How do you fit spearfishing, Thundercats, surfing, skimboarding, van life adventures and a Great White shark into one video?
Firstly assign yourself to spending absolutely hours sitting in front of a computer. Once you’ve sorted that then get to work. Work I did and here is the result
I struggled a little bit with this episode as there was just so much content and I’m looking at a little change to the series too!
Stay tuned and I will see you at the beach!
-Sam
I’ve never really been much of a numbers man. When it comes to social media, I can’t be bothered playing the game. It’s just not me.
What I do focus on is being consistent and producing solid content, which I feel I do.
Here’s some stats! At the time of writing I have 771 subscribers on my main channel and 696 on my second channel. Engagement is much higher on my vlog channel but views (thanks to a few videos kicking along) are much higher on the main. Currently I’m doing about 24000 views a month which is nice. A long way from making big dollars off ads but it’s a start.
What the hell does this all mean? It means with recent changes to YouTube monetisation has been removed from the smaller channels. You now have to have 1000 subscribers and over 4000 watched hours in the last year. This is the new goal. I don’t usually press people to subscribe as it all happens organically but right now I am advertising this point as well as bribing you to do so. Find out below
So there it is. A goal of mine that I would love your help achieving. Also watch some of the videos, I upload often and I think you’ll like them.
Thank you for your support and I hope you win some stuff 😉
See you at the beach!
-Sam
Whenever I ask this question it usually gets one of two responses. The first and by far the most common, painfully boring, mundane and uninspiring is “not much, just work”, or very similar. Then add how busy you are. Choice bro.
The less common and considerably more interesting goes more like this. So much man, been shooting Thundercats, diving (been getting some good fish too), skimming, the boat’s running again, clocked up a fair few km’s in the van, Been up north a few times, had an epic dive out West, swam with a Great White, ticked over two years without an alcoholic drink, ate some fantastic food (incl a BBQ on 90 mile), there’s been waves and I’m off down White Island again this weekend.
Here in New Zealand we don’t like that sort of response. We don’t like people who talk about themselves. Sorry but it’s been bloody hectic to be honest. There’s a Winter chill in the air so we have to cram as much into the next wee while before it gets cold. Then the same thing happens, it’s just colder ha.
Seeing I haven’t done an update blog post in a little while, here’s a clip from last week that you will enjoy if you’re into free range food
I will touch on the weather now. Shit it’s been difficult to get. Seems to be really nice… Or really not nice. Saturday was more of the latter but we were out there
On another note I’ve been trying to sell some of my merch. Not only do I want to sell it, I want to expand the product line and get really stuck in so if you’re on the hunt to rock some branded goodies then get to my online shop!
Lastly all the things I mentioned up top have happened lately incl the Great White part so if you need to catch up then get along to my main YouTube channel as well and my vlog channel!
As always, I will see you at the beach!
-Sam
Being fairly new to spearfishing I haven’t really got around too much yet. After diving White Island last week I have now realised that I must in fact, get around some more.
Good viz, plenty of fish and a good couple crew of guys. Check the video below for the details.
220m of water, one log and one Kingfish already in the boat.
This guy was trying to score himself a feed.
This blue water!
Friendly little guys these Mau mau. Tasty too.
Just a Helicopter parked on an active volcano.
When a school rolls through and you’re armed with nothing but a camera.
Big bug!
Day 1 transport.
There’s a tiny little fish on the right of this frame. It was trying to hide from the bigger bait fish. It’s a eat or be eaten kind of world.
That’s it for this post. As I want to cover it far more extensively I will be making another trip!
Cheers to all the guys I went with!
See you at the beach.
-Sam
The road to self employment is a piece of cake and everyone should do it.
Now that I have your attention I will come clean, That first line isn’t true. For most anyway.
Self employment for me is about a dream. Not just a boring business that I copy and paste a how to from others. It’s about creating what I view is my dream life and living each day as I want to. This isn’t at all easy.
Last week we shot to the Far North to help my parents with their little slice of rocky roaded self eployment. You can find Saturday here
They have had easily enough of their own problems incl that big shed burning down but boy, what an amazing process for the produce.
Sunday morning we were up and looking to score a feed (thumbnail hints as to how it went)
Back to self employment. As far as my dream goes, in my mind I want to go skim, surf, spear, run my brand and shoot content all day.
The complications arise when you actually have to make a few bucks from these things because life is expensive. One thing I’ve always had from the start is product to sell and I’m always looking to expand this. Selling is hard but when it’s your own product but boy, it’s satisfying. Anytime someone wants to fork out their hard earned cash on something I made makes the pursuit of the dream worth it!
Producing content is much harder than selling product as it requires far more of my time invested, for much less income. If I wasn’t so passionate about it, I wouldn’t be doing it. For some reason I love it!
Oh and on a sales orientated pitch you can sign up to my mailing list here.
On that note, I will see you at the beach!
-Sam
As of the 22nd of October I’ve lived in a van. Before I get into this blog post here is the video from moving week
Before you gasp and ask the obvious questions I will post some obvious answers.
It’s not a tiny van, I can stand up.
I park mainly up at my shed space where I run my business from.
It’s not that difficult to find a toilet.
Solar or borrowed shower. I’m still working on a really solid option here.
Yes it helps me save a lot of money.
I don’t have a move out date.
To be perfectly honest as of right now, this is one of the best things I have ever done. The van isn’t quite finished but I’m chipping away at it. It doesn’t make me feel uncomfortable at all but it does make me feel warm, happy and freeeeee. Which is great!
So where to from here? Well I’m essentially rebuilding my business at the moment. The hardest thing I feel has been the volume of equipment i ave from boat stuff, van stuff, skimboards, surfboards, dive ear, print gear, you get the picture.
Overall I’m feeling super stoked on this and would encourage anyone out there thinking about it, to seriously look into it! I can’t wait to make some proper road trips happen very soon. Will keep the updates coming as I make progress.
See you at the beach!
-Sam
What do we need to survive? Food, water and sleep. Yeap that’s about it.
What do we need to keep us happy and “sane”? Well that’s different for everyone. I myself need to go away, I need to get cold, I need to see things, I need to do the things I love to do. Without these things I don’t know what would happen.
Last weekend we went away with a beauty but cold forecast. To be honest I had kind of glossed over how cold it was forecast to be. Saturday we were greeted by a stiff Southerly breeze, skim exploration and some fun but disappointing diving
Sunday we woke with more than a little frost on the ground. This meant for a freezing night in the tent, my four blankets did their job but oh baby it was cold
This is what I love. Getting away, looking at stuff with no real commitments other that to go enjoy yourself and feed your soul. Plus those post dive showers are amazing!
See you at the beach!
-Sam
It’s taken me a long time to work out my direction with my business.
From starting making skimboards in 08, which sold quite well. Expanding a bit into screen printing and finally making some effort to expand my future in the content creation world.
You see when you have so many things on the go it’s hard to get anywhere.  I like too many things so when one thing is going well I want the others to which I feel tends to take away from the momentum of  thing that was working. Put simply 10 10’s don’t make 100. Basically what this means as of late is that I’ve had to make a few decisions as to my future and I feel the photography and videography is where I’m heading.
The areas I’m focusing on are the boating and marine industry, golf and lastly, shooting all the stuff I enjoy shooting. The dream of making an outdoors based show is being put at the end of the list of priorities.
I’ve been on a few projects lately which have fitted the bill nicely. That has of course been a couple of videos for a local business supporting Emirates Team New Zealand. Below is a vlog or behind the scenes from one of the videos
You can check the videos on full on the Matakana Botanicals Facebook page.
As for the future I know what I’m targeting, how to “get it out there” and most importantly I’m feeling focused on it!
Phew! Time to get to work.
See you at the beach!
Sam
Do swim. Do skim. Do surf, dive, spear, fish, explore, adventure, learn, bleed and live.
Do go do something new and get uncomfortable.
Do try, eat well, drink lots of water and get fit.
Last Sunday involved some epic doing in and around the water (as usual)
Monday into Tuesday was more about sales and I DO need to sell a few
Don’t wait and wonder. Just don’t.
Do start. Do go!
See you at the beach!
-Sam
