Shadowing Practice: I built my dream podcast studio in Austin. - Learn English Speaking with Video

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It's supposed to say studio tour.

This is the most expensive thing I've ever bought.

The most complex project I've ever built.

We did it.

Studio's finished.

It was arduous.

Every little touch means something.

We spent so long.

F* me.

Okay, where do I start?

So this is the first day in what will become from modern wizarding studio.

I'm excited I am excited slightly daunted.

We moved in we found out that the building had a ton of mold

so we needed to remediate all of that

but it's part of an HOA which means

that you can't make changes without getting their approval

and some of the mold was inside and outside which means you need to reclad the outside differently.

Everything needs to be done sequentially

because you can't do the build until the molds done

and the mold can't be done until the remediation is finished

and then the particulate clean needs to come after that and the bathroom needs to be done at this time.

I feel like this is the real winning in the weeds of what we're trying to get into

and getting that wrong is going to be like, oh, we committed so much time.

We're talking about the specifics of the office and the studio.

I keep changing my mind.

Any kind of pendant lighting that we want, but if we don't want to go that route, then yeah, it's...

I'm pretty good at moving quickly, but I can be quite undecisive.

This is essentially any build is just a huge list of decisions

that need to be made It's not just what do I want it to look like it's can I make that happen?

Without any doubt this is the most complex

and elevated studio We've put together for any of our clients

even Rogan It's just nothing was skimped on in terms of you know quality budget equipment

constructions it is so

Difficult to put any kind of building project together on a good timeline

But when you're also trying to build a studio and there's electronics

and lighting setups and five different companies providing your lenses

and your cameras and the storage that goes online and

that needs to speak to the system that actually records locally and that needs to be uploaded to the cloud.

it is just an unrelenting stream of challenge after challenge after challenge

and each time

that we think we've got to a stage where we can

begin to move on to the next thing there is a hold up

and this is i guess the same whenever you're trying to do any big project especially something

that requires people with hammers and nails and paint

and then you add cameras and microphones in on top and it just gets exponentially more difficult.

I'm learning the art of patience one studio build day at a time.

Isn't this good?

I'm gonna show you studio tour.

I bought this ten months ago.

It's still not entirely finished.

It's nearly nearly nearly nearly done

but been watching me record episodes out of here for a long time

so now it's time for me to show you around most impressive part most impressive parts the doormat

so this is the studio in the office i bought this in october

and this was a marketing office none of these pillars existed

this middle section didn't exist obviously no podcast studio we made

fake walls fake ceilings painted everything i wanted to make a

green room green room adjacent sometimes guests bring family friends managers

and they can come here and sit and watch this sexy cool vestiboard thing

that we've got in the office that everybody sees including the guests

when they walk in vb .plus slash modern wisdom you can

put whatever you want on the board apart from swear words what's been cool is i've been

so involved in everything the art the soft furnishings like cozy earth i really love cozy earth shit

so like we got these i don't know every time i

sit down it always feels really comfy we got this I

think it's funny pencil design head -in -the -sand ostrich wallpaper I just think it's really cute

and kind of dumb and it's everyone's like what the fuck is

that everybody's got different offices we've got a place

that people can work out here we got a cute kitchenette

we have a variety of snacks hey Siete sponsor me nuts .com are awesome Siete I need you as well

custom new tonic fridge we are fueled by frosty beverages

and have an equal opportunity energy drink consumer obviously the lion's share is new tonic

very important my office i love the fact that it's light

and airy which is a big deal this little mezzanine being able to be outside

and you know take a call

or just get a little bit of fresh air is pretty

cool this is a copy of joe rogan's favorite book so it's his birthday today

we're up hey Christopher good to see you thank you very

much for the book this is very cool of you it's inscripted

inscription inside to Yoko

ono who knows well what the jazz life entails i've just

exploded a can of newtonic all over my crotch as well

look i love being able to make a fool of myself

on rogan i love bringing you great guests on the podcast

and your support and pressing subscribe helps me to continue to do

that so if you haven't hit subscribe or if you just go

and check down below whether

or not youtube has unsubscribed you from the channel tons of

people who have pressed the button apparently just get unsubscribed

which sucks and makes me very sad indeed

so go there check one please

and i will continue to do my best to bring you

great episodes all the time on this table right here thanks

this was a gift from mark zuckerberg that's the decal from his ranch

and i got to go

and hang out with him in kawaii this was a gift

from bill thompson he put a custom modern wisdom decal on the site i'm aware

that we're kind of edging you toward the actual thing

that you care about which is the studio in there

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but this is foreplay it's a little bit of this is

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a interior design foreplay i'm like a naked marie kondo marie kondo is

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that who did the fucking who did the feng shui shit whatever um the whole studio

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because i've kind of got ptsd from vocs and mold

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and bad pain building material we did micro particulate clean before we came in jasper purifiers in every room But importantly,

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we wanted the furniture that we used to all have no VOCs, no blow -off, just the highest quality that we could.

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And this is all human scale.

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So human scale make the best office furniture on the planet.

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It absolutely fucking rules.

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I've fallen in love with vertical buttcases.

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Had one in my first ever studio back in Newcastle.

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Go back and watch the David Allen episode.

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I remember seeing him going, that looks so sick.

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So I've had one of these everywhere that I go.

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That's a gay bear.

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Very important. Can we look?

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Can we zoom in?

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Thank you.

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It's very important.

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Bullpen.

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That's where the blood and the feces and the titles and the thumbnails are made.

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I did everything in my bedroom on my own for basically forever.

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So to have a place to go to work that isn't a coffee shop is still kind of deranging.

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I come in and there's people here and they say, hey, this thing happened and whatever, as opposed to it just being a Facebook messenger chat between me and video guy Dean.

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So we get a lot of questions about what the setup is for the podcast.

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It's been the most basic setup in history, which is this guy.

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When people ask what's modern wisdom about?

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Well, it's interesting because there's porn stars, but there's philosophers, there's psychologists, and then sometimes there's people that are trying to maximize our ability to do space flight.

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And then there's like this whole other area of health and fitness.

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And then I've got these two mates from the UK

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and we kind of talk about how to make the best toasted sandwich.

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so yeah kind of

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that it has been kind of insane to go for as long as I have

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and did just doing it out of bedrooms

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and spare rooms this really has been a very spit

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and sawdust operation for a long time every single bedroom of every single house or Airbnb

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that I've stayed in for more than a couple of weeks

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has been turned into a studio my bedroom in the first

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house I ever bought was the first 500 episodes of the

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show before I flew out to America before I moved to America I think

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that grassroots spit and sawdust just make it work with sellotape

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and cable ties thing maybe held me back for a little

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while I think I was like like fuck it I can

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do it myself I don't need to have a big space I can go

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and have the most beautiful podcast in the world

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and then record out of my spare bedroom

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and both of those things can work at the same time

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and that is true but it's not exactly conducive to being a sane human

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because some days I don't ever leave the house I I wouldn't ever leave the house

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and I wouldn't speak to anyone except for the guest.

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Wake up, go to the gym, listening, prepping, thinking about stuff, come back, still prepping in my dining room, go upstairs, record, finish up, go back downstairs.

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It's 6 p .m and I spoke to one other person and they were on the other side of the laptop.

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So it's nice to have a place to come in to work.

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This is the co -working space.

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It's really great.

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I get to come in and I can, you know, do my prep and sit down and have meetings with people if I need to, or the guests get to come in it's mostly just all of this all of this

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so far is the spiral staircase going up to the bonnie

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blue bedroom it's a little bit of foreplay catch up have

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a bit of a chat oh do you want a new

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tonic should you try to try this protein shake whatever and then we're getting to the main event

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let's go down this is 20

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yeah i think that's that's nice do you still get

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that spill underneath the light yeah

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and you're still catching a good bit of it from here as well because this is quite bright Yeah,

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nearly a year into buying the office and we're still fixing things still making small autistic improvements

165

i think the window fall off really helps with the blowout from the back of this person yes

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so that's the shot that we're trying to fix we spent

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so long dude putting this together me okay why do i start this table's custom this table's entirely custom

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and it's a trapezoid shape so me

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and guest one are further apart than guest four and guest three

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and what that means is you get a foreshot from the wide shot so you can see all four of us.

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In here is a bunch of stimulants and disguises.

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What's the Make Autism Great Again hat?

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Thank you.

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Very important.

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Thank you.

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I mean this is really me trying to bring together everything from a color perspective, from a history perspective.

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Copper and Teal is this kind of cheat, it's a little bit of a cheat trick from Hollywood the opposite ends of a color wheel

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but they just look so beautiful

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and I kind of fell in love with it a long time ago

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so we got this custom tree made in Singapore

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so this is completely custom made and shipped from Singapore I wanted something

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that had a really interesting shape that would create all of these nice shadows

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but would also double up as a shelf shelving

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so we could put little practicals and art elements and stuff in

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so we've got statues some books these I love these guys climbing up cricket ball

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so used to play cricket from a lighting perspective i'm fortunate

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that you know we've built some of the most beautiful sets

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in the world i think for podcasting in the space of the day the guys were able to come in

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and dial and dial and dial and refine

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and play with until they got everything exactly as they wanted

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so as you can see if you look up there's a lot of nanlites

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and some aperture stuff playing around here we got a great

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partnership with nanolite aperture also absolutely fucking rule we worked

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so hard i mean even looking at this softbox

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that we've covered with our own muslin cloth because it changes the way

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that there's a fall off across people's faces you can see here as well

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so this is just a little fill it's just a little bounce fill

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but we've put tiny little bit of additional cloth over the top of it

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which just creates a little bit more flattering shape on the face

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and then all of this

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and nanolite tubes to create the colors to create the fall

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off my big flex was i wanted to have one set

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with multiple looks without it feeling like it was too chaotic

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and people didn't know what was going on so the solution

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that we came up with was to create fake windows

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so shock horror this isn't a real window behind here parvo tubes nanlights

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and all of these are controlled by the same system

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that controls all the rest of the light this window will

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never be seen you will never this is the only time you're ever going to see this window

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because it's not in any of the shots it's behind me behind the cameras

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so this was kind of the the feature piece and in this window

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we're bouncing tubes off of a white wall through a diffusion paper here and then through

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hand cracked hand painted hand stained glass panes

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that are individually colored with different colored gels

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and then with you can't even see this these little tree branches

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which were again custom made and we can change the color of the fucking tubes

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so we can turn it from daytime to nighttime to sunset to spooky house

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and all of the foreground lighting changes to match the background lighting

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so that it feels cohesive because if you have a different color background

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and people's skin looks the same it doesn't feel like the light is falling out of the windows and

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that to me is just the coolest fucking thing one set

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multiple different looks kind of insane to take a room make it completely brand new plaster the whole thing

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and then go through even more work to make it look

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derelict all of this this moss put on by hand stuck

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on by hand all of the cracks in the walls also custom created

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and we're using it to hide cabling

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and perhaps the centerpiece i didn't order this or ask for it

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and i came in one day and it was just up

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and the team had put together

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and we had a bunch of other ones there's a topless version

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which i gifted him on the pod there's another version i

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think where we're in swim shorts let's present you with two

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versions of a very famous photo that's going to be behind

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you for most of the episodes a rembrandt yeah uh an original yeah this is an original i'm not sure

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if you've noticed um

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i'd like to thank my friends

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and family i look like some sort of freak child with

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bicep veins i think it's like ancient chippendales yes it is

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but for some reason for some reason you're in hawaiian shorts i didn't notice

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that and then the one behind it is the uh this is the original

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all class can't delete um if you go back

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and watch episode 17 above my old couch in newcastle has this hand of Adam.

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I didn't even say put this up but the guys saw

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that and then recreated it and then to have this fall off with the light above

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and below i mean you might be getting super bored this might be too nerdy for you

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but i i think it's really cool i'm gonna sit down

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and reminded it's just little doses of nostalgia

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and trajectory for me this thing that was over the first ever episode

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that me and dean worked on together eight

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and a half years ago has got a little nod here underneath the tv in a new city

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and a new country and a new business essentially

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so this is the party trick

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that you might have seen a couple of times on the

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show as i said all of the lighting in here can

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change what do you want to go to do you want

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to show the sunset one the fire streets of la streets of la

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so um if you look up here all of this lighting

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so look this is changing now we can have pulsing

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and you'll notice that all of the foreground lighting changes all of the colors change

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so all of this is now different we've got this sort

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of streets of la thing going on let's do the daylight

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so let's just do the normal one standard

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so the standard one is really good unless somebody's very pale

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so again now all of this is brightened up

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and this is good

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because it's pretty neutral nice fall off on people's faces it's quite bright there's not it's not as dramatic

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but there's still a good bit of drama going on

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because we've got this negative fill yeah let's do the spooky one

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so we we put this one together for peter santanello uh peter goes into deep rural appalachian forgotten communities

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and um this one that fill

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that was up there has completely been killed we've got a little bit more green coming through these lights

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and what that results in is this really aggressive shadow

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so this now remembering cameras are coming in from this side that's what creates

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that sort of really interesting shot when you've got the tights

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and then we've got this sharp wide as well i really love this profile shot

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that we've started using recently we did it in the elan

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debata on episode in the church in london last year my favorite shot of all

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that side on shot especially when stuff's this dark just looks

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so moody and cool so over the top like i'm not martin scorsese right

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but i think all of this shit's fun

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and i like having the conversations

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but playing around with this is i've got into it i don't know what i'm doing

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but i know what i like all right let's see is it fun

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if damn fucking right it's fun virtual set more human scale custom vines growing up here to try

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and create a little bit of texture this is for virtual episodes guests

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that can't come to see me i spent

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so long doing virtual episodes i think we were by far the biggest virtual podcast on the planet the biggest

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but the biggest virtual podcast on the planet for a very very long time i'm still very pro virtual episodes

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because the content is what i care about the most i

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spent a long time building the skill set to be able to do this virtual thing well

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and i'm not prepared to let

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that go i would rather speak to a guest virtually than not at all

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if i really love them and i'm also doing more solo stuff

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so you will see you have maybe already seen more down the pipe me essay style, reflections, Q &A's, lessons, episodes,

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etc. The significance of today is that it's our first episode in the new studio.

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It's like stepping into another world, right?

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I think overall, to be able to have so much use case from the studio, like the capability the studio has,

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you know, a lot of people don't realize like what goes into the back end of just like simple things.

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Like I want to be able to capture my desktop.

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I want to be able to do zoom calls.

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I want to have nine freaking cameras in one space

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or in one place You know like so when you come in here, you know, you're kind of wowed by just the finishes But

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when you're sitting down I think what people don't appreciate is

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how low impact it is with the amount of technology that's in the space

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So you're sitting down you're in a comfortable place vulnerable to be able to have these conversations But everything's out of sight,

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you know, the lights are all mounted to the ceiling You know the system is its own thing.

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Jared's running it the producers there you can tell who put a lot of time

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and thought into making sure

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that you know you had a really cool spot to have

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a two three hour conversation this is HQ this is like

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home base this is where like everything is going to be feeding into

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and out of whether that's the guests whether that's the content

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having this home base in the literal central center of Austin

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Texas having the guests come through it's like a nice central

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location to where we'll just be able to get a lot

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of stuff done oh man finally holy shit today it's studio lunch day

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it's taken so long it's taken so long gentlemen new studio

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so it's the first place that I've ever had

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which is mine it's the first time

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that I've ever got to record in a studio

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that isn't someone else's or a bedroom so I've kind of moved from prostitutes to a girlfriend.

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This feels like a long -term commitment.

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Cheers!

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Cheers, gentlemen.

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Cheers.

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To the first piece of life.

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There it is.

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Honour of privilege.

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I'm a wingman for life.

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I love this guy.

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Help me help you.

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Help me help you.

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You know, when I look back across the trajectory of the show, it is not

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one of palatial luxury and fortune or expenditure really it's been very shoestring budget -y and then

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when we started to make a little bit of money I just dumped all of it into making beautiful episodes

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and prayed that we could make it back and ran it back again

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and ran it back again and ran it back again slowly lighted up

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and then yeah we started to do David Goggins on a soundstage in Vegas with custom built sets

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and my assistant at the time with a piece of fucking cardboard wafting smoke through the room

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because the fan to blow the fog machine around we didn't know what we were doing there is nothing

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that you could do to get me to speed run

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that journey because it was so cool i understand

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that on the way up you have uncertainty about whether

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or not you're going to make it and

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that means your uncertainty doesn't make it feel glorious in the moment it makes it feel perilous

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but in retrospect

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that is all of the coolest shit like this is also

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very cool right i'm not gonna lie it's fucking awesome i

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get to come in here hunter biden jocker willing matt mccusker

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and duncan trussell having a laugh three puffing on a pipe and wearing a captain's hat it's sick

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but that's not what gets you here what gets you here is doing it in your bedroom airbnbs and hotels

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and i'm some fucking bloke from the north of the uk

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who started off with no money no nothing at all no spare time

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and just really loved having these conversations and didn't stop and

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because i didn't stop i ended up here

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and you know it's been enabled by every single one of

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you guys by device in your pocket like you literally changed my life

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but that's not gonna say

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that it's as much your studio as it is mine it's definitely mine

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but he played a big part in it too that's the

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tour I'm done expect more roundtable episodes over the next couple

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of months more lessons more masterclass stuff we're gonna start to

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put together medleys of my favorite moments from different guests

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and different episodes Jordan Peterson on resilience Alex Hormosey on how to build a business.

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I'm excited.

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I'm excited for what the future's got in store.

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I don't need to travel quite as much as I did.

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I did over a hundred thousand miles every year for the last three years.

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I get to sit in that room.

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People can travel to me.

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I appreciate you all.

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To have this is not something that I take lightly and it's awesome and I appreciate you all.

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I'll see you next time.

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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson

This video has 373 sentences and 4275 words to shadow. The speech runs for 22:40. The speaker talks fast, about 189 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 83% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.

Key vocabulary in this video

15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:

Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
custom noun	/ˈkʌstəm/	Frequent repetition of the same behavior; way of behavior common to many; ordinary manner; habitual practice; method of doing, living or behaving.
bedroom noun	/ˈbɛdˌɹum/	A room in a house, apartment, hotel, or other dwelling where a bed is kept for sleeping.
virtual adjective	/ˈvɜɹt͡ʃuəl/	In effect or essence, rather than in fact or reality; also, imitated, simulated.
podcast noun	/ˈpɑdˌkæst/	A program, especially an audio program, produced on a regular basis, delivered over the Internet in a compressed digital format and designed for playback on…
tube noun	/tuːb/	Anything that is hollow and cylindrical in shape.
mold noun	/moʊld/	A natural substance in the form of a furry or woolly growth of tiny fungi that appears when organic material lies for a long time exposed to (usually warm and…
wisdom noun	/ˈwɪzdəm/	An element of personal character that enables one to distinguish the wise from the unwise.
spare adjective	/spɛɚ/	Being more than what is necessary, or what must be used or reserved; not wanted, or not used; superfluous.
cheers	/t͡ʃɪəz/	A common toast used when drinking in company.
dial noun	/ˈdaɪ.əl/	A graduated, circular scale over which a needle moves to show a measurement (such as speed).
trick noun	/ˈtɹɪk/	Something designed to fool, dupe, outsmart, mislead or swindle.
impressive adjective	/ɪmˈpɹɛsɪv/	Making, or tending to make, a positive impression; having power to impress.
lesson noun	/ˈlɛs.ən/	A section of learning or teaching into which a wider learning content is divided.
shadow noun	/ˈʃædəʊ̯/	A dark image projected onto a surface where light (or other radiation) is blocked by the shade of an object.
essentially adverb	/ɪˈsɛnʃəli/	In essence: by nature.

Phrasal verbs you will hear

Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
sit down verb		To assume a sitting position from a standing position.
go back verb		To return to a place or state after having been there at a previous time.
come through verb		To come into a room or other space through a door or passageway.
fall off verb		To become detached or to drop from.
look up verb	/ˌlʊk ˈʌp/	To have better prospects.
put together verb		To assemble, construct, build, or formulate.
blow off verb		To vent, usually, to reduce pressure in a container.
bring together verb		To cause people to do something together; to bring about togetherness.

Grammar in this video

The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:

Structure	In the video
“Used to” used to + verb — a past habit or state that is no longer true	used to all · used to play
Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now	I've ever bought · I've ever built · We've put
Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it	be done · can't be done · be made
Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing	HOA which means · outside which means · airy which is

Pronunciation to watch

The speaker uses 109 contractions and reduced forms, such as I'm, I've, we've. Say them the short way, as you hear them.

The “th” sounds: underneath /ˌʌndɚˈniθ/, cloth /klɒθ/
The “sh” and “zh” sounds: shadow /ˈʃædəʊ̯/, essentially /ɪˈsɛnʃəli/, partnership /ˈpɑɹtnɚʃɪp/, sharp /ʃɑɹp/, shock /ʃɔk/
Long words — get the stress right: essentially /ɪˈsɛnʃəli/, uncertainty /ʌnˈsɜːtənti/, trajectory /tɹəˈd͡ʒɛktəɹi/, virtually /ˈvɚ.t͡ʃə.wə.li/, differently /ˈdɪf.ə.ɹənt.li/

How to practise with this video

Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like custom, bedroom, virtual.

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.

Shadowing technique: read the full step-by-step guide →

Shadowing Practice: I built my dream podcast studio in Austin. - Learn English Speaking with Video

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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson

Key vocabulary in this video

Phrasal verbs you will hear

Grammar in this video

Pronunciation to watch

How to practise with this video

What is the Shadowing Technique?