Answering Your Influencer Questions | Q&A Session Insights

so I'm gonna answer your questions today about being an influencer so I've got a bunch of questions from you guys about social media work and things so I'm gonna try to answer all of these before my battery dies so the first one is really popular question how were you hired by mother Pat for those of you who don't know I do the close-up eye shots that are on her Instagram Geese ones that's my ball um it's a pretty simple story so when I first arted my Instagram this was back when I was if you hear any rustling it's the cat eye there's nothing I can do so anyway when I first heard my Instagram Jesus I know how long ago that was not like five years or so I was basically just playing around teaching myself I'm a self-taught makeup artist and I was doing these like close up eye shots just kind of playing around with different like eyeshadow techniques if you look back at them goddamn twere bad and my eyebrows were so thin but anyway so she at the time was working on her current brand Pat McGrath labs obviously and she started reposting some of my looks as like inspiration and then when I moved out to Los Angeles maybe a your so later I don't even think it might have been that long doesn't matter she tended up reaching out to me to work with them things were kind of like on and off for a while and then maybe three oh man three or four years ago now she flew me out to New York to show me the metamorphosis kit in person and asked me to create some work for them and that's pretty much how it all started and I've been working with them on and off ever since it's been pretty consistent the past like oh your and a half I guess what type of video equipment do you recommend I have a DSLR already but haven't filmed I mean I have a Canon EOS a TD I have a couple different lenses I have a zoom lens that I never use and then I have this prime lens which was super cheap but there was like a hundred fifty bucks or something it was really cheap I think it's also Canon I can't read it but yeah I have that and then um dude all this [ __ ] came off Amazon like my ring light I got on Amazon I think was like hardened 25 bucks or something I got these two soft boxes and then like an overhead light which I'm actually not using right now on Amazon that came in his set and then I have some like umbrella lights that I use for different things sometimes I use it as like my little um background light I actually got a different thing so I can change colors I just got that on Amazon and then my backdrop thing came from Amazon so like I think I just looked up like photography or filming equipment or something and then a bunch of different things came up and I just I don't know pick which ones had the most reviews or were cheapest so it's it's really easy dude that's all you need I mean when I first started doing um YouTube I was just filming with I was filming with my phone in my front of my living room mirror and by mirror I mean window and that was it on a super busy street so if you go back to my like first YouTube video you can hear traffic driving by it was really bad but yeah I mean just start like you don't really need anything that was like on an iPhone 5 so you own I mean quality wise would love to know your full story how you came into success how can I keep this short success you know what I mean success for me is the fact that I can actually like pay my bills that's pretty awesome that's that's success so my full story I was living in my hometown in New Hampshire I had recently graduated college and long story but I had kind of like a different path set up and it got diverted and then started becoming like interested in makeup when I saw Linda Hallberg Queen I saw her like little step-by-step how to's on Pinterest and I was like this is amazing and then I just became and then I think it was like maybe around Halloween time and people were doing like crazy skulls and it was when I started getting like really into Pinterest and really into social media and then I was just seeing like all this work and I got really inspired by it and it was so much fun and for those of you don't know I have an art background I went to school for painting I got my BFA in figure painting so I was just like super into makeup as like an art and then as my art form or whatever or whatever it's my catchphrase anyway started playing around myself just like I don't know just literally playing with different things I went and I went to like Target and my town had just recently gotten an Ulta which was a big deal so I think I remember buying like a bunch of elf and NYX products and just going to town and then she started posting them on Instagram man started posting I started getting some recognition from like Pat McGrath and then on associate Beverly Hills was one of the first like big brands to start reposting my stuff she should do it all the time why am I not on their PR list I don't know anyway so the first company to send me a PR box was plans lashes in a box and then the first makeup PR box that I received was from makeup geek and tsent me this big-ass box of eyeshadows like full of eyeshadows blush all this stuff and I was like like for free it was so cool and then I at the time was working as a graphic designer in my home town at our local newspaper and I was getting up I was working there full-time did I say that and then I was getting up like super early just like play with makeup do crazy mouth dude I wore the craziest makeup to that job a do crazy makeup take photos in the sunlight before work or I would come home on my lunch break and take photos post them on Instagram or and then when I came home like in the evening I would just like sit and play with makeup or I would watch makeup tutorials and yeah that's pretty much how that started and then about 10 months into that job I decided to move out to Los Angeles with which is where I live now with my brother and then I I don't know like as far as success man I got a couple random jobs while I was here the first I guess one random job while I was here that was related to makeup out of makeup manufacturer and then I think I was there for like another ten months and then I quit way before I should have honestly and it was kind of like on and off man I started YouTube because people were asking me to I was working with some brands and yeah I don't know how did like summarize that it's honestly it's been like a slow process especially here on YouTube super slow but yeah eventually I got to the point where my tent was quality enough that people wanted to work with me on a consistent basis which was nice and yeah I don't know if that answered the question is it possible to get good pictures with just a phone I try and tdon't come out good it would be well not to correct your grammar but like I don't like that yes because basically everything that I post is with my phone the trick is you don't want to use this camera you want to use this camera defi