When you are better known by your YouTube persona “Señor Pelo” (Mr. Hair), than your real name, you know you’re one of the lucky folks who consistently has good hair days. Nix that, incredible hair days. Glorious hair days. Diana-Ross-in-the-1960s-hair days.
Separated at birth?
The superbly-coiffed David Axel Cazares Casanova (Señor Pelo), is a freelance Illustrator, animator, voice actor and future game developer, who is currently dedicated to his YouTube channel, Sr Pelo, where, in his own words, he makes “weird ass videos about absolutely anything.”
Sr Pelo doesn’t shy away from controversial subjects and tackles issues about society, outrage, stupidity and politics, sometimes all in a single video. His animation style is simple and clean and he often uses his recognizable persona to represent himself, as he does in his Art Vs Artist video, which has garnered over 1.6 million video views:
His YouTube channel was originally called ‘123pendejos’ (vulgar Spanish slang for ‘fool’; I’ll leave it to you to google the literal translation), but as his online presence grew, David decided to change the name to Sr Pelo, the nickname his best friends bestowed upon him. At first, David created video game parodies, like the “shellnuts” series (in a nutshell) or just random memes, but after a couple of months realized his passion was creating chaotic, offbeat and hilarious videos.
Although one of the most delightful and genuine souls you’ll ever meet in real life, Sr. Pelo has an edgy and dark sense of humor. He explained his motivation for using his unique humor in his videos. “When someone grows up, life turns into a grey world with all sorts of problems. For me, humor is something that can make you happy in those grey times; it is a way to laugh at our problems and fears. When we confront and laugh at them we weaken them, till we finally solve them or stop caring about them at all.”
Wacom in his workflow
Sr Pelo uses a Wacom Intuos Pro in his videos because it helps him to make things fast and allows him to add nice details and styles to his art. “The tablet allows me to make smooth illustrations and turn sketches into fast compositions. I can even say that is hard not using my Wacom!”
Just a normal, guy having fun
Sr Pelo says he doesn’t see himself as a celebrity even though his YouTube channel has over 1.6 million followers. “A lot of people like my stuff or love me, but I just see myself as a normal guy having fun. I am really happy people follow me for the stuff that I do and they are willing to support me on it. I don’t’ see myself as ‘Mr.-look-at-me-I-have-big-numbers’, I just want to make sure that I never disappoint my followers or community in any of the videos or merchandise I create.”
Challenges
Sr Pelo says that YouTube’s machine-learning algorithm can make life challenging for content creators, especially for those who push the boundaries of humor and satire. YouTube scans video content to determine whether it meets their advertiser-friendly content guidelines. A green $ means that videos can be monetized, but a yellow one means that limited ads or no ads are allowed. “No one knows what is “bad” for ads, so I play the guessing game. YouTube is built for quantity and not quality. You never really know if you’re sharing a video to all your subscribers or if your video is being blocked to certain people. Thank goodness I am having fun with it.”
Weird and proud of it
Weird (and proud of it)
We asked Sr Pelo what he was proudest of in his creative journey and he answered in his characteristic way, “To be honest I can’t decide what I am proudest of because I am kind of proud of everything. I mean I am succeeding as a weird animator, I meet people that I admire and love, and damn! even THIS [interview]!!!! I guess if I had to pick one thing, I am proudest for not giving up and doing everything in my power to reach my goals.”
Learn more about Sr Pelo
David Axel Cazares Casanova (Senor Pelo) is from Veracruz, Mexico, where he runs a popular YouTube channel with over 1.6 million subscribers. His YouTube videos combine animation with live action and are voiced by David himself, in both English and Spanish. In his spare time, Sr Pelo is also a freelance Illustrator, animator, voice actor and future game developer.
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