Wooden Potatoes is creating Gaming Videos
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Hello everybody! My name is "Wooden Potatoes" and you probably know me because of the daily gaming content I produce on YouTube or (recently!) Twitch.tv!
For the past three years I've been attempting to make a living covering some of my favorite video gaming franchises, creating high-quality and comprehensive let's plays for the games I love, as well as providing a home for consistent news and discussion on the Guild Wars franchise.
Earlier in the year, when I started accepting donations, patreon was brought up. Since that time I've had many thoughts on the website, and think I can offer some really awesome stuff to those who are supporting me. So let's talk about my reasons!
Reason 1. Visibility for Donators
There has always been one major problem for me when it comes to donations - Every time someone has done it, sure I've been able to invest that money in worthwhile places, but what do people get on an individual level? That's what I want to fix! With Patreon you will at least be visible to me and all others, easy to contact and there will be some sweet other benefits to boot.
That's not all. What I do is fun and rewarding, yes, but it doesn't offer me too much in terms of a livelihood. The truth is, donations have mostly dried up - with just a few dedicated people out there trying to keep me afloat. As well as rewarding them, the idea here is to encourage something more consistent. Which moves me on to reason #2..
Reason 2. Moving out
In 2012 I quit my job working in IT and training in business consultancy. A real career! And a job I was fairly good at, too. Given the success of "WoodenPotatoes" at the time, I decided I could either quit and give video production a shot, or spend the rest of my life wondering "What if". I don't regret the decision I made.
However, in the three years since, I've been with my family, living on cheap rent and earning less than minimum wage. While very happy - my life is basically "on hold", and there are only so many years you can keep that up. I do want a change.
That's where Patreon comes in. Not only may I be able to do this for a living, but I'll be able to make better stuff while I'm at it! That brings me handily to the topic of..
Reason 3. The Lore series
Many of you will be familiar with the immensely popular series of videos I produced explaining Guild Wars 2's lore. It hasn't been in production for almost two years now, and one important reason for this is the difficulty of working with artists I cannot pay.
The series was produced before by members of the community who made art as nothing more than a favor and on their own time. While a lovely thing for them to do, it also introduced considerable micromanagement. Often I would use a group of people for a single video - with meetings about ideas, deciding who made what, deadlines, quality checks and so on. As I've expanded into making more content, this is time I no longer have.
Should this campaign do well, I can look into paying artists for their work. This cuts away the problems. It means higher quality art made by less people and produced more consistently. It was always hard to enforce deadlines on people who, in the end, were just helping me out for free - I'd like a better way of doing it!
Reason 4. YouTube Isn't Perfect
Those watching me for a long time will have heard my complaints about youtube compression and video quality. With a high-motion game like Guild Wars 2 being uploaded at 1080p60fps, I unavoidably lose a lot of detail on my uploads!
If people are supporting me, I can pay for online storage and allow the bigger contributors to get direct access to my content! At last people will see the work as I wanted them to see it. Those Patrons would be getting:
1. Higher quality content
2. Advertisement free content, and
3. Early content! That YouTube processing is no joke. And this means getting the videos - every day- a lot earlier than everyone else.
That's all!
If you made it this far, thank you very much for the consideration. It sincerely means a lot. Should monthly payments turn you off, I do have a link for one-off donations here:
http://tinyurl.com/lk8rpr6
I haven't gone into this campaign looking to create some insane, multi-tiered advertising campaign to get as much money as possible - I'm just looking for some help to, well, get out on my own and make better stuff for you all.
For the past three years I've been attempting to make a living covering some of my favorite video gaming franchises, creating high-quality and comprehensive let's plays for the games I love, as well as providing a home for consistent news and discussion on the Guild Wars franchise.
Earlier in the year, when I started accepting donations, patreon was brought up. Since that time I've had many thoughts on the website, and think I can offer some really awesome stuff to those who are supporting me. So let's talk about my reasons!
Reason 1. Visibility for Donators
There has always been one major problem for me when it comes to donations - Every time someone has done it, sure I've been able to invest that money in worthwhile places, but what do people get on an individual level? That's what I want to fix! With Patreon you will at least be visible to me and all others, easy to contact and there will be some sweet other benefits to boot.
That's not all. What I do is fun and rewarding, yes, but it doesn't offer me too much in terms of a livelihood. The truth is, donations have mostly dried up - with just a few dedicated people out there trying to keep me afloat. As well as rewarding them, the idea here is to encourage something more consistent. Which moves me on to reason #2..
Reason 2. Moving out
In 2012 I quit my job working in IT and training in business consultancy. A real career! And a job I was fairly good at, too. Given the success of "WoodenPotatoes" at the time, I decided I could either quit and give video production a shot, or spend the rest of my life wondering "What if". I don't regret the decision I made.
However, in the three years since, I've been with my family, living on cheap rent and earning less than minimum wage. While very happy - my life is basically "on hold", and there are only so many years you can keep that up. I do want a change.
That's where Patreon comes in. Not only may I be able to do this for a living, but I'll be able to make better stuff while I'm at it! That brings me handily to the topic of..
Reason 3. The Lore series
Many of you will be familiar with the immensely popular series of videos I produced explaining Guild Wars 2's lore. It hasn't been in production for almost two years now, and one important reason for this is the difficulty of working with artists I cannot pay.
The series was produced before by members of the community who made art as nothing more than a favor and on their own time. While a lovely thing for them to do, it also introduced considerable micromanagement. Often I would use a group of people for a single video - with meetings about ideas, deciding who made what, deadlines, quality checks and so on. As I've expanded into making more content, this is time I no longer have.
Should this campaign do well, I can look into paying artists for their work. This cuts away the problems. It means higher quality art made by less people and produced more consistently. It was always hard to enforce deadlines on people who, in the end, were just helping me out for free - I'd like a better way of doing it!
Reason 4. YouTube Isn't Perfect
Those watching me for a long time will have heard my complaints about youtube compression and video quality. With a high-motion game like Guild Wars 2 being uploaded at 1080p60fps, I unavoidably lose a lot of detail on my uploads!
If people are supporting me, I can pay for online storage and allow the bigger contributors to get direct access to my content! At last people will see the work as I wanted them to see it. Those Patrons would be getting:
1. Higher quality content
2. Advertisement free content, and
3. Early content! That YouTube processing is no joke. And this means getting the videos - every day- a lot earlier than everyone else.
That's all!
If you made it this far, thank you very much for the consideration. It sincerely means a lot. Should monthly payments turn you off, I do have a link for one-off donations here:
http://tinyurl.com/lk8rpr6
I haven't gone into this campaign looking to create some insane, multi-tiered advertising campaign to get as much money as possible - I'm just looking for some help to, well, get out on my own and make better stuff for you all.