Panel on Learning how to Learn Brony Skills · 3:53am Jun 25th, 2016
Do you ever see the content made by other Bronies and wonder: "How did they do that?"
And then right after asking that, do you ask yourself: "How can I do that?"
Then, this panel is for you!
In this lecture, I'll be going over the initial steps to take when trying out new skills such as writing, drawing, vectoring, audio recording, and video production.
Check it out! It's even subtitled!
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So after the angsty debacle of not doing a panel last year, I have finally completed my first panel! I think it turned out pretty well.
This is a panel (and well... a blog series) I've wanted to do for a long time now. I performed a preliminary version of the drawing portion of this panel all the way back in 2013, (which Dr. Wolf commented on). I've learned a ridiculous amount of different Brony hobbies and haven't really done enough with the skills I've obtained. But at least now I have a nice way to show other people how to go about learning those skills. 
And now I have a new skill I've tried out: Public Speaking. Woohoo!
So let me sum up the experience in Hits, Misses and the odd things in between.
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Hit: Way overprepared
I didn't even have time to break into a demonstration of using After Effects, which would have been really fun.
Of course, I talked really fast to get through the material. But I expected that.
Hit: Technology
Only ONE thing went wrong: my Quicktime screencast stopped recording while I wasn't using Powerpoint. I have no idea why. And as soon as I went back to powerpoint, the screencast started recording again. Weird. So in the internet version, I recorded another demonstration of the vectoring program, Illustrator.
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Miss: Timing
I feel like I spent too much time on Writing and Editing portion of the lecture. Which is understandable. Because out of all the skills I've learned, writing feels the most rewarding to me. Which is strange because visual arts are far more likely to reach a wider audience. I guess how something makes me feel is more important than the audience it may reach. Otherwise, I'd just make Gifs all day.
Miss: Talking too fast?
I don't know how to rectify this. I talk fast when I'm excited and nervous. Unless I don't care about the subject, I usually talk fast. But I do recognize that it's not very good for public speaking.
I blame triplespeed YouTube videos. 
Miss: Hands!?
Hands! Wat R U doing!? Hands! Stop!
It's like someone put horcruxes in my hands while I wasn't paying attention. And they come out every so often to perform a made-up-on-the-spot sign language. I was so focused on the words coming out of my mouth (and not looking at any one member of the audience for too long) to worry about my hands.
Miss: Camera Placement
I should have put the camera on the other side of the room. The projection behind me just looks tacky. The colors would have been better as well.
Miss: I was too nervous to tell people about it
I was so nervous that I'd fail and do a terrible job, that I didn't really tell very many friends about the panel. So the people that came were strangers. It would have been nice to have a friend there.
Miss: A remote
I probably should have used one of those presentation notes to advance the slides without stopping to hit a button on my laptop every time.
Miss: Subtitles
I... I don't know why. But I spent several hours transcribing this whole panel and cringing over every "like" and vague statement. By the way, if you give YouTube a transcription, it does a fantastic job of auto setting the timings for subtitles. But in the end, it felt like it was too much effort for a low reward. I hope people that like subtitles comment and say so, otherwise I probably won't spend the extra time to do that in the future.
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Vague: The self
Public speaking uses so much of yourself. It's a constant battle between brain, hands, eyes, mouth and posture. I had the hardest time not looking at any one member of the audience for too long.
Vague: Privacy
I just put up a video of myself on the internet. I hope that doesn't come back to haunt me.
Vague: Questions
Okay, so I tried to follow the Rym and Scott method of giving panels. Which is surprisingly anti-questions. And for good reason. I only got one question the whole lecture... and it took the poor guy a while to get the question out. Which, props for him, speaking is hard. (I edited that part out of the YouTube video.) But... maybe it is better not to take audience questions?
I dunno. I don't want to axe questions completely, yet. I think I should take a leaf out of Dr. Wolf's book and have 40 minutes of content with 10 minutes of questions.
The comments people made out loud were awesome though.
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Awesome: Praise
Afterwards, an art teacher came up to me and said I did a good job describing learning how to do art, and that my panel had a lot of useful information she hadn't heard before. 
And several other people said they liked it too! 
Learning to learn it's certainly one of the most useful skills one could possibly develop.
~Leonzilla
PS: I don't see the subtitles.
4047539
Yep!
And you have to click the CC button in the YouTube player to turn them on.
Most people turn 'em off since Youtube's automatic captions aren't the best.
4047556 Oh, thank you! I was under the impression that those subtitles appeared randomly and I never noticed the CC button until you point it out.
But yeah, those captions aren't up to standard yet, they get a great many words wrong, but just knowing that this exist brings up hope for an improved version in the future.
Congrats on making your panel, I say you did very well considering it was your first time.
~Leonzilla
Don't worry, I'm sure it'll be fine.
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4047887
I'm so glad you enjoyed it!
4048036
Thank you so much!
4051773
Haha! That's awesome!