how i got started on youtube

During the summer break before my senior year in college I interned with my entire film class for a start up company that was going to be a television station for the internet. Unfortunately, neither the company nor the world was quite ready yet. Logically, after college I began posting videos on my website, this website.

My classmate Akiva Schaffer, one of a few students from my film class that turned down the internship, and I reunited at a Channel 101 screening. I remember boldly and naively asking him if he could suggest me to his agent who had just got him an audition for "the new Ben Stiller movie" and him telling me to make something for Channel 101 and he would show them. Though I wanted to be a part of it, I felt like an outsider in that scene and I never made anything. On other hand, Akiva and his two best friends found incredible success with Channel 101 and their group, The Lonely Island, joined the cast of Saturday Night Live in 2005.

One Sunday morning my friend Avi Rothman called me and told me to check out a link he sent me. It was "Lazy Sunday" and it was on YouTube. I immediately started poking around on the site, thinking this is it. This is what I've been waiting for. I can be myself, I can be an individual, I can be pimplywimp.

I had just seen Brokeback Mountain and was amazed by Heath Ledger's performance. I started to see parodies of the film all over YouTube. I came up with the idea to make a video about a ridiculous form of forbidden love between a man and a cat. Little did I know how popular cats were going to be on the internet. So on Superbowl Sunday 2006 I shot Brokeback Meowntain with a friend and posted it March 3, 2006. It ended up getting 70,000 hits. After that I was hooked.

way to go

I am in the process of signing with a network on YouTube. I expect only wonderful things to come from it. I'll keep you updated.

Also, I made a cover of The Shins "New Slang" from their 2001 album Oh, Inverted World. I changed the lyrics a little and played it the only way I know how, not extremely well. The last "faired well", is now "farewell".

challenges rolling out

I have made myself an extremely busy person and am working harder than I have in a very long time on my YouTube videos. So far the response has been great! That's encouraging because if I didn't get any feedback from you, there would be no point in putting a new video up each week. I offer a thank you.

In the future I would like to do more collaborations. Sure, I have been in other people's videos, but I haven't had many YouTubers on my channel. I will change that. Below is an appearance on ShaneDawsonTV and my new challenges.

comedy challenge thursdays kick off

Yesterday I was on a shoot with Shane Dawson and Michael Gallagher. It's going to be an epic music video satire with many talented YouTubers. I would tell you more but I would probably be killed.

Also, I have begun my Comedy Challenge Thursdays. I chose the first challenge from FaceBook, where Jordan wrote on my status update: "Where's Waldo...but he's in denial about being found!". Guess that mean you better join my FaceBook Fan Page and contribute!

I have already chosen my challenge for next week. It involves a recording studio, so be excited!

comedy challenge comedy chomellengy

If you have seen DeStorm or CharlieIsSoCoolLike on YouTube you know that they make videos where their subscribers and twitter followers challenge them. Like them I am going to make a Comedy Challenge series with a new video every Thursday. Now let me tell explain how these other YouTubers challenge videos work.

CharlieIsSoCoolLike's challenges are more like dares. For instance, he's painted himself purple, dyed his hair red, and learned to juggle. My favorite of his challenge series is when he was asked to make a song using only voice and everyday household items as instruments.

DeStorm's challenges are limited to his music and rapping. For instance, he's had to make a song with a pretty girl, rapping from the point of view of an inanimate object, and rapping using movie titles. My favorite is when rapped while skydiving.

So the moral of the story is, you can now challenge me and whose ever challenge inspires me the most I will choose and complete. My challenges will be limited to comedy videos, but if CharlieIsSoCoolLike challenges were my own they'd be to make a comedy sketch about hair dying, a purple person, juggling, or make a funny song with household items. If DeStorm's challenges were mine they'd be to make a comedy sketch with a pretty girl, as an inanimate object like an annoying orange, with dialogue using movie titles, or a comedy sketch where I skydive.

Now please challenge me and be imaginative! Make me do sketches in different genres. Make me do something so hard that I am mad at you. Just kidding I could never be mad at you! I love you!

david lynch & crispin glover

Okay, so we got to Episode 5 of David Lynch & Crispin Glover's Big Box Office Blockbuster and we plan to move forward with more. We finally got our credits for it up on IMDB, which is particularly sweet for me because it's my first writing credit. The show also led to a cameo in a couple videos with The Station, where I got to work with LisaNova and KassemG, two comedians on YouTube that I really admire.



Aslo, I got sick and started googling myself, as if that is a cure. Everything I found actually made me a little more sick. Anyway, I did find a review for the show at Film Threat, a subversive webzine about independent film. I like the part where they say "Ryan Reyes finds more Crispin than the man himself could ever channel.". I also like how Matthew Sorrento, the site's editor, seems to understand that we are big fans and not merely trying to make fun of two of our favorite artists.