What It’s Like Running a Gear Review YouTube Channel with Chris Brockhurst

Pat Miller: 00:00

I'm Pat Miller, and this is The Professional Photographer Podcast. This is the Professional Photographer Podcast live from Imaging USA 2025 in Dallas. Hi, how are you? I'm Pat Miller. I'm the host of the show. This is a special series that's all about scaling your influence presented by Sony. They have, and I'm not sure how we did this, but we have the best of the best of content creators coming to join us here, here at Imaging USA. And we get a chance to talk to them about how they think about creating content, how they distribute content, and what kind of nuggets can we get out of them so we can get better at telling our story online. Chris Brockhurst is our guest. We're going to talk to him in just a minute. Now, this whole getup presented by Sony, and that means they brought out the big guns. We're using the Sony cinema line cameras, which are just flawless. And the whole thing is like being controlled by this brain center on an iPad. Sony's Monitor & Control app is running the show, and people are walking by oohing and ahhing at our setup. Makes me feel like a big deal. I'm not, but it makes me feel like a big deal. So thanks to Sony for the great setup. Okay, enough delay. Let's go behind the scenes with Chris Brockhurst. Chris, welcome to the show. How are you this morning?

Chris Brockhurst: 01:15

Very well. How are you?

Pat Miller: 01:15

I'm excited. We get to spend the whole day talking about scaling our influence. We get to start with you, which is great if someone–unlikely, but if someone hasn't seen your stuff, tell everyone who you are and what you do.

Chris Brockhurst: 01:28

So I think that title always changes, but right now I'd say I am probably a content creator that makes videos and photos that go on Instagram and YouTube in the camera gear educational kind of talking a little about what I shoot space, if that makes sense. It's a very large picture of what I kind of do.

Chris Brockhurst: 01:48

It's a big area.

Chris Brockhurst: 01:49

Yes.

Chris Brockhurst: 01:50

But it probably starts with a real passion. Is the passion for the gear or the creating content or both?

Chris Brockhurst: 01:56

So the passion kind of came with taking photos and videos. I actually have the very first video that I ever recorded, and it came from when I skateboarded when I was like 12 years old, 14 years old. So I have the very first video I ever shot, which is kind of a fun thing to say, but that got me into the world of making family films, capturing video of my kids, and just taking photos generally. Then YouTube came about, and I started being a consumer of other people's content, and then realized, you know, I can talk about what I like as well. And five, six, seven years later, here we are.

Pat Miller: 02:27

You still have the buzz when you upload to YouTube?

Chris Brockhurst: 02:30

I do. I do. Not every video, but some videos, like they always say that the videos that you should be nervous every time you upload. So it's nice when you get that.

Pat Miller: 02:39

So how quickly are you getting signal back from the fans and followers that you have? You put something up, you start to get that wave back. What does it feel like? And how quickly are you getting that feedback loop?

Chris Brockhurst: 02:50

I think it depends on the platform. YouTube is definitely a little bit slower. Like, sometimes you can have a slow burn video that maybe doesn't start as well. Then within a few days, even a couple of weeks, it picks up and you're like, okay, yeah, that's really good. But with Instagram, generally speaking, you know, within the first hour, whether something's going to be really good or if it was a mistake, or if maybe you could have done things a little bit differently. But the nice thing with Instagram is that you can just delete it, try again. So, yeah.

Pat Miller: 03:17

How much of this is presenting it in the right way? I've heard some evangelism around it needs to be titled the right way. The thumbnails are important that it's not just the content that you're creating, it's the way that you're packaging it and delivering it.

Chris Brockhurst: 03:30

It's everything.

Pat Miller: 03:31

Okay, wait, hold on. Tell me about that.

Chris Brockhurst: 03:32

Yeah, it's everything. Honestly, you can make the absolute best, let's say YouTube, for example, the best video that you've ever made. You can be, yeah, this is going to be a straight 1 out of 10. And if people don't know 1 out of 10 means it's a good video. It's not 10 out of 10, it's 1. You want a 1 out of 10 when you upload, you can make the best video ever. But if you do a lackluster title and a thumbnail that doesn't get people to click. A thumbnail, for people listening, essentially it's the magazine cover. You need people to want to pick up the magazine and open it up to get into the meat and potatoes of the video. If you can't package it, that video will not do well and it sucks. It really sucks because it takes the fun out of why you made the video in the first place sometimes. But you got to play the game. And I tell people that all the time. You get a lot of commenters that are like, this title is a bit too clickbaity for me. It's like, I agree, but you got to play the game. Like, I'm not going to put all that time in with the video just to upload it and it disappears.

Pat Miller: 04:25

So I heard someone say it's okay to use a clickbaity title as long as you surpass the expectations of the clickbait. Give them a title that gets their attention, but make sure that you pay off inside the video.

Chris Brockhurst: 04:36

Absolutely. And you pay off quick, too, because when people, if they see a title and a thumbnail that goes with it, because you kind of want to have the title and the thumbnail match in some way, if they don't click on that, if they click on that video and they don't get that payoff within the first 90 seconds, at least, hopefully earlier, they're clicking away. Yeah.

Pat Miller: 04:56

Give us the landscape where we sit today. We're recording in early February 2025, a lot of different platforms we could go try and build on pros and cons. What are you seeing out there for someone that maybe is just starting to scale their influence.

Chris Brockhurst: 05:10

In terms of how to how to build?

Pat Miller: 05:11

Where would you go if you were starting over? Which platform would be the one that you think, you know what? TikTok really will get you the traction, or I see that, you know, YouTube shorts are still hanging around and making an impact. I mean, where would you direct someone if they were just starting out?

Chris Brockhurst: 05:25

As a brand or a business, Instagram first, because it's the easiest. They have the simplest tools on there. Genuinely, if you make really good content that you're passionate about, even if you don't package it in like the perfect way to begin with, it will get sent out to the right audience. If you are an interesting person that has a good thing to say that other people want to hear about, it will do well. But Instagram is probably the quickest and easiest way. YouTube involves a lot of you need to have things look good, you need to have good sound, you need to have good video. Instagram, you can just shoot with your phone, you can make a story, you can make a couple of reels, you can upload them, you can make a real an hour, you can post every single hour, and one of them might do okay. Instagram is definitely the quickest and easiest way to get going for a business.

Pat Miller: 06:15

You're doing a lot of gear reviews.

Chris Brockhurst: 06:17

Yes.

Pat Miller: 06:18

There is discipline in that. If you become a gear reviewer and everything's a 1 out of 10, because that's good. You told me 1 out of 10 is good. If everything's a 1 out of 10, why would I watch all of your gear reviews? How seriously is that something that you're concerned with when you're reviewing your stuff?

Chris Brockhurst: 06:33

It is a thing you're concerned with when you first start. And after a while, you realize that not everything is going to be a 1 out of 10. Because if one video is a 1 out of 10, that raises the bar for what now a 1 is. So then now it's harder to get a 1 out of 10 next time. So you quickly realize that if you can get like a four or a five, that's generally a really good video. The one out of ten, I would say for me, maybe three or four times a year. It's pretty low now. Yeah, it's tough.

Pat Miller: 07:04

The point of view and finding your voice. How long did it take you to find out who you are on camera and what you have to say, the relationship that you're building with your viewers? Like you say trial and error or how did you get to that point?

Chris Brockhurst: 07:16

Repetition. We were chatting just before about how long it takes to get comfortable on the camera, and there are definitely people out there that can just switch it on. And my wife is one of them actually. We just got her into the social media world the last couple of years and she's a natural. But for me, it took a long time. A lot of videos. And you look back at my old videos, I feel like I'm really awkward on camera, but it's really great to see where I was and where I am now. It's just comfort, getting there, even just being able to have a conversation about things now with other people. Right? It just takes comfort. And the only way you're going to get there is by making more and more videos. They say your first hundred videos on YouTube will suck. And I do believe that. And it's not because you may have made a bad video. It's because if you're a person on the camera, you're not comfortable talking to the camera.

Pat Miller: 07:58

Now I want you to get that. You see him on YouTube and it sounds like he's only talking to you. And he just admitted, hey, it took a while to get there. You mentioned being nervous when you hit upload. Is that still an ongoing thing? Are there days where you feel like, why am I doing all this? I'm just going to go take pretty pictures for a living?

Chris Brockhurst: 08:17

Oh, yeah. All the time, all the time. But I think those videos that make you nervous are the important ones because normally those are the ones where you're like, you're not sure. And sometimes the videos that you're not sure about are the ones that do really, really well because they're a little bit off from what you would normally do. So you get that nervous of like, ah, it's maybe not going to do too well because it's not what people want to see. But I had it happen recently with a video. I made a video about a little printer that I'm psyched to use, and I can print my own photos, and it's great to actually have tangible things in my hand. And the video did way better than I thought. And everyone was, they were loving it and they were going to buy it themselves and like. So it's good to have that nervous feeling. Yeah.

Pat Miller: 08:53

And I'm not sure if this question makes sense, but it makes sense in my head, so I'll try it. Like traditionally, because I'm an old school broadcast guy, you would figure out I'm gonna create content for wedding photographers, and then you would create content with them in mind. It seems as though the high-level content creators today are gonna create content they find personally interesting and things that light them up and the audience finds them.

Pat Miller: 09:16

Is that true?

Chris Brockhurst: 09:17

Yes, very much. Yeah, everyone's about personal brand now. People are all about–you hear it all the time and there's a ton of things here at Imaging about story. People want a story. They want to know what other people are doing, how they did it, why they do it, and they want someone to follow along with. It's the same reason people watch TV shows. They love a story. Right? Like everyone wants to hear other people's perspectives of things that they're interested in. So yeah, absolutely. Someone needs to have their voice and tell their story basically.

Pat Miller: 09:44

So you're getting feedback when the baby cries or when you stub your toe or something doesn't work right the first time. That's the stuff that people engage in.

Chris Brockhurst: 09:51

Absolutely. People love–I mean, people love when things go wrong. When people share like their feelings and things that are just. Because not everything is happy, right? Like people love to relate and have relatable content. So it's really good sometimes to share like when things go wrong.

Pat Miller: 10:09

It's great stuff. I want you to share one last thing. If someone's an aspiring content creator, they're hoping to scale their influence. What comes to mind that you wish everyone knew, that maybe you didn't know when you were starting.

Chris Brockhurst: 10:20

Do it because you love it, not because you feel like you have to. If you don't feel like you're really enjoying what it is that you're doing, it's going to feel like it's always a struggle and you're going to burn out. Like, you really have to be passionate and enjoy what it is that you're making videos or photos of. And that will also translate in the way that you come off on camera. So be passionate. Do it for the right reasons, not because you have to.

Pat Miller: 10:45

That was worth the price of admission. Chris Brockhurst, thanks for coming on the show.

Chris Brockhurst: 10:48

Thank you for having me.

Pat Miller: 10:51

Thanks for tuning in to this episode of The Professional Photographer Podcast. This has been the deep dive on Industry Trends. It's been a lot of fun. I hope you've enjoyed it. Now we're going to gauge whether or not you enjoyed it. Because if you didn't enjoy it, don't click like and subscribe. But you did enjoy it, right? So you're going to click like and subscribe, right? And you're going to leave us a comment and tell us what you liked about our guest today. That helps us and the team kind of know if we're doing the right stuff or if we need to go get a job at Dunkin Donuts or something like that. So please leave us a comment, like and subscribe to the YouTube channel. Also, if you're not a member of PPA, we need to have a real conversation. Because if you're trying to build a photography business, PPA is for you. We're talking top-notch equipment insurance. We're also talking about education, this show and so much more is made possible by PPA. So if you like getting better at photography, PPA is there for you as well. Not to mention the sense of community with photographers that are all trying to get better and build their business. At PPA, you belong here. Register now and sign up for the group ppa.com. That's PPA.com. Thanks for tuning in to The Professional Photographer Podcast. I'm Pat Miller. We'll see you right here next time. Take care.