McClain Portis’ Story

Hello, I’m McClain Portis. I built Live2 starting in my freshman dorm room in 2018, and I have not stopped obsessing over the vision since then. In my earliest years of life, I found a love for building things and for finding hidden treasure. I metal detected, gold panned, sold terrible paintings (as an 8 year old) on the side of the street, built YouTube channels, loved cameras, and most importantly loved doing things that made people stop and stare in awe. At the age of 18, I moved to Los Angeles, in hopes of going to film school before realizing that my distain for authority and my hyper-obsession with innovation lead me right back to posting videos on the internet. I thought my film business degree was ridiculous (and at times, it certainly was, though later I realized perhaps it was important to know how old Hollywood functioned if I was going to build something new)… anyways, I’m getting ahead of myself. I’ve told the full Live2 story (here is a written article of an interview I did as well if you don’t care to watch a 3 hour video lol) a few times on video which I will link because I cannot do it justice over text, but I will simply speedrun it here.

In that freshman dorm room, I realized I was nowhere near the best filmmaker in the world, and I knew I never would be. Because of the internet, I was seeing endless talent starting to rise across all facets of the arts from every random city or town you can think of, It was daunting. The internet gave everyone a chance… which is great until you realize that you are lost in a sea of desperate noise, fighting for attention in a field that calls itself the “arts” which is supposed to never ask for attention. The only way to put it is, you feel helpless.

I decided then and there that my life’s goal would be to tell the stories of the dopest individuals I could find who were not receiving the kind of love and admiration that I thought they deserved. They would be who I pointed my camera at and told stories about, people who had never had anyone believe in them before. I thought just maybe those artists would want to be a part of this movement together. Little did I know that would be the start of an epic journey that I am now almost six years deep into and consider everyone inside of it my closest friends.

Perhaps I’ll spare the rest of the story for a video, I could seriously write about 20 web browser pages full of the story… but I will leave this off by saying, I chase the feeling of knowing we made a difference in someones life. That is what Live2 has always been about (and will always be about so long as I can help it). My dream is not to work with the artists who are already the biggest in the world… My dream is to find artists who have never had anyone believe in them and to be the first in their corner. I want to be known for bringing people to light. I want to discover the greatest talents that the world and all of it’s crazy noise might be stepping over. Nothing compares to someone looking you dead in the eye and telling you that you changed their life when they felt forgotten by everyone else. That is the story of Live2 and that is the story of every member inside of it. We are all artists, and we all have a lot we feel that we need to share with the world. My only hope is that I can find a way to do it alongside all of these incredible characters that have joined the journey along the way. Thank you for being here.