NorCal and Shill
A podcast where NFT artists tell stories, hosted by NorCal Guy. https://twitter.com/GuyNorcal
https://twitter.com/norcalandshill
NorCal and Shill
Matt Scobel - Artist - Throwback
Adventure photographer and filmmaker Matt Scobel takes us on a journey from the misty allure of Niagara Falls to the majestic Canadian Rockies. With a camera in hand and an eye for the breathtaking, Matt shares how his creative endeavors have evolved, from YouTube series "Making a Photo" to offering hands-on courses in astro and night photography. As an artist navigating the digital age, he emphasizes the importance of digital security, recounting his dive into NFTs, inspired by playful ventures like CryptoKitties and a conversation from a Logan Paul podcast.
Reflecting on his multifaceted career path, Matt opens up about his evolution from curious kid making stop-motion videos to a role at Apple during the iconic launch of the original iPhone. His diverse experiences, including gigs as a line cook and forklift driver, have all contributed to his artistic journey. His narrative underscores the long-standing creative drive that has seen him through various roles, culminating in a profound passion for capturing the world through photography and videography.
Our lively conversation doesn't shy away from philosophical musings on the artist's role as a disruptor in the NFT space and the challenges of maintaining individuality amidst trends. Matt shares personal stories of trading NFTs, highlighting the excitement and camaraderie of engaging with notable collectors. With a nod to decentralization and the innovative potential of smart contracts, we wrap up this episode by celebrating the support and community of collectors who inspire continued creativity. Join us for a blend of heartfelt gratitude and artistic exploration on the NorCal and Shill Podcast.
Who is this? Who is this guy? Who is this guy? Who is this guy? Who is this guy? Who is this guy? Norcal guy. Norcal guy. Norcal guy. Norcal guy. Norcal guy. Norcal guy. Norcal guy, norcal guy. Norcal and chill podcast Show. It's chill time, norcal and chill podcast. What the sh-, what the sh-, what the sh NorCal and Shill Podcast. So it's Shill time, norcal and Shill Podcast.
Speaker 2:What the sh-? What the sh-.
Speaker 1:Hey everyone, welcome to the next episode of NorCal and Shill. Today's guest is Matt Scoble. You can find him on Twitter. His website and Instagram is Matt Scoble, spelled M-A-T-T-S-C-O-B-E-L. You can find his work on Foundation. Matt is an adventure photographer and filmmaker based in Canmore, alberta. He was born in Niagara Falls, ontario, and moved to the Canadian Rockies in 2017 to explore the incredible landscapes and activities in the area. Professionally, he embraces the creativity, strategy, planning and technical details that go into creating authentic, visually compelling content content. His patience and dedication to creating unique images and a desire to continue to grow as a creative has opened up the opportunities for him to expand into videography and film production. He shares his creative process through a video series on YouTube called Making a Photo, as well as through an in-person Night in the Rockies course, where he teaches astro and night photography. Everyone, please welcome Matt. Hey, Matt, welcome to the podcast. How are you doing today, norcal? This is crazy. I know it's happening Sitting here talking to each other in person. It's very weird right, it is.
Speaker 2:Is this the first time you've done this in person?
Speaker 1:This is my first in-person interview. This is exciting, which I feel like I should be staring at my paper and not at you.
Speaker 2:Not when you stare at the paper. I'm going to be able to know what you're doing. You're looking at the notes. Oh this is fun, though this is the way to do it. You get the chance to meet in person right, right.
Speaker 1:This is great, this is awesome, and you know, you came all the way from canada just for this right I drove all the way from canada just for this podcast right, right, oh, so do you use a hardware wallet?
Speaker 2:I do, and do you know why I use a hardware wallet?
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:To keep secure, because I heard your voice. I heard you say over and over again use a hardware wallet. Yes and no, I do. I have a ledger and you were very, very gracious with me to help me set that up. Oh yeah, I went through the process, set it up for myself and, like it is, it's intimidating and you start to have these questions as you go, and you were awesome to me on DMs, just sort of walking me through the process, and I made that same offer to other people because it's I've listened to your podcast. Now people talk about it. It's amazing how many people bought one and then haven't used it yet.
Speaker 2:So I have a hardware wallet and I use it, which is a key feature of the hardware wallet is you have to unwrap it and actually set it up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean it is intimidating. I mean especially like I told you to go ahead and go through the process of rebooting it from scratch or, I don't know, restoring it, I should say, and because I've had that happen where a wallet went bad and I had the hope, my, I wrote my seed phrase down correctly. It's. It's not a fun feeling, but it works and I did that.
Speaker 2:I did. I took your advice. It was a little weird, you asked me for my seed phrase, but no, I did that. Yeah, the first step, a hundred percent, you know, get the thing set it up, get a feel for it. And then, uh, yeah, I guess back and restore it, like restore it from your seed phrase before you have anything in it. And then I did a couple small transactions just to get a feel for it. And then you sit down and you're like, okay, what's like the right increment of it's funny how you build confidence.
Speaker 2:You're like, okay, I'll just transfer 0.01 ETH. Then you're like, okay, I'll transfer 0.1 ETH. And then it's like all of it.
Speaker 1:You just go off. Yeah, that is funny, You're checking, making sure, and then now I'm just like, oh yeah, that's the right address. The last five minutes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's. Yeah, that's right. You just oh, yeah, those numbers at the end look right, you get confident, but no, thanks to you, I have a hardware wallet and I'm all set up secure, so don't try to hack me.
Speaker 1:Perfect so what were your first thoughts when you heard about nfts?
Speaker 2:well, I, you know, I kind of I kind of understood what was going on in the crypto space in particular, like with ethereum and smart contracts, so I kind of have an interesting story there. So I, I guess I understood that there was stuff happening on top of, on top of, you know, the blockchain in, in particular, I think it was 2000, probably 2015 or 16, um, with the crypto kitties right like, right, right, right heard what was going on, but I never jumped on it and it was kind of like okay, this is interesting. But the actual like first real nfts was actually a logan paul podcast, oh, and he was talking about it and he was doing one of those like guys, like you know nfts, like you know that, look, that people have where you feel like they are on to something and they know it and they don't want to try to oversell it. But I just saw it like I was like, okay, there's something here. So I started researching and saw, okay, what was happening and I think it was pretty. I think it was pretty.
Speaker 2:Most people's probably reaction, if you're in the art space, like if you're a photographer or you're an artist, I think your reaction generally is like aha, like this is, this could be really interesting. Yeah, versus if you're not, your. A lot of reactions are kind of like what is this? This is, this is silly. But mine was positive and, uh, I thought this could be something worth paying attention to.
Speaker 1:Yeah, to be right yeah, I mean I was with you. I mean I remember hearing about crypto kitties, yeah, and I was just like this is a stupid game. Yeah, because it was a game. It wasn't really like art collecting, it was just like a game and I just couldn't, I mean, I didn't care to look at it. Um, I was also more of a bitcoin maxi and I was just like, oh, one of those anything, anything that they're doing over there on that ethereum chain yeah, ignore it, those wahoos over there in ethereum right, second rate currency.
Speaker 1:What are they doing? Yeah, but yeah, I'm glad I jumped in finally. Um, yeah, and, and it wasn't even on Ethereum initially when I started it was on wow, I'm blinking on the name of that currency, but it was Top Shots, it was Top.
Speaker 2:Shots. Yeah, yeah, that was your first. Yeah, interesting yeah, and I remember hearing about Top. I have this notorious history of this, like I kind of always know what's going on and I'm always just kind of on the edge, but I don't like to just dive in, right.
Speaker 2:So if anyone brings something up, I'm like, yeah, I've, you know, gone deep enough to understand what's going on, but I don't, I don't invest heavily in it. I remember top shots too. Yeah, it was happening there. It's crazy. I I'll tell you a quick story that when I was, I was working in tech in Waterloo in Canada and we had a big tech hub there near Toronto and early Ethereum stuff was happening there. Oh yeah, yeah. And we had a lunchroom and there was a bulletin board and they used to put Ethereum meetups on our lunchroom bulletin board, like original, like this, early, early days. And I remember like reading it and was like this is kind of interesting, but again, not taking that leap to go, and I often think if I had walked, in that room one day and just.
Speaker 2:But you know, let's say the hindsight is 2020. So just would have gone to one meeting, one meeting.
Speaker 1:I could have different life, different life, but you know what I?
Speaker 2:wouldn't change anything, because it's the path to get to these places. If you change one thing, who knows where you'd be? Right, right yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, completely. So what brought you to art photography 3D?
Speaker 2:animation. Ooh yeah, so the current, the more recent version of this was so I, I was hired, so I kind of have a background in tech right, startups, product development, and I was actually, uh, hired by canon. Oh okay, back in 2015 and I was hired by canon to run an innovation lab and this is one of the weirdest things in the world.
Speaker 2:There's a 200,000 person company, Canon, very traditional, a very Japanese company, and I just mean that from the Japanese companies are very conservative and they wanted to innovate and come up with new ideas and figure out how to move quicker.
Speaker 2:So what they do is they hire an entrepreneur or someone who's had a tech startup and they bring them in to create like a little team within the company to come up with new ideas and innovation. So I was hired by Canon and I wasn't really in the space in photography at all and one of the very first things I did was I started like doing user research and understanding like how photographers work and their workflow and what they're doing, and and actually this is where I discovered raw files in photography. So the really interesting about this is I went to, uh, to Kenya on a safari a couple of years before and I had two cameras with me. I had a Sony um like DSLR style camera and I had an old iPhone and I was taking photos on both and when I got back I was like, oh, the iphone photos are way better oh yeah they're just look nicer.
Speaker 2:Everything was really beautiful and, like these photos I took on the sony didn't look very good. So fast forward to. I'm working for canon, I start learning about raw files and I start understanding the algorithms and like the processing that apple applies to your iphone photos right, and I was like, oh, like it was like an aha moment. I'm like, oh, those photos I took in kenya were raw files and I need to go through the process to process oh, got it the color and all.
Speaker 2:So I went home that night and I downloaded lightroom and I started editing the photos and it was like that, it was like an aha moment, it was like magic. I was like, wow, okay, this, I can bring out all these amazing details and colors and style out of these photos. That was the beginning of my journey into photography. Okay, it's kind of like my modern journey down the artistic path, um, and that was just sort of sort of like a launch point to everything I did. And then, also with um, we also worked a lot with videographers. So I started trying to understand, like, how the videographer process worked. So I started doing research and I came across YouTubers that were doing daily vlogs.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, and I was like fascinating.
Speaker 2:Like how do you do a daily vlog and edit it? And I and I was like the only way for me to learn is I'm going to do my own daily vlog for 30 days. Okay, so I learned, you know, video and editing kind of went down that path. So that's what's kind of started me on this. But when I look back now and I think of my life, I think I was just like an artist that didn't realize that I was an artist. Like yeah, I used to do stop motion videos when I was like a kid.
Speaker 2:I used to do all sorts of stuff in Photoshop, like collages of, like, basketball players and football players. I just used to do all these things that were like very artistic, but I think, like a lot of people, it was never like a career option. It was never something I could pursue. It was just like, oh, this is fun. So I look back now I realized there was probably lots of signs. Um, that kind of the artistic side of me was there.
Speaker 1:Just I never really really pursued it until probably like 2015 oh wow, when all this stuff happened with can right, yeah huh, that's, that's funny. So what jobs have you done? Well, I mean, since you've only considered yourself potentially an artist recently, you've had a varied amount of jobs, I guess. What jobs have you had?
Speaker 2:buckle up. But I've had some weird jobs like I've done some I've done been all over the place. So I've been, I've been a line cook.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah.
Speaker 2:Chef at a fancy restaurant in Canada. That was one of my first jobs. It was kind of a started in maintenance in the clubhouse of the golf course where there's a restaurant, okay, and then I became a dishwasher. And then when I showed up the day as a dishwasher and that night the kitchen got very busy. So I started kind of helping a bit dropping fries and it got so insane in the restaurant that the chef started drinking on the job.
Speaker 2:Oh shoot, because he was so stressed out yeah, I got fired and then the next day, when I came into work, the sous chef was there taking over and she said well, like what, what do you do? Because it's my second day? And I said I'm like, I'm a chef, I cook because I was dropping fries like 16 years old.
Speaker 2:I didn't know and she's like okay, like go prep this. And I started prepping and then I, I just started cooking. I never washed dishes again, oh, wow. So those are my early days. Um, I drove a forklift for a chocolate bar company. Um, let's see what else I worked in. Uh, I worked in professional uh sports, as in marketing. So we were, we flew around to different small uh sports leagues around north america and consulted them on how to do ticket sales and marketing. Okay, worked in that when I was out of school. And then I actually ran a professional basketball team, um, for a season in niagara, where I'm from, which is a whole other crazy path. So my early days were, like, marketing was my background. I wanted to work in professional sports, so I did a lot of jobs there, yeah, and then I ended up working for, um, apple in technical support when the original iphone launched.
Speaker 1:Oh wow, first day.
Speaker 2:Yeah, um, we like it's so weird to think about. I was working in apple like technical support call center in canada, like while I was still in university, and one day they like came in, um to the building like it honestly it's like out of a movie like a bunch of guys briefcases ndas, had us all sign that we were going to be supporting a new product that wasn't announced yet okay and we had like the doc, kind of like the how to technicals do technical support for this product.
Speaker 2:That wasn't announced and you're like it's an iphone, like we could tell what it was, but we weren't allowed to say right. And I remember I was this is really young. I remember, like this apple stock price was like 11, oh man, and I remember thinking like I didn't have any money. But I remember, like this apple stock price was like 11, oh man, and I remember thinking like I didn't have any money, but I remember thinking like how could I get money to invest in apple?
Speaker 2:yeah do it and now it's like one of those things you look back on. But yeah, I did that and then I worked in tech um ton of different jobs in tech um throughout my career, and then a ton of stuff um in the creative space and photography and video, so kind of been all over the place, all right, I mean a lot of us have yes, it's true. What was your first?
Speaker 1:job, you know, the first first job, um, um, my sister and I would go to my dad's office and clean it. Okay, like vacuum bathrooms trash. That was mainly it.
Speaker 2:It's always cleaning, right? Yeah, if it's not like working at a fast food cleaning, it's like working at a cleaning company Cleaning, that's always the first.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was cleaning my dad's office, and then I got a job TV delivery big screens, tv delivery that's interesting.
Speaker 2:The projection TVs I always wanted to have a mail route when I was a kid and I never did.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I did have a paper route when I was actually a little older, I guess in my 20s, and that was just terrible.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that would be.
Speaker 1:Does it pay you like four cents a delivery and you're like yeah, well it was a flat fee, but I had to go show up at the the warehouse to wrap my papers at like 11 or midnight and then you wrap all your papers for your route. My car wasn't big enough to hold all the papers so they had to do a drop somewhere along my route. So I had to pick up, reload my car up, put more papers and continue my route. It took like three, four hours through the route. It's not fun. It's not fun I mean.
Speaker 2:I mean it's decent pay for like minimum hours, but the hours when you play paper boy as a kid, they don't put that in there, right? It always seems so cool like you're riding on your bike, just like throwing the paper right front door definitely the dogs, but yeah, it was fun throwing papers three, I'm part it was fun throwing the papers.
Speaker 1:You know getting better at throwing them. You know out your window and across the street type thing, like over over your head type thing or whatever. But like, if you miss, you're like frick, I gotta go back and get that paper and yeah, go back put it, otherwise I'm gonna complain, but yeah I was a baseball umpire.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah season. Yeah, I got in too much trouble. I was yelling with the parents so I realized this is a bad too much. Like you know those things like what's the minimum amount of power to let someone like that goes to someone's head. For me it was like a baseball umpire, because I played baseball and I was always like would always argue with the umpire oh yeah, as soon as I got the chance to be the umpire and I was I could be the power.
Speaker 2:I was bad and I think I remember if I quit or they told me, like you can't, I don't think this is a good job for you you're out of here.
Speaker 1:Oh, if you were an animal, what would you be and why?
Speaker 2:oh, that's a good question. Um, it's the most anti-social animal, most. You know what I I don't know, I think probably like a snow leopard, feels like a good okay, like I think they're very they're. They live like a life of solitude which I enjoy Definitely live in the cold, which Canada is very cold so that matches.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there you go.
Speaker 2:And then, yeah, it's just like it's a very mysterious, like you never see them. Yeah, you know they're just off doing their own thing. I think they like the life of a snow leopard, All right.
Speaker 1:I like it. I like that.
Speaker 2:That's good has there been a snow leopard profile pic project, yet, ooh, what did we call it? I don't know, Something with an S Sneaky snow leopards Solitude. What's the? Yeah, oh man, what was your answer? You probably answered this on the podcast before Octopus. Oh yeah, okay, I did. I listened to. I think it was the last podcast, I don't know. With Baber, maybe I can't remember which one you said it, maybe it was with Ayla.
Speaker 1:Oh, maybe with Ayla you talked about octopus.
Speaker 2:They only live for a year, and how sad it would be. Yeah, yeah, it's an interesting animal.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I always wanted one as a pet and I was just, yeah, yeah, you get like an octopus, like uh, aquarium, what do you get? Yeah, yeah, yeah, it'd be interesting because they're like very interactive smart I always think of.
Speaker 2:There's like the video on youtube where, like they're, the shirt was like the the sharks were going missing, or I think it was the tiny sharks were going missing in an aquarium. Oh they couldn't figure out what was happening and then they like put a video up and like the octopus was like hiding and like grabbing the sharks, like when they were going by. So you might have a dangerous octopus if you get one as a pet, it'd be a solitude one yes, I like it do you have a favorite food?
Speaker 2:yeah, I do so. I grew up in in niagara falls, uh, canada. Okay, right across from niagara falls, canada, is this place called Buffalo, new York Yep, one of the greatest cities in America for my money. And Buffalo New York is the original home of the Buffalo Wing Right and there is like just a particular style there that I mean you can get it in certain places, but I found that even in Canada it was hard. Niagara would do it which is just like a chicken wing with a hot sauce and a little butter. Okay, and you use like the butter is what makes it like mild, medium or hot, so like hot's full hot sauce.
Speaker 1:Oh, got it. And mild is butter and hot sauce.
Speaker 2:Okay, but they're not breaded. There's no like, it's just the hot sauce, blue cheese, carrot sticks, celery sticks. Okay, give me that meal, good Buffalo wing.
Speaker 1:Sounds good. I mean, I like buffalo wings. I, you know, haven't had that answer on the pod. Be, very specific and I guess I need to go to Buffalo to get some hot wings.
Speaker 2:Go to Buffalo and try buffalo wings. Change your life Different. It's very different than a lot of places. That and a bowl of cinnamon toast crunch all, right all right, like that'd be two. There's, like your, your death row meal, uh wings and a bowl of cinnamon toast crunch to finish perfect, I'm ready for the chair that's it good to go what's the best piece of advice you've been given?
Speaker 2:oh, my god, I mean I've given so much you know, so so much advice over the years but, um, it's kind of like a personal one with with my father. Um, you know, it's interesting, like you, so many people just don't have the opportunity like to do some of the like the things that I've been able to do in my life. Um, you know, my father was, uh, was was born. He's born in winnipeg in canada, but um, he met my mom when they were very, very young and um, she got pregnant very early. Like they're very young, like in 16 years old, and um, he didn't have any money and you know he was sort of struggling having you know young kid at that age, right, and uh, you know he eventually uh figured out he they were in newfoundland and canada and they came to ontario and and where we kind of grew up and um, he was very fortunate eventually to get a job as an air traffic controller which was just like a massive someone could have probably ended up working in a factory somewhere to landing that job was a crazy leap for him and it put our family in a much better financial position.
Speaker 2:But he never really got to live his life like fully, right, right, being a father at that age. And you know he, he said to me like, hey, like you have this opportunity, like you know you, you don't have that you can go like, go live, go see the world, go explore, like just live life to the fullest. Yeah, he would always like consistently remind me of that, like when you're given these opportunities, um, you know this privilege you have, like like don't like go, like live, do it. And I always think about that with him. Um, and I think that's probably of all the advice I've given, like his advice to me, to just like just take advantage of of life you have and and don't be afraid to to explore and live and take chances and do everything you want to do. That's, that's probably the thing that resonates with me the most.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's solid advice. Yeah, yeah, it's quick, it's life short, you know it's uh, it's like time has been something I've been thinking about a lot of, because, you know, a lot of people have these story with my father. He um the A lot of people have this story with my father. It started COVID this year. So COVID started 2020 in March, kind of as the world shut down. He actually had a cardiac arrest in June and he's been recovered, but he's had some medical issues, including brain damage, and now I'm not able to do a lot of things and you're just like, like man, it's so short and you don't know how long you have. It's just like, don't, don't waste time and thinking about that a lot and, uh, certainly in this space and twitter and nfts, like you have to. You have to be conscious of it because you know you can sink a lot of time into things that right, that aren't really meaningful.
Speaker 2:So very true um yeah, that that's how I've been thinking a lot about that lately.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Sorry to make this sad all of a sudden.
Speaker 1:No, no, definitely got to make the most out of it. Yeah, I mean it's awesome because you are right now on a road trip around the US.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Which is pretty awesome.
Speaker 2:And I know you're just maybe a week into it. I'm like, I'm almost, I'm. I think I'm like almost a month in. No, yeah, no way. What day is it today? It's the 11th. Now it docs when this is recorded, but, uh, yeah, now the time, now the time clicks for you to get this uploaded. Um, I think I left.
Speaker 1:No, it's probably three weeks really I'm on the road three weeks yeah it took you three weeks to get down here three weeks just to get here.
Speaker 2:I, I said I did, I left home and I said I gotta, I gotta get to northern california for the the norcal and shill podcast. I'm just gonna take like three weeks detours along the way to get there. Awesome, you have taken my time, man. It's just uh, it's another thing with the time situation. It's just like you know, I'm traveling and just trying to explore as much as I can and create and work at the same time. It's uh, yeah, it's been kind of fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, do you have advice for artists joining the NFT space?
Speaker 2:for artists joining the nft space you don't join twitter, I'm kidding, I'm kidding man. Advice for artists uh well, patience is is the first one right, because like you join the space because someone has told you you need to be on, you know, in nfts right yeah, and, perception wise, is really hard for people to realize that you might not sell something right away.
Speaker 2:It may take time. So that first step is like, whatever you do, don't expectations wise, like, be patient. But the thing that I I come back to the most is like artists throughout history have been disruptors. You know, they've been the creatives, they've been the people that don't follow the path. Yeah, and it scares me a little bit.
Speaker 2:You know, as people come into the space, it's like there's sort of these formulas that start to. You know, this is how you build community, this is how you engage on twitter. You'll be on spaces. You know, say, gm every morning. You know, uh, you ask people to drop their yellow photos. Like there's a lot of things that I see that work. But the problem is if, as an artist, you come in and you see that you start to just conform and you get in line and I would say, like, whatever made you get to where you were as an artist? Like whatever you did in your own path, like come into the NFT space with that same attitude, like, yeah for sure, pay attention to what's working, but space with that same attitude, like, yeah for sure, pay attention to what's working, but but don't think that you just need to follow like what's worked for everyone else right, because if those are those of us that were here early and early is crazy, because early is like this time last year in my mind right yeah, especially for photographers.
Speaker 2:Like this is all made up, yeah, like no, there was no roadmap. All of this was made up by the people that were in the space. You know, yeah, and it's not a rule. The next year could be totally different. So I think there's some fundamental things that you can pay attention to. But, just like, be an artist, be creative, come up with your own strategy. You know, do your own thing. We don't need I don't, I don't agree with this like idea. We need more copycats. We need more people acting the same as everyone else. Yeah, I like, I like to see someone come in and, you know, stir up a little controversy you know, start some shit.
Speaker 2:Sorry to start your podcast, but that's exciting to me and, like I from from, from like an observer standpoint, I get excited about artists that do that okay. So yeah, just don't, don't be any different than you were. What got you here? Right, that's my advice okay, that's good advice.
Speaker 1:If you could live or move anywhere, where would you live and why?
Speaker 2:um well, I, I did this right, you travel a lot no, I mean so I, I live in canmore, alberta.
Speaker 2:Yes, there's actually quite a few nft photographers in that, in that particular town, uh-huh, um, I would like to say I was there first, but you know we'll argue. Um, but I did. I actually did a, a trip across canada with that exact intention. Now, just canada, because I didn't want to necessarily move to a different country at the time and I just said, like we're in canada, what I want to live. So I went to every kind of town and city that I could and I kind of tried to get the vibe and I moved to Canmore.
Speaker 2:I was just like a little mountain town, an hour from an international airport. You know, beautiful, clean air, mountains, just amazing place. So if there was one place I had to live, I've got it, like Canmore's the spot. Okay, perfect, 100. But what I've learned is that I love the variety. Okay. So if I could pick, I would move to a different place like every month or two and just stay there and then move somewhere else right, stay there, I'm a nomad, like I love I, uh, I just I love the variety.
Speaker 2:I get so excited to be in a new city and then after, like you know, kind of seen all the corners and all the places and it's like it's not as exciting to me.
Speaker 1:So yeah, somewhere else. Okay, you have any questions for me?
Speaker 2:yeah, we talked about this a little bit before we started. But, um, if, if you were to start it all over again, would you want to be anonymous from the start or would you change?
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I still think anonymous, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Do you think that? Like, because I've thought about this a lot and I've often wondered if I could start over like would I have done that? Yeah, even as an artist, like started, right, it's hard because you're a photographer and you have photography. It's like not like you can be like I'm anonymous and then like mint this photo and then feel like wait a second, like I saw that on your instagram, but I I I've often thought about it because I think there's something really powerful about it, right right, and I mean this is like the space where you can, you know, build that trust anonymously.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's something really cool, because when you don't know, like, who people are, you don't know their background, you don't know what they look like, you just judge them on, like how they interact. You know whether it's a Twitter space or it's their tweets and you remove a lot of bias and I think it's a really cool, powerful thing, yeah, and uh, yeah, yeah, I definitely sometimes wonder how it'd be if everyone was anonymous, right and started from scratch and interacted.
Speaker 1:I mean it'd be interesting.
Speaker 2:It's a cool thought experiment because the other side of it is like people have talked about you know what if you had to verify your identity, right, so you're on Twitter and it's like you had to verify, you know, this is who I am. Would people be nicer knowing that? You know it's? You can't be hide behind the the veil of being, you know, not being able to trace back to this person. It's like the thought experiment is one side, like everyone is there is no, you can't hide who you are, yeah, and the other side is everyone's anonymous and like how would those spaces play out? Right, it'd be interesting, interesting experiment. Yeah, yeah, um, how do you look? Okay, so another question I have is how do you look? I'll, I'll set it up. This is how do you look? I'll, I'll, I'll set it up this way, like if you give you like a foul, like a hundred marbles, and I was like one side is like the quality of of the art.
Speaker 2:And the other side is like the community, like the community and the person like how would you invest? Like what, what? How do you look at those two?
Speaker 1:so I mean, the person matters a lot to me because I want to know that they're going to work or be willing to work in, uh, good times and bad times. So I would put at least 60 to 70 percent on the person and then go to the art. Um, yeah, I think that's how I would do it?
Speaker 2:Do you have like a? Do you have a strategy Like? Would you like, as someone said, like you know, write an ebook on the NorCal NFT investment strategy? Would there be something there? Would there be. Is there a real strategy to how you be something there?
Speaker 1:Would there be? Is there a real strategy to how you've kind of approached this? I don't know if there's real. I mean I don't feel like there is, but there probably is something to it. But I just, you know, I just want to make sure that someone has that work ethic. That's what matters most to me, cause, you know, maybe they're not hugely popular now or whatnot, but you know, if you put in the time, you put in the in willing to put in the years, you know trends happen and people get popular. But I think longterm, I think that's what matters most. I mean that's. You know, it's like the overnight success.
Speaker 2:10 years later, right, yeah, how do you judge it? Like, how would you look at it?
Speaker 1:oh man, I don't know how I judge it. Tweets per minute, um, I don't know. I guess, seeing what they, or talking with them, seeing how they respond to questions or whatnot I guess that's how I figured it out. Interesting, I don't know.
Speaker 2:Have you do you think, did you? Okay, this is kind of a specific question. I'll tell you a trend that I noticed with your collecting is I definitely noticed that you collect. A kind of specific question I'll tell you, like a trend that I noticed with your, with your collecting is is I definitely noticed that you, you collect a lot of Genesis pieces.
Speaker 1:Oh right, right, that's true.
Speaker 2:Yeah, um, so which means that, like inherently there's, you're leading right In the sense that you don't have, like there's no history, right you?
Speaker 1:can't see like here's the floor price there's been four sales You're.
Speaker 2:if you're making that first move, then you really have to decide, like, what's going to happen after that? Yeah, so do you? Did you dm with? Have you dm with most artists that you've collected before you make that, that purchase? Or have you just blindly kind of followed them, you know, without interacting, and then been like, okay, I'm going to make that buy?
Speaker 1:um, you know, I feel like I mainly don't dm them initially. I try and just research on them ahead of time, see what I can find on them first, and then I'll, and then you know, I guess, based on what history I can find or not, then I can like kind of judge what I think like a fair price is, and if it's too high I'm not, according to what I think, I'm not going to buy it. But if I think it's reasonable for you know someone that is unknown or you know maybe not unknown but unbought in the space, then I think I'll go for it.
Speaker 2:Have you ever messaged someone? Is there a limit, by the way, on the amount of questions?
Speaker 1:No, no, no, no no.
Speaker 2:Cause you made a grave mistake, my friend, because you guys saying I don't have any questions, I just I might flip the podcast. This might be second half of this podcast is me interviewing you. Have you ever messaged an artist and said like I don't know if I've had.
Speaker 1:if I have, I don't know. I sometimes I feel weird doing that, I guess Cause they value their work yeah, which you know I guess there is. That thing is like do do they actually value their work that high, or just throwing it out there because other people are selling it that high? That's a good question. Um, I know, towards the beginning I did make some offers really low offer, oh interesting on some pieces and then I appreciated that the artist was like hey, man, that's a little low, I can't do that. Um, I'd be willing to take like this for it so, yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 2:I thought about this a lot because, yeah, it is. It is a really the pricing thing is such a tricky thing in this market and, like you know, I don't want to speak for our all artists, but I think, like even people that think they have it figured out, like they're just, they're just going with, like, hey, this is it, like no one knows right at the end of the day, no one really understands how to price things properly and and how to kind of, you know, understand how to do it.
Speaker 2:And I've always thought about this because I I would I've never had anyone, a collector, do it to me, but I would appreciate it, like if someone said like I really like this piece, but like this, this is just, it's too much, yeah, and then you know, I always think like there's always like, there's always things right. I've done trades before.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, that's one of my favorite favorite things. I know you've done some trades before. I don't know if those have worked out or not, but uh, you know I've done trades. It's fun. It's it's fun, it's like as an artist. It's like someone appreciates a piece of art that you have. It's cool, like that's like that's the best part of it. And then you know the monetization side of it is. You're trying to figure out like what's fair, and I always just I always wish that that would happen more. Yeah, the collector would just come out and say like that's true Cause.
Speaker 2:Then you know like okay, cool, like let's talk, and then if you don't want to sell it for that, that's okay too, but then at least you know right? But that piece resonated with someone and they're just not comfortable with that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that trading or bartering would be interesting to do more in this space. I've done it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a couple times.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've done it a couple times.
Speaker 2:Um, I did once with kath yeah and I did with reuben woo, can you tell? Can you? Can you just can you tell me the kath one, because I think it's so much fun. The kath, yeah, because it just played out recently. No, no, it just played out like the end result of it played out.
Speaker 1:Oh, the end result yes, yeah, so this is back, man, was that in June? No, it had to be in like August.
Speaker 2:July yeah, it might have been earlier, it was yeah.
Speaker 1:So I had Kath's Genesis piece. Yeah, I was talking to Kath and I had a few apes and they were priced around 12 to 5 to 10, I guess it was 5 to 10, because I ended up trading her an ape for one of her pieces that my wife liked and, yeah, that was awesome. It was simple, straightforward, simple deal. Yeah, it was great and it worked out, I think, for both of us yeah, I think she flipped it once.
Speaker 1:She, yeah, she did it once she sold it a little bit later, I think for like 12 or 15 eath, and then she bought it that yeah, that ape with the, the halo, yeah, and then ended up selling yeah just sold that, sold that yeah.
Speaker 2:It's a wild space, right, because it's both sides right. Two plus her floor price has gone crazy and gone up, but it's just not as liquid it's not as simple to just turn around and flip it. But yeah, I agree with the trading. Yeah, I think it's super fun.
Speaker 1:It's sometimes hard to approach it with collectors and figure out how do you propose it, right it with collectors and figure out, like, how do you, you know, how do you, how do you propose it right? So I mean with kath for some reason, I think, because apes were, I mean, they've always been popular but I was like, hey, you interested in, you know, doing a trade? And I like gave her the, or give her the options of the apes that I had. That was one of the trade. Um, so that one was fairly easy and you know, it's pretty easy to talk with Kath, the Ruben one. He was, you know, saying, hey, I'm interested in one of these things. And I was like, so like a week later I like DM'd him. I was like, hey, are you really interested in doing a trade?
Speaker 2:And then we worked out a trade on that it's like a fun story, right, because it ties you together to this like kind of right thing you know it's like you trade it and then you know there's so many things can happen from there and it's kind of this fun it is it's a fun thing. I'd be interesting to think of how they could facilitate more of that kind of trading yeah, I wanted to be like a, like a site.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, they have those trading sites, but it'd be interesting to's like a site. Well, they have those trading sites, but it'd be interesting to have like a marketplace, like, hey, I'm willing to trade this for something. Artists and collectors It'd be interesting, because then you could like say like, I guess it'd be easier for artists to say I'm willing to trade my work for any of these items. Yeah, that's, that's a cool way to do it.
Speaker 2:Then like a collector saying like I have this, yeah you need like we need like a like in the old days of like baseball cards. You know like we need like a like one of these events. You need to just have like a trading person.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, like everyone.
Speaker 2:Everyone's got like a little booth and it's like this is my art, you know. By the way, these are all like my money I actually spent on all these profile pics that I don't want and, uh, you know, people can walk around and be like I like this, oh yeah offer and we can start bartering. That would be fun that'd be kind of in person physical nft uh showcase.
Speaker 1:Right. Then you have like a couple people that like came in with like a yeti. Yeah, they traded up to a punk by the end of the weekend this is a good story.
Speaker 2:So, um, I got a message one night. Uh, so I, I know kath, kath's also from uh we're talking about. It's funny when you start saying first names of people and then, no, you don't, uh, you don't set up what it is. Uh, but kath samard, also an nft artist, amazing photographer. Uh, you bought her a genesis piece and you also purchased my genesis piece, right, it's kind of how this all started. Um, she, I got a message from her one night being like hey, there's this thing called super yetis. You got to buy one. And I said, kath, like where where did you get this? Like this was before any profile packs. Like what are you talking about?
Speaker 2:like, yeah, yeah she's like a norcal guy says you gotta get one oh no, no, don't put that on me, oh man so I was like on open sea and uh oh, looking at this and it was just such a weird world. That was my first introduction to these profile pics.
Speaker 1:I'm like looking at this, before they were revealed.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like looking at this, these Yetis, and I think I missed the mint. And then I was like looking at it on the secondary and like looking at all these Yetis.
Speaker 2:With the one had camera, there was Northern lights behind it and we bought one. And then I returned the favor and this is what's going to be. Great is, uh, kelsey jay, who's also photographer and t-space, which we may meet later on today. I told her you gotta buy a yeti. So she's got a yeti. Yeah, and I'm holding that thing forever, forever, because if anything rings true in this space like, the most absurd outcome is what tends to be the result, right. So like that, just one day, like in five years, yetis being the top collectible in the space would be such a beautiful outcome and that'll be. That'll be my cash out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I still have one yes, I got rid of all of them when they hold some randomly. They pumped yeah a couple of times.
Speaker 2:What's got you the most excited, like in the space, in the future, like, did you see something? So we are here now. I mean you can't say that everyone, anyone could have saw this coming the way that it played out the last year. But is there anything that is exciting you about the future, any new changes, technology trends you're seeing?
Speaker 1:Um, any new changes, technology trends you're seeing, I think I don't know if I see anything, but I think, like a fully decentralized, no one owns it platform would be interesting. I mean, it's a little hard, I guess it would be a little bit hard, but because we still don't have well, yeah, I guess it would be a little hard, but Because we still don't have Well, yeah, I guess we do kind of have decentralized exchanges in a sense, but not truly, but something like that would be interesting. I think, more dynamic, using the smart contract to do things like what Alpha Centauri Kid did yeah, when Trill killed him.
Speaker 2:Yeah, what happened? I don't know the story, I just my mind was thinking about so he so Ack made this piece Okay. Where he's in the hospital.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and the doctors are around and like a couple of lawyers or something. Yeah, and the doctors are around and like a couple lawyers or something.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're all like on open sea looking at his piece, like waiting for him to die, okay. And then Trill bought the piece, yeah, and then there was like an option to like pull the plug, oh gotcha. So Trill pulled the plug, yeah, and that piece got sent to a burn address, yeah, and it was there for like three days and then it was brought back to life and it went back to Trill's wallet and then it had Ack standing there, I think it was, and all the doctors were dead.
Speaker 2:Oh, wow, yeah, so this is all kind of orchestrated behind the scenes with the smart contracts.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So the ability to kind of inject whatever art you want into that piece and then, you can kind of play you could kind of do anything, automate it, or it can be. In this case it was I. I'm guessing it was manual, like he was doing it behind the scenes uh, it was.
Speaker 1:It was all programmed, prescripted. Yeah, it was prescripted, um, but yeah, what you can do with a smart contract and how your art changes along the way, like he also has one that um f man I'm forgetting the name. It's like the. I think it's a rose or something. It is an image of a rose, it changes and um, vincent vando has it okay and it constantly changes, like every time it like something interacts with it, or is it, yeah, like ethereum?
Speaker 1:I don't know if it's like ethereum price. Um, it did disappear for a second and interacted, like, in a way, with the one with him in the hospital that's interesting.
Speaker 2:Um so yeah, it's it's interesting, so many things you could do. You could do like every time a piece that gets sold or traded like a little bit of uh, yeah, you know, like just a little damage, like it, just you know the quality goes down right right, right.
Speaker 1:so yeah, there is that, like know it's been handled physically almost. Yeah, like so Def Beef, the generative music artist. He has something like that. So every time it trades hands, the quality of the music goes down. So, yeah, that's really cool. But it's also like what person am I to buy this? Like 10 times down the line You're like oh, I paid a lot of money for this. It doesn't sound good anymore.
Speaker 2:See, see, that's. I think that's the challenge, like your. Your point that you asked me earlier is, like, what's your advice for artists coming into the space? Yeah, just like, don't forget that you're an artist, right, you know it. The game here isn't to follow a formula to maximize your, your, your financial success in the space. Like, yes, that can be your strategy, but it's like a business strategy and I think that it to me, and I really appreciate when, like collectors, yourself and others, support projects that are experimental. Oh yeah, because you don't know, as an artist, like if you do that, like if you degrade the photo, every like is that good or bad? Like we don't know.
Speaker 1:Right yeah.
Speaker 2:And. But the difference is that we're trying it right, we're experimenting. The difference is that we're trying it right, we're experimenting. And I think that when the community supports that, like supports those people that are just doing things different, it encourages more people to do it Right. And the trick is for people to look past like don't, okay, so someone does a piece that degrades every time it gets sold. Like the move isn't to go and make a piece that degrades every time it gets sold, because that's not why it's sold. Yeah, it's sold because that artist did something different.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and like, you eventually realize, like the game is like, what can you do differently than what other people are doing? Right, it doesn't matter if you're a photographer, 3d artist, a musician. Like the fun of this space is it's so new and different and we're creating these, these new experiences, these new ideas, like just push it right. You know, do something wild, and I mean it. It. It seems to me that there's enough people out there that value that and are willing to to invest in it and support it Right. Um, that it seems like relatively low risk compared to, you know, other industries and markets where you might not be able to do that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I guess the only hard part about experimenting with contracts is all the devs are busy. Yeah, that's true, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we need more devs in the space. There's no doubt about it.
Speaker 1:Go learn the code.
Speaker 2:Yeah, go learn, that's right.
Speaker 1:Oh, but yeah, definitely is some cool stuff you can do. You know, if you can think about it, it it can be done.
Speaker 2:You just have to think about it yeah, that's 100, that's 100, that's 100 true like I know, there's uh man ben ben strauss, so he did the the one where it changed like uh, I think it's a time lapse or it changes with the clock.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that one was kind of cool yeah, that, yeah, that was that was cool and I think they did that like he, he, he did that he's, he's got an engineering background, so I think he did that um with, like a friend who's also a developer, and they did that themselves and I think, um, if I, if I remember this right, I think that they did that project and then a couple other ones that were based on. So, like we're talking about is like this is a photo, yeah, but it was actually multiple photos from different times from the same location, yeah, and then that photo would change based on where it was cool, as it would change based on what time it was, where you were in the world so if you were?
Speaker 2:in japan and you were looking at that nft, it would show what that photo would look like at your local time. Oh wow, versus if you're here in california, it would be different.
Speaker 2:So it wasn't just like that's automated it was reading where your time zone was right, collecting data. For me that's crazy, but then I think that they they ended up launching a company based on that. Oh, they did so. I think they have a little consulting company where you, if you have an idea, you can reach out to them and they'll actually build it for you. Oh wow, so I don't know. I'm sure they're probably crazy busy but you know there are people out there that are doing it? Do they do?
Speaker 2:pfp projects yeah, there, though I think to your point, there is the limitations, right on the technical, but I don't know, even if you just imagine this idea and think about it and pitch it to a few devs, if it's something really exciting, developers want to work on exciting projects too. Yeah, that's true. So they probably have a queue of standard stuff that they're being asked to do, and if you have something really unique I work with a lot of developers like they'll get excited. They want to work on groundbreaking stuff too. So, right, it's not inconceivable that you can't jump the queue, yeah, on some devs time, because you've you pitch something that's super creative. That's true. Yeah, the thing I heard is interesting. I don't know if you see this perspective, but I talked to so okay.
Speaker 2:So one of the things that's really cool about this is I've started to now actually meet people that have collected for me in person. Oh, right, because it's sort of for my style, it's it's what I like like. I like to have like a bit of a one-on-one and get to know people, and I've actually met a few now in person. It's been such a cool experience. Now, to get to meet you is really neat, um, but uh, I don't know where I was going to go with the with the point, but but basically like that, that one-on-one like interaction, the actual chance to hear from someone and meet them and be like, why, like what? What caught your attention about my piece? Like, why did you collect it? That's like really unique for me in such a cool space, whereas if you're, you know you're doing PFP projects or you're doing these massive projects with tons of people. It doesn't feel as authentic and real to me. So, yeah, it's a super cool, super cool experience to do that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I drove all the way here for it, right? Well, do you have any shout outs? Do you want to do any shout outs? Oh man, you don't have to.
Speaker 2:I'm not, I'm not a shout out guy, I mean I just I'll just say, like people would know um, for me, it's just, it's people that have collected for me. You know, it's a small group of people. I've had a chance, uh, to either meet in person now or um interact uh, you know, on dms or messages. Yeah, um, so you know, I won't I won't go through the list and name them, but anyone that's collected a piece for me, like that, it means the world and it's such a huge, it's huge boat of confidence, uh, from people that have done that.
Speaker 2:And you know, whatever the reasons are, it doesn't matter it, it's just it's cool and it's exciting and, as an artist, it definitely pushes you to continue to create and you see people valuing your work. It's a, it's pretty magic. So a shout out to anyone everyone that has that's collected a piece from me is is pretty awesome.
Speaker 1:Thanks, that's my shout outs well, matt thanks. Thanks for uh doing this podcast in person this is awesome man.
Speaker 2:Uh, such an honor and so so cool to do this. Thanks for having me. Yeah, I'll take care.
Speaker 1:Well, I weird. I don't know how to even end this thing. All right, that's it. Who?
Speaker 2:is this guy? Who is this guy? Who is?
Speaker 1:this guy? Who is this guy? Who is this? Who is this guy? Who is this guy? Who is this guy? Who is this guy? Who is this guy? Norcal guy, norcal guy.
Speaker 2:NorCal guy, norcal guy, norcal guy, norcal guy, norcal guy, norcal guy, norcal and chill podcast.
Speaker 1:So it's chill time, norcal and chill podcast. What the fuck, what the chill? Nor? Norcal and Shill Podcast. What the sh-, what the sh-? Norcal and Shill Podcast. So it's shill time, norcal and Shill Podcast. What the sh-, what the sh-.