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Finding Models 2023

As the years go on, it’s getting harder and harder to find models mainly because the only modelling work out there that is paying money is E Commerce, The agencies and models are not looking for portfolio shots anymore and if they are it’s just boring vanilla shoots. In this video I try and explain the best way for you to find models for the style you’re working in.

13 comments on “Finding Models 2023

  • Some great advice and indeed the world has changed a lot since you did the previous vid on finding models.

    Btw, how come this video is mirrored?

    Cheers,
    Ronald

  • nmdphotovideo says:

    This really resonates with me as it totally gives me an idea of how I need to shape my portfolio to get the type of work I want to get but knowing and doing are 2 very different things. Where I’m located I really have to take what I can get as far as shoots because there is zero industry in my area fashion or ecom or otherwise. I feel like I would have to do a lot of traveling to even remotely come close to creating a portfolio that would be attractive to any certain sub genre. I’ve really wanted to call myself a professional photographer for a long time but it kinda helps put it into perspective that unless I really dedicate a lot of money and time to traveling it’s probably just a hobby and I should take what I can get locally as far as finding models and photoshoot opportunities.

  • richard.murphy2018 says:

    I am probably being a bit thick, but if I am offering to paying for a model, at their agreed rate, and their shoot level [nude, e-com etc] equals my shoot needs why should either of us care about the other’s folio?
    I’m sixty-seven and shoot only what I want to shoot – my shit. Yes, it would be nice to produce a book or have an exhibition, but to be honest I live in the real world. I do my art for me, the models that I work with, much like yours, are happy that I make them pretty. If anyone else likes my work, it’s a bonus.
    If I hire a landscape gardener and know what I want – who pays the piper calls the tune – he/she does the job and gets paid. If they like it they may take a couple of pictures on their phone, but don’t demand my garden be beige just because all their other gardens are beige.
    Before I retired I worked for money wages, I often didn’t like it but it paid the bills. If I disliked the job enough I changed jobs.
    My problem is models today want to change the goal posts as the shot date approaches – “… it would be easier for me if we shot in a different city…”
    Do you think the world, for many models, has moved from ‘voice controlled mannequins with G-strings’ into art critiques and entitled divas?

    • Yeah paid shoots aren’t about folios and are completely different. And yes ‘girl with a g-string’ is high fashion and theres very few of them around anymore, a lot of what is around are Insta models and they only want what they want.

    • Peter Joseph says:

      I have found that in recent years, in the wealthy parts of the world, even MONEY isn’t the motivator it once was. Attractive women have a world of options open (which I suppose is good!) to them to make “easy money” and posing for photos that they may not want simply isn’t worth a few hundred dollars to them.

  • Elliott Taylor says:

    This has actually been very helpful, Peter. The take aways for me, as an amateur trying to step up, is where to target my developing portfolio. I believe I will need to target local agencies and work to their brief whilst developing my own style as a side project. At some point my style may creep in as models get comfortable with me, my workflow and get an understanding of where my creative flow fits with them. Cheers

  • Thank you for another very informative video. I don’t know if it is just here in my area in the US. I would say the majority of the models want paid an hourly rate for the shoot, and these are models without an agency and have not done any campaigns or anything like that, but toss up a handful of images and never do unpaid shoots.
    Not sure if other photographers experienced the same.
    -Eric

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