Nick Kyriakides - A Glance Into The Life of a Successful Post Production Artist

Joining us in this week's episode is award-winning Freelance Post-Production Artist and YunoJuno's top freelancer of 2020 Nick Kyriakides! We dive DEEP into the life and work of Nick as a Freelance Post-Production Artist. From recording and editing kickflip videos as a hobby to working with the biggest brands on the planet, find out how he did it all in this week's episode of the 100k Freelance Club Podcast.

Follow Nick on Instagram --> @nkcourses and @nkfilms

Check our his amazing courses for freelancers --> https://www.nkcourses.co.uk

Transcript:

Niall 0:16
Hello, welcome back to another episode of the 100k a freelancer club podcast the show which helps you on your journey to becoming a high earning freelancer. My name is Norma corn and alongside me as always, we've got Jacob Brickell, JV How are you? Are you still sunburn?

Jacob 0:31
That is a very good question. And fortunately, I am not sunburn. I've moved on to the stage. So yeah, currently shedding my skin like a snake. But yeah,

Niall 0:42
it's not the first time you've been called a snake over the years is it to be fair. Anyway, enough of this slide digs, as we often do here on the 100k Freelancer club podcast, we'd love to feature guests, we'd love to hear from top earning freelancers experts in their field. And that's exactly what we're gonna do today because we've got a cracking guest lined up for you, Nick karaoke, this is a post production artists. And if you've never heard of what that is before, then you're in the right place because he's going to explain all to us. Not only that he is an award winning Freelancer he owns his own film company is worked with the likes of Adidas, Google and Estee Lauder, some massive clients. And he's also one of the top freelancers on a platform called, you know, Juno, one of the UK's premier freelance platforms, and the largest marketplace for elite creatives. And tech freelancers. Can't wait to talk to Nick. And he's joining us right now. How you doing, Nick?

Nick K 1:31
Hey, guys, thanks for having me on the podcast, big fan of you guys. How you guys doing?

Niall 1:36
Yeah, we're very good. I'm sure you are as well, because even though it's been a tough year or so, for a lot of freelancers, things have been absolutely flying for you. I guess the first question is post production artists. Explain it to us. How does it work?

Nick K 1:50
Yeah, sure. post production being the digital side. So within post production, you've got all these different sub categories. So one of them would be typically video editing. So a lot of people are really familiar with video to now with, you know, the likes of Instagram and tick tock and all these filters and ways of trimming your clips, essentially video it's in is putting together all this footage and telling the story. So that's one of the main roles I cover. Also, what's considered a visual effects artists. So that's anything from like adding in lightsabers, or explosions to films and all these kind of cool lens flares and things like that. And I do a lot of kind of animation work and colour grading. So colour grading is where you did colour films and make them maybe look more cinematic. Or if you've seen the film, maybe 300, or matrix, they've got very specific colours to them. So that's pretty a good example of just showing what you can do if you push the colours and, you know, really work on the grade. So many, many roles. And it really is expanding over the years. And there's just a few of them that a post production typically, post production artists would typically cover.

Niall 2:59
So multiple skills involved in that it's almost quite an umbrella term. So what was the kind of first skill you learned? Or the first time you sat down at a computer? Because I guess you spend a lot of time in front of your laptop, working away on it? What was the first sort of skill you learn? I guess before we start the freelance journey, what was it that kind of turned you on to this line of work? What was it that gave you the bug? I suppose?

Nick K 3:19
That's a good question. I think it the gateway kind of skill that got me into this was video editing. And that was probably stemmed from me my best mate used to make skateboarding videos when I was a kid. So one of my I think it was like my 16th birthday. I might, my parents bought me a digital camera photo camera that had this feature where you could film for 30 seconds at a time. So we had to kind of do some kind of skate tricks within that time limit and do like a big run. And I used to kind of take those videos and put special effects on them and edit them together in kind of free software that anyone can get, especially nowadays. And I would love to get my hands on

Jacob 4:01
some of those clips, I bet unembarrassed from back in the day you have to

Nick K 4:06
send them into it. It's like you've seen them. Yeah, one day, they might show up on the dark web somewhere, but they definitely weren't the inspiration for just experimenting. Like, I used to be so excited going home and just cutting these videos together with like some kind of rock track and making it upbeat and adding just really irrelevant VFX that didn't make any sense like an explosion when my mate landed kickflip or something. But it was really cool that was that really got me into it.

Niall 4:35
We talked about Windows Movie Maker sort of stuff in it.

Nick K 4:38
Yeah, it was Windows Movie Maker, there was one called you lead Video Studio and Pinnacle Video Studio. And then I kind of got into the hardest stuff like Final Cut Pro seven, which is I believe what the BBC used.

Jacob 4:52
So if we spin all the way back to the start of your freelance career, did you like leave University and come straight out of uni into a free VLANs roll, did you have a job? Or did you, you know, work your way into it like on the podcast last week with knio knio is experienced talks about, he goes through some employment roles into some freelance roles at the same time and sort of juggles it. How did your freelance career actually start? And When was the first time you realised I am a freelance?

Nick K 5:19
Yeah, I done exactly that I finished a BA at uni, which was a really mixed degree, which was covering kind of web design, film, animation, and photography. And I finished that course, and I went straight into just applying for gigs online. So I wasn't really focused on getting a full time job. I've never, I've never really had that personality to just work full time on the same project, or the same company. I just, I guess I'm one of those people. I love variety. And I think a lot of freelancers, one that autonomy, they want that kind of free life of just, you know, choosing when to work, and who for who to work with and in different countries and just have that have that kind of control over their life in that sense,

Jacob 6:02
was the was the idea of freelancing actually introduced to you at university? So I can imagine that you might have been working for some, you know, fake clients or potential clients in your studies. And then did they develop into like paid side gigs whilst you were studying? Or was it something that you saw other people, maybe peers or people older than you freelancing? And you actually force yourself? I want to do that.

Nick K 6:25
It's a good question. I, I'll be honest, I'll never ever had the time freelancing. I heard of like the term self employment. And I think you guys actually mentioned that in the podcast, and one of the episodes where self employed was thrown around. But I don't know about you guys. But I associated that more with like, maybe a builder or a plumber, or someone who's self employed. Yeah. Whereas in the creative field, I never, I never knew any freelancers, myself. So I went home after getting my degree. And I spent the whole summer working on a show reel of just kind of made up work, because I had zero clients in my bank. And I sent this show out to various kind of job sites, which were kind of putting job posts that they're saying they wanted a music video created, and they wanted someone to just cut it together, or they wanted to do visual effects for little commercial they were doing. And I actually went for my first role was actually for a music video to kind of do some colour grading which, back then, I was so new to everything, I just kind of went for every job going. And I got really close to the director at a really good kind of interview. And he said, Look, there's a film competition this weekend, I we both had to write this film in 14 hours, film it and edit it that entire weekend actually had food poisoning and it was like such a hard weekend to just kind of edit while being

Niall 7:49
what was the suspect meal there, Nick, you have to reveal that

Nick K 7:52
I can't remember what it was back then. But knowing my student days probably partnered or something along those lines, ooh, boys, the reporting partner doing Red Bull students diet. And from that, we actually like won the film competition in the States. And we got through to the following round. And they gave us $500 to kind of just, you know, obviously bank or to invest that into the next film. And we just started making films together. And I started freelancing with that director that I met, and we formed a company. And since then, I was just kind of a freelancer. In that sense. I just registered as a freelancer once I got to the tax threshold.

Niall 8:32
Yeah, I really like that. I like that idea of,

Nick K 8:34
you know, not knowing you're a freelancer. And I think that it's interesting that it kind of arrives for different people at different moments, the penny dropping about being a freelancer, is that what you would suggest then to to maybe some younger freelancers, people who are in a similar position to what you've described, maybe fresh out of uni, that do have some unique experience or, you know, educational experience under their belt to just try and say yes to everything, because I've always found that in my freelance career, saying yes to something and figuring out how to do it at a later day at the very early embryonic stages of your freelance career is a good way to go. Because you can build up some good relationships with clients like what you've just described with your director, they're all totally you've literally hit the nail on the head with every interaction, or even business interaction is all about relationships, and is one of the things that you don't learn at uni, you don't really have a module on you know, this is how to build a great working relationship with someone or this is how to communicate effectively, or, you know, how to how to be likeable, and all these kinds of things that helps you in life. And I think these are things that I would really encourage any of the listeners, if you're starting out or even if you're quite a seasoned freelancer, just the best thing to do is build relationships with people. And it doesn't have to be transactional when think, Oh, I'm only going to speak to this person because they might be To get me a gig, it's just literally about being a good person. And I can't tell you the amount of times I've been referred by other people who aren't even in the creative industry, they've been like a friend of a friend is a director, or they want, you know, this commercial shot and they need someone editing it is all these connections really come from, and they stem from key relationships.

Niall 10:22
We've spoken about how essential and how important it is. And I think networking plays a massive part in every freelancers journey. And I'm glad you mentioned that, because being a nice person doesn't cost anything, it's a very, very small investment to make. And life can be stressful as a freelancer, but I'm absolutely with you there. Sometimes just being a genuinely decent person does pay its weight worth in gold in the end. So 11 plus years now, as a freelancer, Nick, it's a long time and you still got the hunger and you still got the desire for it. We spoken about when the penny dropped that you were sort of officially I guess, a freelancer, when did things really start gathering momentum because we'll come on to it in a sec about the use of digital platforms and Freelancer platforms online to get your name out there and pick up clients. But when was it you really start to get some traction and realise that yeah, this is a full time thing for me now,

Nick K 11:16
I think it's when I got a decent portfolio and a decent show reel that probably captured a lot more attention online where, you know, some of our videos, I'll give an example, actually, one of the first major gigs I had was a big music video for a band called in this moment. And I had to kind of invest a lot of my post student money into to buy a computer just for that job. Because it was such a heavy project. And we kind of use these, what's called Red cameras, which was brand new back in 2008. And off the back of that video and kind of learning so much and kind of get experimented with visual effects and a big name international brand, which was like world renowned. I think that kind of credibility of having these record labels on my CV and and when I'm sending out and applying for jobs. And then I'm just asking you, what have you worked on recently, and you're showing something that's quite reputable, and actually quite well known, that kind of gained a lot of traction. And it just it snowballed from there. Because I've built so many more contacts of the back of that film, sir.

Niall 12:22
Yeah, I mean, some of the show reels that I've seen from you are absolutely unbelievable. But obviously, the more experience you get, the better they get. Just quickly on that. Do you think it's important for people when they're putting portfolios together and putting show reels together to have evidence of recent work? Because I know a lot of people that I've spoken to particularly students that are coming through in my industry, the broadcast industry, that continue to push show reels, and demos and portfolios of stuff they did a long time ago. And that's all well and good. But I think sometimes as well, you need to have evidence of recent work and showing what you've been up to, in the more immediate term, I should say, because I think that that shows that you know, you still got your finger on the pulse, I guess. Yeah,

Nick K 13:03
I definitely agree. I think it's certainly a balances now of just showing new work that shows that you're evolving, you're a freelancer that is constantly, you know, you're getting employed. And you're showing that by showcasing recent work and also work that is maybe in different directions work that you're maybe a bit more outside of your comfort zone or just isn't work that you've just done over and over again, is something that's a bit more innovative. So it's totally well in good keeping in existing work that maybe maybe a few years old, but it stands the test of time and showcases a certain aspect of you. I think it really comes down to your show and your portfolio is kind of exude in your personality, but also your skill set. So as long as each piece of work, has significance and is in there for a reason, then it it is worth staying in there.

Niall 13:56
What do you find difficult about the freelance life because we'll come on to it in a second about the amazing success you've had on platforms like you know, Juno and some of the amazing clients you've worked with, like Annie das and Google at owl. What do you find the most difficult thing about being a freelancer because people listen to these podcasts. And I imagine a lot of people that do are in the mindset of they love the idea of having a freelance lifestyle, being able to choose their own holidays, pick their own hours work when they want work with the clients they want, which all sounds great, but sometimes it isn't always as easy as that. So, you know, kind of taken the great things out of this. What do you find some of the more difficult things when it comes to freelancing?

Nick K 14:36
Yeah, like the spin on this just not talking about all the the ups of being a freelancer like the the aspect of Yeah, what else are things to look out for? I think it's two things. I think as a freelancer, one difficult thing is actually saying no to work, saying because it gets quite addictive when, if you're quite successful on these platforms, or you have jobs lined up and you're getting kind of have multiple offers from other people, it's quite easy to say yes to everything. And then what you find is you're a one man band to, you know, in a sense of being a freelancer, but you actually taken on three or four jobs, which is more than what a full timer would potentially do. So then you're kind of working day and night potentially, to cater for these clients. Whereas the other Flipside to that as well as is kind of differentiating. How do you want your freelance life to be like, are you a freelancer? Or are you a small business? And if you're a small business, you start thinking like a small business and start potentially outsourcing that work? Or thinking of the cost benefit of is it worth taking on this client? Like? Is it something that's gonna be good for my soul? Is it good for the portfolio? Is it something that's rewarding, because I don't know, I care about that project. And it's like, an environmental cause. And I'm passionate about the environment. There's all these things I think you need to think about as a freelancer when you're saying yes or no to projects and to clients. But the difficult thing is just knowing when to say no, and when to say yes. Is that

Niall 16:02
a gut feeling thing for you, then now that you've done it for so many years? Is that is that something that you kind of, you get a feeling about certain clients or a feeling about whether a project suits you and isn't quite right for you?

Nick K 16:13
Yeah, for sure. I think a lot of it is, is definitely a gut feeling and very instinctual on, you know, I think you can spot quite easily after a while red flags with certain projects or clients, just with the language they use, and the way they reach out to you and the way they speak to you. And the way they talk about the project, if they're quite experienced with what they want, you know, a clear telltale sign for anyone who's listening who wants to kind of see if there's a client that could be potentially difficult is, if a client comes to you, and you're kind of listened to a pitch, and they're not too sure what they want. That's, that could be down to inexperience, or a lack of an ability to communicate what they want. But usually, it's a case of, it's gonna be a difficult project, if there's no way to please that client, and to get to the nuts and bolts of the finished product.

Jacob 17:06
But I think that's especially important in creative fields where there's no, like, actual set definition of, you know, 100% of what the project can be. Because even if you get the perfect brief, as a creative, it's still, you know, within your power to, you know, build that the way that you see it, the way your mind projects, the project right is open to some kind of interpretation, because of the nature of like, the creative work that you do,

Nick K 17:32
are totally is. So I mean, you think of creativity alone, it's so abstract, and so open to interpretation. So to try and whittle down what someone says they want in their mind's eye, and putting that down on paper or screen can be quite difficult. But also, it can be quite easy if there's a certain formula to these things, and you're working with someone who's quite experienced as well. On both sides, the client and the freelancer,

Niall 17:58
I thought it was interesting how kind of at the start of the freelance journey it was, make sure you say yes to everything to try and build that portfolio and build that evidence of work that you've done. But as you kind of progress down the line, sometimes saying yes, almost on a mandatory basis, can be quite detrimental sometimes to your career. So I thought it was really important that we got that out there that sometimes you do have to flip the coin over and say no, instead

Jacob 18:22
talking about saying no to clients, I think one of the most important things, or what I get asked a lot from the students at the 100k Freelancer club, especially those in the creative fields, like graphic design, video production, and basically any field where there's the possibility of revisions. How do you actually manage that as a freelancer? Because obviously, when you're working on a project, and you're editing a video, a client can say to you, can you change this, you do it, they send it back to you? Can you change this and they could give you essentially unlimited revisions they could really push you really squeeze you and a lot of businesses are like that, especially if they're working on a small budget and they themselves that you took before don't know what they want, they're going to try and squeeze it in experienced freelancers for every hour for you know, everything they've got. So how did you I mean, at the start, were you you know, struggling with that with you know, getting overflowed with revisions and people pushing you too far. And if you progressed into being like better at managing that and just overall, what do you think about offering revisions as a freelancer?

Nick K 19:28
Yes, super important point of view of Jacob because revisions for a freelancer are a blessing and a con because to talk about almost a bigger topic, which is so important is that how you price your jobs. So to give an example, if a client comes to you and says I want these visual effects added into this commercial, and there's seven shots I need to be worked on, and they will essentially just give you the budget and say look, this is what we have to spend. This is 10 grand. Can you make it work. And here's the deadline. And that's what that's what's called a buyout. So if you're going to be getting revisions that go on for months, but you've in your head budgeted for, that's going to take me about 15 days, you're kind of maybe going over the day rate that you would have charged for that. So revisions can be really tough, especially if you're starting out, because you may feel like it's quite hard to actually lay those ground rules in because you're new to the game. So you might just keep doing revisions to just please the client. But for anyone listening, who is a bit further down the line, or looking to just kind of hold their own ground is really about putting these things in place from the beginning. So before you have an engagement with the client to start the project, I really recommend to depends on your relationship with them to either put a contract in place, or have a platform like you know, Juno, which have contracts built in which says, an agreed terms and conditions there, which says this is going to be for this amount of days. This is what we expect. This includes three revisions. And that's it.

Niall 21:05
Let's talk about you know, Juno, then seen as you've just mentioned them, there they are one of the UK is premier freelance platforms, and the largest marketplace for elite creatives in tech freelancers, so very much firmly up your street. And that proven in the fact that you won their top Freelancer of the Year Award, I think in 2020, and 2018. So congratulations, Nick, for those awards. a job well done. Yeah, get the applause in there. I'll probably add some like cheering children in the background in post production on the podcast, just to kind of amp it up a little bit more. To show that obviously, online Freelancer platforms and getting clients online is something we've spoken about on the podcast in previous episodes, we haven't really touched too much upon, you know, Juno's, so I guess, if you could just shed a little bit of light on what it's like on that particular platform, because they do do things slightly differently at you know, Juneau, to other places like Upwork and freelancer.com. And just in general, your experiences of picking up clients using online platforms.

Nick K 22:01
Yeah, I've really signed up to almost any platform, you can name probably aside from Fiverr, Upwork, and people per hour, the ones that were covered in a previous podcast. I think, when it comes to midway, or senior freelancers, you're in a different marketplace completely. And there's certain websites that cater for those kinds of people. And I think, you know, Juno, for me, is really been one of the game changers where it it just offloaded so much of my admin time of having to look for clients, where they have, essentially kind of premium clients like you get, you know, I think I actually met Adidas through them. I've done jobs for ATP, the Association of tax professionals and had workshops at the ITU and on TV and things like that, offer this platform. And the great thing is they're all kind of vetted clients and freelancers, like, be like Fight Club, like, you know, to get in, you kind of, there's only a certain amount of people that know about, it's a bit of a secret. That's why when people say, you know, Juno Vera, we're like, what did you say? So, so, you know, Juno are really kind of a premium service. And it's really easy to find work if you're a midway or senior freelancer, because you essentially have a list of clients there that say, I want this done by this date, here's the skill set is the tension of the day, right, they sometimes put in the brief, and you're literally good to go. And what's amazing with our platform is they handle all of the contracting, so all of the contracts are set up. And they also have a 14 day payment scheme as well. So no more chasing invoices for any freelancers that are listening. Sounds good to me, check

Niall 23:41
out you know, Juno's sounds like something that's been really beneficial for Nick on his freelance journey, and certainly something that we'll be checking out as well here at the 100k Freelancer club. definitely interesting, what you said about there being sort of more tailor made websites for different fields and freelance expertise is, I suppose, is what I'm trying to say. So yeah, certainly, you know, Juno is one of those which will certainly prick the ears up of a few listeners for sure. With what you do, you're spending a lot of money on equipment. So obviously your computer is a key tool but so are the you know, the editing suites that you use the software that you buy, how much money do you put into that in terms of reinvestment into your business in terms of keeping up to date with the latest equipment and keeping on top of the latest trends in software and video editing technology and all the rest of it because it's something which you'll probably have to deal with in your freelance area that other people such as myself and Jacob probably won't have to just quite as much. Yeah, the

Nick K 24:42
gear is is a really interesting topic now because as we all know, you know, the phone in your pocket is is actually incredible, and there's so much innovation and really cool looking projects that you can do on literally your iPhone or any mobile phone. So depending on the needs It really depends on where your film is going to live. You know, what's really incredible is that when I was starting out doing a lot of social campaigns, so a lot of the work I do is actually kind of Instagram and Facebook campaigns nowadays, because there's just a huge amount of kind of budget and marketing put into these campaigns. And what you sometimes find is, is that they would spend probably about 50 grand on a red camera, which is like a really high end Cinema Camera, to then create content that is actually going to be only shown on your phone. And it's quite incredible, someone filming in such a high resolution, but it's only going to be shown on such a tiny display. And it for me, it really comes down to I mean, you might have heard the expression or the gear No idea. It's, it's, I would much rather and I'm sure a lot people agree I'd rather hire someone who is using something like an iPhone or low cost DSLR and knows how to use it inside out compared to a student using a red camera. So it really does come down to your need, you know, your audience where your final film is going to live, and how it serves you all the gear no

Niall 26:09
idea sounds like me playing golf, but we'll leave that

Jacob 26:13
literally just about to say that I was gonna say football though. Bye for now leave out he's had enough today. I got one more question for you on this topic, though, Nick, for your freelance career when you're working on projects, and you're looking at other freelancers. One, do you feel the need to constantly upgrade your gear to stay competitive? And also, do you budget when you're working with clients? So for example, do you for every invoice you take? Do you put 10% towards future equipment or 10%? towards maintenance of equipment? Or is that something that you just leave down to? Like, pure chance?

Nick K 26:53
Yeah, both really good questions, I think, to answer the first question, I would really encourage people to say that if they don't have the initial gear, but are kind of, they've got a really cool brief coming up, and they're like, I want to get this camera, I've got to film in this lens, and I've got to shoot this music video, then you can always just rent the gear out. And you can just hire it out for two days, or however it may take to shoot the video, or you know, even an editing station. For now, people hire out Mac laptops on set and just download all the footage and then edit off that or any computer. So you can hire the gear just in the meantime just to kind of get used to it and to buffer that into the cost. So for Jacob second part of the question, I think it's so important as freelancers that most of us forget, when we charge our day rate or project right to always include all of these things that you typically get when you're a full time staff member. If you work full time, you typically get the software you might get like an Adobe Creative Cloud subscription, you might get insurance with that sick pay, you know, the technology, you might get a computer without a screen, all these things that you're using in your hard drives and SD cards that you mentioned there. Now, these are things that you need to buffer into your price. And it's super important. And I know so many freelancers that that miss this out. And it's something I cover in detail in the course that I created. And that's something that is I would really encourage people to reevaluate everything that just makes up them as a service. And as a freelancer.

Niall 28:26
Yeah. And you know what, it's something that I thought about at the start of the podcast, the difference between Freelancer and self employed. And you know, the self employed makes you think of builders and carpenters and mechanics. And I guess, taking the mechanic example, they charge for parts and labour, when you take your car into the garage and they fix it. They're not just charging you for the labour of them actually doing the work on the vehicle. They're also charging you for the cost of the parts to get them into the garage and fix them to the car. So it's kind of all in one. It's all in one package, the charges near parts and labour. So that was a really, really good point. Actually. I wanted to ask you about Google and Addy das, how does someone who is listening to this podcast end up working for giants in the world of business like Google, and Adidas, how does that come about? I know you mentioned you know, Juno, a few moments ago. But where does that stem from and how does someone aspiring to reach that level? Take the steps to get

Nick K 29:28
Yes, I think is a dream for a lot of people right to when you hear these kind of brands to work with them. And I still sometimes can't believe it. Like, you know, I've got an ad that's kind of brand footage in front of me. I'm like cutting out there to put out to the world. I think for a lot of people that the good news is there's a lot of ways and one of them is that now more than ever, it's so, so much easier because you might have heard the expression is not what you know, it's who you know and You know, with many tools like LinkedIn, for example, in a few clicks, you can tell who the head of hiring is at night, or Google or added us. And you can contact the producers there, or the head of post production or, you know, the recruiting agents. That's such an easy way, in about 10 minutes, you can just contact someone and send them your latest showreel and say why they should hire you why they should could take them for a project and pitch your ideas. That's one really simple way. Another is something I would encourage freelancers to do. And where do they don't seem to, not many people seem to do is hire a talent agent. So I've got a few kind of talent agents that represent me. And they essentially do all the legwork. Like when I'm on a project, they will look for the next clients for me and pitch, you know, some projects to me and say, Look, john, take on this one. If not, we've got this one. So they kind of they have the contacts, they've spent years building these relationships with Google with added ads with Estee Lauder. And that's a really quick way to get in as well without without too much effort.

Jacob 31:05
Yeah, I'm assuming these guys take because this is the first time I've ever actually heard of a talent agent for a freelancer, but I'm assuming they operate in a similar kind of way to the freelance marketplaces where they're going to be taking some sort of commission from those projects, right? Yeah, it's

Nick K 31:20
a good point, because some talent agents will take a fee off of your day, right? And they're very transparent about it. It's not like they just sweep it under your eyes, they'll kind of take a percentage on that day rate on that project, right. And others actually buffer it into their cost. So they'll charge the client, that fee on top so it doesn't take anything off your day rate.

Jacob 31:43
And they just one last question for you. Before we start to end out the podcast in this that I met you here in a wonderful city of Barcelona. friend of a friend, Chris shouts Chris, if he's listening, are we looking for him to DM me for the shout out? But yeah, so you basically you did the same thing as me. Right. So you were based in England? And then you just upstate move to Barcelona? One? What made you do that? Like, what was in it for you? like have you travelled before? And was it just something you're looking for new experiences? That's why you chose a new location other than England, and to how did that actually impact your freelance career? Because for me, it actually kind of dented my freelance career, like for maybe say, six months, when I moved from England to Barcelona, some of my clients are like, Well, you know, am I really going to be able to contact this guy as much he's going to be difficult to go into, like in person meetings, and all that sort of stuff. So it did hinder me a little bit for about six months until I was able to, you know, steer it in the right direction again. So just to recap that question. Did it impact you at all when

Nick K 32:52
you moved? And why did you move? If I could be totally honest, I love tapis. So I had to get out here. I had to get I hate the rain. I love the sun. It's cheap. They're cheap. No, I really, yeah, just to kind of echo what Jacob said, Just gonna, cuz I know, he's a big fan of Barcelona and Spain as well, I, I love the lifestyle here. And I've I've always had a dream to work remotely. And you know, I'm sure a lot of people are familiar with the term digital nomad. And although I love travelling, and I've been so fortunate, I've I've had jobs all around the world, really just kind of like filming gigs and editing gigs. I didn't want to be always on the move, and I wanted a base. So I've always loved Barcelona. And as I set this up this kind of vision in my head, about two years before that, I kind of slowly was getting the idea into my clients head. So you know, I could do this remotely. And I could save two hours of my commute in London and work those extra two hours for you. So I'm giving more input more output, rather. And all from the comfort of my home with having, you know, kind of less travel time, less time on the tube, and do more time doing what I love and being creative. So for me, it was actually a really easy transition, because all of my clients strangely didn't want to shop around. I mean, I'd say, I'd say 100% of them stuck with me, there was no one that really said, Look, we need you in the office every day because essentially didn't make a difference, if anything. I found massive benefits. And I really pitched that to them because I invested in a new Mac Pro, which costs the same as a Tesla. But it could render things like a Disney film it could kind of it's so powerful and fast that my gear was better than the ones that I was going to the studios that I was working at. And I've got all the software and the kind of plugins that I'm so used to so it's a really easy transition. So, to answer Jacobs question, I guess it was more a case of how I transitioned any of the clients to remote working with some amazing platforms I use which automates My whole workflow essentially where I would kind of save a film, it would upload it to this really cool website called frame i O. And they can comment directly on the screen and draw exactly where they want something removed, or retouched and taken out. And I get all this feedback in real time. And then I just kind of crack on with the comments again, and, and send it over. And it's like, we're in the same room.

Niall 35:22
Yeah, that's brilliant. That's, that's really interesting to hear that although I am fearful. Now, the next time I'm in Barcelona, I'm gonna have to brush up on my Spanish because you guys are going to be chatting away to each other. And I'm going to be stood there saying, dressed serve as a support level. And that's all I'm going to be able to say.

Nick K 35:37
You need in Spain.

Jacob 35:39
The way to get fluent Spanish is just to drink those free beers.

Niall 35:44
Yeah, definitely. I'll tell you all, before we let you go on a podcast recently, on the 100k Freelancer club, we spoke about some of the nightmare situations when it comes to pitching to clients, maybe some of those embarrassing moments that you've had in your freelance career. And you've been freelancing for over a decade now, Nick, so there must be some locked away that you that you didn't really want to share. That was kind of a rite of passage, Jacob said his embarrassing moment. Is there anything that is maybe happened to you that's left you with a bit of a facepalm? moment?

Nick K 36:19
Ah,

Niall 36:21
he's too good.

Nick K 36:23
My mind's gone blank. my subconscious trying to protect me from it?

Niall 36:29
I think so. I think I think we're letting get away with it a Jacob.

Jacob 36:32
Yeah, well, maybe maybe we'll have to get you on again in the future just so you can spill the beans because

Nick K 36:38
if this gets 100,000 views for the 100k Freelancer club, I'll come back on and reveal my deepest, darkest secrets.

Niall 36:46
I wondered what you were gonna reveal their nose like this is a family podcast. So as Nick has been an absolute pleasure having you on the podcast. Thanks so much for joining us, I really enjoyed chatting to you and learning the sort of inner workings of what you do and how you do it. Next, a great guy employees go and check him out. I also implore you to go and check out you know, June as well. If that's something you're interested in, then you can find Nick services on there, as well as on his website.

Jacob 37:13
And I want to jump in as well and say, we cannot thank you enough for coming on this podcast. And he can share in your experiences as a freelancer, given your advice and just being you know, a great person to speak to here on the podcast. And I want to tee you up now. And you can jump in and say a lot of wonderful things about yourself in the courses that you actually offer. Because we know you have some fantastic, fantastic content. Over on your website, I've gone through the whole course. And I was going through it, we both love it. And we do think it is like it's an amazing addition to what we offer here at the 100k Freelancer club as well. So anybody looking to advance their career as a freelance, I highly recommend that you go over and check out next content. I'll leave the driver seat to you now next, so you can just jump in and go crazy and promote everything that you do.

Nick K 38:01
Thank you so much, God, I'm blushing. Thank you so much for the introduction. And I'm really such it's such an honour to be here because as you know, Jacob was speaking to you for a while now. And I'm such a fan of what you guys are doing at 100k Freelancer club and I completed I kind of binge the podcast so I was loving it so much.

Niall 38:21
He must have been bogged

Nick K 38:22
down. Last downtime now at the gym and walking everywhere I was going I just kind of wanted the tunes the next episode. So I really love your vision. I genuinely I wouldn't have come on the podcast if I didn't believe in what you guys were doing. So really keep it up guys.

Jacob 38:38
So the neck where Can everybody go to find all this amazing course content? And what is your website?

Nick K 38:43
Yeah, so you could find my film company at nk films dot code at UK. And I've got the course company nk courses, which is nk courses dot code at UK. And all the relevant kind of hashtags are pretty much the same as nk at nk courses at nk films. And yeah, just to give you a quick kind of background about the courses, I finished my second course, which is all about how to discover and win clients part of what I call the master freelance mastery series. So it's perfect if you're a freelancer listening here, and you're looking to get into the film game and a video game. I'm using all of my secrets and tips and everything I've learned over 12 years compressed into this course which is gonna be constantly updated. And it also includes a lot of free tools that are to automate your freelancing life and hacks to get around things like kind of pitching to clients, briefing clients, how to price yourself, how to set up your editing projects, and they're all included in the courses.

Jacob 39:43
Thank you so much for coming on the podcast and we do hope to see you again sometime soon. In another episode. And yeah, if you listen to the podcasts still is worth checking out Nick's stuff you can head over to 100k Freelancer club.com and sign up for our free audio course. It was He's going to basically teach you how to ignite your freelance career. And when I say make sure we go over and check out Nick's stuff, because again, this is the man who's picking up clients like Addy das, Google. So this man really does know his stuff. So we, we encourage you to go check that out and we will catch you in the next episode of the 100k freelance club podcast.