Cal: Hello, everybody. Cal Banyan here. Cal Banyan's Hypnosis, Etc., and I'm here once again with Brenda Titus, my co-host, and I've got a very, very special episode today because if you ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes, well, that's what we're going to do today. We're going to do kind of a walkthrough to show you how we put together the episodes and all the work that goes into it and the kind of the lighting set-up and stuff like that. So, with no further ado, here we go with the behind-the-scenes episode. Hope you enjoy it. Leave comments, leave questions, please like and share us, and let's get the word out. All right, here we go.
Hey, everybody. Here we are as we do our behind-the-scenes. Before we get any farther, as you know, I'm Cal Banyan. I want to introduce Brenda Titus. She is my co-host. She has been, gosh, for two years, I heard the other day. A whole bunch of... how many we got now?
Brenda: Somewhere along this, we'll be recording my fortieth.
Cal: All right, fortieth today. She doesn't look a day over 30 podcasts. She doesn't look like 30 podcaset old, she's 40 podcast old. Anyway, if you've been watching the program, you know Brenda Titus. She's got a great background with a bachelor's degree in?
Brenda: Sociology. Criminal justice.
Cal: And a master's degree in?
Brenda: Criminology.
Cal: And before you worked here, you worked?
Brenda: Rape cases.
Cal: Good. And, look, she just said, "I'm going to the hypnosis side of life," and she's working with hypnosis now. All right, so let's get in here behind the scenes. Now what I would normally do, before we get started recording podcasts, doing any of that stuff is, I meet with Brenda, and I have not met with Brenda yet. She comes up with topic ideas and that kind of thing, so we're just going to proceed with our regular meeting so you can see how that goes, and, gosh, I hope it goes well. All right, all right, Brenda, what you got for me?
Brenda: All right. Well, actually, first I want to introduce everybody to you, Cal. Cal is, as I said earlier, he's the boss. He's the man. He is the man with the plan and he, years ago, decided on this plan to bring you these fabulous training videos, and we're on in the 400s now, it's really great. Cal Banyan developed the 5-PATH system of hypnotherapy, the secret language of feelings. He's the authority on hypnosis that works. He trains the best of the best. You should come and train with him, too, then you can be the best of the best, too. Actually, today, you'll even get to see a little bit of the inner workings of the Banyan Hypnosis Center as we do our episode. So I've got some neat stuff that I want to talk about today, Cal.
Cal: Cool. Let's see what you got for me. Thanks for the introduction.
Brenda: Yes, thank you. Thank you for having me. Well, many months ago, you and I talked about cultivating an attitude of gratitude, and we're getting into that season. Thanksgiving is coming, the end of the year. I want to talk about gratitude. I also wanted to talk about how we can, as hypnotherapists, hypnotists, use age regression techniques, taking people through the season and developing that attitude of gratitude so that they're...
Cal: Yeah, I got no clue where you're going with that.
Brenda: I have a clue. I have a plan. He's the man with the plan but I have a plan, too.
Cal: Okay, so how is this going to help our viewers?
Brenda: Oh, my gosh, because then they're going to learn. Actually, first we're going to talk a little bit about age progression. I really want to encourage people to use age progression work.
Cal: Age progression work.
Brenda: Sorry, yes, I see I flubbed. Age progression work. Taking people through into the future as they start, you know, we talk so much about age regression and the work overcoming the difficulties, but then we really want to take them through an age progression so that, instead of being anxious about seeing their family, anxious about all the stress, or anxious about the food, that we can age progress them through that Thanksgiving meal knowing that they can have good healthy...
Cal: Okay, so this is a different topic than the gratitude thing.
Brenda: It's a combination. Want to work with age progression...
Cal: For gratitude.
Brenda: ... so that, ultimately, they can develop that gratitude.
Cal: Yeah, I don't get it. Okay, I just have to understand. So I can understand doing age regression. Going back, and then finding the good in what happened, and then being grateful for the past. But, how do you be grateful for what hasn't happened yet? I mean, that's what you're telling me. That's what I'm not getting.
Brenda: What's really neat, I get this a lot because I work, starting in September all the way through, I really take people through kind of these seasonal times, and they develop this gratitude, and so when I get to, "What are you thinking? What are you feeling?" as we're doing our age progression, they get to that place of gratitude.
Cal: Okay.
Brenda: And that's when I really want to take advantage of having the future self inform the current self in the chair about how they can get there.
Cal: Okay. So, I kind of have an inkling of what you want to do with that, but I think you have a better handle on it than me. So I'm going to let you take the lead on that one pretty much, and then I'll just fill in as I think of something.
Brenda: I will be asking important questions about things.
Cal: Okay. That sounds good. You got another one for me?
Brenda: I do have a couple more, too. I also want to talk about getting your clients to work for you and your marketing. So referrals, getting your clients to go out and tell their story about the great work that they did with you, sending people to you, and then I also want to talk a little bit about medical referrals. So actually, someone came to me... so, everyone, in case this stays in, I'm a fidgeter, and I was just playing with my paper clip and it just spun completely out of my hands.
Cal: You bet.
Brenda: So someone talked to me at the convention about medical referrals and I know that...
Cal: Wait, you're not this nervous when we do all the other podcasts.
Brenda: Must have my paper clip in my hand to play with, yes. About medical referrals, and, so I actually had some other questions I wanted to talk to you about kind of that concept of when to accept a “no†for an answer versus when we need to educate the medical professional a bit more. So, I just wanted to talk about medical referrals a little bit.
Cal: Okay, anything else?
Brenda: Those are my three that I have planned.
Cal: Well, I don't think I can do a whole podcast on medical referrals. I mean, it's just too simple of a deal.
Brenda: Maybe we'll have a short one. Or I'll think of something else.
Cal: Okay, or maybe I'll think of something else.
Brenda: Or maybe you'll think of something else, because I'm sure you always think of something.
Cal: Yeah. Like I had that thing this week with how sick and tired I am with people making fraudulent advertising claims.
Brenda: Exactly.
Cal: That's good for a five- or ten-minute thing.
Brenda: That might be a great time to bring in that rant.
Cal: Good, good, good. All right.
Brenda: I'm going to stop fidgeting, now that you guys know the secret. I fidget.
Cal: We can help you with that. All right, good. Thank you very much.
Brenda: Thank you.
Cal: And so, now what I'm going to do is I'm going to do just kind of a pan of your office. Well, actually this is my office.
Brenda: Your office.
Cal: Before we get started, so, just so you know, Brenda has her own office, which is over there. This is my hypnotherapy office, and then I have a business office. We have my business office and my hypnotherapy office set up so that we can do video recording in it. So Brenda goes out of her office and comes in here to do this. So I'm going to do a little pan of the office, so you can see what that looks like. Okay, cool.
All right, here we are, just a different view of my office, and you can see that Brenda's set up over there with the lighting. And so there's these two umbrella lights and then the camera, and that's simple right there. There's our doorway where we come into the office, and then little do people know that we record four episodes at once. And so, I have the easy part. I change ties for each episode. Brenda, and Meredith before her, and of course Erika in Washington, and Celeste before her, in Texas, they have to change tops so that it looks like there's some difference between episodes and that kind of thing. So, there we go, that's kind of one angle right there. That's my sound system over there for my sessions, and Brenda has turned it into a closet. I'm going to turn the camera around now so you can see a different angle.
All right. This camera only zooms out so far, but over here is the area where I would normally be seeing clients, right there. While we are recording the video, we have all these blinds open so we can fill the room with as much light as possible. When I'm seeing clients, then I will have those blinds closed down so it's much more comfortable in here. And so, that's what the rest of the office looks like, and it stays the same, obviously, even when we are not video recording. All right, that's it. Now we are going to go back to my office and we'll be wrapping this up, and then, after I get done saying a few things from my office, then what we're going to do is, Marianne is going to talk a little bit about the technical stuff, show you how she edits, and stuff like that. Brenda, you want to wrap it up?
Brenda: Thank you all for joining us today. This is a really great opportunity for, actually, Cal and I to even be in the same room for this episode, so that was kind of fun, too. So hope you guys all enjoyed watching us from behind the scenes. Have a great week everybody.
Cal: I enjoyed it. All right. Now we do some camera magic, and, bam, I'm right back in my office.
Hey, everybody. So now we're back in my office. Hope you kind of enjoyed the insider look, but we're not done yet. In a minute or so here, we're going to take the camera and I'm going to introduce you to Marianne who sets up all the lighting, sets up the cameras, and what she does, after we've video recorded. She downloads the video into our computer and then edits it for audio and video quality and back and forth between who's supposed to be on the camera or on the screen at any one time, which is usually the person who's talking. It's kind of interesting when Erika is our co-host, she has to get that video all the way from Washington, and so, her and Erika, they make sure that it gets uploaded to our servers, and she does that. So, anyway, Marianne's going to tell you about that and she's a lady of few words, so we'll see if we can get a few words out of her. And that will be it.
Hey, everybody. Here we're back with, guess what, the technical mind behind all this stuff, Marianne. Marianne's going to talk a little bit about what she does. She's the one that sets up the lighting and she comes in early and does that. What do you have to keep in mind when you're setting up the lighting?
Marianne: That it's directed to you and Brenda. Well, I have a checklist, and I make sure that I go through all my checklist, because Cal wants everyone to have a checklist. So I have a long list that needs to be done before Cal comes in.
Cal: Now, come on, admit it's useful to have the checklist, isn't it?
Marianne: Yeah, that's true.
Cal: Okay. So then, I sit down and you center me and get everything lit up and stuff, make sure my background isn't weird or my tie isn't on backwards, and stuff like that, right?
Marianne: Yes.
Cal: Okay. Then you hit the record button, and we just record four videos, right?
Marianne: Yes.
Cal: And then after the videos are recorded, what do you do?
Marianne: I download all the videos from the two cameras, which takes around 40 minutes, each camera. And then, after I download them, I just upload them, I mean import them, to our program, our software that we're using, which is Sony Vegas.
Cal: Now, when me and Brenda do it, we're both here at the center, but if you do it with Erika, it's a little different. How is that different?
Marianne: She sends it through our FTP, through our server.
Cal: She uploads the video to our server?
Marianne: Yes.
Cal: Is it all in one big hunk?
Marianne: Yes.
Cal: Okay, and then after it gets uploaded, is it pretty much the same thing?
Marianne: Mm-hmm.
Cal: Okay, good. What's the software that we use?
Marianne: Sony Vegas.
Cal: Okay, and why do we use Sony Vegas?
Marianne: Because it's user-friendly.
Cal: Okay, good, and so then what do you do, basically step by step?
Marianne: Well, it's pretty easy. I just put Cal first on the first track, and then Brenda.
Cal: Now, how do you decide who's going to be on the screen?
Marianne: Well, whoever talks. Whoever's talking will be on the screen.
Cal: What if we talk at the same time? Do we ever do that?
Marianne: Yes.
Cal: Then who goes on the screen?
Marianne: Of course, Cal. That's why you don't talk at the same time.
Cal: Okay. Now, so, Brenda and I, or Erika and I, are in different rooms. How do we hear what we're saying?
Marianne: The conference call, intercom.
Cal: Okay. If it's Erika, we're just on the phone on speakerphone, right?
Marianne: Mm-hmm.
Cal: That way we don't have to have the ear plug in our ear, and stuff like that.
Marianne: Yes.
Cal: Cool. And so what happens? What do you do next? So you upload it in and you're editing it together.
Marianne: And then I apply all the filters to make Cal look handsome.
Cal: The handsome filter.
Marianne: The handsome filter.
Cal: Yeah, because if you guys ever see me in class, I do not look as good as I do on the videos. That's the first thing when you go in the classroom, "Wow, he looked a lot better on the videos." So we paid a lot of money for a handsome filter. Isn't that right?
Marianne: And Brenda doesn't need any beautiful...
Cal: Brenda or Erika. You can't get on our videos unless you're beautiful. That's how you got on the video.
Marianne: Yeah, I don't need any filter.
Cal: Okay, good. Can you put that in motion so, while we talking, it can be chattering in the background? Although, we don't have to hear it.
Marianne: Yeah.
Cal: Okay, so you're going to do that, and then you send me a copy, right?
Marianne: Yeah, so after I upload the video, I render it to just an MP4, a small file, low quality, and then I send it to Cal, and then he does all the podcasts texts, like the newsletter.
Cal: That's right. So, I'm going to take that draft, it's not yet the quality that we're going to publish, and I use it to write the content that goes on calbanyan.com with the video. We call it the podcast text, right? And then I alter for our newsletter and I alter it for a notification that goes out to our Yahoo groups, and that kind of thing. Then what do you do?
Marianne: Then, after you've done all that, you send it back to me and then I finalize all the editing for the video.
Cal: What kind of stuff is involved in finalizing the editing?
Marianne: Well, just making sure that the video is playing right and adding the title and subtitles. Just double checking everything and then...
Cal: Like, if I get a date wrong on the class, then you can put the date right underneath, right? Like in white letters, or whatever. Okay.
Marianne: Yes. And then I render it to 1080P.
Cal: For laypeople, can you explain what rendering is? What does that mean?
Marianne: Like, exporting. Like finalizing to... so we can upload it on YouTube.
Cal: So, like Sony Vegas uses a Sony Vegas file kind of thing, but YouTube and iTunes and stuff like that, or if we want to post it on Facebook, these are different formats, like mp4 or whatever.
Marianne: Yes.
Cal: Okay, good. Or we might not want to post a 1080p on Facebook because it's just too big, or something like that. Good. And then what happens? How does it get on iTunes?
Marianne: Well, we upload it on our Cal Banyan server - calbanyan.com server - and then it feeds through iTunes, so all of the files that go to iTunes is coming from our server, calbanyan.com.
Cal: Then what happens? What's the last thing you do?
Marianne: The transcriptions. I upload the mp3 file and send it to the transcription website, and then they do it.
Cal: Okay, so you make sure that we have a video version for iTunes, for YouTube, and for calbanyan.com. You also make an audio-only version and post that on the site, and then you also make sure that we get a transcription of it and put it on the site.
Marianne: Yes.
Cal: What's the most challenging part of doing these podcasts for you?
Marianne: The setting up for the offices. Make sure that it's all perfect.
Cal: The hardest part is always working directly with me.
Marianne: I didn't say that.
Cal: Okay. And what's the funniest part?
Marianne: Just editing, is the easiest part, and you don't need to think.
Cal: It's kind of artistic, isn't it. I mean, you've got to decide, "Okay, when am I going to cut this over here," to produce it.
Marianne: Especially when there are funny parts and I just can't stop laughing every time I'm editing the video. That's the funniest part.
Cal: Who's the funniest person on the podcast?
Marianne: Cal Banyan.
Cal: Okay. Anything else you want to tell everybody?
Marianne: No.
Cal: Okay. Are you glad you did this? That I made you do this?
Marianne: I didn't have a choice.
Cal: That's right, because if you didn't do it, you'd be fired on the spot. Ha, ha, ha, just kidding. All right, thank you Marianne. I really appreciate you giving an inside look behind-the-scenes of what we do here. I think you'll help everybody appreciate what we're doing for them. And now, I'm back to my office.
Marianne: Bye.
Cal: Well, that's it. I hope you've enjoyed this behind-the-scenes insider look at how we set up and do our podcasts. The thinking that goes into it. You'll notice that the co-hosts are the ones that are responsible to come up with the questions and the topics, and then they just basically tell me what we're going to talk about. If there's something that I feel like I don't want to cover, for one reason or another, like typically, if someone brings me a topic and I don't want to cover it in a podcast, it's because of one of two reasons. One, it is really too long for just one episode, and the other reason is it's going to require more thought and planning. Like, it's a really excellent topic but it's going to require more thought and planning. Like you've seen we've done the ten keys to doing excellent age regression, ten keys to doing direct suggestion right, and those kinds of podcasts which are right here on this website. So, sometimes I'll ixnay, but that's about the only reason I will. Otherwise, I'll go through it, and you saw me talking with Brenda, and if I'm not really getting what she's talking about I have to ask her about it and knowing that, as we do the episode, the discussion will clear things up. It's always worked for us.
One last thing, also. The people that I've chosen to do these podcasts with me, all the way from Celeste until now, they're people that, first of all, they're really good hypnotists, second of all, they're really smart and they're also really able to just roll with it because that's how we do it. If it's somebody that needs to plan everything out and have an outline and read from a script, it's just not going to work because we want to have that really liveliness interchange, because everything doesn't have to be figured out ahead of time. There's a couple of main reasons for these podcasts. One, we want to give you a nugget or two in each podcast that you can use in the next session with a client. The other is, you hear me talk about gold in and gold out all the time, and just by listening to these podcasts every day or once a week or however you do that, it helps keep you focused on this important topic and thinking about it. And you can always send questions in the comments area below the videos.
All right, that's it for this time. I don't know if we ran short or long on this. I told Marianne and Brenda it would be just as long as it takes. If we can get through it in ten minutes, we get through it in ten minutes. If it took a half hour, it would take a half hour, just because I wanted to make sure that it was kind of fun and interesting for you guys. Quick announcement. The NGH approved Banyan Hypnosis and Hypnotherapy Certification Course, our ten-day course, at our center, and the next one is March 2nd through the 13th. It's ten days with the weekend off, 2015. And then the Week of Power, it's our advance course. It's for people who are already certified. Seven days Week of Power - Advanced Hypnotherapy Certification Course. Once again, here at our center in Tustin, California. And, of course, both of those programs you can attend live online because we're just really high-tech here. All right, that's it. Cal with his bell. This bell, this is the one that I ring every episode. Cal Banyan, over and out.