How I actually learned all of this
and what I actually paid for it
I had no idea what I was doing.
Hey there, colleagues!
Quick thing before we get to the juicy part. In my last email i shared quite valuable stuff about my gear and I believe due to high dosage of links it went down to promotions. Well, it wasn’t a promotion at all. So, If you missed it- don’t forget to check your promotions box.
Okay, here goes…
People often assume there was some kind of structured plan behind how I learned all of this. There wasn’t. Some things I figured out myself, mostly because I had no other option and, obviously, because I’m incredibly witty and smart 😂. I learned the basics of editing in Final Cut, Sony Vegas, and CapCut just by clicking around and watching other people’s videos. The same goes for filming. I didn’t really understand composition at the beginning. I just copied what looked good. I followed creators like nordic_scott and a few others on Instagram and tried to replicate their angles and movements without fully understanding why they worked.
At that stage, I genuinely thought I would always shoot on my phone and edit in CapCut. It was simple, fast, and most importantly, not stressful. Almost immediately, I realized I wanted better quality. And that meant learning how to use a proper camera, switching to more advanced editing software, and getting into color grading. All of that sounds intimidating when you have no idea what you’re doing, and while you can learn it on your own over time, I didn’t feel like waiting.
So I bought a course from Al Dante, they mainly create food videos, but of a very good quality. It cost five thousand dollars. A New Year’s gift to myself, which is either a bold investment or a questionable life decision, depending on your perspective. There were cheaper options, but I specifically wanted feedback form the mentor.
I went through the course quickly, and somewhere along the way, something shifted. I stopped being afraid of the camera, DaVinci Resolve stopped looking like a cockpit, and even the color grading tab became manageable. Because most of the difficulty isn’t in the tools themselves, it’s in the hesitation before you start using them.
Next time, I’ll tell you a story about a brand that built its entire business on never replying late — and then proceeded to ghost me with the dedication of a performance artist.
Consider this your warning.
Warmly,
Al Shogenov.
