Brace yourself for an enthralling encounter with Reuben Wu, the genius behind Ladytron's melodies and a photographer whose work has enamored both Apple and National Geographic. His pieces grace the hallowed walls of the Guggenheim Museum and MoMA, solidifying his stance in the art world. In our latest episode, Reuben recounts the tribulations of capturing Chicago's unforgiving winter through his lens. The bone-chilling temperatures that test the limits of both man and camera equipment are not for the faint-hearted, yet Reuben's persistence yields stunning visual poetry. The discussion veers into the digital art realm as Reuben shares his initial trepidation and subsequent embrace of NFTs, with insights on the transformative potential they hold for artists.
Our candid conversation with Reuben takes us on a winding road through his illustrious two-decade photography journey. We uncover the pivotal experiences and fortuitous meetings that have chiseled his distinctive artistic vision. With a dash of humor, we also delve into the quirks of life, from hypothetical animal alter egos to gastronomic revelations in new locales. The chat isn't complete without Reuben's take on the critical role of portfolio reviews and the exciting, yet uncharted, territories of NFTs for creatives. Listeners seeking insider knowledge on thriving in the photography landscape will find Reuben's anecdotes and advice both enlightening and inspirational.
Navigating the ebb and flow of family life and a demanding creative career is no simple feat, particularly from the confines of a home studio. The Midwest’s dynamic vistas serve as a picturesque backdrop to our discussion on achieving that elusive work-life equilibrium. Reuben and I share our strategies—and struggles—with maintaining focus amidst digital distractions, the importance of scheduling (though sticking to it is another story), and the art of juggling parental duties with professional endeavors. For any creative professional seeking solace in shared experiences or tips on managing the chaos, this heart-to-heart might just be the companion you need. As we bid farewell, Reuben and I reflect on the rich exchange of ideas and look forward to our paths crossing again in the vibrant tapestry of the creative world.
Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:
Brace yourself for an enthralling encounter with Reuben Wu, the genius behind Ladytron's melodies and a photographer whose work has enamored both Apple and National Geographic. His pieces grace the hallowed walls of the Guggenheim Museum and MoMA, solidifying his stance in the art world. In our latest episode, Reuben recounts the tribulations of capturing Chicago's unforgiving winter through his lens. The bone-chilling temperatures that test the limits of both man and camera equipment are not for the faint-hearted, yet Reuben's persistence yields stunning visual poetry. The discussion veers into the digital art realm as Reuben shares his initial trepidation and subsequent embrace of NFTs, with insights on the transformative potential they hold for artists.
Our candid conversation with Reuben takes us on a winding road through his illustrious two-decade photography journey. We uncover the pivotal experiences and fortuitous meetings that have chiseled his distinctive artistic vision. With a dash of humor, we also delve into the quirks of life, from hypothetical animal alter egos to gastronomic revelations in new locales. The chat isn't complete without Reuben's take on the critical role of portfolio reviews and the exciting, yet uncharted, territories of NFTs for creatives. Listeners seeking insider knowledge on thriving in the photography landscape will find Reuben's anecdotes and advice both enlightening and inspirational.
Navigating the ebb and flow of family life and a demanding creative career is no simple feat, particularly from the confines of a home studio. The Midwest’s dynamic vistas serve as a picturesque backdrop to our discussion on achieving that elusive work-life equilibrium. Reuben and I share our strategies—and struggles—with maintaining focus amidst digital distractions, the importance of scheduling (though sticking to it is another story), and the art of juggling parental duties with professional endeavors. For any creative professional seeking solace in shared experiences or tips on managing the chaos, this heart-to-heart might just be the companion you need. As we bid farewell, Reuben and I reflect on the rich exchange of ideas and look forward to our paths crossing again in the vibrant tapestry of the creative world.
Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:
who is this?
NorCal Guy:who is this guy? Who is this guy?
Rueben Wu:who is this guy? North Cal G E Y. North Cal-a. North Cal G E Y.
NorCal Guy:North Cal-A, north Cal. G EY, north Cal G EY. North Cal-A, north Cal. G EY. North cowl and shill Time Parkhouse 秀 North Cowl and shill Parkhouse. Put this down the shill, north Cowl and shill Parkhouse 秀 the shill time, north Cowl and shill. Hey everyone, welcome to the next episode of NorCal and Chill. Today's guest is Ruben Wu. You can find him on Twitter at Ruben, underscore Wu. His website is RubenWucom. His Instagram is at its Ruben. His link tree is backslash Ruben Wu. He's a founding member of the musical group Ladytron. His commercial clients include Apple, national Geographic Partners, volkswagen, rodentrack, audi, acura, samsung and Interscope Records. He has work in the permanent collections of Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and MoMA. He's been published in Wired Magazine, time Magazine, national Geographic Magazine. He is a global ambassador for Phase One. You can find his artwork on Nifty Gateway Foundation and Super Rare. Everyone, please welcome Ruben Wu. Hey, ruben, welcome to the podcast. How are you doing today?
Rueben Wu:Doing well, thank you, how are you?
NorCal Guy:I'm doing well, had a busy weekend, but here I guess enjoying this cold weather that we're having right now. It's been raining a lot, but now it's just cold.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, I'm really glad that summer is over, because I had to wear T-shirts and shorts and then I'd prefer to wear a jacket and trousers and have that freedom. I like being cold and be able to put my layers on, rather than it be hot because you can't get cooler. Yeah, there's no layers anymore. You need the aircon. So, yeah, I'm happy that the elements are back.
NorCal Guy:Right, you might need to move even further north, like in the Canada or Alaska.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, I don't know. I think I'm in a good spot right now. I think our winters are pretty brutal enough. I like the seasons here, and it's in the middle of the continent so I can kind of travel. Traveling is concerned, I can just relatively easily go to various other parts of the country.
NorCal Guy:Right, that's true, you got a nice large airport that many connecting flights can be had, exactly. But man, I know it's cold up there. I've been there, I think it was like November and man, that wind coming through that city is crazy.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, it's actually the only time when I'm photographing Chicago is when it gets really, really cold, and I go with a couple of friends and we go to the lake in January or February. Last time it was minus 35. Wow.
NorCal Guy:The wind chill on that. Wow, that's crazy.
Rueben Wu:That was minus 35. No, no, it was insanely, insanely cold and I'd frostbite on my thumb and my thumb was peeling like days after that. Oh, no, yeah, I still got my drone up. It didn't crash.
NorCal Guy:That's all that matters. Oh man, that's some cold weather. I know I've been to Alaska dead of winter, like middle of a end of December. It was awesome, but it was cold Like I could feel my. When you breathe in, you feel the ice, like it feels like ice is forming in your nose and stuff. It's crazy.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, it's the worst when your face is like stuck to the camera. When you put your face to the camera and your skin is like stuck to it because it's so cold, that's not nice yeah.
NorCal Guy:I can imagine your equipment's just like the same temperature, as the weather, as the outdoors.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, that's a challenge in itself keeping the equipment working in those temperatures and also like cameras fogging up and stuff like that. You can't just keep it inside your jacket. And then batteries they don't like the cold at all. So I usually take external power and plug that in and it's just more to carry and I'm ending up just carrying a shitload of stuff on my back.
NorCal Guy:Hey, I guess it's paying off, though it's looking good.
Rueben Wu:I enjoy it, I love it.
NorCal Guy:So do you own a hardware wallet?
Rueben Wu:Yes, I do. I have a Trezor, and I got one as soon as my first NFT sold back in March. I like to be careful, yeah, and I've just been using it ever since, so this is part of my workflow now.
NorCal Guy:Oh, good good. Yeah, they're not too hard to use, I mean once you get used to it. I mean it is a learning curve a little bit and yeah, they're pretty easy to use.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, I try not to kind of get too involved in the kind of complexities of it. I know exactly what I need to do with it and I just do that and just keep it simple. So right now it's pretty good.
NorCal Guy:Good, that's good to hear what were your first thoughts when you heard about NFTs.
Rueben Wu:I first heard about them in January. You know, I started noticing people I follow on Instagram posting these things and mentioning Super Rare and NFTs and Foundation, and I didn't think anything of it at first and then it just kept on popping up and I just started talking to a few of my friends, people like G-Monk and Victor Mosquera, who are both really talented 3D artists and G-Monk's a photographer himself and they said, yeah, you should totally do this. And you know, they kind of explained it to me and I think I got it quite easily because I've licensed digital files before, even like ones which are kind of one of ones which I'm never to use ever again. So I see this value of digital scarcity, so I kind of got that. But at the time there were very few photographers, that maybe even hardly any landscape photographers. So I was really questioning, you know, if I even belong there and I saw just like it was all like 3D artists and people like JN Silver they were collaborating with. Thank you X. So there was that kind of hybrid there, but there was nothing kind of straight photography or straight landscape photography.
Rueben Wu:But then I, you know, just considered my work and a lot of my work kind of looks rendered anyway, and you know the stuff that I've been doing. You know it wasn't really the photos per se, but they were these animations that I'd been doing. And I suddenly realized that these animations, which kind of they had no viable income in my business. You know that kind of I'd done them out of love. They were just sitting on my Instagram earning likes. They were like the obvious choice offer as an NFT. You know, they seemed kind of they seemed metaverse, native, even without me being aware. So that was kind of an obvious thing in my work which I felt could fit the space, Whereas things like my still images I sell prints of those, I license them. They were already something that was, you know, part of my business. So, yeah, so I started with animations. Up until now I've just been doing animations, but in a place now where I'm ready to start releasing stills. So that's kind of exciting and a bit nerve wracking.
NorCal Guy:I'm gonna look forward to those.
Rueben Wu:Yeah.
NorCal Guy:I mean just knowing your, some of your background, I mean your photos. I don't know, they just fit what I know of, like your design background. I guess they're planned or like perfected. Yeah, they just start, well done. I don't know what else to say about them.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, they're kind of purpose deliberately short so I can put all of my focus onto this tiny little thing and kind of get it just right, and I kind of like working in that, inside that tiny bubble. And because of Instagram, when they introduced video, it was like a 15 second long loop, and so I first did them for that, and you know, so they would just, like you know, be designed to kind of loop over and over and over again, and so they were kind of the development from that sort of new feature on Instagram and kind of grew into its own thing. And so since NSTs, you know, that kind of medium that I've been experimenting with has had a newly supplied. So it's that's really exciting for me.
NorCal Guy:Yeah Well, I mean, I'm very excited about the space as well. What brought you to art, or did you choose art? Or I mean, how did you get into this?
Rueben Wu:I have been doing art since I was a very, very young child and I started drawing when I was very young. I've always been extremely visual and I just drew all the time and it was my thing, it was the thing that I was best at and I wanted to be an artist, like from, you know, from year one. So I kind of went through school doing art and doing music and then I was told, oh, you'll never make any money doing art, you're being an artist, you know you'll be a starving artist or something like that. And I was like, hmm, okay, I'll do design then, because I was quite good at, you know, working with things and figuring out how things worked, but also how how things looked, kind of style of things. I liked fixing things. So that kind of made sense to me. So I just went into design and did industrial design at university and then during that time I got really involved in doing music and DJing and making music and that kind of went on and I ended up like forming a band with a few of the friends back in Liverpool in the UK and I'd started like my masters in industrial design. So that was kind of going on. I ended up getting a job doing design in the consultancy and then doing kind of band stuff and going on tour like traveling the world. It was kind of weird because I was taking time off to go tour with a band which was pretty tiring and intense and hectic, and then coming back to work and being kind of not really ready to put 100% into things and I got to the point where we got signed by a major label sorry, not by a major label by a reputable indie label in the States and we were asked to go tour the USA. And so that's when I decided I was going to quit the band. So I quit the band, quit the job in design and do full time with the band. So I did that 10 years.
Rueben Wu:So during my time touring with the band we'd been just traveling all over the world and just visiting these incredible places and I kind of felt that I was getting less in touch with my visual art kind of passion and so I needed something to kind of fill that hole. So I picked up my old camera and just started to take pictures of where I was going. So it was like a travelogue, tour diary of sorts. And that got a lot more involved and I started experimenting with different types of film and old vintage cameras and I think, because of my background in design, I was just really, you know, I started getting really passionate about, you know, the machines and the mechanics of photography and that kind of suddenly made photography more meaningful to me and kind of understanding the basics of it, like deconstructing the medium. And then, you know, I was it got to the point where I was just booking time, like before we went on tour with a band to these places and I'd go and travel and take pictures and then I'd join the band and we do the tour. So it was like a really great way of just traveling and taking pictures and just seeing the world.
Rueben Wu:And then, in 2011, the band took a break and you know I had no interest in doing my own kind of musical solo career and I saw photography as the one thing that I wanted to do. So in a way, photography is like my solo career and you know, it was at that point where I moved to the States and I started to really look at my work and figure all of that out and how it kind of makes sense as a body of work and thinking about my work if I wanted to exhibit it. And that's kind of how I started with my fine art practice and selling prints. And then on the other side, you know I already made quite a wide network of friends all over the world through my band and so through that I got an opportunity to work with, like my first client commission, which was for GE and that was like a that involved music and involved photography and involved video and that kind of, you know, triggered something in me. That's when I realized that I wanted to do my client branded work but also kind of go ahead with the fine art work as well. So you know, I kind of started with those things at the same time and just been doing.
Rueben Wu:You know it's been kind of up and down and it's been a really long.
Rueben Wu:You know part of it has been, you know, quite a long struggle with kind of not really knowing how I was going to do something.
Rueben Wu:You know I had opportunities in the beginning but in the middle it was it got pretty dire. There was nothing else I wanted to do, there was no plan B, that was just photography. But you know, over the years things you know got better. I just kept working and I just kept on like sharing my work, to a point where I'm now, you know, full time doing both client work and my own fine art work and like, especially now with NFTs, that's just a whole new level to my personal work where suddenly, you know, I can afford the time to work on those things other than having to say yes to every client project I do. So this is like, yeah, long story short, this is like my third career, but I definitely feel like it's almost like I've gone full circle and I've come back to the point where I was as a kid, where I wanted to be an artist, and now I've been able to make it real. So it's been pretty insane. I'm just very grateful for where I am right now.
NorCal Guy:Yeah, I love the story. I love the flow of that, that career or the different moves throughout your life to get to this point. It's just interesting to me because none of us we like, oh, I'm going to do this.
NorCal Guy:And then you know, 20 years later, you've gone through all these different changes and you're like I mean, they each benefit you along the way. But it's always nice to hear, because when I was young I was like what do I want to do for the rest of my life? That's one thing that I want to do. And then, as you get older and you've realized you've transitioned and done all sorts of different things. They've all come to this one point and I like your version of it.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, it all kind of makes sense when I view it as like an arc, because if I did photography when I first got out of college or something I actually did, I tried getting into photography in college and I couldn't get into it because there was nothing that I felt passionate about capturing and I only found that passion by traveling. So it made sense after a while, after some things had happened. So I think that's happened. That's interesting how that path only makes sense once I've done certain things. What's really interesting is how every photographer, every artist, their path is different and unique and everyone I speak to is like how did you get into photography? And some people actually went to school and studied it, but most people did a load of other things in the past and I find that really interesting that they have all those experiences in the past that kind of amounted to what they're doing now.
NorCal Guy:Right, yeah, all that past helped form and get them to that point and helped shape and made what they do unique, thank you. So if you were an animal, what would you be and why?
Rueben Wu:I would be a black cat because I'm pretty quiet and cats are pretty quiet, then nimble like in my work I'm always hiking and climbing up stuff and kind of getting to you know all sorts of spots. I guess I'm very observant and I just always notice things. I guess that's the photographer's eye. I guess I'm quite independent and sometimes I'm quite distant, but you know, cats are very affectionate as well. I also like black.
NorCal Guy:Perfect. I mean that makes sense. The observant part of it. I mean I know I was watching a video with you. When you're like out on a shoot and you were flying your drone and you were just like Watching the light and you're like just waiting for the right moment to stop it, to take a picture, and you're doing it in silence most of the time.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, it's like it's Juggling, I'm like controlling the drone and the camera at the same time. I can only do it that way. I mean, sometimes I have, you know, people do it for me or with me, but usually I'm doing it myself. That's the best way because I can, kind of, you know, operate the two at the same time and, yeah, sometimes I crash, which is funny, but not funny if you only have just the one drone.
NorCal Guy:Hey, it could make for some interesting photos if you catch it on film.
Rueben Wu:I have. I have a few drone crashes on film. Yeah, actually, my worst one was was like a drone crash over like Michigan and it was like early March, so it was really still really cold and there were still icebergs floating and the battery kind of went from like 80 to 25% in a few seconds and this is like years ago. So these were like Phantom 2 or something like that and so it started to like automatically land like next to this iceberg. Oh no, yeah, I think this was like my first or second crash. So I was like really, really, you know, I was really upset and I ended up hiring someone who had a wetsuit and Like swimming out and trying to find it, which is not a good idea because it was Chicago in the winter and also the wetsuit was baggy. Oh no, we're a big guy.
NorCal Guy:That would have been so cold didn't find the drone.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, I didn't find it.
NorCal Guy:It's unfortunate, but hey, got a better one after that.
Rueben Wu:Yes, I've had many.
NorCal Guy:Do you have a favorite food?
Rueben Wu:I like a lot of food, or like Indian food a lot Coming from the UK, you know, indian food is like a staple diet. So when I was back in England, like a couple of months ago, that's kind of just what I ate every day, which was great. Since, coming to the States, I discovered like I've rediscovered things like pizza and things like milk shake. It was like when I grew up, pizza in the UK it was like nasty. It was like pizza was the best and I would just eat like little, like frozen crap. Yeah, it would just be horrible. Milk shake was just frothy and flavored milk.
NorCal Guy:Oh, Okay yeah not that creamy ice cream.
Rueben Wu:No, and so when I first moved to Chicago and had my first deep dish pizza, I was like, oh my gosh, it was amazing thing and I love that. I love deep dish. And yeah, milkshakes are incredible Incredible they are. Pancakes are incredible. Everything, all the foods are incredible. The new lease of life for me.
NorCal Guy:Well, I mean, you got access to a lot of options over there. I mean big city you're going to have great food of almost anything you want.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, actually, I eat a lot of plant-based foods, so there's loads and loads of choices. In this country, like in the UK, there's a lot fewer choices, so I think having that diet is a lot easier and it tastes really really good. Yeah, so that's been really good.
NorCal Guy:What is the best piece of advice you've been given?
Rueben Wu:You should totally get into NFTs. It's probably the best advice. Yeah, that was definitely the advice given to me by people like G-Monk and Victor that kind of started me on this journey. So I'm like that was amazing having those conversations so early on. But I think, thinking about my art photography career, I think the best piece of advice was to do a portfolio review, and this was given to me by a photographer called Jeff Milstein. He's an aerial photographer and we worked together on a project for GE about six years ago and I showed him some of my work, some of the drone light stuff, and he said, oh, have you been to a portfolio review yet? And I was like, what is a portfolio review? And he said it's where photographers or photographic artists go and they speak to people in the industry like gallerists or editorial directors of photography, book publishers, museum curators, and you show them your work and it's like a one-on-one kind of 15 minute session where you have your elevator speech for like a certain body of work that you have. You said this is the work, this is what it's about, this is what it means, what do you think? And you have this conversation.
Rueben Wu:So I attended one of those in Portland called Photo Lucida and there I met the person who ended up publishing my book and also the director of photography at National Geographic, and so we kept in touch.
Rueben Wu:Nothing happened just there and then, but just being in touch and just sharing the work and making that connection early on really was worthwhile. And the portfolio reviews are expensive. I think the admission was something like a thousand or something like that $1,000. But it was well worth it and I think I'd got to a point where I had made all of these contacts and I was sharing all of this work on my social media and people were aware of my work. But there was a certain sphere of industry that wasn't seeing it because maybe they were too busy doing other things, and that's portfolio review is like the way in to that to show your work. So that's definitely the advice that I would give for new photographers who want to start putting their body of work together and to make sense of it and take it to the next level. So yeah, that's really good advice.
NorCal Guy:Okay. Do they critique, give advice, or is it more of a trying to make network?
Rueben Wu:It's both when you show the work, they do critique it. They ask you questions just to gain an understanding of what it is, and then at the end, you can exchange business cards or whatever, stay in touch, and things can take a while for opportunities to happen. I ended up getting invited to speak at the National Geographic Society in 2020. And this was like three years after the portfolio review, so I just kept in touch and you know Sarah Lean, who's the director of photography. She messaged me and said would you like to do this? And I was like, yes, unbelievable. So, yeah, great things can happen from them.
NorCal Guy:All right, that's good advice. Do you have any advice for artists coming to the NFT space?
Rueben Wu:Yeah, I think the first thing I'd say is to take your time. Just go at your own pace, because the whole scene is so fast moving, you know. Don't try and keep up. You know. If it's affecting your mental health, just relax and just learn and partake as much as you can. I think. Just you know to keep a consistent rate as well.
Rueben Wu:It's best to do things kind of in a steady manner rather than kind of dip in and dip out.
Rueben Wu:I feel I think engaging you know, obviously engaging the community is really, really important, but I think it's really about finding the community that's specific to your interests.
Rueben Wu:For instance, if it's photography, then find photography, but also find the parts of photography that you are most interested in and then kind of get involved there and then expand from that You're interested in the things that you're truly enthusiastic about. If you're not into PFB projects, you don't have to engage with that. You know it's like do things on your own terms, because you know you're just starting to think something and it's good to just begin in a way which you want to continue, obviously, things like sharing your story and your passion, lifting others that you admire and really just staying visible. I think, and I think that that goes back to keeping a consistent rate, and it kind of reminds me of Instagram, where if you keep a consistent rate then things are a lot more handleable, where you find your rate which you're kind of comfortable with, you're able to stay as visible as you can and just kind of. I think in that way, once you've found the rate at which you're able to partake in the community, and just keep at that rather than try and stop and start, and that's not a very good answer, sorry.
NorCal Guy:Yeah, just be, keep the pace that works for you. Be deliberate with what you want to do. You don't have to FOMO into other stuff or just FOMO into being like I need to be doing this or I need to do a collection now, or I need to do more one-of-ones, do you?
Rueben Wu:Yeah, exactly.
NorCal Guy:I feel like I know your answer for this one, but I'm going to go ahead and ask it if you could live or move anywhere, where would you live and why?
Rueben Wu:I've wanted to move, to the desert. I've wanted to move oh, maybe I should move to Los Angeles or somewhere closer to Death Valley and all these amazing places that I love. So, me and my wife, we were seriously considering this, like last year, and just really thinking about it. I can just travel there. I think, being where I am and having such a big airport close by, I can travel anywhere and just go and just enjoy these places, rather than having to be there and kind of deal with the extreme heat. As I said, I really love the seasons of the Midwest, which you won't get out there. Also, it's crazy expensive. So I think the Midwest, in terms of long-term, it seems like it's not going to have much environmental problems in terms of drought or flooding or anything like that. So I think I'm in a good place geographically.
NorCal Guy:I can see that I agree with that.
Rueben Wu:But I love in general. I just love living in the USA because it's so big, there's so much to offer and so much range in terms of landscapes that it's just for me I'm in heaven. I'm just traveling as much as I can and just exploring these places as much as I can. I know that these are the places which I dreamt about as a child when I was growing up in the UK. There were amazing national parks there, but the USA had all of these the Grand Canyon, monument Valley, all of that were kind of part of my imagination and I knew that I wanted to experience those later on.
NorCal Guy:I know there's so much here in the US. I've only gone to a fraction of it. There's so much, but hey, as my kids get older I plan on getting an RV or something and traveling.
Rueben Wu:Yep, that's past my mind too.
NorCal Guy:And then do you have any questions for me?
Rueben Wu:Yeah, first of all, I'm just wondering how you split your day up. I work from home and so I'm kind of working through the day and at the same time I have my family as well, and it's always been a challenge to have a kind of schedule and a routine in place. And you know other aspects of my business, like the NFT stuff, and then there's the quiet stuff. It can get a bit kind of chaotic and a bit overwhelming sometimes. So I'm just wondering if you ever have, like you know, ways of arranging your day and you have kind of like a set, you know schedule that you kind of stick to, or do you pretty much wing it?
NorCal Guy:So I mean I kind of have a schedule. Well, if I'm up early before the kids, I will, you know, try and catch up on DMs and whatnot. Once they wake up, I try to not be on my phone, it's a little bit easier. So my daughter goes to preschool like three to four days a week. So that frees up some time for me, because I mean my five month old he's like he's a little easier. You can feed him, play with him for a little bit and then they take a nap for like an hour and a half. So that gives you time throughout the day. But, like on the weekends when my daughter is home, I will try and stick to just looking at my phone while she's napping or after she goes to bed. It's hard, it is hard, but I want that family time. I want to be dedicated to my kids.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, that's really good to hear and that's something that I'm always working on myself. And just being stuck to the phone is something that I feel is so necessary to kind of being part of something and also being kind of in communication, but just being able to balance that, being able to put the phone down.
NorCal Guy:It's tough. Yeah, I mean I know I miss DMs a lot and I feel bad. I mean Twitter does a terrible job of organizing DMs. You can't like sort by, like unread, so it's just terrible. I feel bad. I do miss DMs, but I just want. I mean I'm not going to get this time back with my kids, so I try and make the most of it.
Rueben Wu:Are you a late night worker or do you get an early night?
NorCal Guy:I do stay up late usually and I need to go to bed earlier. But I do usually stay up late, but it's not like as late as I know a lot of artists are. I'm like trying to get to bed by midnight.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, me too. By midnight I'm pretty much brain dead.
NorCal Guy:Anyway, I need my seven hours at least, Right right and trying to get up like three days a week to do some workout at like 6am, so going to bed at midnight is a little hard when I went on those days.
NorCal Guy:I'm trying to go a little bit earlier on those days, but usually midnight's my cutoff. But yeah, I've been thinking about doing like a schedule, like this is time for like NFTs here. But I mean, I think I got a pretty good work around right now, but I kind of want to schedule it in. So I guess. So like people are that I'm like communicating with, like hey, these are my like office hours. If you hit me outside of these hours, I'll get back to you when I'm on the phone again, but I don't know how big a deal that is.
Rueben Wu:Yeah, I guess everyone has their own kind of rules that they stick to. Yeah, I think for me it's like I have so many things that I'm working on that it's difficult for me to kind of get into the creative flow and then for me to break it and then do something else. You know, if I'm going to do one thing, then I want to kind of do it all day, and now I'm finding myself having to break my flow and kind of do other things in between that, which is, I think, that takes up energy. That's just something that I'm getting used to.
NorCal Guy:Yeah, I agree with that, that is hard. Well, ruben, do you have any other questions?
Rueben Wu:Not really, I don't think so Perfect I hope this was okay.
NorCal Guy:Oh, this is awesome, it was perfect.
Rueben Wu:Sorry, I rambled.
NorCal Guy:No, no, it was perfect. This was a great interview. Thank you so much for your time.
Rueben Wu:You're welcome. Thanks for having me on.
NorCal Guy:All right, we'll talk soon. Bye, thank you, bye.