Our First Ever "The Art Of Telling Story" Podcast

The Art Of Telling Story

In the debut episode of 'The Art Of Telling Story,' hosts Gareth Boot and John Steele introduce their backgrounds in photography and busines

Key takeaways

• John Steele utilizes photography to document human stories within businesses and weddings.
• Gareth Boot discusses his transition from running a logistics business to pursuing public speaking and content creation.

Main topics

• Photography as a narrative tool
• Personal professional transitions

Notable quotes

I tell stories with pictures.

Conclusion

The episode establishes the podcast's mission to encourage authentic,

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:08) Okay, John, here we are, first ever episode of the Art of Telling Story podcast. I know, it's exciting, isn't it? I'm excited. I genuinely got to say, and I'm not saying that for effect, I am excited about this because me and you all have a lot of interesting conversations. Speaker 1 (0:24) Yeah, we do have conversations, don't we? Just don't regard them. But you know, I think one of the Speaker 2 (0:29) things, I think the challenges we face going forward with this podcast channel is to... Try to recognise when there's something coming worth recording. That's not always easy. No. Because I don't know how you find this, because we'll introduce ourselves in a little minute, but certainly with the art you use, it's sometimes very difficult when people say, right, just do it now. Speaker 1 (0:49) Yeah, absolutely. You have to be in the zone. Speaker 2 (0:52) Yeah. Speaker 1 (0:53) Yeah, no, and it's all a bit foreign to me, is this, so hopefully it'll get a bit easier. Speaker 2 (1:00) Well, the thing we've got to look at is we're testing out some equipment, so we're recording this, so hopefully this should be on YouTube as well. Yep. If it's not on YouTube, you know the video recording didn't go that well. Well, you know. And, you know, we're playing about a few levels because we're just getting used to the voices. So this is the first episode, so this generally, statistically, the one most people listen to first. Speaker 1 (1:18) Oh, my word. Speaker 2 (1:19) So we've got a couple of minutes, John, for people to kind of be either engrossed in what we're going to be talking about or switch off and go listen to Joe Rogan. Speaker 1 (1:26) Yeah. Well, Speaker 2 (1:27) you should do it at some point anyway, because Joe Rogan's very interesting. Speaker 1 (1:30) He is good. I like a bit of Joe. Yeah. Speaker 2 (1:32) So let's really talk about why we started this. That's what I thought we'd get at in the first few minutes. Okey-dokey. So your background, I mean, if you like, your kind of craft. What's your craft? Speaker 1 (1:45) I'm a photographer, a stills photographer, actually. So, yeah, I'm a stills photographer, but my way is I just tell stories of people. I go into businesses and I tell their story. but usually through the people. Speaker 2 (1:57) And weddings, you know, weddings. Yeah, Speaker 1 (2:00) well, weddings is just a full story. You know, it's someone's happiest day of their life. And it's like, well, why not document it? You know, just create what's happening. Just photograph what's there. So that's what I do. Yeah. Speaker 2 (2:14) I think we should just add one more thing to what you do, John, is you're not just a photographer. You're an award-winning photographer. Speaker 1 (2:20) Oh, yeah. Yeah, awards. Speaker 2 (2:22) Yeah. You're not very good at... We weren't going to awards. Dear listener, dear listener, John is not the best person at selling himself. He's an award-winning photographer. And I first got interested in John because of his work, but also... Because of me Speaker 1 (2:36) awards, that's why. Speaker 2 (2:37) With his awards, I just go with that. Yeah, yeah. I'm not interested in him as Speaker 1 (2:40) a Speaker 2 (2:40) person, just his awards. Ooh, Speaker 1 (2:41) look at his Speaker 2 (2:41) awards. Speaker 1 (2:42) Yeah, Speaker 2 (2:42) yeah. So you're a photographer? Yep. And you do that. Okay, so my background is, I suppose... Predominantly in the last 10 years, I would have been classed as a businessman. Speaker 1 (2:50) And Speaker 2 (2:51) within that kind of world, I used to have a logistics business, employ a few people to do that. But I became increasingly interested in speaking, public speaking. And then in the last probably two or three years, more interested in this concept of recording using videos because I went from running a business to becoming really to be an online. I wanted to create online content. Speaker 1 (3:12) Yep. Speaker 2 (3:12) There's a couple of words that I have to use because it'll give you context, but the words I don't particularly Speaker 1 (3:17) like. One is the word influencer. You want to be a rah-rah coach. That's what you want to Speaker 2 (3:22) be. Speaker 1 (3:22) Do you know, I initially wanted to be Tony Robbins. Speaker 2 (3:24) And the only reason. I wanted to be Tony Robbins was because what Tony Robbins did for me, you know, back in the kind of 90s when I got into personal development and improving myself, there was only Tony Robbins. Yeah. And he told some really good stories. Yeah, absolutely. And the stories he told you made you believe in yourself. Yeah. And Speaker 1 (3:41) I suppose it was Speaker 2 (3:42) only probably in the last maybe three to five years, maybe a little bit longer than that, I started to understand the power of story. Yeah. And I understood it. And I did a lot of work two years ago. where I actually did a lot of work looking at stories in a different way. Specifically, I did something called the Four Seasons Program, which we talked about how stories were told many, many centuries ago, millennia, I suppose, to explain the world we lived in when there was no internet and there was no TV and there were no cameras. Speaker 1 (4:13) Wow, did that exist? Wow. You think about it. Sounds exciting. Speaker 2 (4:17) Well, you think about the stories that people used to tell in the caves. You look at cave drawings. Oh, yeah, absolutely. And that was a Speaker 1 (4:23) story of something. I'm thinking of the Speaker 2 (4:25) Bay Speaker 1 (4:25) of Tepper. Is Speaker 2 (4:26) it Speaker 1 (4:26) Bay or Bayow? Bay of Tepper Speaker 2 (4:28) Street. That thing where Adol gets stuck in his eye, whatever it is. That thing. But that became a documented... of a story of our history. Yeah, yeah. I've always been interested in history and things like that. So when me and you first got to know each other and we started to sort of build up a friendship, it was that, there was always this common thing came up. Speaker 1 (4:48) Yeah, it was always about story, Speaker 2 (4:49) wasn't it? It was always about story. Yeah, absolutely. And I was always, as I suppose people tend to be, I was always impressed by other people's talent. You don't see your own, I don't think, sometimes. Speaker 1 (4:59) Nah. Speaker 2 (5:00) So I know... Because people tell me I've got a reasonable way with words. Speaker 1 (5:04) You're all right. You have your moments. I have my moments. And Speaker 2 (5:07) I always think when I saw your work, how impressed I was because you had a way of using a camera. Even though I had some equipment that was similar, I could never get to use it like you could use it. Speaker 1 (5:18) Yeah. I use it upside down, though, to be fair. Yeah, Speaker 2 (5:21) you do use it upside down. You get into some strange positions with your photography, John. But the beauty of what I liked about your work is it... I always knew a John Steele photo. Speaker 1 (5:32) Yeah, yeah, yeah. Speaker 2 (5:33) And that got me interested in photography and it got me interested Speaker 1 (5:37) in different genres of photography. Yeah. Speaker 2 (5:41) So the one that we kind of talked about a lot going back last year was street photography. Speaker 1 (5:45) Yeah, yeah. Well, street photography Speaker 2 (5:47) is amazing, you know. Speaker 1 (5:48) You're not allowed to do it now. You get your head kicked in. But, yeah, but, you know, just looking around and looking at the environment is amazing. can just create so much with light and shadow and Speaker 2 (6:01) someone. So you've got this thing where you tell stories with pictures. Yep. I tell stories with words. So in the same way you're looking for maybe light and circumstances that you'll think will make an interesting photograph, I'm always looking for things that happen in life that will make an interesting story. Yeah. Generally something, hopefully, that at the end of that story somebody will have got some kind of, I don't like to use the word inspiration from, but something that gets you to think. Speaker 1 (6:24) Yeah. Speaker 2 (6:25) So for me, I certainly, and this is why we ended up doing this podcast and we've ended up starting this art of storytelling thing. Yeah. Speaker 1 (6:32) I Speaker 2 (6:32) don't know what to call it really. Is it a business? Is it a... We'll Speaker 1 (6:35) see what happens with it, eh? But that's the beauty of it. It's going to unfold. And in some cases, Speaker 2 (6:40) I think some of the best stories, the stories unfold. So some of my influences over the years, especially from a kind of speaking to people perspective, were comedians, stand-up comedians. Yeah. I used to, I think one of the first ones I ever watched was Eddie Murphy, Delirious and Raw. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you know, probably looking back now, it's very politically correct in the times we're in. Speaker 1 (7:04) Yeah. But the man was funny. Oh, yeah, absolutely. And he Speaker 2 (7:06) told stories. Yeah. And then there was that programme where they used to do kind of, I think, was it, where they had the comedians on a panel and then they'd throw a word out and you'd have to make a joke about that. Speaker 1 (7:18) Whose line is it anyway? One of those Speaker 2 (7:21) things. But this idea Speaker 1 (7:22) of improvised comedy. Speaker 2 (7:24) Yeah. And I look at jokes like anything. It's just a very short story with a comical end. Speaker 1 (7:30) Yeah, there's jokes and there's jokes, isn't there? But the best comedians are the people who can tell stories like Billy Connolly. Oh, my word. Well, I Speaker 2 (7:39) mean, Billy Connolly. The thing with Billy Connolly is there are some comedians, the likes of... and again, if people listen to this from other parts of the world, you may not know some of these comedians, but when I was repping the 80s, there was Bernard Manning and Chubby Brown. Speaker 1 (7:54) Yeah. And they were just, they told blue jokes. Speaker 2 (7:57) I didn't think they were particularly clever. They were clever in an art at the time that was popular. And within that realms of stand-up comedians in a club. Yeah. It was very Speaker 1 (8:11) working men's club. Very working men's club. Speaker 2 (8:13) But when Billy Connor came along, You couldn't imagine Bernard Manning doing a documentary like Billy Connolly's documentaries. No, Speaker 1 (8:20) absolutely not. So Billy Connolly for me is the ultimate Speaker 2 (8:23) storyteller. Absolutely. Because he can tell you jokes on stage. Yep. He can play a banjo. He can. He Speaker 1 (8:30) can tell Speaker 2 (8:30) a musical story. Yep. And he's also got the ability to tell a documentary and be really interesting. Speaker 1 (8:35) Yes. Yep. Speaker 2 (8:37) So in effect, really, why we started this podcast, I suppose, is so we can share our love of telling a story. Speaker 1 (8:42) Yep. Speaker 2 (8:43) And maybe encourage other people to tell it because I think we both recognise this. Well, I hope we do, otherwise this bit of the podcast can sound really silly. But everybody's got a story to tell and Speaker 1 (8:54) everybody Speaker 2 (8:54) can tell a story in whatever way they feel comfortable. You don't have to be a professional photographer to take photographs. Speaker 1 (9:01) No, no, no. Speaker 2 (9:02) You don't have to be a professional speaker to speak to people. Speaker 1 (9:05) Nope. Speaker 2 (9:06) Because you're doing these things all the time. Anybody with a phone is taking photographs. Speaker 1 (9:12) Yeah, absolutely. Anybody Speaker 2 (9:13) who has a conversation with, whether it's a member of the family or anybody at work, is speaking to a public audience. Speaker 1 (9:19) Yep. Speaker 2 (9:20) But I kind of hoped over the course of our podcast and the work we're going to do around this project is to encourage people to have faith that they are storytellers first and foremost. Speaker 1 (9:32) Yeah, yeah. I think everyone can do it. It's just how they do it. You know, people ask me things and I tell them in pictures. Like, that's how I work. That's how I see the world. I see it in pictures. Even when I was skateboarding, I was a skateboarder for a long time, and people would ask me for directions, and I'd tell them the directions by the environment. So I'd be like, turn left, go up until you see this set of six stairs, and then turn right at this, well, whatever handrail. And then people will say, oh, you know, now they'll tell directions in pubs. Go to Red Lion, turn right, wait till you see Black Bull. I Speaker 2 (10:17) always Speaker 1 (10:17) did Speaker 2 (10:18) pubs. Yeah, I thought you might. You Speaker 1 (10:19) know, Speaker 2 (10:19) but from your Speaker 1 (10:19) background as a skateboarder, my background as drinking. Yeah. Speaker 2 (10:22) Not as Speaker 1 (10:22) successful. Yeah, but, you know. But it's what Speaker 2 (10:25) you do. I mean, Speaker 1 (10:25) it's like you were coming in this Speaker 2 (10:26) morning Speaker 1 (10:27) and Speaker 2 (10:27) there was a diversion not far from where I'm living and you said, well, where am I? I Speaker 1 (10:30) said, Speaker 2 (10:30) what can you see? Speaker 1 (10:31) Yeah, absolutely. Speaker 2 (10:32) Now, you did Speaker 1 (10:33) something, and people do this to me sometimes. You said, I'm on Albion Street. Speaker 2 (10:36) I haven't got a Speaker 1 (10:37) clue where Albion Speaker 2 (10:38) Street is in Wakefield. Speaker 1 (10:39) No. Speaker 2 (10:39) I honestly don't even know what the road opposite, I know the one opposite my house is called Stanley Road, but I don't do names. No. I do, so I said, can you see the playing field? Yeah. Can you see the new housing estate? So I think it was interesting how my work, as I developed as a kind of a business person and then into some kind of, I hate to use the word coach, but I suppose that's the only title I can pronate, learning about human behaviour. Yeah. We all speak or we all understand the world in different ways. Yeah, yeah. So some people are very visual. Yep. It's all pictures. Yeah, that's Speaker 1 (11:11) me. Speaker 2 (11:11) And other people, it's sounds. Yeah. Other people are words and numbers. Speaker 1 (11:15) Yeah. And unfortunately, Speaker 2 (11:17) when you get one person who discusses and understands things in, let's say, pictures. Yeah. Trying to explain something to somebody Speaker 1 (11:25) who understands things in words and numbers. It's not good, is Speaker 2 (11:27) it? Speaker 1 (11:27) It's not good. No. Which is why Speaker 2 (11:30) you'll find a lot of the best stories. And a lot of the best storytellers will mix all those things together. Speaker 1 (11:36) Yeah, absolutely. Speaker 2 (11:37) They'll use visual, they'll use auditory or the sound and they'll use the numbers. Speaker 1 (11:42) Yeah. Speaker 2 (11:43) You know, and I think it's like when you think about Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Speaker 1 (11:48) Yep. Speaker 2 (11:48) Well, you've got some there for everybody. Speaker 1 (11:50) Yep, you have. Speaker 2 (11:51) You've got Snow White, so people who kind of a bit touchy-feely, ooh, snow, cold. Yeah, it's cold. White, that's Speaker 1 (11:56) a Speaker 2 (11:56) colour, we can imagine that. Yep. And then seven, that's a number, so people get that. And the dwarfs, little people. Yep. And all the best stories are that. And when I was doing my training to learn a bit more about human behavior, it was something called NLP. And you can Google it if you're listening to this, but it stands for Neuro Linguistic Programming. We looked at the speech done by Martin Luther King. All right. I have a dream. I have a dream. And if you break that speech down, it sounds like, oh, he wrote that well. That aimed at every single person. It's something with the people who are visual. Speaker 1 (12:30) Right. Speaker 2 (12:30) I have a dream. Yeah. You know, I can see this happening. I can see my sisters and brothers. I don't exactly remember the full speech. Right. But there's something for everybody. And I think the best stories are always going to have that. Speaker 1 (12:42) Okay. Yeah, yeah. Speaker 2 (12:44) The other interesting thing as well, I think about this whole concept of why we love stories so much is whenever we discuss something about our life, either... past, present, or future. We're creating a story around it. Speaker 1 (13:01) Yeah. Speaker 2 (13:02) Because at any one time, you're taking all this information in, like, you've got a camera in your hand. Yep. You can take a frame, a picture. Yep. Speaker 1 (13:09) But there's 101 other things going on around that. Oh, yeah, absolutely. But we're focusing, Speaker 2 (13:13) so we're always telling stories to ourselves in our own heads. Yep. We're telling stories to other people whenever we talk to them. Speaker 1 (13:20) Yep. Speaker 2 (13:20) And also, we're always looking for those stories, I think, that mean something to us. Speaker 1 (13:25) Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Speaker 2 (13:26) And like your photographs, but then I'll get your wedding things. Some of the photographs you do are really powerful, but the best photograph I've ever seen you take or seen that you've taken is a bloke asleep in a chair. Speaker 1 (13:39) Right. Speaker 2 (13:40) Yeah, yeah. That for me is the best. That won an Speaker 1 (13:43) international award, did that, Gareth? Speaker 2 (13:45) Did it? There you go, an international. It was fantastic. Speaker 1 (13:48) Yeah. So, Speaker 2 (13:49) I mean, people can't see it because it's a podcast, clearly. Speaker 2 (13:55) You just tried to explain that photograph in a way that somebody listening could put it into their own head. Visually, or actually how it happened? Visually. Tell us what it visually looked like. Speaker 1 (14:06) Well, we're in a kind of a nice bar. It's, well, it's quite late stroke, early morning. And it's been a wedding. It's the best man. And he was worried about his speech. Speaker 1 (14:22) he just fell asleep on a chair and next to the next to the chair happened to be on the left hand side a picture of a dog and then on the right hand side there happened to be a picture of a dog um and both the dogs look like him to be honest so it's kind of he's asleep in the bottom of the frame in the middle and then there's these two pictures of dogs and then there's also someone put his wife's purse in his hand as well so it's quite an easy picture but it's just you know people like it you know because it's different and it tells the story it's like it's the end of the night so yeah well Speaker 2 (15:04) let's come back to that what story you think it tells because what i'm going to try to know so that's that's a photographer trying to make something visual to somebody who can't see it yeah Speaker 1 (15:13) that's Speaker 2 (15:14) what i was going for so what i'm going to know is as somebody who uses words more yep I'm going to try to do the same thing. Okey-dokey. Okay. Speaker 1 (15:22) Interesting. Speaker 2 (15:22) So if you can imagine now, a lot of the bars, try to imagine it's a very dark room. So the walls behind the subject are very dark. And they're not black, but they're a very kind of dark slate grey. Now, I'm a colour blind. You've got to bear in mind with this. I'm going to give you my interpretation of it. Speaker 1 (15:41) They're actually green, Gareth. But Speaker 2 (15:43) they're dark green. No, no. I'm only joking. They're a dark green or they're grey. And the thing about this photograph, straight away you're brought into this, that everything in it is quite dark, apart from three elements. Now, if you can imagine that the dog portraits are quite bright, and also the guy's wearing a dark shirt, and he's got it kind of slightly open, so his face and his neck, because he's got a beard, they kind of stand out. So you've got these three kind of visual points of brighter photograph, brighter photograph, and this guy's face or flesh showing. And it's kind of almost, it has this feeling of the minute you look at it, you feel like you're in the bar with him. And it's very, it's the darkness I like with the light coming out. And it's also a photograph which is very, it's still, there's a stillness about it because everything's a very similar colour. Speaker 1 (16:30) I agree, yeah. Speaker 2 (16:31) So if you wouldn't, this is the kind of, and John says it nice, it's like a nice bar. Things have moved on a few years ago from things like flashing lights and neon. This is a very dark, subdued, very kind of, I suppose I'd class it as contemporary kind of bar. But that's what you're looking at. So you've got all this darkness and there's three bright points, two pictures of dogs behind. And they're not normal dogs as in a photograph of a dog. They're kind of almost like caricatured dogs. Like Speaker 1 (16:56) portraits. Portraits of a dog. Yeah, but it's caricatures. Caricatures, like you used Speaker 2 (17:01) to Speaker 1 (17:01) have the smoking Speaker 2 (17:01) dogs and dogs playing pool. Yeah, they are like that. So that's Speaker 1 (17:03) how Speaker 2 (17:03) I would Speaker 1 (17:03) explain Speaker 2 (17:04) it. Yeah. So that's... So you see anything like that. Two Speaker 1 (17:06) different versions. Speaker 2 (17:07) Now, tell me, from your perspective, what story do you think that photograph told? Speaker 1 (17:14) I don't know. I just, Speaker 2 (17:15) I Speaker 1 (17:16) just sort of sleep in there. I thought he's not getting away with that. I'm having that. So I don't know. For me, it's just the end of the night. It's the best man who was worried. And he's, you know, he'd, he'd gone through so much. He didn't even enjoy his meal because he was panicking about his speech so much. And then as soon as he'd got his speech done, he could let his hair down and he could just get drunk. And he did get drunk. and therefore he had to sleep. And that's the story, you know, it's the Speaker 2 (17:45) end of the webinar. I would say that's not an unsimilar story to why I would make out that photograph. Now we're going to play it somewhat. Okay. Right, this is what we're going to try. So, again, for the audience, you've got a guy sat in a chair, holding his wife's purse, dark room, he's asleep, or he looks like he's asleep. So, how could you tell a full story around that piece of picture? Speaker 2 (18:12) So for instance now, explain it a different way. Make that comical. Let's try to make that comical. How would you make that comical? Comically, Speaker 1 (18:18) visually? No, Speaker 2 (18:19) comically. So this is the picture, this is the story behind it. So make a comical story. It doesn't have to be a true story. Speaker 1 (18:25) Just try and Speaker 2 (18:25) make him, there you go. This is our best. On your toes here. Speaker 1 (18:28) You are my plumbing toes, yeah. Yeah. Speaker 2 (18:34) I'll tell you what. I'll give you my example of it. You give Speaker 1 (18:37) me your example Speaker 2 (18:38) and my... And Speaker 1 (18:39) what Speaker 2 (18:39) I want to kind of get across to listeners is how sometimes... You can make a story up around something based on your view on it. So I'm going to give you two stories here, right? Right. I'm going to tell you a sad story, a happy story. Yep. Speaker 1 (18:54) Okay. Speaker 2 (18:55) Let's have sad first. We always do sad first. Never leave your audience with an unhappy feeling. Yeah, yeah, Speaker 1 (19:00) absolutely. Okay. Speaker 2 (19:05) This photograph was taken at a restaurant in London. Speaker 2 (19:14) this was a restaurant that was very close to Tower Bridge Speaker 2 (19:19) Now, this was on the night when there were some shenanigans went on in London and these terrorists went out. Right. And basically, this is a guy that's been up all night trying to find his wife. All he's got left of his wife is his purse. Speaker 1 (19:32) Ah, for do's, yeah. There's no Speaker