Category: Minecraft Videos

I just released my 10th episode of my Longplay series! This is a big milestone. I haven’t hit 10 consecutive episodes before. And especially in this short of time-frame. I have been doing a new episode each week.

I am absolutely loving this series! I took all the things I loved about filming and kept those, and removed the things I didn’t love.

• Keeping: small cute builds, playing at my own pace, focus on building, not advancing, relaxed, quiet videos
• Removing: massive builds that take a long time, complex filming and editing, recording with voice, trying to be in ‘performing mode’ on a group server

The result is a series that is fun and easy for me to film, which means no burnout and a sustainable effort. I can do an episode each week because of the smaller, simplified process. And I’m starting to find my new audience. I’ve seen a few unsubscribes, and then around an equal number of new subscribes, but my views and viewed-minutes is going up! People who are looking for relaxed Minecraft videos are finding me, so it’s great to see.

Now, I am still working on my big castle on Arcadia. It’s coming along really well now that I am not trying to record my voice. It’s just going to be a timelapse with music. So that’s still happening. And I do enjoy everyone on the Arcadia server. But it’s funny how most of the creators on small SMPs are constantly trying to do big builds to compete with the full-time YouTubers, and then continuously get burnt out.

I saw a video with Mogswamp and fWhip where they were talking about how each one of their videos takes a full-time 40+ hour per week effort because ‘that’s what the audience requires’. Massive builds with amazing details requiring hours of effort in materials collection and building. And they are correct that there’s a level of competition there that requires that level of effort. BUT, why not try to change that? Why not try to make smaller builds with more lore and design story behind it?

So, I guess that’s what I’m trying to do with this series. A quieter, simpler way to do Minecraft videos with smaller builds. And I’m having so much fun doing it!

One thing I want to bring back into my videos is my art. But I’m not sure how or where. I like the simple filming process that I have. It’s not easy to film traditional drawing and painting. At least it’s not easy for me. I would need better, more consistent lighting and I don’t want a big setup for that. That’s why I was thinking of digital art, but I don’t like my style there yet. So, I haven’t been doing art for my videos, which is fine for now. I might do some paintings and post them here. It’s something I can get back to eventually. For now, I’m just enjoying my simple Minecraft time! 🙂

I started a new Minecraft series, a survival longplay series without voice (no commentary). I did some longplay videos a long time ago and I wanted to return to that format. I have been thinking and planning for a longer series for a while, but instead of trying to plan everything out, I just started. It’s more fun just letting things develop as I explore the work anyway.

I have also been getting a little bored with the standard Minecraft builder videos these days. You know the format – intro, gather resources, building montage, then walk through. I also have been feeling like the Minecraft builders are building so big and grand, with such an emphasis on pushing to be bigger, more detailed, more colorful, that I feel like we are making the game less accessible for the casual player. I wanted to make more down-to-earth, smaller, easier builds that anyone can do, and even play along. More of having fun playing the game than trying to build something impressive.

I know that might not work for the algorithm that’s trying to serve up something unique and eye catching, but I’m ok with that. I would rather give people something relaxing and cozy to watch than try to do the next big thing.

My ‘rules’ for the series? I’m going slow and taking my time enjoying the early game. I’m sticking to stone tools for now, but I am allowing myself to use any found iron that I get from exploring. I am very bad at exploring and tend to stick to my base, so this will be a good incentive for me to get out and explore. So I can use buckets and shears, but for the basic tools, I’m sticking with stone. This will allow me to have a copper age in game once that release comes out! I’m really excited to have the Copper Age.

Why longplay? I love putting a longplay video on while I work. Or I should say that I used to. I got out of watching longplay because I wanted to see more of what creators were doing on their builds. But longplay has always been a comfort watch for me, so I’m happy to be working on a series like this.

Why no commentary? I have a surprisingly noisy home office. There’s always noise and interruptions, so recording with voice has always been stressful. It’s really hard for me to get good sound, and then I’ll get interrupted while trying to film. My filming has been stressful and hard to schedule as a result. Once I decided to try filming without voice, it’s gotten so much easier and more relaxing. I can do so much more because I don’t have to schedule things. I might try solving this later, but for now, no voice is working much better for me now.

And what happens to Arcadia and Skyblock? Honestly, I don’t know. I am still filming on both and I’ll try to work on videos for them. But I’m not sure if they will work out. The SMP community really relies on voice and interactions, which I can’t easily do, so I’m not sure how I can fit into that. I’ll see how it goes.

This is from my Arcadia series, number 6-ish? I’m not keeping good track of the sequence, because this is really a one-off video about my friends base, instead of a progress report on my base.

I have been watching Red’s, Nuciee’s, and Duke’s videos and was really caught by Red’s mention of the plane liking belly scritches. It’s a plane, and should be inanimate, so how can it like scritches? When I hear a story like that, it really catches my imagination. And so, over several weeks, I kept thinking about the story, especially when Red added the crane. So I had this lore story in my head.

My whole life, I have had little lore stories like this capture my imagination, and it’s hard to let them go. When I’m bored, or can’t sleep, I’ll pick up whatever lore story is running through my mind and continue fleshing it out, figuring out the exact words to use. I have never written them down or done anything with them. In fact, it’s hard to drop them out of my mind. Sometimes they even get very intrusive. They keep rolling around in there!

But this time, I wrote it down. And beyond writing it, I made little sketches. And for the first time in my life with these stories, it quieted my mind! I could get the story out and it stopped rolling around in my brain! Amazing!

So then I decided to make it into a video. I spent three weeks learning animation in Clip Studio Paint and practicing for the ‘live drawing’ segments. What was fun is that I was able to get my point across even with just rudimentary sketches of people and objects. And it was a blast! I had so much fun filming this. It’s the first video I have made that didn’t include any first-person shots. Everything was shot with a camera angle in mind, and I was just a character in a ‘movie’. It was so much fun to make.

Then, I didn’t even want to post it, because I wasn’t sure what everyone would think of it. Mainly Red. But he was very receptive to it. And people seemed to like it. I was honestly glad it didn’t get too many views. I think in a few years I could make an even better story. But that’s ok, this was a wonderful fun video to make.