We’re back this week with our second episode of Divi Nation. This time around we’ve got even more segments for you to watch, listen, and enjoy. Including our very first installments of “This Week in WordPress”, “Plugin Highlight”, and “Divi Design Challenge”. I had a great time putting this episode together and I hope you enjoy it just as much!
Don’t forget, you can watch/listen to the full episode here in the top section of the post or watch any of the shorter segments individually in the sections below.
- 1 Divi Nation Episode 02: Unlocking the Good Life with Divi featuring David Blackmon
- 2 This Week in WordPress 01
- 3 David Blackmon’s Divi Story
- 4 Divi Quick Tip 02: How to Manually Edit the Divi Footer Credits
- 5 Plugin Highlight 01: The Divi Footer Plugin
- 6 Divi Design Challenge 01: The Divi Footer
- 7 Production Notes
- 8 Want To Star In The Show?
Divi Nation Episode 02: Unlocking the Good Life with Divi featuring David Blackmon
[powerpress]
In this episode of Divi Nation, the official Divi podcast, guest host David Blackmon of Aspen Grove Studios and I talk about his journey as a WordPress entrepreneur using Divi and what taking that career leap has meant for him. Along the way we talk about the WordPress Rest API, developing plugins, WooCommerce, and more.
Subscribe To Our Youtube Channel
All Subscription Options:
This Week in WordPress 01
In this, our first edition of This Week in WordPress, David and I talk about what the future of WordPress might look like with the adoption of the REST API into core, lessons learned from writing premium WordPress plugins, and how intimidating it was for him to start using WooCommerce (but also how it was totally worth it).
Articles We Discussed:
- A Future WordPress
- The WordPress JSON Rest API: What It Is, How it Works, & What it Means for the Future of WordPress
- Lesson Learned from Writing a Premium WordPress Plugin
- The Beginner’s Guide to WooCommerce
David Blackmon’s Divi Story
In case you don’t want to watch the full episode and just want to watch David and I talk about his journey with WordPress, this is the video segment for you.
We chose the name for this episode, Unlocking the Good Life with Divi, because for David success with Divi has meant that he is now able to do things with his life that were not previously possible. And he’s loving it.
In this Divi Quick Tip I show you two different methods for manually editing the footer credits of Divi–the proper way; so that they stay changed. This is something that you’ll probably want to do on every single Divi website you operate, so don’t miss this tip!
Tools & Resources Mentioned:
- Divi Child Theme Builder
- Nick’s Tutorial – How to Create a Child Theme, And Why You Should Be Using One
- The One Click Child Theme Plugin
In this plugin highlight we feature a plugin created by Aspen Grove Studios (David Blackmon’s studio) called Divi Footer Editor. This simple little plugin allows you to make all kinds of creative edits to the footer credit area of Divi with the standard WordPress WYSIWYG editor. Check it out!
If you’ve got a project you want some eyeballs on, try participating in our very first Divi Design Challenge. We will feature the winners in a blog post here at Elegant Themes in two weeks! Watch the video for submission details.
Production Notes
For those who like to follow along with how Divi Nation is made each week, I’m back again with some more production notes. This week, the big game changer for me was workflow.
Workflow
I learned a lot from the process of creating episode one. The biggest lesson being an old one that I kind of forgot about in my enthusiasm to dive into a new project.
Always work from a detailed script.
Even if it takes longer to get into editing to get a full interview transcript and create detailed scripts of the dialogue, b-roll, graphics, and titles–it is 100% worth it. By hitting the editing room without ever having to wonder what my next step was supposed to be (just follow the script) I was able to cut my editing time in half! Maybe more.
And in addition to that big time saver, I was able to incorporate more shortcuts and bin organization in Premieire than I knew at the start of the first episode and things really zipped along.
Another area that dramatically improved was the exporting and uploading process.
Pro Tip: if you are planning to upload content over night, make sure your computer’s sleep settings are only putting your display asleep. If your computer falls asleep, it doesn’t actually upload anything.
Oh, and 5mb/s upload makes a world of difference compared to 1mb/s!
Tools
Once again, we used the following tools to create every element of Divi Nation:
- Scrivener for the scripts.
- Skype for the interviews.
- Ecamm Call Recorder for the interview recordings.
- Blue Yeti mic for my audio.
- Garage Band for recording and editing voice over.
- Quick Time for recording myself outside of Skype.
- Adobe After Effects CC 2015 for the motion graphics.
- Screenium for the Divi Quick Tip screencasting.
- Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2015 for editing.
- Blubrry PowerPress for podcasting from WordPress.
I’m not entirely sure what episode this will occur on, but I’ve been working with Nick and co. at the home offices and we’re in the process of acquiring and testing some great studio quality gear to improve the production quality of the show. I’m looking forward to making the show a little better each week and telling you all exactly how we did it (and with what gear).
If there is anything about the production process you’re curious about, please feel free to leave me a question in the comments below.
Want To Star In The Show?
We are looking for Divi enthusiasts to co-host Divi Nation each week. If you are interested in sharing your experience with the Divi community, be sure to submit your application below so that we can get in touch! We can’t wait to hear from you.
What was the works-anywhere internet service?
Hi Tevya,
Here is the article that refers to the service I spoke of http://www.rvmobileinternet.com/another-new-rv-satellite-internet-option-mobile-hughesnet-ka-band-service-from-rtc/ I hope this helps!
Really like the Divi Nation Podcast. Well done Nathan!
Only thing I would suggest, lose the music. It’s not necessary. The information you have is what we are interested in. The music becomes a distraction even in the background.
For example I lost the Divi Footer Editor information because the music interfered.
Make a Divi Nation signature music theme, use it to introduce the podcast then fade it out as you start talking.
Thanks for all you do. It is really appreciated.
Geniusdigit.
Thanks Nathan for doing a masterful job! Aspiring to podcast and dabbling a little over the past couple of months, I have learned a great deal from your first 2 episodes. I think you are a natural and you definitely have found your calling. Keep up the great work, I look forward to many many episodes to come.
I am in the process of designing a new website for my wife and I’s adventure, if anyone is interested in following along they can find it at http://lovinrv.life
Thanks again Nathan!
David
David, wow! Love that panoramic background video on your wife’s website. It’s like I was actually there in that grand canyon-like desert. Great idea!
Thanks David, it was a pleasure having you on the show.
Just wondering when the deadline for the footer submissions is? You mention that the winners will be announced in two weeks, however I’m assuming you’ll need time to evaluate and decide!
I have a couple sites I’m working on now and would love to submit them, but they’re not quite ready yet so I wanted to know when I need to finish them by!
Great work, thanks!
I will announce the winners in the episode after next. To participate you will need to submit either this week or sometime early next week. For future design challenges I will try to be more precise.
What was the prize again for the footer contest?
Getting featured on the podcast and the blog.
This may be a stupid question, but why isn’t the ability to edit the footer of divi a built in feature? Seems like it should be.
It may be in the future. This quick tip is meant to help people right now though.
Helpful stuff, and I really do appreciate all your work — but I have to say that it really makes no sense to your customers (maybe it’s logical from ET’s perspective) that this isn’t built in already. It’s almost … bizarre.
So to restate Andrew’s question, _why_ isn’t it a built-in feature? Surely it’s not a technical challenge.
Is there a windows alternative to Screenium?
Honestly, I’m not sure. However there are loads of good screencasting apps out there. Camtasia comes to mind as a popular one.
Above all – thanks for such generosity & stellar info. My comments about the music, was only mentioned because these podcasts are so super. If they’d been any less so – I wouldn’t have cared. So – thanks again! I’m looking forward to all of the upcoming podcasts.
Thank you Karen, I really appreciate your feedback and your words of encouragement. I’ll work on making the music less intrusive next episode 🙂
Hey Nathan and David!
Thanks for such a great episode, yet again!
I loved it all the way through. My only feedback would be either eliminating background music entirely or really muting it. I couldn’t really focus on the conversation until 9th minute when background music stopped. Apart from that, thoroughly enjoyed it.
Keep it up, Nathan!
Thanks Timur!
Thanks Timur, I think the overwhelming consensus this time around is that the background music needs to calm down, haha. It shall be done.
Awesome podcast. Loved to hear both of you and hear David’s career and future plans. Look forward to next. Good job Nathan.
Thanks Kalyan.
@Nathan
Nice episode #2 . I am a big fan of background music .
But your Background music is OK not too bad .
Regards
Priyanka
Thanks Priyanka.
Another great show Nathan! I learn much each episode …
Best
John Malloy
Good to hear John!
Nathan,
Nice… this week (#2) has been groomed to be a richer experience, indeed !
Liking the newest outline, whereby you’ve incorporated…
* Additional break-out sections allow quick references to subject topics.
– maybe consider adding more to break the interview up some.
* Starting with immediate subject matters, eg., this week in WP.
* You hold-off on guest host past history, until later in the podcast.
– However, it stills gets a little long on the life of the interviewed.
Maybe consider spreading out their life’s history through-out the podcast, as opposed to making it a complete (even long) segment, showing actual examples instead.
* Tools reference list.
I’d (subjectively) suggest that you ‘kill’ the background music during the regular DIVI Nation podcast delivery… it subliminally puts me on edge!… Yet, seems ok in your short segmented clips (albeit I agree with the aforementioned, by Bob… at least lower the background audio music bed).
A final notation, and I (again, subjectively) call out an earlier mention by (founder) Nick… where he suggested that DIVI was going to be the first Theme that would be ‘cutting-edge’ and a ‘game changer’… What stood-out for me was one of his first mentions regarding DIVI… its ability to virtually ‘eliminate’ the ‘Child’ !
Noting that since DIVI has a vast CSS incorporation, the Child would soon be a thing of the past. Anyway, that’s what I’m aiming for…
What reminded me of this (the Child) was your mention to edit/modify the Footer… The Divi Footer Plugin may indeed be the answer for such. I’m personally staying away from the need of a Child, as a ‘ground-breaker’ model for myself. Also making it brain dead easy, to prevent clients from breaking something.
Keep on keeping on, Nathan… appreciations for your time and energy.
Great job!
-michael
Thanks Michael, lots of good feedback here! I appreciate people’s subjective thoughts just as much as anything else. This show is for THIS audience. So my goal is to create something just for you guys; with your tastes in mind.
Thanks for the plug Nathan! So happy to see someone else getting some value out of the ramblings I jot down on occasion. 🙂
No problem Daron 🙂
What is the RSS feed url? I recommend having that listed as it’s the easiest way to add your podcast to any Android catcher. Let me know if you have any questions, I’m happy to help. I’ve set up a few and run one myself.
http://www.elegantthemes.com/blog/feed/podcast
Thanks! Loving it so far!
I am not a fan of background music when watching info videos. I find it very distracting – usually too loud, and depending on the track that repeats over and over and over again… annoying enough to stop watching.
Whew! Got that off my chest. Aside from the annoying background music, I appreciate the short tutorial videos and the supplied links. Very helpful.
I also appreciate the shorter excerpts from the podcast. I don’t have the time to spend 45+ minutes on podcasts… unless they are jam packed with productive information and tutorials. Even then, 45 mins. is tough.
Because time is in short supply, I found myself skipping ahead in the podcast… too much small talk… wanted to get to the meat.
Thanks for your commitment to help the Divi community with tutorials and podcasts… lose the music, tighten up the dialog, get right into it…. and you will have a winner! Thanks. (my 2 pennies)
I really agree with Bob,
The podcast should be edited down to 30 minutes:
1. The time investment is way too much to go almost an hour
2. The content will be more compelling, with less small talk
3. It will be more “sticky”
Thanks for taking this on.
g\\
Thanks Bob, appreciate the feedback. I remember thinking as I was editing that the music might get too repetitive. However, when I watched/listened to it without the music I felt that the music moved the pace along. I might be able to find a happy medium in the future. I’ll keep experimenting.
Please- this music is so awful and distracting. You don’t NEED to move the pace along! The content is wonderful. Trust it. I’m not sure I can continue listening to this podcast – the music is SO distracting!
I agree. Sounded like someone was playing Super Mario Bros in the background.
I disagree with the above comments. I thought the music was great. It’s a nice touch. It adds a level of production quality that I think is necessary so that it’s more like watching a podcast than watching someone’s Skype call.
I prefer no music. No matter the volume, it is distracting and not necessary.
… however you could use music background as an intro and outro which would work… just don’t have it playing continuously the entire time.
Great podcast. I enjoyed the delivery style and content. Look forward to future episodes.
Maybe just a lower volume would help… but then again, I listen with headphones opposed to speakers, so the background music may be louder to me. It’s all good… 🙂