I said in last months review that there’s two things I wanted to focus on in august, videos that would grow the channel, and better audio. So, how did that work out? Let’s have a look!
I’m going to be focussing on this graph going forward as it has some really important info! The purple line is returning viewers, which means people that have seen one of my videos in the past, and have come back to see another video, and the blue line is new viewers finding the channel for the first time. Ideally you want a big spike of purple every time a new video goes live, and a constant flow of blue line above the purple. I think from looking at this graph that i’m definitely on the right track! You can see the biggest spike of purple was the first video of the month, which was:
Top 15 GameCube games
I knew this video would do well, as most top games lists do, this one was no exception and has brought in 44 new subs at the time of writing this!
Next was Neo Geo Games on the MiSTer FPGA. A follow up video to my Mister review a few weeks earlier.
This one has done ok, but I don’t really like it. This was my first go at trying a more gameplay focussed video, over a more scripted one, but people seem to loose interest in it pretty fast, and I wasn’t super excited about a lot of the games either which might have made it hard to watch all the way through…
I think this kind of video would have been better suited to my gameplay channel. It seems to be picking up a bit of momentum recently, partly thanks to the fact that my main MiSTer video is still doing well!
A pickups video next, it had been a while since I did one, so there was plenty to show!
This was also the first time I was using my new camera lens, (the Sigma 1.4 16mm, paid for by Patreon support!) which I think makes a big difference, but a lot of people probably didn’t notice.
The auto focus really helped with showing the games by holding them to the camera! Certainly easier than recording individual B roll clips like I used to!
And finally a video I’m quite proud of, and one I’d actually wanted to make for ages! Unreleased GBA games! This one was made specifically to try and address both the things I wanted to work on this month, the improved audio, and a video to grow the channel!
The audio bit worked out well! I recorded all the voice over with the same mic I used for the on camera sections all in one take, so you can’t notice any change in quality! I think it turned out really well, and I’ll be using this technique instead of recording separately from now on!
In terms of growing the channel, I know it brought in a few new people, but not as many as I was hoping… maybe unreleased games is too niche?
Now for next month, it might be difficult to really work on improvements as i’m getting closer to moving house, but one small thing I’d like to improve is to actually try and make videos and the process of editing a bit faster so I can build a buffer for when I’m moving house and not able to make weekly content for a few weeks. I have two lined up in advance ready to go live whenever I need them to so far… let’s see how much I can do to get ahead while I still can!
September might be a slower month for the channel, I have a few videos planned, but I know they won’t really be very popular, at least in comparison to the past few months. i might be able to squeeze in one “popular” video in-between the planned ones. I’m hoping to have more control over my videos when I get set up, I feel lie i’m doing too many videos because people have asked me to, or I feel obliged to make them because i’ve been sent something.
Really just playing the waiting game now until I get the new studio setup then I can focus on growing again, and making my own content again too! For some exciting plans, but they might need to wait until next year… hope you stick around!
Thank for reading!