Student Spotlights: In Conversation With Maddie Murray, 3/17/2023

Tell us a bit about your YouTube channel and what you’ve done with it!

I started making videos in eighth grade just as a joke with my friend Victoria, and we pretended to [make it] a competition to see who could grow a [channel] most and the fastest. We were serious about it at first. We were posting vlogs and ‘a week in my life’, ‘a day in my life’, all the silly things that you always see people post on YouTube. From there, I just kept up with it for fun. I make a lot of random vlogs, and I like to record my vacations and big events in my life, also just so that I can look back at them later.

Have you gotten any feedback from people online that watch your videos?

I actually wrote my college essay about my bullet journaling videos, because that’s something specific that I’ve always kept up with. I record myself making these journals and designing them, and I’ve gotten comments from random people on the internet saying “I love these” or “You’ve inspired me,” and I think it’s really cool there’s a community on [YouTube]. There [are] a lot of other small creators just like me, so it’s kind of cool to be part of that online community.

Can you explain your bullet journaling videos?

I buy a journal and I record myself setting it up. I have a bunch of pages and spreads and it’s all my design. I’ll sit down and make time lapses of me filling [the journal] in, drawing, and doing lettering. It’s kind of like a planner but more decorated, and that’s kind of been my niche. That was always my favorite kind of video to film.

How have your videos evolved from when you first started to now?

I love looking back at my early videos because I can see how much my editing style has changed, and also the way that I’ve changed, not only personality-wise but also in the way I talked to the camera. In the beginning, I didn’t know how to be seen on camera so it was a lot of word jumble. In my videos recently I feel like I’ve learned how to only keep in the parts that are interesting. 

What aspects of creating videos do you enjoy?

I love the editing aspect, getting to make my own aesthetic, and deciding exactly what kind of vibe I want to put in the video. I’ve been focusing more on making my videos aesthetic. I don’t make money on any of them, so I’m allowed to put in whatever music I want, and I love putting in my favorite music.

Do you have any future plans to make certain YouTube videos?

When I first started, I wanted to make ‘college day in my life vlogs.’ I’m so glad I’ve kept with it as long as I have because I’m going to be starting college in the fall, so hopefully, I can still make videos and I’m going to be looking forward to that. I watch dorm tours and college moving vlogs all the time so hopefully, I can make my own, and that’s what I’m looking forward to a lot.