About

Do You Speak English? I'm A Street Photographer. Can I Take Some Pictures Of You? Your Style Is Amazing, Bro refers to a series of parody videos on TikTok of a Russian street photographer's video style in which he approaches strangers, introduces himself and asks them to pose for pictures. The videos typically use the song "Agony" by Yung Lean as a background track, with the trend starting in mid-2022.

Origin

On April 24th, 2022, French TikToker^[1] iamjeanblack posted a video in which he asked a stranger if he could take photos of her. Hesitant at first about the portraits, the woman ultimately obliged and let iamjeanblack make the video. Over the course of five months, the viral video received roughly 5.4 million plays and 366,700 likes (shown below).

Spread

Due to the success of iamjeanblack's first video, he continued with the style going into the remainder of 2022. For instance, on July 6th, 2022, he posted a TikTok^[2] in which he approached two women on the street and used the instrumental for Yung Lean's song "Agony." Over the course of two months, the video gained roughly 19.7 million plays and 3.1 million likes (shown below, left). Following the virality of the aforementioned video, others started to recreate iamjeanblack's video style for their own channels. For instance, on August 26th, 2022, Russian TikToker^[3] vlad.galyon posted a video that followed the style, earning roughly 5.8 million plays and 1.5 million likes in three weeks (shown below, right).

Going into late August 2022 and September 2022, Russian TikTokers followed the video style en masse, predominantly parodying it by following the same dialogue format, "Do you speak English? I'm a street photographer. Can I make some pictures of you? Your style is amazing, Bro," and having the final "photoshoot" slideshow become more meta and satirical. The aforementioned dialogue format was inspired by TikToker iamjeanblack's videos, but also a video uploaded on August 29th, 2022, by TikToker^[4] _polnyuk_ who interviewed a short and distinct-looking man and followed the dialogue format, receiving roughly 12 million plays and 2.4 million likes in two weeks (shown below, left).

Young Russian TikTokers then parodied the style in the following days and weeks. For instance, on August 31st, 2022, TikToker^[5] olleeeek posted a video that received roughly 4 million plays and 612,200 likes in two weeks (shown below, right).

Related Memes

What Song Are You Listening To?

What Song Are You Listening To? or Hey You! Interviews refers to a series of man-on-the-street interview videos where the interviewer asks people wearing headphones what they're listening to. After they answer the song is often edited into the video alongside its title, artist and sometimes album cover. The earliest viral video to do this was uploaded to YouTube in 2011 by Ty Cullen. It inspired a number of viral videos doing the same thing over the following years and became widely popularized by YouTubers and TikTokers.

Various Examples

Search Interest

Unavailable.

External References