One of the highlights of 2011 was being selected as one of the winners of the YouTube Next Chef program.
The Next Chef program evolved out of YouTube’s NextUp Program. Basically, the idea is to cultivate the next wave of up and coming talent on YouTube. The original program was not focused on a specific content niche. The second wave focused on cooking and fitness. The goal of the program is to help content creators take things to the “next” level and ultimately make a full-time living via YouTube.
As part of the program, winners received $5,000 worth of gear, training sessions conducted via Google Hangout and $10,000 in YouTube advertising.
But, I was starting to get a little restless. After hanging out with some shooters for the Food Network (and ogling their gear), I really wanted to make the transition to shooting with DSLRs. When we heard that we would be getting $5,000 of gear from YouTube, I decided to just wait and see. The gear was selected by YouTube and we didn’t know what we would be getting until the boxes from B&H Photo arrived. My fingers were crossed that a DLSR would be in the mix.
Here’s an overview of what was in the first box to give you an idea of what YouTube apparently thinks is a good starter kit.
Some of their choices were kind of interesting.