🌲 #01: Only 18 people live in this town, would you move here?

I love the amount of great content being uploaded to Youtube all the time. And I hope you do too. This newsletter is to celebrate and share the best stuff I encounter.

You know that feeling when something catches your attention a little bit extra - that is what’s going in here. Mostly it will be the kind of films I want to make myself. About passionate people doing nerdy things that are making the world better somehow.

Every time you get my three favorite stories, one film that can make you a better film maker and one film made by me. Hope you appreciate it.

/Robin

(If you want to subscribe to any of these channels but haven’t taken the time to sign up with an account on youtube yet, this could be your starting point. It takes 3 minutes to make an account and once you have trained the algorithm to what you like to watch it provides an infinite source of inspiration that will always be there for you. So much more rewarding than doom scrolling facebook or instagram :)

#01 Life as the Last Fire Lookout

WATCH IT HERE

This is the first film of this whole sharing concept, and it’s from Aidin Robbins who is a super talented storyteller. It’s about all the lookouts throughout the US that were built in the late 19th century to prevent wildfires. How they came about, how they got obsolete and why they now are the best hikes available.

This story is a masterpiece and the views and visuals are totally stunning. Only thing is that the filmmaker in me thinks it’s a shame they didn’t bring a better microphone for the interview with the old ranger they found and interviewed. I can hear what he’s saying but better sound would improve it so much. And match the visual amazingness even more.

I truly recommend following Aidin.

#2 I Visited the Most Remote Town in the USA (Outside of Alaska)

WATCH IT HERE

Eva zu Beck is one of my long time favorites and this episode was so captivating. She is travelling with her dog in a huge old 4x4 car camping everywhere, but after years on the road without a home she is now roaming the United States to find a place to (maybe) settle down.

She drives for hours and hours on gravel roads without any signs of service to end up in this town consisting of 18 people in Nevada. It’s so beautiful and inspiring and her storytelling makes me wanna go there immediately.

She 100% masters the art of filming herself like this. It’s hard work and takes so much time, but few people does it better. And one detail I love is how she giggles sometimes when she does the voiceovers, it brings such a personal and positive tone to the films.

#3 The Life of a Retired Sumo Wrestler

WATCH IT HERE

Ok, so this was actually something that came up during a random conversation at a japanese restaurant with the random people I shared a table with the other week. What happens to Sumo wrestlers when they can’t wrestle no more? How do they adapt going into a normal life? I got super intrigued and started researching. Maybe this is a topic I could do a story on myself?

But this one is very good. Even though it’s a bit dated at 4 years old, it’s still brilliant storytelling. WATCH IT HERE.

Filmmaking tips: Filming Outside? You NEED THIS!

I stumbled over this clip by Sam Holland and I humbly admit that I learned something new about polarising filters. This is a very nice walkthrough on why and how to use them. I have been using them before but usually their power is disabled by a variable ND filter which is two opposite polarisers. Oh well, now it got technical, but watch his example at 45 seconds to be blown away if you have every struggled with filming a face in harsh sunlight.

This is providing true value. Thanks Sam!

My contribution: Life of a Bali Surf Teacher: FOR THE LOVE OF THE OCEAN

WATCH IT HERE

This is one of my personal favorites from my own channel. Before I went to Bali in January 2023 I booked 5 surfing lessons with a random surf shop I found on Google Maps.

It turned out to be Noa, the owner of Sea & Surf Bali who is also the friendliest and one of the happiest persons I have ever met. So after one lesson I knew I had to make a film about him and his unique reason to teach people how to surf.

It’s funny to look back, since this is less than six months ago and I was still making films for my Youtube the way I have always made films for clients - without me in frame at any point.

Since then this has changed, and I am now trying to guide the viewer more. But I will always keep the main character being the main character, and unless I have something to add - I won’t. Check out the rest of my channel here!

Thank you so much for reading this far!

That’s it for this first edition of my curated youtube history. Did you like it? Hate it? Have something nice to say? Or suggestions for me? Let me know!

Just reply to this email or send me one on robin@danehav.com

You can also find me on instagram on @robindanehav where I post more regularly.