The End Of All Things To Come, Again.

Me and Mae March 2022

It was 2017 since using that headline. Then used at the time I'd fallen out of love with photography. It had become stagnate, actually no that's wrong. I became stagnate with photography. After seeing the power of taking photos to a more a filmic and creative look with almost any camera shooting in the RAW picture settings I was well on my way back to being revitalized. With a lot of help from my friends. Then and now.

Mae on the the Darlington, SC Public Square

"MaeDay"-- I thought that sounded so catchy! I'm a fan of catchy rhymes, pro wrestling promos, and generally clever phrases. It was a 2020 and I saw a Facebook post of Mae who I'd only come across a few times while she worked at a restaurant. She did photos with a friend of hers and I thought, "Hmmmm she's so cool in person and looks so cool on camera...wonder if she remembers me?" I nervously hit send on that DM after spell checking it and re-writing it for what felt like 20 minutes. Obviously the photo session was on and we're here again in 2022. Mae was already set to "Wonder Woman" now on the 2nd shoot she's on a whole other level. The Style. The Poses. Her Personality is jumping off the screen. Just read any comments under her photos or videos. There was just one problem on the shoot day... The Photographer or I... didn't know exactly what I was doing.

Mae in front of some boutique shops.

The end of all things to come was reference to A) The song by the rock band MUDVAYNE and B) The fact that I was revitalized on a new course with a new style of photography in 2017. Now, I'm here with all of that again then some more in 2022! I rolled into our shoot with my new dream camera that I had practiced using with my dog and in a park. Not how I was using it on MaeDay 2, with my hybrid quick style of going between still photos and video recording. Actually stopping the session at some points to fiddle with camera settings. Ugh, armature hour! As embarrassing as that is let's not get it twisted. I'd planned for this camera and this 2nd session with Mae for so long I was giddy inside that it was all really happening in real life! I couldn't do that with just any ol'body-- It had to be with Mae! We ended up with two videos, one of which I wanted to attempt for awhile and it scared me real bad to attempt... or real good I don't know which.

Lawton Park in Hartsville, South Carolina

Video Portraits are a Rorschach Test. They can be music videos or just pretty people being pretty. Test footage or experiments if that's the video makers intent or they can go off the rails and became a total waste of time to make and watch. I knew I wanted it to be a dreamy romantic filmic vibe like that of YouTuber Mabo. So using the Sony A7iv shooting in a S-log 3 and a variety of settings from 24p, 60p, and S&Q Modes with varying angles to keep the video fresh with quick cuts and the right pitch of catchy other worldly yet personal sound- we ended up with this.

A Video Portrait Featuring Mae

For our behind the scenes photo shoot video I was so happy to be mic'd up with a 2nd camera! I wanted to make one of those style videos for what seems like forever like one of my favs Julia Trotti. Basically this was the mimic your heroes day for me! I always like the look of the 35mm focal length even though I really didn't know I was looking at it and in the past year I've learned that the 35 and 85mm focal length are serious go to for a lot of photographers. Oh if you're wondering why I just threw in the 85mm that's because that was the one that took me new heights even before 2017. Just check out the Shot Caller Page. It's 90% the 85mm focal length.

For one of my favorite stories ever it's using Voice Over from a play by the by La Mont Zeno Theatre (1975) with the song "Vison" by Earl Sweatshirt.

One more giant thank you to Mae, without her none of this would of been possible. She's a brilliant tag team partner to collaborate with wonderful to be around. Next Up? New Work. New Gear. New Creative. New Strategies. With out forgetting what all came before but just putting an end to the less useful parts and getting better at doing all things to come.

Thanks for stopping by!

-Yeager

Photographer/Content Creator