Time and again, some viewer would tell us - hey man, there is no need to put out so much content on Chalchitra Talks. Why don't you guys take some time to figure out what you guys really want and lower the frequency of churning out videos. You guys should focus on quality over quantity.
I would suggest a perspective shift here.
Over the course of life, I have realised that if there is one thing that I am good at, it is rapid execution. It's my biggest strength. As a content creator, first you need to know if you are a sniper rifle or a machine gun. Sniper rifle makes one shot and it's bloody accurate, and machine gun makes multiple shots and then manages to hit the target. It's a beautiful concept penned down by David Parell.
We, at Chalchitra Talks, are Machine Guns. We need to take multiple shots to hit the target. We do so many experiments knowing only 2 out of 10 would land. It's something we enjoy. It's something we don't want to change.
Even while playing CS 1.6, I just knew sniping just wasn't my thing. Getting it right in one shot scares me and I have tried to use this fear as my strength. There is a beauty in knowing that you might not be as talented as Christopher Nolan, or Aamir Khan or Hans Zimmer - all good examples of sniper rifles.
So I like being the machine gun. If you take away my machine gun from me, and ask me to learn sniping, it will lead to paralysis. In the pursuit of making one perfect video, I won't be making any videos. I am not Christopher Nolan. I am not a sniper rifle. And I take pride in it. Because when you know that you are not aspiring for perfection, you can get to work.
More than quantity over quality, it's about speed over paralysis for me. Because Speed is all I have. Please don't take it away from me.
There is the beautiful thread by Sam Altman which resonates with me a lot.
I still underestimate the compounding power of the rapid execution and iterated learning feedback loop. A commitment to this, over the course of a career, is the closest thing you can get to guaranteed success.
When you learn that you can learn anything, you are willing to take on anything. And when you learn that you can win with execution speed alone, you are willing to take on anyone.
My personal blog is called Filming in the Dark. And I once wrote there I am constantly filming in the dark and failing in the light. So what people see as quantity, I see them as my archive of failures out in public domain, Look long enough, and you'll see some shots that hit the target. And that is what keeps us going.
So which one are you? A sniper rifle or a machine gun?