THE HISTORY OF ASTROBISCUIT
The concept for the Astrobiscuit YouTube channel started in 2015. Both Rory (presenter and video editor) and I (Riktenstein – sound/music) had worked on various programmes together for Discovery, including Asteroid Day, Gold Rush and Deadliest Catch. In fact, this was how we first met.
One lunchtime, Rory asked me if I would be interested in doing some sound for an astrophotography YouTube channel he was thinking of setting up. We knew we had the technical skills to do something good, but we didn't want to just mimic what was already on the TV. You see, in TV Land you hear the phrase, ‘think outside the box’, but in reality this never happens. If you try something different, various management levels above you shut your ideas down. This is why when you turn the TV on, everything feels the same and the majority of it is rubbish – and familiar rubbish at that. We agreed from the off, we wanted to turn TV on its head and break the rules whenever we could, so we'd have the freedom to do what we wanted.
A couple of episodes into the journey – the Saturn episode I think – we realised Rory needed someone to bounce off. Why we chose Pink Bunny I'm not really sure. Truth be told, he is more famous than the both of us put together.
THE EARLY DAYS
The early days weren't an instant success. The first video we produced had less than 100 views in a month, but with Rory's passion for getting that perfect shot while breaking things, and my passion for writing outrageous music and sound-design, we just ploughed on.
Five years later, we still hadn't made any impression on the YouTube algorithm. You see, each episode takes a lot of personal time, from filming and video editing to re-editing, re-filming, sound-design, music ideas and mixing. So much so, that around 2020 we had to face the reality that none of our videos were being viewed much and we decided the channel was going to have to be discontinued. We had previously spent 6 months putting together the episode ‘Is This The Most Important Idea Since Einstein?’, and it completely flopped and no one watched it. After a phone call, which was quite emotional, we decided it was too time-consuming and expensive to continue. We'd given it our best crack, but maybe our style just wasn't popular and only appealed to us personally. The last episode had already been filmed and was about 80 per cent complete, so we thought we would try to go out with a bang with one last video. In 2020, we put everything into making our final film, ‘The Blue Lake On The Moon’.
WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!!
The video went live and I didn't really think too much about it. A couple of hours later, I went to check YouTube to see how it was getting on. I looked at the views and I was confused. Normally, after an hour or two, we'd have around 300 views. This video had hit nearly 5,000. I'll be honest, I wasn't quite sure what was going on. By 24 hours, we hit 25k and it wasn't stopping. The next day, it hit 50k and then off it went to 100k and beyond. To date, it has over 2 million views. Our subscribers went from 14k to 44k over the next few months. It seemed that the Astrobiscuit channel was finally reaching a whole new audience.
After a very long phone conversation, we decided to have one more go, but this time we would need to do some things differently. The channel would have to start paying for itself, so Rory started a Patreon to help get funding to pay his bills and keep the channel alive. I decided to write lots more tunes to help make the videos feel fresh and take my Bandcamp (where I sell my music) a lot more seriously.
THE FUTURE
YouTubers tend to have a 5-7 year life span and then run out of ideas or they burn out. We are at that stage now, but I hope we can continue for another 5-10 years creating wonderful missions. Rory never seems to run out of crazy things to build, break and then fix.
As of right now, Rory is currently building a new scope, ‘The Beast’. This is his third scope, after Big Bertha and Betty. If the weight of it doesn't break his roof, I am sure we will be up for some fun adventures.
SUPPORT
Without the support we get, the channel would not exist. So, in December last year, we met up with some of the Patreons. It was a great night. I only just made my last train home.
Astrobiscuit Christmas do photo
