influence the way that workflows are being constructed and like the way that tools operate. And I’m also making marketing material for Runway. I’m teaching. I’m doing educational courses. We’re launching a new microsite called Runway Academy, where we teach people, like, literally for free, everything they need to know about shooting and editing their own video using Runway. And so yeah, it’s been a really, really awesome choice for me, and I’m super, super glad that I decided to go this direction, because candidly, Adobe was already talking to me, and they’re like, hey, we think that we can use somebody like you to help influence the way that our product works. You’re clearly passionate about it. Yada, yada, yada. And so they implanted this thing in my head that like, I should be helping to shape the way that people use creative tools – and call it what you want, Adobe is a massive, massive, massive company; they move pretty slow; and I don’t think that they would have been able to give me the kind of freedom that I was looking for in a job like this, but Runway could and does. We’re a team of 30 people, right? Like, Adobe is a team of 30,000 people. So, it’s definitely a stark difference. But yeah, I love working on the small team. It’s been a really, really positive impact in my life, taking that job.

Nick Lange

How cool. Okay, so, for the – for the editor, who is maybe early in their career, how can they expect their workflow to change, and the types of work that they’re doing to change because of products like, Runway?

Ian Sansavera

It’s – it really – so, what we’re working on right now is this huge push into collaborative editing: collaboration while editing. So, basically, what we have right now – you can go and try it out runwayml.com. You can sign up for free; you don’t have to pay any money; you can go and be editing on a timeline, and then somebody else can just like drop in on your session, and just like watch what you’re doing; and you can collaborate in this like really interesting way that wasn’t possible before. Because if I’m working on something, sure, I can screen record and you can watch what I’m doing. But then, you have to be like, hey, can you – can you just move that over here? Can you try – hey, try this. And it becomes this like battle. Like, collaboration shouldn’t ever be a battle; it should just be like this very free flowing thing. And so, if I’m working on an edit, you can now jump into my session, copy my timeline, paste it somewhere else, do your own thing and then be like, hey, check out what I did. How do you feel about this? And it’s like, oh, cool. And like, you can just kind of like do things that you weren’t able to do before, because if I wanted to do that with you, and you know, let’s use Adobe as a framework, I would need to probably get you a hard drive; get you all the footage; we have to share assets; we have to have some sort of way to all be working off the same material. It’s kind of annoying. Team projects doesn’t work the way that it should. It’s kind of confusing and cumbersome. It doesn’t really become collaboration; it becomes working in a silo, and then you have to like, battle for inches, right, of who gets their way. With Runway, you can be editing – a producer can be like, in the session, watching what you’re doing, leaving notes, giving you active feedback, trying new things, and it’s very airy, free flowing and all of the assets are shared. So, I can start and edit from my computer, at my desktop right now, upload my footage, be editing or whatever, leave the house, grab my laptop and just pick up right where I left off from a Starbucks. And it’s like, that kind of flexibility, I don’t think has ever really been thought of before or have been done correctly. And so if you’re a new editor, even if you’re an experienced editor, think about the kind of flexibility that you want, and think about how you want to work with other people. And that’s where Runway is filling the gap, because editing has been a very solo focus mission for a very long time, you know? Sitting in a dark room by yourself, in front of a computer, and kind of tuning out the rest of the world. But with this like AI ML wave that we are seeing right now, I think that everyone should be far more open to collaboration and collaboration on a scale, at which Runway is trying to build into. And so yeah, I think it’ll drastically change the way that people work. Even right now, the fact that you can upload a video, click once or twice on it, and it rotoscopes on like – gives you an alpha matte that you can then go and you know, continue working in Runway, or go to another program if you so choose – it’s amazing, and it saves a lot of time, and it just kind of – it cracks open the door to thinking about things differently, and I want that for everyone. I don’t want anybody to be stuck in their ways. I don’t want anyone to be on a one track mind. Because if you’re going to survive in any industry, especially in the creative industry, you need to be okay with pivoting, and you need to be flexible and open to new ideas and new programs and features and trains of thought.

Nick Lange

Yeah, that’s great. What piece of advice do you have for an editor, who is either amateur and wanting to go professional, or working in a role that is not the end game for them? They really dream of working in eSports, making movie trailers, doing something – cutting movies or TV shows. What advice do you have that can help them get there? 

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, the biggest thing is focus. Focus on the thing that you want, and do not stray, and take every ounce of free time and creative energy that you have and put it towards the goal that you have. You know, the president at the time of Quest always used to say, you can be stronger than me. Like, you can genetically be stronger than me, but like I can learn more than you. Like, our brains are the same; if not, my brain is like more superior, right? So, always be learning, and always be leveling up and never get complacent, and focus on the thing that you want. That’s the biggest thing and it’s hard to do. It is very hard to do. Set good habits, get into, you know, having a ritual or a system of things that you do to like get in the right headspace, whether it’s meditation or listening to your favorite artist, or you know, having a cup of coffee and doing some deep breathing, or whatever the thing is. Like, develop a ritual and really hyper focus on the thing that you want. If it’s moving up in your current company, focus on that, talk to people, ask how you can get there. If it’s getting a job in another industry, look at what they’re doing, replicate it, get in touch with them, do free work, give them the free sample, and then they’ll probably buy the product. So, yeah, focus and grit are like the two things that you can’t hand out to people; you have to like really try to develop it. And those are the things that I would say to, like, for anyone to focus on.

Nick Lange

Okay, so, Ian, thank you very much. This was great. Learned a ton. How can people get in touch with you?

Ian Sansavera

Yeah, any social media platform @notiansans. Unfortunately, iansans was taken, so I had to go with notiansans and it kind of stuck. So, notiansans on Twitter and Instagram. Mainly, if you want to do that route, or on YouTube @learnhowtoeditstuff.

Nick Lange

This was awesome. Thank you very much. 

Ian Sansavera

Thank you, man. I appreciate you having me on.