Draw My Life: Part 2 (18 August 2019)

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itasca00
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You're being beamed up by aggressive aliens and they're plugging in the anal probe
"Oh, God. Okay. I say: *shrug* [...] I'd be like, 'I don't know how this works. Put a condom on that thing. *shrug*'"
Dan Howell, 5/10/18 Try new things..?
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itasca00
moon room
Posts: 438
Joined: Tue Jul 31, 2018 12:53 pm
Pronouns: He/Him/His
Location: USA

itasca00 wrote: Mon Aug 19, 2019 4:25 am I really enjoyed this video! I learned a lot of interesting (and personal) things about Phil (and Dan) from it, and I'm so glad to see Phil start to open up about some of the struggles he's experienced in his life, both professionally and personally. There were a lot of announcements about the future in this video, but I find the thing I'm most hopeful for is the success of Project Sphere... Anyway, here are my timestamps:
  • [0:30] Phil says the only thing he wishes he could change about his previous “Draw My Life” video is that he wishes he could add “P.S. I was gay!” to it.
  • [0:36] The last “Draw My Life” story left off with Dan and Phil moving to London around 2013. A year’s rent in London cost Dan and Phil their entire life savings. If they didn’t make a career online happen, they would be left with no money and some student loan debt.
  • [1:04] Thankfully, they got a show on BBC Radio 1. The contents of the show were a lot of fun but also very ambitious.
  • [1:40] Phil tells a story about the radio show. In the beginning, Phil was in charge of pressing buttons on the control panel during the radio show. However, he once pressed the wrong button, which resulted in a full minute of dead air. After that, Dan was put in charge of pressing the buttons.
  • [2:03] Phil talks about hitting one million subscribers on YouTube. This was the point that Phil decided he was certifiably a full-time internet entertainer.
  • [2:40] As the radio show continued to get bigger, Phil says that he and Dan got an agent (presumably at FlipSide).
  • [2:48] Not having much money at the time, Phil felt like he should say “yes” to every professional opportunity that came his way. He lists a variety of jobs that he agreed to do: presenting at a film premiere, doing a YouTube spon, doing the Brit Awards, interviewing Ed Sheeran on the red carpet, introducing Imagine Dragons at a festival, doing a week-long outdoor shoot in exchange for “exposure.”
  • [3:24] Phil’s anxiety got really bad during this time because he was juggling too much. He was working hard, not getting sleep, and worrying about not getting anything done the next day.
  • [3:38] During this time, Phil got a call saying that he needed to come home because of his dad’s health. His dad had a very rare form of blood cancer. He was really sick for over a year, but he was upbeat the whole time. Phil considered dropping everything to come home while his dad was fighting cancer, but his dad convinced him that it would be more helpful for Phil to stay in London and continue working. Because he was put on an experimental drug, Phil’s dad has been in remission for five years (since 2014).
  • [4:52] Phil shows a photo of his mom and dad holding hands while walking near a beach. :love1:
  • [4:56] Dan and Phil realized that all the jobs they were agreeing to do were no longer advancing their careers, and they were doing them out of obligation rather than passion. They also wanted full control over the content they created, and they felt that “the internet” was the future. So they decided to focus on their online/YouTube careers, and they decided to stop doing the radio show and everything else. At this point, they also ditched their old agent at FlipSide (who focused on TV) and got a new team from Above the Fray (who focused on the internet).
  • [5:28] To celebrate all things Dan and Phil, Dan and Phil decided to make TABINOF. This also felt like the perfect moment to go on tour, which launched TATINOF. Now, there was no one telling them what to do or change, but this also meant that they had to make every single decision, which came with a whole lot of office work while planning and executing an entire world tour.
  • [6:51] TATINOF felt like moving to London had because Dan and Phil put all their savings, even the money from TABINOF into it. Thankfully, ~100,000 people bought tickets and made TATINOF successful, and TABINOF was a #1 bestseller.
  • [7:52] Meeting so many people during TATINOF really affected Phil. Hearing the stories of how his videos had brightened up people’s days or gotten people through the hard times or really inspired people that related to his life made Phil realize just how special this YouTube thing he was doing was.
  • [8:13] During this time, Dan and Phil had to do some press to promote TABINOF and TATINOF. Phil experienced some “gay fear” during some interviews because he was still closeted publicly and to his extended family. Some reporters just wanted to talk about dating and sexuality, and they wanted to ask about liking girls and “hot female celebrities.” Some reporters were also obsessed with the idea of YouTube as a career.
  • [8:55] Phil tells a specific horror story about dealing with the press. During a photoshoot, Phil was made to balance on a disco ball with his legs spread out in tight jeans. The photographer sat on the floor with the camera pointed up towards Phil’s crotch, and they asked Phil to look more sensual.
  • [9:20] As an aside, Phil says he’s really enjoying drawing. He draws a seal on wheels. It is magnificent.
  • [9:32] Phil talks about starting DanAndPhilGAMES. Dan and Phil wanted it to be something they did on the side, but they quickly realized that it was a lot more work than they had expected because they wanted to edit their gaming videos at the same level as they did their other YouTube videos.
  • [10:07] Dan and Phil bit off more than they could chew with Gamingmas. It had them up editing until 4am most nights in December, including on Christmas Eve. However, Phil thinks the Undertale Let’s Play was worth it, and he apologizes to and thanks Dan for editing it (I presume).
  • [10:22] Phil says that the TATINOF era of life lasted for two years. After he and Dan got through it, their first priority was moving out of their first London apartment, and then they had to face the question of what would come next.
  • [10:39] For Phil, 2017 was a sad and death-heavy year as he lost his grandmother and aunt in the same month.
  • [11:04] Phil doesn’t like announcing that he’s working on a secret project that he can’t talk about (and that may never come to be) because he thinks it’s an annoying thing to do. He thinks it’s better to drop an announcement when there’s something interesting going on or when the project is fully ready. However, the downside is that some people don’t understand that it takes a lot of work behind-the-scenes to create the project. Phil says that this made him realize that people only know what’s happening in your life if you’re talking about it online. He sometimes wishes that people knew when he was going through a hard time rather than thinking that nothing is happening. At [12:04], Phil concludes this point saying that there’s more to people’s lives than what they’re posting on social media, and you never really know what someone is going through or working on unless they tell you about it.
  • [11:46] To give an example of a secret project that never came to be, Phil tells the story of how he and Dan once spent months planning a Dan and Phil travel series. It was just about ready to go when the people that commissioned it said that their plans had changed, and they would have to wait a year to film it. This clashed with Dan and Phil’s other plans, and they had to let it go.
  • [12:16] Two examples of secret projects that have come to fruition are: Truth Bombs and IRL Merch. Truth Bombs apparently originated as a party game that Phil would make his friends play on scraps of paper. For IRL Merch, Dan and Phil felt that YouTuber merch could be so much better than a basic T-shirt, and Phil’s brother Martyn knew everything there was to know about building a website and online shopping. Thus, they banded together to form their first business. Phil is grateful that this business allows him to spend so much time with his brother.
  • [13:34] Phil lists two random things that he and Dan did over the past few years: release the 7 Second Challenge app and have cameos in Big Hero 6.
  • [13:46] In 2017, Dan and Phil started to think about the rest of their lives/their next big dream. They decided that, before doing anything else, they wanted to tour again to try to visit as many places as they possibly could. Getting into more places was a lot easier this time, but some places still wouldn’t let them in. Phil suspects this may be due to Dan’s face looking suspicious. :lol: Regardless, Interactive Introverts was born, and they decided to also revisit the places they had already been because the show was so good.
  • [14:51] Phil talks about changing his hair. At the same time he changed his hair, Phil says that he also went and got a pair of ripped jeans as part of his character progression.
  • [15:14] With regard to Interactive Introverts, Dan and Phil had some “big issues” getting into Manila. This cost so much that they ended up spending their own money in “Asia” rather than making money.
  • [15:27] Dan and Phil were zombies when they got home from Interactive Introverts. Phil thinks they pushed themselves slightly too far with this tour. He felt like he had unlimited energy while on tour, but he crashed once he got home. However, he didn’t exactly rest as he and Dan immediately spent three weeks editing the movie version of Interactive Introverts.
  • [16:06] Phil talks about having a poor work-life balance from 2013 through 2018:
    P: So if you’ve been paying attention--Hey! Get back to this tab! Don’t you like my beautiful art?--you might have realized that this chapter of “Draw My Life” has been incredibly work related. Where’s all my fun stories about the things in the rest of my life? Well...turns out I don’t really have one.

    P: Obviously, this career has given me so many incredible adventures and experiences I could never have dreamed of, but outside of it, I suddenly realized how lame I am. I prioritized work so much, I stopped making friends. I only have about four in London that actually want to hang out, and I’ve got no real hobbies except for exhaustedly plonking myself in front of a video game after writing emails ‘til 5am. And I didn’t do any normal stuff people would do like getting a house or a dog, for dog’s sake! I think the next project should be to give myself a more well-rounded existence: Project Sphere! The sphere is me! I am the sphere! Do you think there’s a flat sphere conspiracy? I’m sorry.

    P: We both realized you don’t need to say “yes” to everything. It’s up to me how much work I want to do in order to secure my future, but there should be a balance, so at the end of the day, you’re still happy. This was like the clouds parting to reveal a new land. I like to think this world was in the jurassic period. “Yee.” For the first time in my life, I felt like I could breathe a bit. I wasn’t afraid of risking everything and having to move back into my parents’ if I failed. No offense, fam. So what next?
  • [17:25] At the end of 2018, Dan and Phil wanted to think about what was next for them, and Dan wanted to focus on creating his coming out video. As such, they decided to pause making content for DanAndPhilGAMES.
  • [17:40] Phil talks about his current thoughts on the gaming channel as well as what to expect from the next big secret project (outside of YouTube):
    P: The thing is: Most people love DanAndPhilGAMES just for being funny and the couch banter rather than hardcore gaming skills action. So I think if we did feel like having that thing on the side again, maybe it could transform into something new in the future. But on the other hand, I think that final Sims video was definitely a perfect ending if it is.

    P: As “Dan and Phil,” we definitely feel like we’ve done every genre of big project we could do together over this five years, apart from maybe a cookbook, where we all know how much of a disaster that would be. So while we love creating together, and we’ll continue to pop up together on YouTube for more classic content, maybe for the next secret big project, it’s time for Philly to think about the big dreams he’s always had.
  • [18:18] Phil shows himself filming the video, breaking the customary format of a “Draw My Life” video.
  • [18:20] Phil talks about coming out:
    P: But before anything else, there was something I needed to do. I just came out as gay! Which still feels slightly weird to say out load on YouTube. I think meeting my audience made me realize is sometimes sharing personal stuff can help others. So to do that and feel comfortable myself talking publicly about parts of my life going forward, I decided to make a YouTube video about it. This also involved telling some of my extended family beforehand, and this, thankfully, was a very positive experience. But when I read the reaction down in the comments, it really warmed my heart and gave me hope for the future of humanity, so thanks!
  • [19:16] Phil says that for the secret project he’s currently working on, “some writing is happening.” However, he doesn’t know yet if what he’s working on will ever become real.
  • [19:22] In the meantime, Phil’s still on YouTube, and he’ll keep sharing stories from his weird life and strange mind for as long as people are listening. Even if people stop listening, he might still keep sharing stories as that’s what he was doing when he first started YouTube.
  • In the video description, there are links to all three versions of the AmazingPhil Shop, and there is no link to the Dan and Phil shop.
You're being beamed up by aggressive aliens and they're plugging in the anal probe
"Oh, God. Okay. I say: *shrug* [...] I'd be like, 'I don't know how this works. Put a condom on that thing. *shrug*'"
Dan Howell, 5/10/18 Try new things..?
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