TicedUp, real name Tyler, is a 27 year old from the south that’s always had the drive to create. He’s been creating various styles of content on and off for nearly 2 decades. In just over a year, he has amassed 56,000 subscribers on YouTube, and built up a strong community with his fellow creators. Tyler bleeds all of his passions into his works. Whether it’s anime, games, music etc, it is intertwined into the content’s DNA. Every day, he strives to evolve and perfect his work, with hopes of being able to expand the reach of who he can entertain. Together with his wife and 4 cats, he has found a life for himself making content full time, and encourages others to take the leaps of faith they are considering.
What made you decide in the first place that you wanted to do Youtube professionally?
Honestly, my entire life I’ve always had a desire to create, but my biggest hurdle was always myself. I’ve tried in the past on multiple channels that don’t exist anymore. I started when I was 8 or 9, I got a $20 webcam and pointed it at my Game Boy Advance and was like, time to do a Let’s Play. If you remember the show Total Drama Island, I made little animations in Powerpoint. Plenty of my friends had shared similar goals as me, but they actually acted on it. It was honestly them that really inspired me to finally make that push and take this seriously.
When you first started your current channel, what were some of your goals and expectations?
My goal was to hit 1000 subscribers. I really didn’t know what modern day youtube was gonna be like so I set myself a tangible goal that felt difficult to achieve but not impossible.
Now you’re almost at 60,000.
The Anime Jeopardy videos played a big part in that. But nowadays, I try really hard not to set constant numerical goals for myself, as I’m scared of obsessing over numbers too much for my own health.
With how fast you‘re growing, do you have any big plans for when you hit 100,000? How has the community grown over time?
I do have something planned, I’m just hoping I can have it finished in time. The community is everything to me. When I hit 1,000, that was a big number for me, and look at us now. When we launched it, we were hoping to have a place where people could connect with each other. We really expected to have a couple hundred members at most, but the discord server has now hit 10,000 members. It’s almost overwhelming at times, but it’s wonderful. Seeing so many people hanging out and interacting with each other and having a good time just really makes me happy.
What other ways do you interact with the community?
That’s pretty much it right now, but I do have a goal to attend a convention as a guest one day. I think it would be cool to have our own panel where we do a game show like Anime Jeopardy live. It would be cool to meet fans in person too, like what happened at AnimeNYC last month. I admit, I was a skeptic of if I’d even enjoy it, the idea of being surrounded by so many people was just out of my comfort zone. I am so glad I was able to break out of that comfort zone and meet so many people! I spent way too much money but I wouldn’t trade the experience for the world. It was genuinely wonderful meeting so many people.
Speaking of Anime Jeopardy, it’s incredibly niche. Why did you go that route when you could have chosen standard genres like Let’s Plays and vlogs?
The straight answer is this wasn’t the path I initially chose for myself. I had started out by just throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what stuck. My friend Heralen had been making anime videos. He’s my best buddy and I’ve been supporting him forever. He gets me into his anime jeopardy game and we had to spend 40 minutes teaching him how to host the game he’s hosting. He just puts me through so much anguish through those first few episodes that I was like, you know man, I’m gonna make one and get back at you. So I hosted one and he said to put it on my channel. I didn’t think it would do well, but it did. I only ever created it because I wanted to get back at him, but people ended up loving it, and I myself fell in love with running games for my friends. We started growing a community and it just became something that stuck with me. I do feel as a creative there are many other routes I hope to explore, but I’m extremely grateful to be doing these videos.
Because the genre is so niche, the resources must be very limited. Do you ever struggle to come up with new ideas and questions?
Oh absolutely. That’s half the reason I have such an expanded cast compared to my counterparts. You run out of questions to ask the same people real fast. That’s also why I started doing video game game shows. Doing just anime jeopardy was going to drive me crazy and I was going to run out of things to ask, so I’ve been trying to really switch it up. But people love the anime jeopardies the most, and I’m grateful for what they have given me. Hopefully I get to a point where the success from those will allow me to explore other creative endeavors. Thankfully I think a lot of people showed up for the games but are sticking around for more than just that.
How much planning and effort goes into a single video?
It varies, but each video usually spends multiple weeks actually being built. For example, the Dungeons and Dragons Anime Jeopardy video, that took months of planning and actually building, of course I also just work pretty slow. The editing phase also varies between one and six weeks per video. When I started, it was just me editing the videos on my PC. That took longer than I’d like, but my PC simply couldn’t handle the strain sometimes. Since then, I’ve gotten editors and also expanded my editing setup to be much more efficient. I guess to say on a low end, a video can be planned and finished within two weeks, but it’s more likely to spend at least a month cooking.
That’s a lot of time for one video, how many do you usually have in the pipeline at once?
There’s always a lot going on. Right now I have four videos recorded for the main channel and I have three more planned. I’m planned out to about the middle of October on the main channel. Then I’ve gotten three things planned for the second channel and even more beyond that. Right now I’ve got around ten things planned and that’s not including the hopeful streams that I will start planning.
That sounds like a lot of work.
That’s because it is. The reason I have a lot in development is because I’m a self-proclaimed workaholic. I’m working 10, 12, 14 hours a day. I’m a little bit married to the job and I realize that I need to reel it back a bit. Mostly because I suffer from pretty intense chronic pain. I took a fall a couple years ago and shattered my leg and a part of my spine. For the past year and a half that I’ve been doing videos, I have also been dealing with a spine that’s compressing on itself. It’s really hard to sit, move, and walk. But I just work through it. I’ve had to reschedule a few videos before because I was in too much pain. That’s one of the reasons I work so much, I use it as a coping mechanism to keep my mind on something else. But I am thankfully getting that taken care of this year.
Looking back through more than 50 videos that You’ve done so far, is there one that you’re really proud of?
You know, I could sit here and give you my best performing videos or the one that took the most technical editing to create, but I think the video I’m still most proud of is the I lost 150 pounds playing Video Games video I created towards the start of my career. It didn’t really do all that well, but it’s the most vulnerable I’ve ever been on camera, and it’s a story I’m genuinely proud to share. I always hope that one day it’ll get the same appreciation from others that I have for it.
You can’t be an anime youtuber without first being a big fan of anime. What’s your current Mount Rushmore of anime?
This question is evil, because I have to decide do I do what I think should be here objectively, or just pick my 4 favorite things. I’m gonna go with One Piece, Evangelion, Monster, and Vinland Saga.
One Piece is a pretty obvious answer for anyone who’s seen your channel. Why do you like it so much?
August 2015, I’m in high school, sophomore year. I wouldn’t say I’m doing the best in my life, I’m feeling down and out. I tell myself I need something to watch. I knew about One Piece, but it was too long. But then I was like, eh, I’ve got nothing but time. I thought it was pretty good, and then I started sobbing by like episode 70. I became emotionally invested in the characters, especially because I was watching it in a point in time where I wasn’t really talking to anybody, I was very isolated off. It got me through a lot. Halfway through the show I got really sick, and it helped me stay sane when I was confined to a room for a month. I’ve been watching it for 11 years and got my wife, cousin, and friends to watch it. I just think it’s the greatest story ever told, to the point where I literally named a cat after the main character because I feel that inspired.
You named a cat after Luffy?
Our newest cat is named Luffy. I named him Luffy for one reason and one reason only. When I went to go pick him up for the first time, he stretched. He doubled in size, and I was like, Luffy’s coming home with me.
What are your other cats like?
I’ve had Scooter since he was three weeks old and he’s 14 now. He’s literally a senior citizen who does not know he’s a senior citizen. He literally doesn’t stop following me around. Luffy has been taught by him to act the same, so now I’ve got two cats who constantly follow me while I’m editing. Then there’s Dexter. I rescued him in an ice storm. He’s a broken cat who’s got a messed-up tail, some nerve damage, and missing teeth. He doesn’t have a single brain cell, but I love him.
That should be it, thanks for taking the time to do this. Any last words?
Honestly, I would be nothing without the fans. If people weren’t enjoying my content then there’d be no point to making it in my opinion. I also wanted to thank you for having me on for this interview, it’s my first time ever doing anything like this and I’m honored you chose to interview me. As for what’s next? The grind continues, I hope to continue growing my channel as well as going forward with many other projects, so absolutely be on the lookout for that!