 Hey everybody, it's HCC here. I thought I'd do something special with the last review of 2018 I thought I'd give you kind of a bus behind-the-scenes look at the making of the video I've sort of done something like this before. This will be a little bit different I like to take you through the entire process from the very beginning to hopefully the very end So this is an experiment. I don't know how this will go It may actually be too difficult to put this together so I can actually present it to you But my hope is to give you like a real full inside look at the production of one of my GI Joe review videos So let's try that by starting out with The research this is where everything always starts. I am sitting in front of my laptop here and I'm on my My sofa. This is where I usually Do my work It's in you know, it's in my living room. There's nobody in here right now It's just me so it's quiet so I can work Right now my this is kind of my workstation and right now my workstation is a terrible mess So please excuse the mess. I mean I've got I've got like figures here. Oh, I've got my earbuds here. I've got Figures, I've got Zanzibar's air skiff which I reviewed two weeks ago and it's still cluttering up my space here I've got my copy of the Secret code book so I can devise the secret code for this week's review Sorry, here's my my camera that I will normally use to shoot Video right now. I'm shooting this video on my phone, but there's the camera that I normally use And I've got let's see The subject of this week's review is gonna be crimson guard, so I've got all my crimson guards here Including the python patrol version so I've got them all here within arms reach so that I can look at them I also need to decide since I have several of them. I've got as a side which is going to be The one that actually gets reviewed like which is the one that's in the best condition Which one is the hero that's going to actually appear on camera the most So I'll figure that out. I've got my file cards here I've got my Balomo guide so I can see what that has to say about it And I will be doing a lot of my research on on here on the internet But all of these things that are around me will be helpful What I will do is I will take my notes on this notepad And this is actually how I first starting it started out doing it when I first started out doing reviews Notes were kept written on a pad like this. I Tried doing it differently I tried for a while Typing my notes out and then printing them But that proved to be just kind of an extra step plus my laptop isn't connected to a printer So I'd have to use a different printer and you know, it's not that difficult, but it's a little bit of a hassle also At one point I tried to keep the notes electronically on my tablet And that worked for a little while, but then it sort of became too cumbersome It wasn't it wasn't as convenient as I thought it would be it It's not quite as easy to update on the fly on that tablet as I would like for it to be So I went back to just Riding down my notes. So that's what we will do I will start the research and I will go through. I'll basically answer all the questions I normally have about the subject I will write the notes down on here Hopefully by the end of the evening this will have produced Between three and four pages worth of notes and that's what I will go by to do the review. It's not a script It's just notes If there is a particular thing that I want to say and if I want to say it in a very specific way I might write that down, but I can't Do a script for you know a 20 22 to 25 minute video handwritten in a notepad that would be take way too long So I'm not scripting things here. I'm just Basically have bullet points of what I want to cover and what I want to say so I will do that. I will have you guys with me and I will Kind of time-lapse that so you can you know sit with me here while I do the research part of the video You know, it's a good thing I have a minute to sit down and think about this stuff before I Go on camera and start talking about it because until a moment ago I had forgotten about the Crimson Guard vehicles the Sears exclusive vehicles Which I have and I should include in a review of the Crimson Guard And it totally slipped my mind until I started getting into My notes and then looked up on the shelf and saw one of them right up there You know, you know, I can't do a proper review without including The Crimson Guard vehicles, you know a lot of people don't Even know that there were Crimson Guard vehicles because they were Sears exclusive. So I'm gonna add those to my notes and move forward preliminary research I've got few notes already and I remembered that I have a modern Crimson Guard action figure And so I'm going to include that in their review. So I went and pulled that out It's one of these comic two packs the person who sent these to me did say that it's okay If I opened them, he won't be offended if I opened this so I do plan to open this and pull the Crimson Guard figure out and And include that in the review I'm always reluctant to include modern figures in the reviews because I Don't review modern figures So I don't want to set an expectation that this channel covers Modern figures any inclusion of modern figures is just a bonus within the vintage figure review, so So it's something that I want to be careful about Because whenever I review the vintage figure and I don't mention modern figures or more recent comic books That were after the Marvel run and so on I Have to remind people that hey, that's not what I cover on this channel. I only cover GI Joe in the vintage era However, I you know, I do have it. I don't think it will hurt anything to include it So I'm gonna toss it in just as a short segment to compare and contrast the modern Crimson Guard with the vintage I've been thinking about the inspiration for the Crimson Guard and I think there's some inspiration drawn from Star Wars from the Imperial Guard And I'd really like to show the Crimson Guard Next to the Imperial Guard just for reference, but I don't have a Star Wars Imperial Guard figure And I have to decide if I want to go get an Imperial Guard figure To use in my video I Could just use a photograph of the Imperial Guard figure, but I'd have to find a source for that photograph And you have to be careful about using other people's work. It can be done in fair use, but Whenever possible if I can have the actual object to show I prefer that even though that can be an extra expense for me So I'm gonna have to really think about whether or not I want to get a Star Wars Imperial Guard figure Specifically for this video. So that's something I'll think about if I decide to do it then you will see it in the review Here's something I often have to do as I'm doing my research and looking things up online. I have playing an Episode of the animated series the actual first appearance of the Crimson Guard so that I can Figure out what part of that episode I want to include in the review Of course, I've seen this episode before But it helps to refresh my memory. So I kind of have it going in the background as I'm typing so I'll try to Like I already seen An appearance of the Crimson Guard just in the first couple minutes of this episode. So I will grab That video for the review and I just remembered that I have other versions of the Crimson Guard post-vintage and I guess I should include them in the review But the modern section of the review is Growing and I don't want the modern section to take over the review This is a review of the vintage toys. So I'm gonna have to now think about how much I actually want to talk about these I do want to show them. I do want to talk about them But I also don't want that section of the review to be too long I don't want that to be a large part of the review. So more things to think about and I'm still taking notes So I think I'm mostly done now. I have What four pages of notes three and a half pages of notes? I have covered all the comic books that I can think of I've covered the Animated appearances that I want to cover I've got you know, I've got Tomax and Zaymod and I've got all my Crimson Guardsmen here right beside me I've got a mess here basically I have created as I'm going a Text document that will have All of the reference material and this will be copied and pasted into the credit scroll at the end of the video and I hope I've got it all here Of course I had to take some notes in the margins because I remembered some things after the fact that I wanted to add If I remember anything before I start shooting I will add that as well this going through this will give me an idea of Which other figures and vehicles I might need to include in the video, so I will pull those I Hope I've covered enough here. I want to talk a little bit about the Crimson Guard immortal I want to talk a little bit about the Crimson Guard commander But I don't want to go into too much depth with those because the video is not about them It's about the original Crimson Guard, so I want to focus on that And I want to focus on the vintage figure and not spend too much time on the modern figures So it'll be a little tricky this time, but for the most part I think the research section is done so now I need to set up my studio section and Just get everything ready to actually start shooting. It's kind of late at night now that took several hours to do how many hours like Three hours I think And I forgot to eat dinner, so I'm really hungry, so I've got to stop now I will probably actually start shooting tomorrow and I will bring you guys along with that so you can see how that's done Okay, I have Everything set up to start shooting. I'm not going to start shooting right now. I think I'll start shooting tomorrow It's getting kind of late here It took another I don't know hour to hour and a half Just to clear off my workstation here my studio space Because I had left a bunch of my stuff from previous reviews. It was just all over the table, so I Had to clear all that stuff up before I could even set this up. It was just a ridiculous mess It's something that I run into Frequently and that is I can Sometime and I can find the time to Shoot the reviews obviously because they do go up But it's harder to find the time to put everything away where it belongs So that I can you know, you know clear the space and have the room to Work so things pile up And that's that's not good because that's how things get lost Have a hard time finding things that I need for reviews because I can't remember where I put it So I took some time this evening to actually clean up and get ready So it's all set up here. I've chosen which of my crimson guard figures. I want to be the one On camera I've got the other figures that I need here over to the side For the review. I've got my notes here The modern figures that I'm going to include in the review are over here to the side Got my vehicles here Everything's more or less ready. I Have the time to shoot right now like I could shoot the the review right now like the core review, but if I did it right now, I Would sound tired you would be able to tell in the review that I'm tired, you know, I don't have energy my voice You know sounds like I've been talking all day because I have been I've worked the video as far as I can get it for today and I'm gonna take some a take a break. I'm gonna Do a good night's sleep and I will pick this up in the morning And I will record the core review the actual part of the review that is focused on the figure and I will Show you that part of the process too. So for now good night and see you in the morning All right, it's the next day and I really need to get the shooting done I have other things I need to do today So my time is limited and I don't know how long this is gonna take. I think it's gonna take a while This is meant to be a bigger review than just a regular review. It's a special figure It's the last review of the year. I need to take extra time on it and try to make it good And you know try to make it special So I really need to get this done. I need to get started. I kind of have waited too long I should have started earlier in the morning I've got My phone set up over there So I'm gonna try to record some of the behind-the-scenes as I'm shooting this So you can see me struggle through that process It's always a struggle. I Have an idea of what I want to say but the words don't you know flow Very easily. So I Stutter and stumble quite a bit So I will let you watch some of that process as we do it And then I I have to think about the Wrap around the front of the camera stuff the cold open And what exactly I want to do to make that special. I Have an idea for the cold open But I need help with it. I need I think I need my brother to assist with that so I have texted my brother to see if he could make time to do that but I'm not sure exactly when that will happen or if it'll happen if it doesn't happen I'll have to come up with another idea But the I my first idea. I think is a good one. I think it would be a good way to open The review especially considering what I'm reviewing. I'm set up. I've got my lighting set up I've With this initial setup. I'm thinking about like what's the first thing you're going to see when the actual core review starts What's that first image of the figure? How is that going to be framed? How is it going to be lit? I wanted to fill your screen I wanted to fill your whole screen as much as possible So I'm thinking about how this is going to look On like your big TV screen even though I can only see it right now through this little viewfinder I'm trying to think about what it's going to look like when it's bigger So when I say HCC 788 presents the crimson guard and it fades to the image of the crimson guard I want this little figure to be like huge so When I set up the camera, that's what I'm thinking about I'm thinking about angles. I'm thinking about framing. I'm thinking about lighting and once that's all you know The way I want it then I can hit record and Start the actual review. I've got my notes over here Usually actually tear the notes out of the notepad There we go Way so that you know as I go I can just discard them as I'm done and I've got the modern figures over there that I'm gonna look at I've only vaguely thought about what I even want to say about the modern figures I don't really have any notes about the modern figures other than like the year they were released. So I'm going to think about I'm probably just gonna look at them and kind of React to them and make whatever comments I can think of in the moment. So I Think we're about ready. I've got the figures here that I think I will need for this review, but As I get going I may realize oh, I need other figures to include in this So I'll just go grab them as I go. So I've stalled enough it's I've stalled for a couple hours now. I should have done this a couple hours ago. So no more stalling Let's get started Okay, set up for the first shot. I'm thinking about framing. I don't want the figure dead center in the On the screen I want him a little off-center and kind of turn to the side a little bit Just having him dead center and facing directly at the camera is a little too static So now I'm also thinking about Where this first shot ends because I'd like you know the first shot I needed I needed two second lead in and I need I Don't want to like just have this shot on the screen for like Five seconds and then switch to something else. I want to hold this for a little bit, you know 20 seconds maybe longer Just to allow this initial first shot to sink in a little bit Allow the audience to absorb that before I move on to something else So I'm looking at my script and thinking about where Where to cut it so where to like Change the shot to something else one thing that I do that I don't know that a lot of other reviewers do is When I get the shot that I want when I I'll Do what I want to say When I get the take that I think I want to use I will stop the camera there and I will start to the next section as a new video clip For me, that's easier to Edit I know that some people might not prefer it that way they'd rather have one long You know video file and then cut up what you want out of it. I like to have shorter smaller video files With you know, usually the last that the correct take the final take as the last one So as I'm editing I can look at that last take and you know, make sure that that's the one I want to use and then You know cut out everything else and then you know sort of Slide it in and make it fit within the you know Within the video within the whole video To me, it's also a little easier to move things around that way That's just my preference. So you will see me starting and stomping quite a bit and as I'm doing that I'm thinking you know Is this the take I want to use if it's the take I want to use then That's where the video clip stops and then we kind of reset and figure out what's next. So All right, it's time to get started All right Here we go This is the crimson guard the Cobra elite trooper from 1985 this figure was first available in 1985 It was also available in 1986 and was discontinued for 19. It helps if I hit record There how about that we can actually record what we're saying, huh? Okay, two-second lead in Here we go This is the crimson guard Cobra's elite trooper from 1985 this figure was first available in 1985 and it was also available in 1986 it was discontinued for the year 1987 although this channel focuses on vintage GI show toys I do have a couple modern versions of the crimson guard and we will take a look at them later. I was happy with that. Okay Let's see now I need this I Need the Python Patrol because I want to talk about later versions my Python Patrol Figures joints are a little loose. So I need you to stand up buddy stand up All right, he's off-screen right now I'm gonna slide him into frame Like that. I've got to leave enough time for me to put the text on the screen Because that's what I'm doing now and when I introduce a new figure the first time I have it in the video I try to put the name of the figure and the gear of release on the screen, so Okay, I gotta think about this versions. Oh wait, hold on. I just remember something I wanted to say All right, let's do this real quick before we before we move in the Python Patrol figure Okay, as you can see we have a number of file cards and I have an extra backpack here That means we have some variants to look at in this video. Okay now There were only two versions of the Crimson Guard in the vintage era. There was Version two was in the Python Patrol subset. He used the same mold as version one But with radically different colors. That's what I'm trying to say Okay There were only two versions of the Crimson Guard in the vintage era Version two was from the Python Patrol subset It used the same mold as version one, but with radically different colors Yeah, okay. Now we need to talk. Oh crap. All right I want to talk about Figures that were not exactly the Crimson Guard but similar to the Crimson Guard in the Crimson Guard family I've got the Crimson Guard immortal and the Crimson Guard commander Sometimes I like to when I have these other figures in the video. I like to have them with their Accessories and sometimes I don't I am going to off to not include their accessories in this one because they're a bit elaborate and would take some time to set up and Not really reviewing those figures right now, so I don't need to give them that much of an in-depth look In my opinion though In my opinion though, the only true commander of the Crimson Guard is Cobra commander himself. I In my opinion though, the only true commander of the Crimson Guard is Cobra commander himself I believe the Crimson Guard would be selected for that In my opinion though, the only true In my opinion though, the only true commander of the Crimson Guard is In my opinion though, the only true commander of the Crimson Guard would be Cobra commander himself I believe the Crimson Guard In my opinion though, the only true commander of the In my opinion though, the only true commander of the Crimson Guard would be Cobra commander himself I believe the Crimson Guardsmen would be selected for their absolute loyalty to Cobra Commander and would be answerable directly to him without anyone in the middle. As we will discover when we look at individual Crimson Guardsmen, their loyalty to Cobra Commander may not be absolute. As we will discover when we look at individual Crimson Guardsmen, their loyalty to Cobra Commander may not be absolute. As we will discover when we look at individual Thrida, their loyalty to Cobra Commander may not be absolute. Okay, we're already recording. For this section I want to say, the Crimson Guard is, the Crimson Guard are often referred to as CGs. CG is a phoneticization of the initials CG or Crimson Guard. Yeah, good enough. All right, 1985 is reintroduction of Cobra Army Builders, of those in vehicle drivers. We didn't really have any Cobra Army Builders since the 1982-1983 Cobra Soldier. And I just realized I'm going to have to go get some 1985 Cobra Army Builders for this next scene. I didn't plan ahead and I didn't have them ready, so I'll have to take a break after this shot and go get some other figures. All right, 1985 was the reintroduction of Cobra Army Builders, other than, okay, 1985 was the reintroduction of Cobra Army Builders, other than vehicle drivers. We didn't have any, ah, 1985 was the reintroduction of Cobra Army Builders. Other than vehicle drivers we didn't have any new Cobra Army Builders since the basic Cobra Trooper from 1982-1983. All right, good place to stop it. I got to go get some more figures. I decided to put my notes on my clipboard here so it's easier to write, and I'm just checking them off as I go, checking off each point. And I've done some things out of order from how I wrote them down. This helps me make sure I don't miss anything. Like the variants, I've mentioned the variants already, but I want to talk about the variants in a little bit more detail. I think just before we start talking about the accessories. So I'm holding off on that for a second. And I just finished talking about the other 1985 Army Builders. I haven't talked about the Fred series yet, so I'm going to get to that. And some thoughts about the Cobra command structure. And then I need to talk about the Crimson Guard vehicle. I have to stand up for this one because I had to change the camera angle. I've got more figures on there. I'm trying to get them all in the shot. So I've got to stand up to actually be able to look over here and talk about them. So here we go. It's mine. Okay, recording. Yes, recording. It's my belief that the Crimson Guard are on a separate career path to the usual accepted career path to the usual accepted progression of Cobra troopers. I would expect all Cobra... It's my belief that the Crimson Guard are on a separate career path from the usual accepted progression of Cobra. It's my belief that the Crimson Guard are on a separate career path to the usual accepted progression of Cobra. It's my belief that the Crimson Guard are on a separate career path to the usual accepted progression of Cobra troopers. I believe everyone starts out as a blue shirt when you first join Cobra. And you could progress to become a Cobra eel and eventually a Cobra snow serpent. It's my belief that the Crimson Guard is on a separate career path to the usual accepted progression of Cobra troopers. It's my belief that the Crimson Guard are on a separate career path. It's my belief that the Crimson Guard are on a separate career path to the usual... It's my belief that the Crimson Guard are on a separate career path to the... It's my belief that the Crimson Guard are on a separate career path from the usual progression of the Cobra Trooper. I believe everyone would start out as a blue shirt when they first joined Cobra. And from being a blue shirt or a Viper, you could eventually become a Cobra Eel and then eventually a Snow Serpent. But if you're selected as a Crimson Guardsman, you would go on a different path. See how many tries that took? It's because I can't speak. And that's typical. I needed to say what I wanted to say, I needed it to sound clear, I needed to not stumble over my words. I don't know that I got it perfect, but I think that's about as good as I'm going to get it. He has double silver stripes down each thigh, and on his left thigh he has a black gun in a holster. And that gun almost looks like a sawed-off shotgun. It's surprising that it's on his left side. That would imply that the Crimson Guard is left-handed. But it's very unlikely that you would have an entire army of left-handed soldiers. Alright, 3, 2, 1, here we go. We finish up with some tall black boots. They look great. They have pouches on the outside of the boots. And they're at a nice wicked angle. We finish up with a pair of tall black boots that are angled at the top. He has a pouch on the outside of each boot. And the boots also have some sculpted in spurs. I'm not sure what. We finish up with some tall black boots with angled... We finish up with some tall black boots that are angled at the top. He has a pouch on the outside of each boot. And the boots have spurs sculpted on. I'm not sure why the Crimson Guard would need spurs, but they are a nicely detailed boot. We finish up with some tall black boots that are angled at the top. He has pouches on the outside of each boot. And the boots have some sculpted on spurs. I'm not sure why the Crimson Guard would need spurs, but there they are. The boots look really good and they're great with this overall uniform. Okay, so I made a mistake. When I started talking about the file cards, I had the file cards in the wrong order. So now I have to go back and fix that. This is taking a really long time. I've been doing this for at least 3 hours. My Saturday is dwindling away, and if I'm not careful, this will take up my whole weekend. So I've got to redo what I already did and fix it and hopefully get it right this time. I'm just now getting to the point in the review where I'm going to talk about the modern figure. This is taking longer than I had hoped. I had to go back and fix a few things. I had to add a few things to my notes. In my notes, I forgot about one of the most important Crimson Guardsmen in the comic book series, so I needed to add that. I don't want to miss that. It's hard to believe I spent all these hours doing research and forgot about a really important Crimson Guardsman in the comic book. Fortunately, I caught that before I recorded it. I'm hoping I can keep this modern section very succinct. I have not had lunch, I'm hungry and getting really tired, and my day is getting away from me. Yeah, this is taking a while. I wish I could say this is taking a lot longer than the videos normally take to make. It is taking a little bit longer than usual because there's more in it. I've got more to talk about in this video. A typical video takes almost this long. Alright guys, I just wrapped up the core review. That took four and a half hours. That's a little bit longer than a normal shoot would take. Not a lot longer. There was more to do in this one. But I'm tired, I'm hungry, and I want to eat. I have to do a few other things today, other than video work. This is a typical Saturday, basically. It's a typical Saturday. I could have skipped it today, I could have done it tomorrow, but then I just would have been doing this on Sunday, and I feel like I don't have any weekend at all. So I'm trying to get it done so that I can have a little bit of downtime this weekend. The video is not anywhere near done. The core review is shot, and that's all. I've got some close-up photos of the accessories and the file cards. I've put the figure on the turntable for the 360 spin. That's the last part that I do of the core review. I still need to shoot the front of the camera stuff. I still have the idea that I want to do for the cold open. And then I've got to edit, and that'll be several hours. So the video is not anywhere near being complete, but I do feel a little better because the core part of the review is done, at least it's shot. Yeah, now to take care of a few other things and then work out in my schedule when I'm going to do the rest of the video. I have so far probably seven and a half, maybe eight hours invested in this video. And I've probably got at least that much more to go. It's maybe halfway done. So by the time this actually gets published and you see it, I'll probably have 16, 17 hours invested in a video that may be half an hour long. This took about three and a half hours, no, what, what say four and a half? Crap. I don't know, like four and a half hours, I guess, whatever. But I mean, that is for what will end up being about maybe 25 minutes worth of video. So like four and a half hours, 25 minutes worth of actual video time, that's the ratio. It'll get done, it'll get up, and I'm hoping that it'll be, you know, a special video since it's a popular character. It's the last review of the year, and so I'm hoping that people will like it. For something like the Crimson Guard, the history within the series is vast. There's so many aspects of the Crimson Guard to talk about. The only way that I could really cover everything, everything, everything, is to do a video that's hours and hours long. It's not possible for me to do that. I don't have the time to do that, to shoot it or to edit it. It would take days. And so some things have to be either left out, you know, selectively edited out or they have to be, you know, diminished to focus on other things. And honestly, even if I made videos that were hours and hours long, there would still be people complaining about it because I either still left something out or still, you know, didn't say something in the way somebody wanted me to, or I didn't emphasize something that they thought ought to be really important, but didn't seem as important to me. Anyway, I gotta stop talking about this now because I'm really hungry. I skipped lunch to finish this, and I got other things to do today. So I'll pick up this video again when I figure out when I'm going to do the rest of the shooting. All right, so we are in Veterans Park, and I had this idea because, you know, the Crimson Guard, they all look alike. I had this idea that for the opening of the video, I would run into myself. So I needed somebody who could play me from behind. So the only person I could think of is my brother, my brother, this is Eric, yeah. And Susan's been very kind to work as the camera person. So we're here, we had kind of an interesting experience. We show up, we find this nice spot where it's not very crowded to do our shooting, and then all of a sudden, like this whole crowd of people will show up, and it totally ruins our shot, so we had to change plans. So anyway, I think I got everything we needed. I should be able to edit that together into the opening of the video. So that's it. I didn't take too long, but it's kind of cold. A bit chilly? Yeah. So maybe we can wrap it up and go someplace warm before the battery on the camera dies. So, all right, so anyway, on to the next phase of the video. See you later. Okay, this is the final few shots of the video. I'm set up here in my living room because I wanted to have a Christmas theme again. So I've got this as my backdrop, and around me is just a bunch of boxes, which I don't have a space for right now. So I've set up the camera, so it kind of looks like, you know, you wouldn't know, you know, that this clutter all around me, because all of it's off screen. I try to give some thought to what shirt I'm going to wear for the review, and it doesn't always end up being, you know, the perfect choice. But for this one, I decided to go with this shirt that my co-workers gave me. The stars are kind of coming up there, but it's still, for me, a pretty cool shirt. They got it for me, you know, when I was transferred to a different department, because I wasn't going to be working with them anymore. So they wanted to send me off with a special gift, and it was very nice. It's very nice. This is unscripted, but I have an idea of what I want to say, all the stuff I'm saying in front of the camera is unscripted, and I don't really even have notes for it. So I'm trying to keep it all on my head and make sure that I remember to say everything that I'm supposed to say. So let's get started shooting so I can finish this, and then I can start the editing process. Here we go. Looking at the Crimson Guard overall, this is a fantastic figure. I know this is a favorite of Timmer from Half the Battle. I mean, it's, okay. Looking at the Crimson Guard overall, it's a great figure. I know it's a favorite of Timmer from... Looking at the Crimson Guard overall, this is a great figure. I know it's a favorite of the... Looking at the Crimson Guard overall, this is a great figure. I know it's a favorite of Timmer from Half the Battle, and of course it is. A red... Red, silver, and black. Looking at the Crimson Guard overall, this is a great figure. Looking at the Crimson Guard overall, this is a great figure. I know it's a favorite of Timmer from Half the Battle, and of course, red, black... Okay. The Cobra figure was red, silver, and black. Looking at the Crimson Guard overall, this is a great figure. I know it's a favorite of Timmer from Half the Battle, and I can understand why. We have a Cobra figure with red, silver, and black. From a visual standpoint, it's striking. Just shot the final shot of the video. That took about an hour to finish. That's an hour for what will end up being maybe five or six minutes worth of video. So finally, I can put everything away. I can put my camera away. I can put my lights away. I've got so much clutter around here. I've had to move things around in order to set up space to record. Now I can do that, and then it's time to edit. Pretty deep into the editing process, I have been editing this video for about five and a half hours, and it's not done. The hold up is the media section. Animated series, comic book. This takes, I've been working on that for at least a solid two hours. Because I have to crop all of the comic book pages. I have to trim all of the animated series, animated episode clips. And it takes a lot of time. It takes at least as much time to do the media section as it does to do the rest of the video. So I should stop now, but I really want to get this video done and edited. If I can get the edit finished, and if it's good, I can hit render, and the video can render while I'm sleeping. And it'll be all done when I wake up in the morning, fully rendered and edited video. Ready for Sunday, it can be done on Monday morning. I would really like that, because if I left it to finish tomorrow, then that would cut into any shooting time I have tomorrow evening when I get home from work. And tomorrow evening, I would really like to shoot a short video for the middle of next week. I really, I try to put up a short video on Sundays, well I gotta shoot those at some point. They don't usually take a long time to shoot, but I still have time to do it. So that would cut into my editing time if I saved this for tomorrow. I wanted to show you guys this. This right here is the media section of the video. As you can see, I haven't done any of the last bit, so that's what I still need to work on. But this is the media section, and each one of these little clips is a clip from the animated series, or a crop from a comic book page. And each one of those, first of all, I have to gather them and make sure that I have the reference images and clips, and then they have to be trimmed and cropped and placed where I want them on the screen. With my backdrop of, you know, my Crimson Guard figures, this is what takes so long in the media section. That's about two hours of work right there. That's two hours of work. And I'm gonna zoom this out. This is the video as a whole, as it stands right now. That's the media section. That right there, those few seconds, that's the bit that I shot with my brother. There's the intro right there. And that's where the core review starts, and that's the end of the core review. This is not an especially complicated video. This is, at least as far as the editing goes, it's pretty typical. It's a little bit longer, apparently. It's over 30 minutes, so it's a little bit longer than a typical video, but it's not especially complicated. It's basically a typical video that I put out every week. But it's 12.44 a.m., see right there, it's 12.44 a.m. It's late, I'm tired, but I'm gonna get this done. Alright, the video is done. It is 2.19 in the morning. What does that take in? Is that seven hours? Eight hours? I've lost track. I'm really tired, and I have to get up and go to work the morning. That's not gonna be fun. But anyway, I thought you'd like to see this. This is the whole video. I've collapsed it down, I've shrunk it down, so that you can see the entire video all on one screen, as I'm editing, I would expand that so that I can work on it. But here it is, all just kind of shrunk down. That's the whole video. It's got several layers of audio, because in that opening scene I had to layer the audio a bit and also add a music track. Oh, that's not the whole video. I forgot. The little bug that goes in the corner there, that's what all of that is. That runs through most of the video. And then here is, there's the cold open. That's the, let's expand this a little bit, hold on. There we go. There's the cold open. It's pretty short. There's the standard introduction theme song. There's the introduction to the review, with me standing in front of the fireplace, and there is the little musical interlude, and that's where the actual video begins. Each of these is a bit of text, a text overlay that goes over the video. A whole bunch of those. Let's see. And it looks like, okay. Basically from here to here is the vintage figure review. This little section is looking at the modern figures. That's the media. That's the last little bit with me talking about the figure, giving my overall opinion of it. That part is where I am, excuse me, where I'm saying goodbye to everyone. See you next time. Visit the website and all that. And then down here is the very end credit roll. The end credit roll with the image that it runs over. And then a little stinger there at the end. And that's it. That's the whole review that has taken, essentially, you know, an entire work day to work on. And I'm ready to render this thing so that I can go to bed. It should be done, hopefully, by the time I get up in the morning. And I can upload it, schedule it, and it will be done. We'll be done with our video for the week. Hopefully that'll be worth all the hours that I put into it. I was able to catch a couple mistakes and fix a couple mistakes as I was watching it again. So there we go. See Crimson Guard review. And there, all right. That'll take a while to render, but I'm going to sleep now. So thanks, and we'll see this again in the morning when it's all rendered and ready to upload. I'm going to call it done on this making of the Crimson Guard review video. I hope you enjoyed it. The Crimson Guard review is done. It's Monday evening. Actually got next Sunday's video done on Monday evening. Now that is a little bit unusual. Usually it gets done a little bit later in the week, but I really try to jump on this one and get the work done as quickly as I could, because I do have other videos that I need to do before the end of the year. I need to plan those out. I need to be ready. So you've seen essentially the whole process. The only parts that I cut out were just parts of me doing more of what you already saw. So I just actually finished shooting a quick shot for Special Mission Brazil. You should see that. In fact, you'll see that before you see this, but I just recently got the Special Mission Brazil set. I'm pretty happy about that. Since I finished the video, I did actually think of a couple more things I could have said about the Crimson Guard, a couple more things I could have included in the video. At this point it's too late in the process to go back and add something. It would actually involve several hours worth of work, just to add maybe a couple of clips. This unfortunately is just a limitation of the medium. I'll just have to let those things go. There weren't important things, not necessarily things about the lore or the background or the figure, but just some thoughts and ideas that I had about the Crimson Guard as I was editing it. I thought, oh, that might have been an interesting thing to say, but it's too late now. The video is done. I have lost track of how many hours I have put into that video. My estimate was around 17 to 18 hours, but it was longer than that. The edit took longer than I expected. So I don't know. It's something like 20 hours maybe went into doing this video that's a little over 30 minutes long. It's an especially long review, but it takes that much time to put together a review like that. For some of you, that may seem kind of strange because you may not feel like the final product shows or reflects that amount of time that goes into it, reflects that amount of work. You may feel that some of my effort is wasted and doesn't actually show up on the screen. Well, that's fair, but this is the way that I know to make videos, and so I'm doing it the way that I believe that it should be done. So it would certainly be easier to just point a camera at something and talk about it and leave all of my stutters and stammers in and not worry about editing, but I don't think I would like the final product if I did that. So I'm trying to do something that I at least feel is worth you watching. I do get tired and when I get tired I question how much time I put into this, but I always try to keep in mind that it's a privilege to do this. It's a privilege for me to talk with you about G.I. Joe to present these videos to you so that we can enjoy the G.I. Joe nostalgia together. It's my privilege to do that and it's created some amazing friendships. It's been just an amazing journey that's really changed my life in a lot of positive ways. I did a review every other week, basically did a half the number of reviews. I don't think that the videos would necessarily be that much better. I don't know that I could sustain the channel doing the videos less frequently. I need the deadline to kind of push me forward plus I don't want to wait that long to see you guys and to interact with you and to present something to you, which I hope you will like. I really do get a thrill out of that and I don't want to do that every other week. I want to do that as frequently as I can, which seems to be once weekly. That seems to be a schedule that is sustainable. I would like to be known as the guy who made really good and enjoyable G.I. Joe videos. I want people to enjoy the end product. That's one reason I was a little bit reluctant to even do this behind the scenes because I don't want this to be seen as, you know, look at how hard I work at these videos. My goal is not to be recognized for working hard. My goal is to make the best videos that I can for you every week. That is what makes me work as hard as I do. Because I don't feel like I have achieved everything I want to yet. I don't think the videos are quite at the level that I want them to be. I think they can be better. So every week I have to work to try to make them better, to try to learn from what I've done in the past, to try to improve. And I know I'm not going to please everybody. I don't try to please everybody. But I know there is an audience for these videos. I know there are people who do appreciate these videos. It's not going to be every cup of tea. Everybody's cup of tea. And if these videos don't appeal to somebody, then I am absolutely fine with that person not watching the videos, moving on, don't like it, fine, no big deal. But I know there are some folks who do like it, who do appreciate it. And I want to make the best videos I can for them every week. This project is one that is limited. My goal has been to review only the US domestic release vintage G.I. Joe toys, or 1982 to 1994. And that's a very finite set. It's got a lot of stuff. We've got a long way to go. But it's a finite number of things that I have to review. That means at some point we will be done. And I've thought a lot about what to do after that. And honestly, right now, the idea of retirement is very appealing. I don't know that that's necessarily what I will do. But I like this idea of having this years-long project that we've done together have it actually complete. And maybe it's not perfect. Maybe somebody else could have done it better. But this is the thing that I created over several years. And it is actually done. And so somebody discovering the videos at that point can actually see the entire product, the complete whole. And it's my hope that after this project is over and after I've moved on, somebody years down the road who discovers these videos will enjoy them, will see all of them, and will wish that he or she was here when it was happening. Will wish that they could have experienced it as it was ongoing. And those of you who are here, we do get to experience it. We get to go through this journey together. Even if not everybody likes the videos, even if some people hate the videos, if I can have a few people who enjoy them and have a little bit of a legacy and put a little bit of my own stamp on this toy line that I grew up with and I still love so much, that would be very meaningful to me. I'm rambling now. I know. I'm tired. Thanks everyone. I will see you again with another toy review. I'll be repeating this process again. I know what the next one will be. It's going to be big, so I hope you like it when you see it. So thanks everyone. And as I always say, remember, only G.I. Joe is G.I. Joe.