VALDOSTA — What began as an outdoor show in 2002 has evolved into quite a popular production company in South Georgia called Southern Outdoors Productions, LLC.

Run by two Valdosta State University graduates, Jefferies Eldridge and Jeff Corley, Southern Outdoors is known for its in-depth documentaries on university mascots, commercials and most recently, forensic videography of the explosion at the Imperial Sugar Dixie Crystals plant in Chatham County.

“We started out just doing an outdoor show, then started producing commercials,” Eldridge said. “The first documentary we did was on the Auburn University War Eagle. Then one day Jeff’s aunt and uncle were at a book signing by Sonny Seiler. They started talking to him about the documentary we did for Auburn.”

Seiler, who is best known as the owner of the University of Georgia mascot, took an interest in the documentary and requested that Eldridge and Corley contact him about producing a film on Uga.

“We worked on the Uga documentary most of last year,” Eldridge said. “It’s probably the neatest thing we’ve done, when you look at the story and the tradition in college football. After we had the first documentary complete, Uga VI died. Therefore, we decided to tape the ceremony introducing Uga VII.”

The 30-minute version of the Uga documentary ran on Fox Sports South all last month. The Auburn documentary is scheduled to run this December on the same channel.

The recent forensic videography on the Imperial Sugar plant proved to be both adventurous and educational for Eldridge and Corley. The assignment stemmed from the Feb. 7 explosion of the Port Wentworth plant, which left 13 people dead and several others severely burned and injured.

“We got a call from Jack Ward, who was the head investigator over the case,” Eldridge explained. “He asked if they could come over, take a look and do forensic recording on explosive patterns. What we thought would take a few days turned into a five-week project. We really got to understand how explosive technicians come in to look at blast patterns, and we worked with one of the best particles-explosive experts. We also had the opportunity to work with members of the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board and OSHA. It was quite a unique experience.”

Southern Outdoors Productions recently finished running two quarters of Southern Outdoors television show on ESPN2 Southern Zone and is currently producing a coach’s show for the Valdosta Wildcats. The company does game taping for several other coaches throughout football season as well.

“We are also working with Bill and Allen Durham for a project about Florida State University’s Chief Osceola and Renegade ritual,” Eldridge said.

After exciting ventures like African safaris, duck hunting in Mexico and flying jets at Moody AFB, the Southern Outdoors Productions crew looks forward to turkey hunting in the spring, which is when an ample amount of production is done.

“It’s never the same thing in this business and that is what makes what we do so enjoyable,” Eldridge said. “However, it can be hectic.”

More information: Call (229) 247-7552.