webinar Archives - Page 2 of 2 - Josefin Waltin spinner

I love being a creator – blogging, making videos, webinaring (It is a word as of kindanowish), teaching and working with wool. The response I get from you truly warms my heart. I love that I learn so much from doing what I do and from interacting with you. I can’t imagine not doing it and not developing this work. However, it takes a lot of time, energy and money to keep my work going.

This is not a post about spinning. It is about showing you what lies behind the posts, videos, webinars and courses I make and the time it takes. It is also an invitation for you to contribute to the work I do.

The joy and hard work of being a creator

Josefin Waltin spinner is a whole bundle of services for spinners. You can read in-depth blog posts, watch spinning videos, join a webinar or take an online course. If you happen to be in Sweden you can also take face-to-face courses. Hopefully there is something for everyone. While this is something that I love doing it is not done without hard work.

Blog

My fingers itch to write. I have a physical need to write, to shape my thoughts with words. Writing helps me think and deepen my understanding of the subject. Since I know I have many readers I try to be as thorough as possible and do a lot of research, testing and sampling to prepare for a post. I learn a lot from this research process too.

While I do shape and fine tune the post during the whole week, Saturday is the day I make the final adjustments and publish the post. I get up at 7 am to get some time all to myself to finish and publish the post for you.

Average preparation time per post: 3–4 hours.

Videos

I started making videos to share my love for the craft. It still works. When I make a video I explore a technique or process to learn. I also make the video to spread knowledge and encourage you to explore and learn. It is like we are on a quest for new or deeper knowledge together. Finding new angles and ways to tell the story of a particular technique or aspect of spinning drives me to continue exploring spinning through this fascinating media.

A screen shot of a video editing process — Being a creator also requires learning the tech

It starts with an idea – a technique or tool I am curious about or have got questions from you about. I shoot the video. It can take anything from an hour to a day, depending on how much I need to prepare for the shoot. Sometimes I want to shoot a whole process and then I need to do the whole process even if I only show you glimpses of it in the video. Two examples of this is Slow fashion – from sheep to sweater and Slow fashion 2 – from sheep to shawl. After shooting the video I edit, create effects, add titles and music. If I speak in the video I also add captions. It is a subtle balance between being creator and learning and understanding tech and software.

Average preparation time for a 3 minute video: 5 hours.

Webinars

Webinars is my best way to stay connected to you. I’m live and unedited and anything can happen. But to be able to talk to you there and then gives me so much.

There seems to be a high demand on this type of service. I haven’t come across anyone in this field that does webinars and I think it is a very powerful medium that works very well with spinning and wool.

Josefin Waltin drafting wool from a comb — A webinar is a perfect medium for hand spinning

When I prepare a webinar I first make an outline and write a script. Perhaps I need to prepare fiber or spin yarn for the webinar to be able to show you a special technique. I make a promo video, set up registration, send emails and prepare the studio. I rehearse at least three times before the live event.

The studio isn’t ideal, but it’s the best I can manage at the moment. I host the webinars in our tiny study. For the best lighting possible I move all the lamps I can to the room and use a king size bed sheet as a backdrop. I am afraid to move, the room is full of cables, lamps and working material come Webinar Day.

Better lighting solutions for the webinars are a priority as well as the possibility of changing camera angles or zooming.

Average preparation time for a one hour webinar: 5 hours.

Online courses

Many of you have taken my free course How to pick a supported spindle and bowl and some of you have also taken my paid course Spin on a supported spindle or the ebook version of Spin on a supported spindle. I love making these courses and keep exploring the possibilities that an online course can give. I am happy for all the feedback I get from you, it helps me become a better course creator and teacher.

A person spinning on a supported spindle — From the online course Spin on a supported spindle

Making an online course takes a lot of time. I make an outline, write the script and create extra material like pdfs, check lists, glossaries etc. After that I shoot the A-roll (the main angle with me as a talking torso) and the B-roll (closer images to show you details of a technique). I edit, add titles, images and cut the material into lecture-size pieces. I usually make a written pdf version of the whole course. The final part is captioning the whole course. This takes a lot of time since I need to transcribe everything I say and place the text chunks in the right spot with a decent duration. An estimation is that captioning takes me around 10 minutes for every video minute.

Even though the captioning takes a lot of time and energy I will not skip this part. So many people benefit from captioning. Several students who don’t consider themselves sufficient in English have told me that they wouldn’t have been able to take my courses without the written pdfs and the captions. I have not yet found a way to create optional captioning, so for the time being I burn them in and I ask those of you who are annoyed about them to be patient.

Average working time for an online course: Several weeks or months.

Patreon

To those of you who are patrons already: Thank you, from the bottom of my heart. For believing in me enough to make monthly pledges for my creative work. For those who are not patrons: Thank you for believing in me, asking questions, giving me valuable feedback and spreading my work. It warms my heart and keeps me going.

Being a creator makes my heart sing but at the same time it is hard work.Patreon is an online membership platform that allows fans to regularly provide financial support to creators. It also enables fans to get to know the creators better and get access to exclusive material. Here is a video that explains how Patreon works.

I have made four different reward tiers my patrons can choose from. The gist of it is that the more you are able to contribute monthly the better rewards I can offer you for $1, 2, 3 or 5 a month. There is also a fifth option to choose a donation amount of your choice and without rewards.

I say it again: I love doing this work for you and I can’t imagine not doing it. But it does take a lot of my time and energy on top of a family life and a full time job. I would like to be able to spend more time with my family whilst making better content for you. If I could cut back on my day job, I would have a more balanced life and get food on the table. Concrete things I would like to get to make better quality content for you are things like software for different services that makes the job easier, equipment for better audio, video and lighting and captioning services.

The material that is free today will continue to be free – blog posts, videos, the free online courses and live webinars. But with your contributions I can keep creating for you and still live a balanced life. If you like what I do and want me to be able to continue my work sustainably, consider becoming a patron.

Thank you.

Happy spinning!

Josefin Waltin sitting with a pile of wool. Locks are flying in the air around her.

You can follow me in several social media

This blog is my main channel. This is where I write posts about spinning, but also where I explain a bit more about videos I release. Sometimes I make videos that are on the blog only. Subscribe or make an rss feed to be sure not to miss any posts.
My youtube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook page where I link to all my blog posts, you are welcome to follow me there.
I run an online spinning school, welcome to join a course!
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons is an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. Shooting and editing a 3 minute video takes about 5 hours. Writing a blog post around 3. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
In all the social media I offer, you are more than welcome to contact me. Interacting with you helps me make better content. My private Facebook page, however, will remain private.
If you like what I do, please tell all your fiber friends and share these links!

Community: A group of people living in the same place or having a particular characteristic in common (Oxford dictionaries)

A particular characteristic in common. Communities thrive all over the world and all over the Internet, full of creativity and passion for the particular characteristic. There is something extraordinary about the spinning community, though. I have never seen such a beautiful fellowship of people who are so eager to help and support each other. I have never seen an unkind word directed to another spinner in the spinning community. Everybody is eager to help, from beginner to expert and from all fields of the spinning spectrum. There is a true foundation of, well, actually peace, love and understanding.

Peace

Spinning doesn’t agree with unkindness. Spinning is by nature a peaceful act. With our hands we fuse fibers together in the cooperative motion of creating yarn. The hands work together to get the fibers to work together and align themselves in the draft. They may be sleek and consistent or bumpy and wild, but they are nonetheless yarn. It is like we spin our own community of fibers. We spin togetherness.

The spinning community is for me a safe place. I know I can ask any question and get a thoughtful answer. I embrace the new knowledge and I feel humble towards the spinner who taught me something new and valuable. The act of helping a fellow spinner, new or experienced, is and act of peace. When I help another spinner I know my reward will be more peace in the world. The more I learn about spinning the more I respect the people who make up this community. And I know that the learning and inspiration never end.

Love

In the spinning community we share our knowledge. Because knowledge of spinning is also knowledge of what spinning gives us in return. I know about the transition in my body when I sit down and spin after a busy day. I know about the feeling of flow and weightlessness when I get into the creative bubble. And I know that I can give that feeling to another spinner when I help them develop or solve a problem.

Spinning has been a cultural heritage since someone took some cellulose fiber, tied it around a rock, set it in motion and realized what it could result in. Too many crafting techniques have been lost and forgotten, even in the spinning world. I feel a responsibility to help saving endangered textile techniques. That is the reason why I wanted to learn techniques like nalbinding and twined knitting. They had almost been forgotten.

Recently one of my videos was spread in a non-spinning context. In less than two weeks it grew from 600 to over 25000 (!) views and people commented on the cultural heritage of spinning. There is obviously a surge for old techniques and natural materials. We need to cherish these old techniques, develop them and make them a thriving and natural part of our contemporary life.

Understanding

There are so many kind souls out there, sharing their knowledge, understanding the love of the craft. We share something unique. We share the understanding of what spinning gives us and the world. As spinners you know what I need without me having to necessarily tell you. And every now and then I know what you need. It is a mutual understanding of what spinning gives us.

Barbro who unprovoked gave me her long and loving list of spinning literature. Anna who offered to send me copies of rare spinning books. Kate who seems to know what the spinning part of my mind is trying to figure out and always asks the right questions at the right time. Gunilla who is the fastest book sender in the world. Jenny who cheers me on and referred me to another fiber enthusiast. Kirsten who offered to send me fiber that was new to me. Björn who makes the best supported spindles. All my Teachable colleagues who cheered me on after my course launch. Fran, Grace, Babs, Rebecca and all my students and followers who reach out and help me become a better spinner and teacher.

All these people are to varying degrees a part of the spinning and fiber world and understand the beauty of it.

Yesterday was International Women’s Day. So many women have worked so hard with textile crafts to provide warmth and shelter for their families, and so often unpaid (for an elaboration of the value of textile crafts, see my previous post on calculations). We can give something back to them by celebrating, treasuring and developing textile techniques.

To all women who have worked hard to provide for their families

Sharing

I have so many ideas I want to share with you. Because when I share, you share and when you share I share. With that we all grow as spinners and people and once again 1 + 1 = 3. The sum of the parts is greater than the whole.

Webinars

When I launched my new online course a week ago I hosted a live webinar on spindle ergonomics. I was very nervous the whole day and totally drained afterwards, but the webinar turned out a success. So many of you cheered me on before, during and after the webinar and you seem to have genuinely enjoyed it. The best comment came from my 16-year-old son, though: “Mum, it actually sounded like a real live stream!”.

It felt so good to be there live with you. Editing is a powerful tool – I can edit away any flaws in videos, courses and blog posts, but it was also a liberating feeling to be totally unedited with you. A webinar is also as close as I can get to meeting you in person.

I plan to make more webinars and I have lots of ideas. It is a medium I believe in and that I think would work very well in the spinning community. I learn a lot from making them and I hope you learn something new too by participating in them. Together we can create a forum that will work and contribute to the community. If there is a special topic you would like me to address in a webinar, just let me know. You can contact me via any of the links below or via email if you are on my email list.

Thank you for all the peace, love and understanding that make up this beautiful spinning community.

Happy spinning!

You can follow me on several social media:

This blog is my main channel. This is where I write posts about spinning, but also where I explain a bit more about videos I release. Sometimes I make videos that are on the blog only. Subscribe or make an rss feed to be sure not to miss any posts.
My youtube channel is where I release a lot of my videos. Subscribe to be sure not to miss anything!
I have a facebook page where I link to all my blog posts, you are welcome to follow me there.
I run an online spinning school, welcome to join a course!
On Patreon you can get early access to new videos and other Patreon only benefits. The contributions from my patrons is an important way to cover the costs, time and energy I put into the videos and blog posts I create. You can read more about my Patreon page here.
Follow me on Instagram. I announce new blog posts, share images from behind the scenes and post lots of woolliness.
In all the social media I offer, you are more than welcome to contact me. Interacting with you helps me make better content. My private Facebook page, however, will remain private.
If you like what I do, please tell all your fiber friends and share these links!