From $13 to $100K Brand Deals on Instagram w/ @adrianper

I was 32 with like $13 in my bank account even with having the accolades under my belt like whether things were Grammy nominated or award-winning I still don't know as a creative you don't know what your future holds it's crazy to think that what a brand will spend on a more Legacy style commercial some content creators getting paid the same amount just to make vertical selfie videos talking about a product I was like that can't be real and then I saw it I was like oh my God it's real what pushed me to do it was knowing that it was real knowing that I had my back pushed up against the wall and I went for it it was rough it was tough and somehow it [Music] worked all right guys we're not in the regular studio where it's somewhere Spacey and trippy and I think it's maybe appropriate for the kind of conversation we have today I first met Adrian at Adobe Max in the green room we're both doing different things but uh I think it was dgo who introduced me to you and said you need to meet this guy he's blown up on the on the internet Mo too so they're both fans of yours and that's how I find out about cool people I'm not that cool myself and I start looking at your content okay so let's let's set it up today what are we going to talk about what I want to explore with you and then I want you to introduce yourself but I think Adrian's an incredible filmmaker but also he's got mad style are you Filipino yeah I'm it's the Filipino thing guys if you don't know Filipinos they got a lot of style I I steal some of it from from Filipino culture so if if there's something here it's from these guys but I'm interested in this kind of long creative Arc that you're on and what you're doing currently and if you've ever wondered for yourself like what is the real trajectory or Arc that a creative person goes on I think this is the episode for you so stick around for that okay so Adrian if people don't know who you are please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit of your backstory because I want to dig into that yeah what's up everybody my name is Adrien purr also known as OMG ad on my social media handles you know it's interesting like how can I describe myself in like one word I guess the the easiest way as a filmmaker I make videos but I just like doing all creative things I just don't share them but most people would know me as a filmmaker just being creative is something that I've done my whole life it's something that like whether I was told it was something I should follow or not that's something that my heart decided to follow and never drop and uh it ended up me up here which is crazy you know I've never dropped in it's always just been my my safe space for expression okay we were talking a little bit before the show before we started recording in this other career that you had oh no Well w embarrass you but I want to know I want to know when is the first moment this creative spark revealed itself to you where were you what you were doing what was it about there were so many little moments as a kid that I remember picking up on for example I remember being like 10 years old or so and some sometimes even younger but one specific moment is I was in the car with my family and we were driving somewhere I don't know stuck in traffic we were listening to Dr Dre's Chronic 2001 and I don't know what it was about it but the drums were hard and I remember just like not knowing what a kick drum was not knowing what a snare drum was and like just picking out oh this is a pattern it does D do do and I was like the other sound is doing c c like every so amount of times and that brought me so much joy I don't know why but I would like pick apart music and I would look out my window and you know as as all kids do and like imagine you're in a music video I would just be like oh this would be a great scene and from there it just became like my escape from like uh it's not like there was anything I needed to escape from but it just brought me into I guess that would be my version of daydreaming I wouldn't really think of myself doing things like most kids like they daydream about themselves living a dream but I would just think of you know just different scenes as if it was a music video or a movie and like how this song scores this scene that I'm watching right now I have so much to pull apart here forette the fact that you can listen how old are you at this time you think 2 you said 2002 2001 2001 okay so how old are you like 10 okay T yeah it's amazing because when we hear music or things we don't study we just hear all of it we can't break apart the layers like when I look at a a design a poster I can break up every single little part but somebody's like what are you looking at the fact that you're listening to this and you're starting to break apart the pieces is there a musical background here are your parents in music or did you study music I didn't study music but it's something that I've been drawn to my whole life my my uncle one of my uncles is really good at singing him playing the guitar and and also I'm Filipino so I grew up around karaoke since before I could even speak so it it runs in our Filipino blood to just be around music I'm not blessed with like a beautiful singing voice but I was just around it and um I don't know I think like inadvertently like it made it kind of just molded my musicality yeah no I never studied any of it okay we're going to dive in a little to the stereotypes a little bit here what is it with Filipino culture makes most of you not all of you really good at singing carrying tunes and being able to dance especially hip-hop and the swag and the style like what is it I don't understand it but I can appreciate it I don't know at all really I don't know I wish I did I wish I had some of it I wish I could come on you have I could dressing up is easy but like the talent and the skill to sing and dance like on any given moment like you could walk down like a karaoke bar in the Philippines of f disrespect any of those incredible Legends right but they're like God level good yeah I don't know what it is that's in the water but these people they're nuts so shout out the Philippines like I was born with with something not all of it not all of the musical ability but like it it's in here I just can't execute it 10 years old you're listening to the beat you can break it down you're dissecting it and then the first thing that you feel like you're having is you're visualizing what the music will look like now I've grown up mostly in California for my life and until someone exposes you to something you see things and you don't know that somebody did that you just assume it just happened I give you an example okay I'm a bit older than you I'm introduced to music videos through Friday Night videos because we didn't have cable we didn't have MTV or anything my cousin from La comes up and says hey it's Friday Night videos let's stay up and watch this and Michael Jackson's Thrill Is debuting on Friday Night videos I think and my head explodes I'm like or what is this art form and I know nothing about it but here you are 10 years old and you're like I'm visualizing the images that go with this I was at the I'm in the generation that already had TRL okay so like I had seen music videos so and I was like huge into to music as a kid like all my older cousins like put me on to to poac J C biggie all these folks so yeah I'd been exposed to it but like I I just you know when you ask like what is one of the first times you remember like my creative spark or my creative brain working it was then it was literally us driving across a bay bridge and I'd never forgotten it let's move forward in a timeline when does this manifest itself into a thing that might feel like a professional career for you oh man I'd say the delusional version of me I like that version probably I'd say 23 really yeah are we skipping over the music part oh um a little bit but like 23 because that's when I finally started getting paid for creative things I see what you're saying but because I I knew I wanted it to be a career but you know having Asian parents or going to um I went to a private school from kindergarten to n to 8th grade art was just an elective class right you know and I wanted to get into these great high schools wasn't smart enough or well on paper I wasn't um I was never that good at school so you know they would tell me like stop drawing stop making beats on your desk like none of that stuff is going to like that's not as important as learning fractions and inequalities and um you know algebra so it had been drilled into my head that it wasn't a real thing and then I started getting paid for it and I was like oh this might be able to be a thing so there there's like a huge gap from when I first you know from when it first entered me to uh when did I feel like I can make this a reality and and even even in 2022 I still felt like will I be doing this 20 years from now like it's it's tough like it's you know it's not easy you know it's like you're fighting I mean whether you're working in the corporate world or or not like you're always fighting for the spot you feel like you deserve so for the first time ever this year I was like oh I really do this okay that's heavy it's hitting me right now okay I want to unpack all that stuff I want to dive there but it's become a therapy session well I I love this man I I love how you're processing all this stuff because this is the thing I want to a lot of folks know you see somebody admire that's got hundreds of thousands of followers you think oh it was like ordained by some Supreme Being that this was your path and it was super clear and to hear you say it is not like a year and a half ago you're still thinking like is this am I supposed to be doing this is this the thing right cuz I was man I was 32 I was 32 with like $13 in my bank account actually I was like I need to sell this watch I need to sell this camera I yeah I mean like life hit me in so many ways that I didn't expect so even with you know having the accolades under my belt like whether things were Grammy nominated or you know award-winning I still don't know I as a creative you don't know what your future holds like and then I applied to jobs and then I didn't get a single interview I applied to 60 creative jobs and then non-creative jobs like I applied to like 60s something of them and I landed zero interviews and this is having had an extensive commercial career um music video career and it was like you're either overqualified or underqualified or we also just don't know you so yeah it was it's rough so yeah I I think when I was 23 I was like I want to do this as a career yeah but even and that's when I I dropped out of my dental program I was going to be a dentist so you know from then until I was making I mean I was living with my parents till I was 27 you know I would have been deemed as a loser as like the struggling artist for a long time um this is in the bay right this was in the bay okay so 27 from 0 to 27 you're with your parents yep the some of the Asian stereotypes are true the fact that you're still at home not on your career path didn't go to like whatever that that's got a weigh on you right do they make you feel this like Adrian you got to go do your thing yeah how did that manifest itself at the kitchen table wherever you would have conversations well my mom always believed that I was going to go hard at whatever I chose she was always like the um the push on my back like she is my spine and everything to this day I still do for her because of her um my dad at the time I didn't understand it but you know and I I think a lot of us kids of immigrant parents you need to understand this at some point we're going to have to forgive our parents for acting the way they did at us because I was very thankful like the last handful of years before my dad passed I was able to realize all of these things but at some point he didn't speak to me oh my God like he uh you know like it's it was just these people left their country yeah they could have had amazing lives completely automated they would have been comfortable they left their home country gave everything up struggled worked night and day and to resent them for whether it's not being there or being obset or temperament like sometimes I come home and I'm tired and I'm like oh I got to walk my dog I love my dog but I got to walk him right and I I if I do have a temperament like I can't blame any of that CU these people are busting their ass and to have a kid who became a high school dropout to have somebody who got FS across the board on their report card to you know getting caught drinking smoking you know dabbling with different drugs yeah I was the quintessential Asian disappointment that had this uh talent to make art or to express himself they came here with this dream of I want him to become the the family's Jewel like he will make us money all of these sacrif deves will pay off and you can't get there by not being in the medical field so yeah my dad didn't understand it and I don't blame him for that like it's something that I feel like a lot of Asian kids or Just Kids of immigrant parents need to understand like you can't fault them because like sometimes you come home from your job and you're just like if things aren't going right you won't know how to cope right and yeah it's like I was that Asian disappointment it was rough it was tough and somehow it worked somehow it all worked out and sometimes it doesn't work out you know but I'm here and he was able to see it yeah and um after leaving my parents house at 27 I gave myself 3 years in La I said I need to make it work cuz in three years I will be 30 if I am making $30 to $40,000 a year which I wasn't even doing at the time 2018 or 2019 on my um invoicing program my first year I think I made $1,000 okay right it with my silly little art I was Uber driving I was uh delivering food in my Prius the second year I think I made like 309,000 or something some progress there yeah yeah and I was like okay I'm about to be 30 I got to really figure this out and then boom it clicked so yeah I I just stayed here longer and and here I am thanks for sharing that if it's not too painful I I I want to go back to some things yeah you said that you're glad that you were able to kind of appreciate your upbringing before your dad passed yeah what was the feeling before what was it that made you realize the thing that you know now and and how did it change your relationship I'm glad that things worked out I'm glad that it started becoming a tangible career that he could see whether it was my work on TV on the internet like to see that and not understand how whether it's big Hollywood or the media world looks like I think that did it um it wasn't me convincing him like look what I've done this legitimizes it cuz sometimes you can show you know your immigrant parents this and they still don't understand so there was a a bit of understanding there for him that he had to do as well I don't know maybe him and my mom talked about it at some point but yeah like one day it just started to shift and and then I just got older and I just know I started to understand my own temperament like how tired I can be from work like and that man worked a lot you know whether we had a lot or a little like you know anybody who works 40 something hours a week will be tired yeah 40 or more right so I just matured enough to understand like you know there's no I don't to say there's no right or wrong way to parent there's definitely wrong ways apparent um yeah I just like matured enough to understand where it was coming from like I knew that this is not a path that anybody could have foreseen for any kid of first immigrant children right I think the thing that a lot of people need to understand is we can all be better parents because I'm I am one but that all parents whether good intentional or not are not perfect so we have to remove the standard of perfection as the bar in which they're all measured against cuz that's not possible that they're doing the best they can with what they know they have an operating system that's really outdated by what we're seeing and you'll be outdated too when you have kids because it's just the way the world Works things are moving paradigm shift and there's a whole generational Gap that's they put a term on that and they do that and if we could acknowledge that you know what they had limited resources and and their own upbringing shaped how they thought they did the best they could imperfect as it was and we can come to peace with that at least we can move the energy away from one of resent or anger or whatever other thing you're feeling and directed towards what we should be working on I think there's there's a positive outlet for that right for sure you know like a lot of our parents worked with a lot less than what we have and for all of us to feel like we're barely getting by imagine how they felt you know like dude like if if a lot of us in our 30s can feel like we're barely getting by and a lot of our parents had us in their 20s like dude that's a tough one yeah so it's something that we all kind of just have to have the self-awareness to understand and I was self-aware enough to understand that and and look past um you know the anger of uh me being this High School Dropout yo if my kid became this High School Dropout and said I want to uh do something that I probably didn't even know exists as a career I would be like uh dog what are you doing I want to catch dad I want to catch air you're like what yeah I want to package air and I want to sell air right right right yeah and you would have a probably what wait no not what right and I think at the end of the day most parents want us not to suffer to have a better life than they had and so when they see you suffering they don't know how to articulate that and just comes across as a lot of disappointment and judgment but I'm I'm just really happy for you that because you were able to come together at some point before it was too late yeah so I'm I'm just really happy for you about that thank you I I I'm like so happy that he got to be proud and like to see the fruits of his labor before he went and that you got to show him like there was an investment here it's working out and out to this day like you know my family is still able to reap the benefits of all his hard work yeah yeah I know I want to talk to you about the crazy amount of work that as far as I can see because I used to produce commercials the what you put into your videos on Instagram but we're going to get into that a little bit but it did surface on the internet somewhere rich found it this hip-hop well no we don't we do that it's available Maybe couple of bars there I'm like who is that guy I think he looks just like the guy I know but that is not the guy I know and there you are rapping doing your moves yeah uh what what tell me about that and how that leads us to where we are today like I said earlier like it all stemmed from music My First videos were music videos of my friends and myself and that's because I've just been so what is it what would the word be enamored by music it just been so fascinating it's like my euphoric little me Time Escape time so I just decided to try it out myself you know we're all guilty of having freestyle circles you know growing up as kids when you say we all I mean a couple of us oh you you've never done this no I no Rich Have You Are You Freestyle rapping with your circle shut up dude right no I I'm pretty sure most dudes out there most Filipino let's tighten that Circle a little bit but keep oh man okay I will some of us in our freestyle circles some them I'd say it's more than 50% of people will just freestyle randomly you know growing up in high school you know you like but at some point you just get bored enough and start freestyling okay well at least me and my friends did and I was like you know what my voice don't sound that bad and I mean it it probably did sound that bad but you know we just tried it anyways and that's through making my own music videos for myself and my friends actually led me to making my first music videos for actual musicians how old are you where are you doing this I believe I was I was 19 okay we were living in Daily City okay yeah right by San Francisco and yeah I just would set up a microphone in my um in my little bedroom studio and plug it into my I had an HP computer like just straight out the box that I bought from Best Buy for like $359 and I bought like this audio sound card I installed it in there myself and I would just download instrumentals from YouTube rip them they would still have like the tags on it and um it was just like another way for me to express myself the same way I would draw I'm not a painter or like I'm not Picasso or van go by any means but like I love just different ways to express myself but music came before any of this so you do music videos cuz you're you're kind of leaning into this directing and creation of visual storytelling and the music was just a way for you to practice your art yeah yeah yeah mainly okay okay I like that so if I move us forward in the timeline you said I'm G to move to LA I'm going to give my three years to make it why La of all places and what is making it sound like to you and that deal that you made with yourself it's just Hollywood is here you know the best of the best in the creative field that I wanted to be in was here you know at any given moment I'm like within 20 miles of the people that I look up to most and the thought of that is insane whether it's in the music space the the movie space the music video space I'm like y'all are we're all pretty much neighbors and to be in that energy is a wild thought it was motivating for me I had been down to La for work for probably 3 or 4 years prior to moving and I just knew it's where I needed to be to to grow my career and me making it you know I had big delusional dreams and I still do I still do they they keep me going you know whether it's winning Awards or you know people knowing my work or leaving an imprint on any creative community that inspires people but those are all things just to validate you know my ego right but to me making it at the bare minimum level was just to be comfortable to be happy doing what I'm doing to not burn myself out and you know right when I was around 28 going to 29 I was making like 30 something Grand and would that be deemed as successful no but I saw growth and I was happy with where I was at so I decided to keep going what is the point when you have like 13 dollars or I was going to say cents $13 in your bank account that was October of 2022 oh my God yeah okay I'm I'm trying to this is not long ago like 22 Yeah a fast forwarded version of that is I made like my first six figures and then it started growing you know I didn't understand taxes a lot so let's say I'm just going to put an arbitrary number that it isn't exact it doesn't exist okay I'm not rich by any means my good people um if I made 150 Grand I thought I had 150 Grand to spend I went and bought all the things I seen my favorite rappers wearing right I bought an iced out chain that had my initials I bought you know a Rolex not one but two why I don't know looking for validation in the wrong places I would wake up and buy a car if I didn't like it I would let it go like I and I did this for a couple years and then I'd saved up a decently healthy amount and then life happened where I had to pay for a lot of things and what it was really is like funerals are expensive you know Memorial services are expensive so when all these things started happening I was like damn I I got to liquidate my savings for taxes yeah for funeral services and at the end of it yeah I had $13 left in my checking account I was like all right I got to really figure it out which actually led me to making content just so people know and and what you're going through is pretty typical this is not crazy stuff you make money and you say you see the check for whatever amount let's say $10,000 you think you are now $10,000 richer yeah if you just think about the taxes you have to pay on that that number is already much lower and minimum 35% is out yeah I and I didn't know that and that's that's like a lot I'm sure there are programs and courses you can learn but nobody tells you this there's not a single business bank account that I know of that you can automate putting you know a certain percentage of savings if you're a content creator or a freelancer like I I don't want it to I don't want to know that that money exists because if I see that money exists I'm going to think I could spend it and I mean sure it could have been like my own responsibility to know this but like you don't really know when you're thrown into that much money like all of a sudden you think you yeah you just think you have it to spend like if I had only known or if there were like other ways it could have been solved or automated for me probably would have been a different story but no I was really really dumb and which ended me up being yeah I was $32 $13 a couple of Rolexes a nice ey Stout chain I was like this is so dumb like why do I have this here sitting in front of me in like three cars and I have $13 in liquid that's crazy what did you do to earn that money before you hit that point and when you're like $13 in oh I was uh so to get to that point I was running my production company um with my business partner he did the editing I did the directing we lived in two different places a lot of times and we grew it I was putting my name on all the music videos that I was directing and he would you know bring some different work in as well whether you know it was just post- production for him or you know me directing or us me producing something that he's directing and over time just saved it up didn't save enough of it but you know I saved it up and it was solely from creating okay this is like doing work for artists making videos for them yes for artists and Brands okay and and how was it your friend who got the work or was it you who went out and procured the work a lot of it a lot of it was me yeah um in the 2021 to 23 yeah a lot of it was me just going out and um making these connections with these people in LA and you know just a lot of convincing hey you should trust me like I know you work with a lot of really talented production companies and directors but let me do it and I would work with artists you know that I knew from around here and then I started working with artists from I guess on a global scale on an international scale and it helped we would gross a lot um like un unimaginable amounts but I just didn't save enough for myself and also you know just because you get as a production company or a director $100,000 budget does not mean you get $100,000 a $500,000 budget like you're going to be lucky if you see like um I don't know 10 grand 20 grand out of 50,000 at the very very end of it so yeah like while I was doing all that I was like this this is great This Is The Life and then you know I had seen what content creators were doing I was like oh there's a whole another world you're telling me the entirety of my budgets is what you're getting to make these brain deal videos that's insane I got to try that yeah see we live in good times right now right um where we can do something like this yeah it's crazy to think that what a brand will spend on a more Legacy style commercial Legacy Media style commercial some content creators getting paid the same amount just to make vertical selfie videos talking about a product I was like that can't be real and then I saw it I was like oh my God it's real so you know what pushed me to do it was knowing that it was real knowing that I had my back pushed up against a wall my manager who's my manager now he was like you have the skill you should try it you know my my girlfriend would tell me a lot like you've been talking about trying to make content for years like give it a shot all of these led into you know and also one of my best friends a lot of people were saying you should give it a shot you have nothing you literally have nothing much left to lose and I I went for it real quick before I forget this video is brought to you by us the future are you ready to Kickstart your creative career and build a business doing what you love whether you're just starting out or you're switching careers are starting something new with Decades of experience we can help accelerator is your fast track to building a killer portfolio and Landing those dream clients you'll get training and experience on everything from lead generation and building your network to closing the sale and project management with over 100 video lessons weekly coaching and personalized feedback from the future team you are never alone an accelerator want to learn more about the coursework community and coaching you'll get as an accelerator member get all the details at the future / accelerator we'll see you there all right let's get you back to the video I want to take you back to that point in which you said I would go out I would go to events or something and I would convince folks that sounds like there's a there's a whole thing to unpack there can you can you share like a an example a moment or a story about how you did that I'm an introvert I don't know are you an introvert I don't like being outside okay so you have to get out of your own skin to go to an event and then you have to do something that's even harder than going outside which is you have to go talk to people and then you have to convince them to work with you take me through like how you might do that because there's going to be a lot of filmmakers creatives in there like Chris why didn't you ask Adrian how he did it yeah so here I am asking how you did it so Talent is the base level right it sounds cliche it sounds obvious but we're all capable of doing great things yeah the thing that will separate us from everybody is our soft skills like the hard skills is making it the soft skills is how easy of a person are you to work with um are you moldable for the job are you willing to you know it's just the grittiness that it takes to to work in this field and all of those things you know they will vet you on whether it's a conversation at the bar or a video conference call and showing up understanding that I need to remove my ego from this as just a creative to I am just a cog in the entire machine has helped me navigate that whole convincing process cuz at the end of the day it is a job if we want to go create art we should go create art and express ourselves freely by our own passion projects but if you're working for Nike and they have this Big Brand campaign they want you to direct you can't just come in there making this commercial that doesn't feel like a Nike commercial like it just doesn't work that way I mean there are bits of you that you should inject and can inject but overall like I know a lot of creatives get frustrated that they're told you know bring your creative approach to this and then we need to make revisions on revisions it's just understanding that I need to deliver for the brand more than I need to deliver for myself and if I want to deliver for myself I have my own passion projects for that it's just an exchange that I feel like people should pay more attention to just understanding that I know artists are very uh guilty of like thinking that the creative the creative for any project revolves around them and their ideas and when I started I don't want to say letting people know that I was about the project more than I was about myself I don't know I feel like it was an energy that you can feel like I wasn't in this to just get my creative off I was like let's make a great product something that this brand is proud of something that this AR artist is proud of and I would assume that they felt that so they hired me for these things I totally appreciate that perspective a lot of people need to understand this when you want to create work for yourself that's great you should do that and that's something about your your own ego or some Vision you have you do that the minute you involve collaborators it becomes much more than just what you want yeah and it's a maturing that creatives go through so they can be go from an independent artist to being a successful commercial artist and that's kind of really important you can write crazy songs for yourself but if people don't want to play it they don't want to buy your records it's going to be a tough thing to sustain yourself right right so you realize that but I'm just curious like really like when you're in that room like an event or party screening I don't know where you are when you're doing this how do you strike up that conver well how does that conversation begin and how do you transition into yeah give me a shot I won't let you down I would read the room first and the vibe like I think there's a an appropriate and inappropriate time to do things but when it was appropriate I would just let them know yo I'm a fan of your work and what you're doing this is what I do uh if is any place you feel like I could help your entire Vision or or your message like I would love to see if there's a way that we can work on something and we would exchange emails or phone numbers and you know it would just be a little conversation like oh yeah tell me about the things you've done like what do you think that we've done that you could put yourself into and I would just talk it out be like okay well I see this thing here that I like and if I were to do it I would do it this way um and we would just you know it would just go from there it would just and that's also something that people need to practice it's just the social skills and being confident in yourself while also allowing the other person to speak that's something I've learned along the way that's just become invaluable I love the way you explained that because it felt so natural it felt so real a lot of times people think that the way you get business is maybe you saw something on TV and you act like that that's not the way it's done right it came from a place of genuine appreciation and saying I know enough about what you're doing and if they're if invited to that dialogue you're like here's a couple of things I've noticed and letting that play out the way it plays out you know just doing it in a way where you're not attacking what this brand or artist is already doing it's like just letting him know like hey like in this music video I saw he did this but how about like next time let's try this idea you know let me know what you think about it and it wouldn't it just wouldn't be invasive so you know somebody could look at you and it's like this guy's going to come at me with his attitude his style and not going to care but what you're saying sounds completely different like you can look a certain way and have a ethos but then your heart shows cuz you're like I would love to help you if it makes sense that's all it is right I think that's what a lot of us Freelancers should understand too like we have the talent and skill that we've done through our own art to get to this place to make it a profession when it becomes a profession like our whole job is really to serve whether it's an album cover whether it's a music video or a commercial to sell pasta we're serving something through our skill yeah and I let that be known I let it be apparent like I want to help make a great product you're getting paid a lot of money to do content branded content you're also making money through Production Services yeah I was just like yeah I gu I'd say it's a lot yeah yeah I mean relative it's Everything's Relative everybody right you're not a Michael Bay budget but you're getting a budget that you're like this is cool I get to do this right yeah what is the mix between doing your own work as a brand as an influencer versus commercial work as a production company there breakdown before I started making content was 100% just work for hire 0% my own personal brand everything that I would post as my own personal brand was the work that I was doing as a professional and then when I started doing my own content I'd say now it's about 10% production company work working with other you know just like work for hire for my production company and I'd say 80% of my own content that just lives out there personal content passion projects and the other 10% is uh brand Partnerships where I through my personal brand I'll work with you know a a brand to to do some sort of integ okay yeah that's an interesting mix I didn't think it would be like that so 10% you do commercial work for others in service of their projects and their brands and then 10% is you're getting paid to do your thing but for Brands yeah 80% of your time just spent doing you m do you make money doing your stuff or that's just for you that's just for me yeah okay I just want to make sure I spend money doing my stuff that's a money losing that's where I go red um but I believe in it I believe in my art and I mean that's what it takes you know and I am lucky enough to have that Runway to do these things and you know hopefully a brand sees the things that I do for myself and say hey he represents our mission statement or our brand well let's pay him to integrate ourselves within his own personal content as you know a paid partnership I do all those things and hopefully it happens and if it doesn't that's okay as well I will always have my production company but it's happening now and I'm grateful for it I knew it existed but it's just like I never thought I'd be in a place where these brands that I'm huge fans of and that i' would buy on a daily basis would be like hey we like your stuff can we you know work with you or collaborate with you I was like you're going to pay me to do something I would have done anyways what yeah let's do it I'm I'm just going to share a little story and some information feel free to share what you want no no pressure on your part my attorney who I met because the very first years in business I got sued for some kind of copyright problem oh no not my fault but you know there we are so I've known him now for almost 30 years and so he's seen this Arc from being a commercial artist service provider to being I think I don't think he understands what we do but he's like wait and how much did they pay you wait I don't even understand this because he's he knows about our business he's in the business himself s so I got paid $140,000 to work with a tech company and it was kind of not like a selfie video but it was not on my iPhone wow I edit it myself and I'm thinking back in the day you know they'd pay you 100 grand for a music video an entire music video freaking and you spend most of the money if not all of it on producing it as a director you only get 10% and you cut into that trying to make it a better product yeah cuz you're like I want to make sure it's a great yeah thing for the artist because I love them so much yeah he when I first told him about this he couldn't get his head even wrapped around like what I'm like me neither what kind of dream world are we living in and I understand this because I've been in the business for a long time there's the budget to produce the video or commercial and then there's the media buy so they're actually getting a huge bargain because what they're doing is they're buying not only your Production Services but they're buying your distribution yeah so the larger you're following the larger the engagement the viewership that's what they're buying yeah so they're getting actually a great deal so more brand should support artists and they're going to have a much more effective delivery vehicle for someone that people trust and like and the message is authentic yeah I agree I think it's just a beginning you know I I was lucky enough to go to can lion this year and I heard all of these Brands talk about it and it's just the beginning I think it's a a really effective use of their ad dollars I will talk to you a little bit in the time remaining here about your process I look at the things do it doesn't look like you could shoot it by yourself and you can tell me otherwise cuz there's all these creative angles unless you're running around setting crazy things that's exactly what I'm doing is it you're just doing it yourself the car mount or what oh my God okay I have to rephrase the question then there seems to be a high effort into making a very specific type of film and I appreciate I recognize that I do not have that kind of energy to do that tell me a little bit about your creative process and how you actually pull these things off the things that I'm seeing that are just done for you yeah so my creative process A to Z starts with you know it's going to be I'm going to break it down really simple y'all it's the ideation process a lot of that comes from whether it's driving or listening to music um I'm drawn to a feeling and if this song invokes A Feeling or a thought I write it down then I'll usually pick a song to write to like an instrumental that I like and I use for all the brand Partnerships of course I don't use any copywritten music it's all royaltyfree but because I'm just uploading it on my own channels without you know it's not getting I'm not getting paid for it I'll pick like a a Jay-Z song or something I'll write my concept to that beat like a like a rapper embarrassingly enough like the together it's coming right together like I said in the beginning it's um it all stems from from music yeah I'll write my script to it and then I'll put the shots to it so I'll break it down like here I can actually show you what it looks like I could also show the camera so for this there's this concept I have called creative paralysis and I have my script here right here and it says this is for every creative who comes up with a million grade ideas but fails to do any of them that's one sentence but I'll break it up into two shots one where it's a profile shot a wide shot of me as a profile and I'm looking down at something I'm writing and then I'll go from this angle and then I'll look forward but fails to do any of them I'll complete the sentence and I'll just break it up between wide shot closeup medium shot and I do all this before I go out and film basically my edit is done before I go out and shoot anything which is something I call the paper edit yeah and then I'll go out I'll do by shoot day come back inest the footage and I just drag the song in which I've already I know exactly what parts of the song I'm going to use and it's just plug-and playay from there people think it takes a long time I think it to it takes a long time to get to the point to know your own taste and what you're looking for that's something you have to refine over years but since I know that it's like I'm just dragging and dropping things into place I look at my shot list I look at my script and because I'm I filmed it like you know 45 minutes ago I just put them all in the place that it needs to be and it's done you want to say something I want to make a comment because I know a lot of people who follow you including myself it does seem like a lot of work because of the volume that you put out you know what I'm saying so it looks like whatever he put out 30 days of Instagram reals for you is like two years for someone like me so it's the time that looks quantity that you're putting out regularly that makes it seem like wow this is an insane amount of work thank you I spent a lot on pre-production which helps my post-production and my filming be super effective and streamlined if it wasn't for me doing my planning I wouldn't be able to Output as much as I do yeah literally if I took something that I filmed and sent anybody my shot list and script with the music anybody would be able to edit it just as fast I think yeah you're working like a director yeah if you had to submit this to a client to approve and you got it all worked out we know day is expensive and very short so you got to get your shots you want to get your coverage and so you know you're you're kind of editing and writing in your mind because you know what you're doing through your experience right yeah okay I mean I even think of a dumb things like he's got to go over there and hit the record and come back here and get in the car and then look I do go through those things and that's painful I just try to do dumb you you'll laugh but I thought hey I'll try a weird hook where I'll walk into the camera and then I'll say something but the walking into the camera makes me forget what the hell I want to say oh I still go through that to this day yeah all right so seven takes later I'm like screw the walk in the camera I'm just going to say it's to camera now because that's as much creativity has got for for them right now so I really do admire whether you do with the team or by yourself even more by yourself that you're going to go through that okay let me set this up I hope I'm in Focus okay focus check the lighting exposure get back in the car pretend like it's not not thing and you do your thing that's one shot yeah I think because I don't use that much gear I actually have a LoveHate relationship with gear I just want a camera that works and that's good for that specific job I am not married to a single type of camera yeah if the focus is on point and I don't like you know I use all autofocus um I don't use any lighting I just go out there and and I the lights good frame y and and I I also think it's easier to do it by yourself I think it's less embarrassing to do it by yourself because you mess up nobody's there to laugh at you you know um nobody's there to judge you you know if somebody decided to Shadow me for an entire day of filming they'd probably be like wow okay he actually really sucks at this and then they see it put together yeah they're like there's no way he got that out of what he was filming yeah it's actually such a painfully uh it's a painfully messy process cuz I'm not trained to be an actor so I'm just looking at my script and usually it takes me I don't know 5 Seconds to forget exactly what I looked at yes and then halfway through saying it I got to look at it again yeah um and it happens to this day I just it just gets easier because I've done it so much but it hasn't helped my memory recall you know that's just something that I'm going to have to deal with forever so you're recording the audio live to the camera you're not doing post no I I record I wear a little lav microphone right here sometimes you could see it yeah um but yeah know I I like recording actual it's kind of like U are you familiar is it Dogma rules for filming do you know what I'm talking about there's a there's a rule that a certain group of filmmakers signed on back in the day only available a lighting you can manipulate the scene and and we're going to make films like this to get into the spirit of making films and not getting caught in production so available light yeah you can't manipulate the scene so if that's there you can't move that around you have to frame around it that's cool I got to look that up now yeah I think it's Dogman something what is it called that's crazy it's really it's a really strip down no superficial action handheld camera this in case you can't because you got a it's just a oneman deal but you're very close to Dogma rules there but even as a director you know working with a lot of big artists and Brands like I'm very much like that as well I don't like overshooting I like shooting for the edit I don't need to do a bunch of different takes for safety if I feel like we got it we got it let's move on I like getting coverage and I like being efficient there's a lot of reason why a lot of directors do get a bunch of safety shots but I've never been that type yeah like I don't like beating something to death yeah yeah yeah well you know what you want you've already worked it out in your mind it's going to work yeah that's a sign of maturity and experience and I like I appreciate the economy of film making it's like very much Clint Eastwood style right he doesn't do extra takes oh I didn't know that oh yeah they're like can we do another he's like nope we're moving on that's crazy I I know Christopher Nolan does that a lot he's one of my favorite directors and I know like when they were filming Oppenheimer like he wouldn't even look back at the footage at his uh DP shot he'd be like oh if you think we got it we're good let's go yeah and I'd be the same way I'm like all right I trust you when you say I trust you you're saying I trust me oh if I'm talking to like a cinematographer oh okay I see what you're saying yeah yeah like I'm hiring you because you're way better at this than I am and if you think we got the take and I feel like the you know our talent gave it what it needed like let's go like we don't need to do it two other times or extra angles like keep going I think it'd be funny if you did a video I don't know if you've done it already where you turn around like we got it and you're talking to yourself we got it yeah I I actually have I've done some bloopers you have it's it's just us we got it right the royal yeah I just talk to myself a lot like I think this is good yeah I hope it's good I think it's really neat that we started a story with you talking about when you're 10 years old listening to something from Dre and understanding the beats and Imagining the visuals that leading you into maybe rapping and creating videos and now you're not rapping but it's you're writing words in your mind and telling a story that way because I I all of my content I talk locked into a tempo actually so the song dictates the speed of which I talk like I I am not going out there not knowing the speed I'm talking dude that's crazy yeah yeah so like I'll listen to the song right and if I I pull it out on my phone I'll be like okay this is the BPM that we're talking at I need to make sure I'm talking in this pocket and even if I need to switch songs you know I I need to find songs that fit this this Tempo which is probably like I don't know 92 BPM or something um that's what I was thinking 92 BPM yeah feels it feels a little faster than 90 slower than 100 yeah um yeah it sits in the pocket I could get that is insane bro so there's a lot of there's a lot of formulaic sence that I've done whether it's framing right like there's a method that I use also in in portrait framing uh horizontal you have the rule of thirds but when you're filming vertical you don't really get the same rule of third you know framing so it's a line straight down the middle and I thought a lot of people think that you need to look straight into the camera and your eyes need to be equidistant from the center line when really some of the most captivating paintings and photos the lead eye is in the center of the frame right down the middle which draws your eyes to whoever's speaking or posing more than if it were to be completely symmetrical those are things that I think about okay I'm rewatching your reals later yeah no there's there's a lot of little bits in that that I do do which if we were to talk about this this would be like a 10hour conversation but yeah there's a lot of Dynamics in a song like when I let things hit like after after every four bars like there will be like a switch like a Fast Cuts before a long cut I let things ride out you know with the beat I let things get fast with the beat um so many of it is is music driven I know what our next video is going to be Adrien breaks down his most popular videos and we just stare at them and you talk and you draw over it that would be so fun I think that we always wanted to do that but I would never knew how to do it we'll figure it out that'd be sick we'll totally figure it out okay before we get out of here I want to talk a little bit about your personal style what informed this aesthetic can you can you let us know a little bit because there's a lot of folks out there friends of mine mostly who say Chris I I don't know what to do with this this being what they wear so they wind up looking like J crew so as as a man who's got a lot of personal style there tell me about what you're putting together what inspires it in any kind of takeaways and thank you but you as well like I know when I'm looking at you and how you dress like I think it's important you know it's just another way to express ourselves I don't I don't think it's a make or break thing but I think it helps for you know recognizing how somebody expresses himself and like you know that this is is just part of their brand you know like I am such a fan of hip-hop you know I would watch forel Through The Years really really big influence on me um Kanye and The College Dropout days huge influence on me and also just living in the Bay Area um we wear our beanies a certain way yeah we uh do things a little different we don't wear the same things that folks in New York are um which both are incredible but it just comes from being a product of my environment and the things that I consumed and it's just yeah it's just another way to to show who I am really uh I don't put that much thought into it I just wear things that I like and there frustrate guys like him like you just come out and it just works right but keep going keep going yeah it's just um you know I I don't I mean it's it's changed over the years like I liked showing you know which brands I'm wearing to now I just like showing I don't want to say not showing Brands but like I've matured out of being very loud and kind of just yeah just buying the things that I like versus what I think other people would like on me what is your next guilty Indulgence purchase cuz you mentioned getting Iced Out things and are you do you have something in mind I just I'm just CU it's just personal I'm actually about to go do that right after this but I'm not that guy I'm I'm buying a new little camera like the little DJI osmo yeah should I feel guilty about it yes and no no it's I feel gu spending a dollar do you yeah this a reform Adrian here this is like well it's because I'm still not far enough removed from having almost no money yeah so that everything that I have right now like I tell my manager this all the time like when he says oh we're we're doing this brand deal for this amount of money I'm like that's insane yeah like but it also feels like so arbitrary like back in the day I would while out I would buy dumb things yeah um but no no I just spend a lot of money on food but no I don't think I'm I'm um I don't plan on buying anything irresponsible okay I bought a motorcycle actually uh a couple months ago a few months ago it just like in Falls like here it is boom that's the most recent one that I did okay but um in the Future No I'm trying to save up to to buy a home which is going to take a lot out of me in a couple years a few years live in LA maybe a handful of years but um no I have to really limit the frivolous spending in order to get there last before we get out of here what's it like to be highlighted or featured from Instagram CEO I mean that's incredible yo one morning I woke up and I seen a bunch of folks tag me and they're like look at this I got text they're like dude the CEO of is it CEO or is it the head of Instagram the CEO okay they're like I seen the CEO of Instagram highlight my profile wild that was like even to this day I don't think I fully processed how crazy that is I'm incredibly honored I'm flattered and it's just like for the person who runs the platform on the platform that changed my life for them to notice is crazy yeah it's like if the what's if Colonel Sanders the the guy who runs KFC like if he found out that I love KFC I'd be flattered or any of these things right if it's just an insane feeling and I still don't think I've processed it enough I responded I was like I'm insanely honored like you're a real person this is this is nuts M yeah I mean I also take it the way I take my losses I think that's why I haven't processed it MH um I try not to get too hyped on any award or Accolade um which it's a it's a double-edged sword but you know with that specific moment it's as a Creator on that platform to have somebody like that know that I exist is just I would have never thought when I first started this journey I was like there's no way you know and and I woke up and it was just like shocked yeah I still am shocked but it all goes goes back to like if a video doesn't do well I kind of feel the same way I'm just like I don't really process it I just keep going yeah I think that's the healthiest way to do this it's a long long journey well I want to thank you for doing this for keeping it real uh for sharing some personal stories and allowing us in on your journey I for people who want to look you up or follow you where should they go yeah you can just follow me on any of the platforms At OMG Adrian OMG a d r i a again beautiful beautiful thanks so much man of course man it was awesome dude I could have talked for hours yeah we will