Tips and Tricks: Tools of the Trade and Useful Resources (Patreon)

For today's tips and tricks post, I thought it might be nice to provide a behind-the-scenes look at many of the tools I use to create content. These are the things you might want to invest in if you'd like to start a channel like mine and make audios of similar quality.

I'm not just talking about the things you'd expect, like editing software or recording equipment, but also everything that lets me manage all the tasks necessary to run my channel successfully. Planning! Organization! Taxes! All that fun stuff. I'll try to be as thorough as possible.

Now to be clear, this is just how I do things currently or how I did them in the recent past. There are a million ways to run a business and mine is just one! I also had the benefit of access to some of these tools for other projects prior to starting my channel. Others were gifts, hand-me downs or heavily discounted, so my startup costs were not completely bananas. I consider myself very privileged to have had so many advantages when I began posting audios. Not everyone is so lucky!

Still, I hope this gives you an idea of what's involved, and maybe even a ballpark figure to help estimate the potential costs of running a channel of your own if you want to make similar content.  

As usual, no affiliate links here. I wouldn't do ya dirty like that. Now, let's get into it!

Equipment

We've already talked a bit about microphones and sound treating so this section of the post will be quite short, but I'm going to briefly delve into the specific equipment that comprises my current set-up. I've been fortunate enough to make some small upgrades in the last couple of months, thanks in part to my patrons!

Microphone: Logitech Blue Snowball iCE $39.99 

The Blue Snowball is one of the best reasonably priced starter mics. As a company, Blue is ubiquitous, so it's easy to find one new or refurbished at a hefty discount. It's tempting to take a risk on a lesser known brand at a lower price point, but you could easily burn through half a dozen $15 mics before you find one that will perform as consistently and reliably as a Blue microphone. 

(I can also attest that this little baby can handle quite a bit of abuse: between my clumsiness and a certain cat who shall remain nameless, my Snowball has taken a lot of spills! It's held up just fine.)

Shock Mount $24.99

Behold, a shock mount! A shock mount functions like the shocks on your car, reducing vibration and protecting the delicate diaphragm inside your microphone from getting jostled, which can affect sound quality.

Pop Filter - $9.69; Windscreen for Blue Snowball - $9.98, Amazon

You may remember these little guys from our first Tips & Tricks post: the pop filter and fuzzy wind screen. I finally broke down and upgraded my DIY pop filter for a real one which is much easier to adjust, and doubled up with the windscreen to help cut down on various sounds that can make or break a recording.

OneOdio Studio Headphones $31.99 

A pair of decent headphones for sound mixing is important, especially if you plan to produce audio with lots of sound effects. (Some SFX, especially those that are available for free use, are of varying quality and require tweaks to sound their best. Good headphones make it easier clean them up and ensure the SFX mesh well with the vocal track!) These are hardly top-of-the-line, but they're a great option with plenty of bang for your buck.

Seagate Portable External Hard Drive 2TB $62.99 

Two whole terabytes may seem excessive, but trust me: running even an audio-based youtube channel takes up a TON of space. You are not prepared for how much. Between Audacity project files, finished WAVs, a sound effects library, video elements, stock images and other graphics, you're gonna need elbow room. I got by on just my laptop's built-in storage for awhile, but weekly audios and big events put an end to that pretty quick!

Content Elements

There's a lot to cover here, so let's break it up into sections. Here are some of the things you'll need for running an ASMR/RP channel, and where to get those resources:

Scripts

The ASMR Script Haven: This SFW reddit community is dedicated to posting scripts and promoting the audios you make based on those scripts. Most are free to monetize on youtube and writers are (mostly) easily accessible if you'd like to ask for permission to post script fills on other platforms. Script quality varies and searching for stuff is a bit of a hassle, but there's something for almost everyone available here!

Scriptbin: Scriptbin's main advantage over the Haven is it has a better tagging and search system. Its content tends to be spicy--therefore risky if not impossible to produce for youtube--but there are SFW scripts as well if you're willing to dig around a bit. (For example, one of the SFW scripts I've covered from Scriptbin: Rescuing a Sweet Princess from Her Dragon Keeper) 

The other drawback is that unlike the Haven, monetization policies are rarely mentioned by writers there, so you may have to contact each author individually to secure permission to post fills on monetized platforms. That said, in my experience most writers are cool with it so long as you politely ask before recording.

GWAScriptGuild (18+/NSFW): A script-focused counterpart to Gone Wild Audio (18+/NSFW), the Gone Wild Audio Script Guild is where you can find NSFW scripts to fill if that's your jam. They don't usually have monetization policies up front (obviously these scripts are not youtube friendly!) But if you're looking for frisky content to perform for your Patreon or similar, you could do a lot worse than poking around here to find a script you like and asking the writer for permission to fill it.

Sound Effects

freesound.org (free): Freesound has been online for something like fifteen years, so its sound effects library is robust. Literally everything on Freesound is free. You can easily search by keyword and even narrow your results by license. 

I prefer sounds released under the CC0 license because they're dedicated to the public domain, which means I don't have to keep track of credits. That's pretty handy when I end up using dozens of sounds in a single audio. If you're less lazy than I am or use fewer SFX in your audios, other licenses are great too!

Zapsplat (free with premium option): Zapsplat, like freesound, has free SFX available. However: you must provide attribution if you have a free account. You can upgrade to a paid account to gain access to more SFX and skip the attribution if you like!

Pixabay (free): Pixabay has free sounds (and images), and while it has a license for use it's a bit riskier to do so. Copyright content occasionally slips through on Pixabay and can get you into hot water if the copyright holder decides to be a bad sport about it. So be careful!

Youtube Sound Library (free with various licensing terms): Yep! Youtube has its own small built in library of SFX and music, free for your use. Some of it can even be used off youtube! The licenses are more restrictive than freesound--about on par with Zapsplat--but if you need decent music to set a mood in your audio, this is a fine resource!

Stock Images & Thumbnails

Before I get into this section, a PSA: do not "borrow" images off Google, deviantart or Pixiv for your thumbnails without explicit, documented artist permission. Don't use images from visual novels, wikis, video games or an anime character database. 

Just don't. There are free options out there that do not require art theft, and using art without permission can kneecap your channel with copyright strikes or get it removed from youtube entirely. While it's rare, you could even find yourself sued for this. I'm sorry to report "🥺 I thought images I found online were free uwu?" will not hold up in court.

Pixabay: Free!

As mentioned above, Pixabay is a little risky as copyrighted content occasionally slips through the cracks and can get you into trouble. Other pro-stock sites (like Shutterstock) also have that problem, but they provide some legal protection in the unlikely event you get sued for using an image. Pixabay has no such protections, however: most works you'll find there are genuinely free (and safe!) to use. Just keep an eye out for anything that looks too good to be true (like high quality anime artwork!)

Just because Pixabay is free, don't think you can't make great thumbnails with what you find there. Here are a few example mock-ups I just threw together to show how versatile the site really is:

With a little imagination and an eye for design (or a service with thumbnail templates), you can turn out some pretty fantastic thumbnails with just what's available on Pixabay.

Unsplash: Free (with minor license restrictions)

Unsplash is mostly photos with a few renderings, but photos with a blur make great thumbnail backgrounds!

Rawpixel: Free (with attribution) or a premium option ($8.99 monthly)

PNG elements, photos, vintage public domain images galore. 

Shutterstock: Free trial, then $29 monthly for ten images ($2.90 each)

Shutterstock is one of the OG stock image sites and has a library that could choke a horse. I've used them occasionally for youtube stuff but they're quite pricey compared to other services, so try to make sure you license images with multiple uses. They're especially expensive if you ever want to license any of their images for merchandise ($99 each! 😬) and your images don't roll over from month to month--you gotta download all ten every month or they're just gone. 

That said: they do offer the benefits of a huge catalog of stock as well as some good legal protection, though, and you can find decent anime-style images there. 

Adobe Stock Free trial, then $29.99 monthly for 10 images ($2.99 each)

If you find something you like on Shutterstock, you can often find the same image on Adobe Stock. Lots of artists spread their work across multiple stock sites to maximize their profits, so if you've already used the Shutterstock free trial, you can go 'round again with Adobe and maybe snag some of the images you were eyeing on the other site. 

Adobe is slightly more expensive as a subscription, but it does allow images to roll over every month so you don't lose your credits if you fail to use them immediately.

Deposit Photos: $36 monthly for 25 images ($1.44 each), though cheaper is possible! (See below)

Deposit Photos is like Shutterstock's lighter, more nimble sibling. It boasts a less expensive merch license ($89 per image, but hey every penny counts!) and fewer images total on the site, but it has one major benefit over other big sites like Shutterstock and Adobe: AppSumo deals. Deposit Photos regularly teams with AppSumo to offer image packs for bargain basement rates, sometimes as low as $39 for 100 images. That's a ridiculous discount. You can sign up for e-mail alerts too, so next time that particular deal rolls around you won't miss it!

Freepik: Some free images (with attribution) or premium access to all images ($14.99 monthly)

I'll go on record and say Freepik is a fantastic resource. I use their stuff all the time. So why is it so far down the list? Well, their usage restrictions are downright draconian. Handle with care! They don't allow merchandise licensing at all, for instance, unless the image from freepik is not the "main element" of the item being sold. There are lots of other ways you can slip up with their agreements, so I wouldn't recommend them unless you're well versed in legalese and not risk averse.

Useful Software, Apps, Etc.

This is another sizable category, so let's break it down a bit.

Writing/Script Organization

Scrivener: ($49)/yWriter: (free) I've used Scrivener for years to organize my writing projects because my squirrel brain needs a solid structure to function properly. Corkboards? I forget to use them. Index cards? I lose them. Notes? I know I have some, but...where??? 😭 

Scrivener has pretty much everything you need to write anything, whether a novel, screenplay or D&D campaign. You can organize your project with chapters, folders, character bios, research, word count goals, whatever. It's incredibly versatile.

When I started doing audios, I found it was also immensely useful for keeping dozens of scripts sorted, easily searchable and at my fingertips. Before I bit the bullet and paid for Scrivener, I used yWriter, which is a free alternative with fewer features (and an unfortunately tendency to crash!) If you're not a working writer you likely won't need all the bells and whistles that come with Scrivener, but I've found it to be invaluable tool for all the creative things I do.

HemingwayApp (free): Are you wordy? Verbose? Prone to using twenty dollar words when a five and dime will do? Do your sentences run on (and on and on and on)? This app is your friend. 

I've used it to help clean-up my own writing for ages, but it has a great alternate use for audio scripts: plop one into the window and watch how many sentences light up red or yellow. I guarantee most are too long to get out in one breath during a performance! I use the Hemingway editor to find troublesome passages at a glance and insert alternate punctuation so that I don't get gaspy while recording.

Pinboard ($22 annually): Pinboard is a bare bones bookmarking service that allows you to track, tag and sort your bookmarks anywhere online easily. As great as reddit is for finding scripts, it has a bad habit of hiding older posts even if you search for them directly. I use pinboard for other things (writing research, articles I'm reading, etc.) but it's also SUPER useful to keep track of (and organize!) scripts I find on the ASMR script haven that might otherwise get lost in the shuffle.

Thumbnail & Graphic Templates

Canva: Free, with a premium option at $12.99 monthly 

PicMonkey: free trial, $7.99 monthly 

PicMaker: Free, with a premium option at $7.99 monthly

These are all good options for making professional looking thumbnails and the service you choose ultimately depends on your personal aesthetic taste and needs for your channel. 

My preferred app is Canva, even though it's the most expensive choice, as you can make basically anything with it in a snap. A premium subscription also comes with free access to tons of stock images of all kinds. I consistently use it to create community elements, video intros/outros, thumbnails and just about anything else you can imagine. Its ease of use can't be beat.

Art & Image Editing

Gimp: (free) Gimp is the free Photoshop clone. If you've been on the internet for longer than a minute, you've probably already heard of it. It's got a steep learning curve but there are enough tutorials floating around on youtube that you can get a handle on it fairly easily if you're determined. Gimp can also handle vector images if you purchase stock in that format.

Clip Studio Paint: (Free trial, then $49.99) Full disclosure: I used Gimp for about half the life of my channel, as I stubbornly didn't want to have to re-purchase a new edition of Clip Studio Paint just because I couldn't find my old serial number. ^^; Eventually I caved because I got the itch to draw and for me, there's no better art program than CSP. Your mileage may vary, of course!

Wacom Intuous Tablet ($49.99) I've had a Wacom drawing tablet for so many years they don't even sell my exact model anymore, but this lil cutie is in the same family by the same brand. Plug-and-play, easy to use, almost impossible to screw up and if you take good care of one it can last for 5+ years.

Audio Editing

Audacity and Tenacity: (both free) Audacity is the gold standard in free audio editing software and afaik always has been. It's fairly easy to learn, simple to use and reliable. Within the past year it introduced data gathering and you can't opt out, but because it's open source a group of folks got together to create a privacy-focused "fork" of the program called Tenacity. Which one you use depends on how you feel about keeping your data private, but they're essentially the same thing.

Video Editing

Animotica: Free, with premium options ($6.99 or $15.99 for a lifetime license)

When I started my channel, I wanted a video editing program that was light and lithe. I didn't require a full suite of flashy tools, but I wanted something a bit less dated than Windows' built-in video editor. After a bit of poking around, I opted for Animotica for its ease of use and price point. If I ever plan on doing anything more ambitious, there are other options out there, but for now I'm satisfied.

If you want a more substantial piece of software but balk at paying hundreds of dollars for something like Adobe Premiere, Blender is free, has a built in video editor with a lot of features and comes highly recommended by all corners of the internet.

Other Useful Things

Humble Bundle: (items, prices and features vary) 

If you're unfamiliar with Humble Bundle, you're in for a treat. They regularly sell deeply discounted bundles of games, books and software and give a portion of the proceeds to charity. Why am I listing them here? Because they offer bundles of professional grade sound effects, video effects and editing software for low prices on a fairly regular basis. Check them out often, you're bound to find something good! 

Planning & Channel Management

Let's break from the list format for a bit, since this particular part of running a channel is less cut and dry than a simple shopping list. Buckle up and brace yourself! We're going to talk about money. 

Starting a youtube channel just for fun is easy! But the second you choose to monetize your work, whether through youtube itself, starting a Patreon, selling merch or some other means of making cold hard cash, you take on additional responsibilities that require good organizational skills behind the scenes.

Keeping Meticulous Records and Why That's Necessary

This is not the fun part of making content but it is the single most important. We'll get into why in a moment. First, some definitions:

• Gross Earnings: income made before deducting expenses
• Expenses: anything purchased or used to run the business
• Net Earnings: the income left over after expenses

If you plan to monetize, start a Patreon, or do any kind of commissions: you NEED to keep track of these numbers perfectly. Personally, I use a columnar book ($9) to do so (my brain processes numbers better on paper) but there are plenty of other ways to handle this task if you like your spreadsheets digital instead. 

Why is this part so important? Taxes.

If you're in the United States, Google--which runs AdSense--doesn't deduct tax when it pays you. You're not an employee so it's not their responsibility. The same is true of many services content creators use, like Paypal.

In the eyes of the law, a YouTuber is a business owner. What kind of business owner exactly depends on a few factors, like whether you choose to start an LLC or decide to be identified as a sole proprietorship, but the fact remains. Once you hit that "monetize" button? Congratulations! You've just signed up to be considered self-employed by the IRS--and they've got special rules for you.

So here's your crash course in money matters as a content creator:

If you make more than $400 dollars from content creation and/or make enough to owe at least $1000 in tax for the year, you must pay self employment taxes, an estimated amount due on a quarterly basis. To be precise: that's 15.3% of your net business earnings, four times a year.

The dates those payments are due:

• April 15
• June 15
• September 15
• January 15

The fact that your tax bill is estimated is where things get a bit sticky and why good record keeping is so incredibly important. 

After you've been monetized for a bit, you need to look at how much you're making and make an educated guess about what your total self-employment income will be for the tax year. Then, figure out how much you'll owe on that amount and split that number into four equal payments. The amount of tax due may even change if you make more or less than your initial estimate! 

For instance, maybe you started the year hoping you'd make $10k, so your first couple of payments were $382...but by the time the third is due, you've made $15k! You'll have to recalculate how much you owe, deduct what you've already paid, then split the remainder into your last two payments. Otherwise, you'll risk penalties that can cost you a pretty penny.

If you're going to make money at all on youtube or Patreon or wherever, you must  make sure to save enough of your earnings to pay the estimated tax amount when the bill comes due every quarter. You can pay it online, but the system is far from intuitive even if you're generally pretty savvy about that sort of thing. (Y'know, government websites. They ain't great.) If you opt to pay the lo-fi way, I suggest sending the payments via certified mail and keeping the receipts so you have proof you paid on time. 

Tracking Expenses

One of the other reasons it's so vital to keep track of your earnings is because you can write off purchases made for the benefit of your channel and that reduces the amount of tax you owe. Remember: you only pay tax on net earnings after expenses.

What kinds of things can you deduct for a youtube channel like mine? Microphones and other audio equipment, editing software, stock images, graphic design services, research materials, postage for sending merchandise, even a home office if you have the space for that. (Beware: home office deduction rules are very strict!)

The guidelines for claiming business expenses are particular. If the purchased item is used solely for your channel, you can claim it no sweat. You bought a hundred dollar microphone and only use it for youtube/Patreon/etc.? Write it off as a business expense. 

But it gets more complicated with big ticket purchases or items you only use for your channel part of the time. For example if you bought a laptop and only use it for youtube 20% of the time, you can only write off 20% of the cost. 

You also can't buy something super expensive and write it off all in one year; anything that is likely to last longer than one tax year has to be depreciated. If you bought a $2000 microphone in 2022, you can't deduct the entire cost for that year because it's going to last awhile. You'd get a smaller deduction over several years instead.

Another thing you can't (and shouldn't!) do is buy expensive equipment just to spend down your earnings so you don't have to pay any taxes at all. If you're thinking "I'll just spend 80% of my earnings on 'expenses' 😈" you're begging for an audit. 

That said, the IRS gives you some leeway. They know starting a business is a pricey affair. In the first year, you can deduct up to $5000 of start-up costs. There are rules, of course--bureaucracy, y'know--but if you want to save up a bit to buy equipment before you launch your channel, know that you can deduct those costs.

A Short List of Useful Things/Tasks for Managing Your Channel

• Columnar book (price varies according to your needs, but between $5-$15)
• Accounting QuickStart Guide ($10-$20) if you're completely new to accounting
• Print and keep receipts for every expense and every cent you're paid!

Generally Keeping Track of Your Channel

This part is much less Serious Business than the last section, but it's still something I personally do behind the scenes. I keep a massive planner ($10) for tracking all sorts of things. (I use an academic planner specifically, as I started my channel in the summer!) 

It contains my channel stats, scripts I'm considering, checklists of tasks I need to complete, goals for the year, when I get paid, when I make business purchases, etc. Tracking my progress (often with shiny stickers!) keeps my ADHD from spinning out of control (ooo achievements!) and staying organized in a way that I can check and double check regularly keeps my OCD (mostly) satisfied.

Some final words...

I've said it before and I'll say it again: this looks like a lot. It is a lot! (This post alone is 4,000 words and I had to cut an entire section on research materials because it was getting too unwieldy!) I'm lucky that I've had a lot of help and good advice that led me to this point..

But: this is just how I do things at the moment. If you want to start a channel, you can get by with less. (Okay, maybe not so much the tax part, but everything else!) Consistent effort and determination to learn make a big difference in any creative endeavor. Those things matter more than the tools at your disposal.

This may look scary and overwhelming but I promise if I can do this, with my neurodivergent squirrel brain, you can too. I believe in you!

Now go out there and kick some ass! Or...chew some bubble gum? idk, I'm not the boss of you.

xoxo,

Vel