Is This Call to Shoot a Sexy Woman An Opportunity or Opportunistic?

My friend Steve recently for­warded an oppor­tu­nity to shoot a sexy woman for a local mag­a­zine. I don’t want to name the mag­a­zine. but I decided there are a cou­ple of ways to inter­pret this cast­ing call.

First, here’s the text of the mes­sage. I’ve omit­ted any ref­er­ences to the name of the mag­a­zine, but it’s oth­er­wise shown here as they deliv­ered it, includ­ing the occa­sional error.

First Shoot for June 8th, Mag­a­zine Pub­li­ca­tion (Open to All)I need to know who is inter­ested in being part of a Pin Up Shoot Both Pho­tog­ra­phers and Mod­els. For Printed Issue. Let’s See You In Print.Sub­mit Request to be part of this event.… NOW. Mes­sage Me Here.Loca­tion and Date to be announced soon. We Already Have the Loca­tionWill be a Week Night between 7pm –9pm, At local Bar Here in OrlandoSet Up.…  Mod­els both Male/​Female will be at a Pool Table in a Real Bar… And, will be in their HOTTEST Outfits. A set of lights will be onlo­ca­tion, along with wire­less flash relays, Pro­fes­sional Help for those who are new… with the lights, and every­thing will be LIVE.… Pho­tog­ra­phers Have 15 mins to work with mod­els … We Have selected for them. Props and Out­fits can be added for your shoot. No Copy­wr­ited or Branded items, Only Per­sonal Stuff.  We Will Shoot for sev­eral Dif­fer­ent Ideas. Best Male Solo, Best Female Solo, best Guy/​Girl and Best Girls/​Girl. Win­ners (photographers/​models) Will Have Images fea­tured in “ON LOCATION” sec­tion of the Printed Issue, For June 8th, Publication. Require­ments: Mod­els: 18+ Model Release Not Nude But Very Sexy Must be will­ing to work for all pho­tog­ra­phers on request. Pho­tog­ra­pher Pub­li­ca­tion Release Lim­ited to Hold Images Until Pub­li­ca­tion Date (June 8th) Must Use Mod­els Selected for the Event, but can have favorite mod­els sub­mit ahead of time for consideration. We may have to limit the num­ber of peo­ple, due to time limits. Event will be open to all Mem­bers, Happy Hour price on food and drinks.… Bar open after event until 2am to min­gle with friends, please bring any­one who is inter­ested .… Let’s Network.

The Oppor­tu­nity Perception

Let’s start with the pos­i­tive view. Here’s an oppor­tu­nity for a pho­tog­ra­pher to get some expo­sure with a shot of a sexy woman. Con­sider it mar­ket­ing. You com­pete with other pho­tog­ra­phers and if you’re the best, you get expo­sure in a mag­a­zine. Sure, it doesn’t pay any­thing, but that’s not why you’re doing it. This is your chance to show what you can do. You never know who’s going to see it and the expo­sure could lead to pay­ing business.

Even if you’re not a pro­fes­sional pho­tog­ra­pher, it could be fun just to do the event and see what kind of images you can cre­ate. There’s an oppor­tu­nity to net­work and meet other peo­ple — pho­tog­ra­phers, mod­els, edi­tors. This isn’t the kind of event that you see every day, so why not take a chance? How many times do you find a sexy woman on a pool table wait­ing for you to take her photo, anyway?

The Oppor­tunis­tic Perception

Now let’s take a look at the other side of the coin. Here we have yet another mag­a­zine try­ing to use pho­tog­ra­phers for free con­tent. You aren’t get­ting a chance to use the pub­li­ca­tion to show­case your own style. Instead, you have to shoe­horn your pho­tos into their for­mat of hot & sexy on a pool table with­out even know­ing when, where it’s at or who you’re going to shoot. Worse, you can’t even show your own pho­tos until their pub­li­ca­tion date in June.

These peo­ple can’t even spell copy­right cor­rectly, so how pro­fes­sional is this orga­ni­za­tion? Have I ever even heard of this mag­a­zine before? What kind of expo­sure am I even going to get for my effort, any­way? Unless you’re a boudoir pho­tog­ra­pher, how much busi­ness are you going to get from another shot of a sexy woman on a pool table, anyway?

Which Per­spec­tive is Right?

So is this an oppor­tu­nity or a rip-​off? There’s room for either to be true, and per­haps even both at the same time. I can’t read minds, so I don’t know that the folks who sent this notice have any ill intent. Yet many pho­tog­ra­phers have rightly become sus­pi­cious of any event like this for a pub­li­ca­tion because so many “oppor­tu­ni­ties” have been lit­tle more than rights grabs and excuses to avoid pay­ing for con­tent. A photo of a sexy woman is a good cover draw to sell mag­a­zines. What does it do for you?

These folks aren’t steal­ing your work, though. They’re ask­ing if you want to sub­mit your work. They’re ask­ing if you want to com­pete for a chance to see your work in print. That’s a nice draw for some folks who’ve never been pub­lished or may see a mar­ket­ing oppor­tu­nity. A lot of pho­tog­ra­phers who shoot for big name mag­a­zines really don’t make that much money for their work. Instead, they use it as a mar­ket­ing effort, a kind of calling-​card that shows poten­tial clients what they can do and hope the phone rings with new busi­ness because of the expo­sure in a magazine.

The Sexy Woman on a Pool Table

I’ve decided that I’m unlikely to par­tic­i­pate in this event. After all, I’ve already done my photo shoot of a sexy woman on a pool table before. It’s time for some­thing inter­est­ing and new rather than repeat­ing what I’ve already done.