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Tom looks discreetly in his pocket mirror to check for flyaways before starting the recording. The cold chews on his cheeks, nose, exposed earlobes. Overhead the sky is a milky grey that may save him from doing colour corrections in the edit, turning his skin sallow enough to cancel out the wind-bitten pink.
He tugs his knit bobble hat down over his ears, makes certain his fringe is positioned just so. Go figure that he’s acutely self-conscious about fixing it while other people are standing next to him on the platform, but cares not one iota about turning on his camera on travel tripod and doing a few cuts of his intro before boarding gets underway.
He smiles, waves. Stops, looks off to the side like he’s surprised to have found himself there. A long pause before he looks at the lens and tries it again, a little less feigned surprise, mustering the real long-buried enthusiasm in order to remind himself that it’s cool that he gets to do this kind of stuff, right? Course. It’s a living.
Hey everyone! he says, with enough excitement that you can hear the exclamation points. Fresh Jops here with another leg of my journey around Scandinavia. If you’re interested in how I travelled here on a boat from Denmark, you can click here. He indicates a space to his left, using his dominant hand to mark the gesture as natural. Also check out my tips on how to make the most out of an Interrail Pass — he points up, at what will be another popup, over here. All caught up? Great, glad to have you along!
His teeth clack against one another in the cold, which was not anticipated but makes sense given the windchill. He improvises a few reactions before moving on.
Lady’s over there’s got a thermos he says, looking around him. Good idea, wonder if she’d share. I have a collapsible travel mug in my suitcase, but then — he grimaces, too widely, ugh — I’d have to open it. He looks at the camera as if scolding, wags a finger. Don't be like me, kids, make sure your drink receptacles are easy to locate and close at hand!
From the other side of the platform, the woman is eyeing him with suspicion. Tom smiles at her with his white, perfect teeth, until she looks away hastily. He blows a kissy face in her direction after her head is turned, just to take the piss. Then back to the planned content.
I’m sure you’re wondering why I didn’t come here in the summer, and you’d be totally right to ask. We’re on our way to the original Ice Hotel in Jukkasjärvi, Sweden, which is only open during the coldest months of the year. Up there that means December through April, which is why we’re going to see it now before it gets dismantled. Pretty cool, huh?
He checks his notecards to make certain he’s got the facts right and rattles those off. He gives it a couple gos, one peppier, the next more chill, and the final one in a low talking voice that he’ll release for his paying patrons a full week before the main video goes out. He’s feeling pretty good, maybe he’ll throw in some extra footage for the hell of it. The premium content is hardly difficult to generate.
To be honest, he finds it a little creepy, but his regular commenters seem to go wild when he does quiet, low talking, and a few subscribers who have been with him since he was livestreaming himself playing video games in his pants, were always telling him to upload the same content but to change his voice, from his usual sing-song to a gentle murmur into a barely audible whisper. He’s asked on the creators threads. According to those, he should incorporate ambient noises, a hairbrush rasped against a stand mic, tapping cutlery against water glasses, his nails against a table.
Finally a whistle blows indicating it’s time for the passengers to board. He finds his seat next to a window, and films their departure, the slow roll through nondescript suburbs and light industrial areas, before the landscape shifts, becoming more scenic. Gently undulating countryside, fields, forests, barns. He’ll add some voiceover tracks to it rather than cutting back and forth now, maybe explain the geology of the region, a bit about its history.
Once they’re moving steadily and at speed he explores the car, the vestibule, the toilets. Sets up a shot of himself walking between the rows of seats. Him cross-eyed and goofy, making a fish face at the camera, which he does right as the older woman from the platform, the one who grimaced with the coffee, squeezes past and, to his complete horror, blows a kiss in his direction.