Sailing Uma Made Me Do It!

Sometimes I’m just a lazy bum until someone kicks me so hard in the ass that the only thing I can do is stand, which prompts me to get moving. That person who kicked me square in the ass, with no regards for what I thought about it, was Dan and Kika from Sailing Uma. Obviously, not literally, we’ve never met those two beautiful individuals. Watching their videos inspired us beyond words. It helped guide us like a lighthouse guides a ship to port on a stormy night. It gave us a vision, and clarity, that far surpassed anything we had thought before. They showed us that we could go beyond our preconceived notions and build something amazing. We could go the unconventional route, and still succeed, and find happiness all in the process. So, everything we do we can say, Sailing Uma made me do it!

New Bedford, MA. We always try to capture the beauty of nature and the world around us, and push ourselves to be better!

If you all haven’t figured it out, I don’t know what to say about your eyesight, but Nick has talent coming out the wazoo. That man has so much creativity, intelligence, and talent that sometimes he isn’t quite sure how to hone it all. It just explodes out of him like the Phoenix exploding from Jean Grey when it first possessed her. Only difference is, Nick doesn’t go dark. He just stumbles until he can find a direction. Watching Sailing Uma helped him hone those talents, and really put it all in perspective. It showed him that he could do something different with his existing talents. He could turn those skills towards something that he truly enjoyed, and make something beautiful in the process. If you haven’t watched their channel, they have done what a lot of people didn’t think possible, which was bring good modern design into a boat. They took their skills of architecture and home design and applied it to boat building and design. They took an old boat and turned it into a marvel. They busted open those preconceived notions about what a boat was. Seeing that inspired us to do the same. We could throw out all we thought about boating, and truly make it our own. Sometimes you need someone to show you something is possible before you can ever step up and do it yourself! Part of our biggest struggle through both of our careers was how to hone our talents in a way that was feasible to accomplish. It’s akin to a superhero learning how to use their powers to help others. We have these skills and talents but aren’t always sure how we can use them to better our lives or our careers. Normally, we can only see how they are used in the most traditional sense. For example, us making films and working in Hollywood. That is the most traditional sense of how we would use our filmmaking skills, but Uma and other channels have shown us that we can forge a new path with our skills. By combining multiple interests and skills we found something new to pour our power into. We never would have found that without people like Dan and Kika. They truly deserve their due, not only for what they have accomplished, but for inspiring so many others.

I could literally talk for hours about filmmaking and everything that goes along with it. It’s one of the few topics that I will never tire of. Whether that be about films and tv, or the actual craft involved in making them. It’s a passion that is unrivaled for me. As much as I enjoy sailing, it will never even come close to my love of writing and filmmaking. With that being said, filmmaking is effing hard. I wrote an entire blog post about it. I have spent countless hours, days, years, and centuries trying to figure out how to transfer my knowledge and skills into this new medium. How we can take our traditional skills and make them useful in this nontraditional medium? It’s a doozy. It’s not easy, and anyone who tells you it is doesn’t actually do it. My biggest struggle, and will probably continue to be my biggest struggle, is taking the aesthetic of film and transferring it to our channel. To be honest, and no offense to any other channel, Sailing Uma is the only channel who has ever even come close to what I’m attempting to achieve. They have proven that even though you are making YouTube videos, you can make them beautiful. They have stepped outside the realm of what you would expect from this medium, and really stepped up their game. They have taken filmmaking and brought it to the sailing YouTube world. We have yet to fully achieve it, and I haven’t seen anyone else achieve it yet. They have proven that you can have both, and both can exist in the same place. I walked away from Hollywood for a plethora of reasons, many of which I don’t want to get into here. But it doesn’t mean I want to turn my back on filmmaking. Uma inspires us to push ourselves and do better! To always step up our game and keep focusing on filmmaking. Just because we aren’t making traditional films at the moment doesn’t mean we can’t keep pushing ourselves to get closer to that. There is no one way to do this. Uma constantly reminds us that we can be better. I wish they knew how much they inspire us.

Inspiration can be found in many places, including even in your own mind!

Sailing Uma isn’t the be all end all for us, just a huge inspiration for us. The reason I chose to write this and give a shout out to them is because they are the biggest inspiration behind us deciding to make this journey. They are the reason we decided to pick up the camera and document our journey. There are plenty of other channels, and mediums, that inspire us; Uma is just the largest inspiration for us on many fronts. They have shown us what we can achieve with boat design and filmmaking alike. If you haven’t watched them, then I definitely recommend you go and watch their journey from the beginning. The progression of their videos and boat work is truly a great feat that I’m glad was documented for all of us to see. I hope that we can one day achieve their level of artistry in this medium. To take something we love dearly and bring it up to the level we expect of ourselves. At the same time we need to be able forgive ourselves and not be so hard on ourselves. What we are trying to achieve isn’t easy, and it’s a huge transition from what we are accustomed to. But we will keep looking to Dan and Kika from Sailing Uma in the attempt to push ourselves further and be the best we can be! Thank you Dan and Kika for reminding us of what is possible and allowing us to dream! Thank you!

-Jake

To watch our journey from the beginning and see how we have progressed, click here on the episode page.

If you would like to support us further and help continuing to make this dream a reality, you can also become a patron or by purchasing merchandise!