G Reese wrote:
I never fell pray to gearitus. :-)
I'm fine with the Nikon D3500 with 2 "kit" lenses. You should buy what fits your hand no matter the brand.
It's not the camera, .....it's the person holding it.  ;-)

I also started with a Nikon D3500 and later a friend insisted I upgrade to the D7000 and he even bought it for me and sent it! It is a cherished gift as he passed away only a year later. I knew it would've been an insult to pay him back for his generous gift and I sure miss him.

I also like my Canon AE-1

Jen B Photo

Audrey Rinehart wrote:
One of the photographers complained about "girls with Canon Rebels who think they're photographers....

.....Without even thinking, I responded, "I shot it. With an entry level Canon Rebel and thrift store glass. I'm a girl with a Canon Rebel." Dude just put his phone away and turned around. We didn't speak much after that, and I had a great day.

TLDR: people worry about the wrong things. Gear is less important than paying attention to what is right in front of you.

Love this story and I 100% agree with your TLDR.

Omaroo wrote:
Love this story and I 100% agree with your TLDR.

https://www.modelmayhem.com/portfolio/pic/126619

My best friend took this picture via pinhole camera from an oatmeal box. It is one of the most brilliant pictures I have ever seen.

Model Sarah wrote:
https://www.modelmayhem.com/portfolio/pic/126619

My best friend took this picture via pinhole camera from an oatmeal box. It is one of the most brilliant pictures I have ever seen.

Well it's definitely better that all the Big Foot photos coming from your state.

Model Sarah wrote:
https://www.modelmayhem.com/portfolio/pic/126619

My best friend took this picture via pinhole camera from an oatmeal box. It is one of the most brilliant pictures I have ever seen.

Half of my work is pinhole photography,
But appropriate to this thread my main pinhole camera is as far from a Quaker Oats box as can be.
my Zero 612b is a work of art in its own right.

Audrey Rinehart wrote:
I supported myself in my 20s and 30s by traveling around the US, as a nude model. I posed for lighting workshops that rich guys would host at their suburban McMansions. That was back in the days when photographers would trade you airfare and a couch to sleep on to fly out and model for them for several days. You could book other paying work while in that city, then go home with a profit a week or so later.

The workshops were often populated by the types of people this YT video is spoofing. As one of the models, I minded my own business and never said much, but I was often amazed at how much energy and money people would talk about dumping into their gear, while the work they sent back to models or posted from those learning/lighting/whatever sessions left so much to be desired. Those in attendance would obsess over the tiniest issues in gear operation, while framing the models in some of the most unflattering ways possible. Like shooting downwards at short girls, or from straight on positions that made people look wide and flat. Just horrendous poses, not paying attention to outfits or styling, or even where the highlights and shadows were falling on the subjects' bodies. There was preoccupation with the types of strobes, how fast and brightly they fired, how fast their images would write to cards or whatever, but the resulting photos were...🤷 I never would do those events for TFP, after I wised up, because I knew that if I got a crowd of gear-obsessed shooters, the resulting photos would nearly always be mediocre to bad.

Some years ago, I posed for a workshop with multiple photographers out in the desert in the Southwest. It was probably 2018ish. I was in an SUV with one other model and 2 photographers, and we were all headed out to the location. One of the photographers complained about "girls with Canon Rebels who think they're photographers." I'd already been doing photography for awhile at that point, mostly shot my own portfolio work and had had self-portraiture featured in galleries. I didn't talk about it though, because it was irrelevant to my work as a model at the time. I thought he was being an ass, for obvious reasons, but again, I just needed to do my job and get paid. It wasn't my business anyway. At some point later in the ride, the guy literally pulled up a self-shot.image from my portfolio, turned around and said to me, "This is great work. The white balance is on point. It's the best photo in your port. Who shot it?" Without even thinking, I responded, "I shot it. With an entry level Canon Rebel and thrift store glass. I'm a girl with a Canon Rebel." Dude just put his phone away and turned around. We didn't speak much after that, and I had a great day.

I have a studio full of nicer gear today, but it ultimately doesn't even matter. It's how you use what you have.

TLDR: people worry about the wrong things. Gear is less important than paying attention to what is right in front of you.

That's literally EVERY photographer. They are usually IT guys or engineers for a living. I would never ever attend any of those "workshops" because of exactly what you said here. Chip Willis is the only photographer I have ever seen to successfully pull off an actual workshop where people learned shit. He is a brilliant photographer and actually taught people how to shoot with lights. I remember talking to a model once about posing for a photographer's workshop in NYC. She said by the end she was hate staring at all of them because they were just pressing the shutter until it was time to go. It is THE worst. I can't tell you how many times I wanted to tell photographers who obsessed over gear instead of hiring one of us; I'M SORRY YOU PICKED AN EXPENSIVE HOBBY. It's like Trump convincing himself he is a good golfer because he is rich.

Model Sarah wrote:

That's literally EVERY photographer. They are usually IT guys or engineers for a living. I would never ever attend any of those "workshops" because of exactly what you said here. Chip Willis is the only photographer I have ever seen to successfully pull off an actual workshop where people learned shit. He is a brilliant photographer and actually taught people how to shoot with lights. I remember talking to a model once about posing for a photographer's workshop in NYC. She said by the end she was hate staring at all of them because they were just pressing the shutter until it was time to go. It is THE worst. I can't tell you how many times I wanted to tell photographers who obsessed over gear instead of hiring one of us; I'M SORRY YOU PICKED AN EXPENSIVE HOBBY. It's like Trump convincing himself he is a good golfer because he is rich.

Those workshops are/were fine when models get paid for them. They made up a decent amount of my income back then - workshops and group shoots. But they were not worth it for models who needed to build portfolios. The photos that came out of them were very rarely portfolio quality. I did pose for a group shoot in the desert outside Salt Lake City, in 2010 or so. There were some very good photographers in attendance, but that was an exception to the rule. I also got paid a day rate for that shoot, as well as some tips, and ended up with several usable photos after the fact. But, again, that was an absolute rarity. In the 10+ years I worked as a model, that experience stands out as one of the best group shoots I ever worked for. Beautiful, remote desert location, paid booking and the shooters in attendance seemed to actually care about the quality of their work.

The vast majority of those were like this: 5 or 6 photographers, each of whom were fighting with 5 different gadgets costing $200 each, that would supposedly tell them what the light was doing. Only 1 or 2 of the gadgets would work properly at any given time, and none of them resulted in a basic understanding of how angles and shapes work to produce a flattering image of a human, because they are entirely different skill sets.

That being said, I did meet a lot of very nice people through those events, but the level of obsession with gear over learning how to actually work with human faces/bodies, was a notable part of that culture.

Model Sarah wrote:
That's literally EVERY photographer. They are usually IT guys or engineers for a living.

I refer to "those guys" as "Dentists with a hobby",
They show up with a $12,000 Leica and matching gear that they don't really know how to use.

I used to rent out my studio to local photography "meetup" groups, and there were always a few.

Audrey Rinehart wrote:

Those workshops are/were fine when models get paid for them. They made up a decent amount of my income back then - workshops and group shoots. But they were not worth it for models who needed to build portfolios. The photos that came out of them were very rarely portfolio quality. I did pose for a group shoot in the desert outside Salt Lake City, in 2010 or so. There were some very good photographers in attendance, but that was an exception to the rule. I also got paid a day rate for that shoot, as well as some tips, and ended up with several usable photos after the fact. But, again, that was an absolute rarity. In the 10+ years I worked as a model, that experience stands out as one of the best group shoots I ever worked for. Beautiful, remote desert location, paid booking and the shooters in attendance seemed to actually care about the quality of their work.

The vast majority of those were like this: 5 or 6 photographers, each of whom were fighting with 5 different gadgets costing $200 each, that would supposedly tell them what the light was doing. Only 1 or 2 of the gadgets would work properly at any given time, and none of them resulted in a basic understanding of how angles and shapes work to produce a flattering image of a human, because they are entirely different skill sets.

That being said, I did meet a lot of very nice people through those events, but the level of obsession with gear over learning how to actually work with human faces/bodies, was a notable part of that culture.

My point is that they always tried to screw the model over with $$$ so more photographers could think they were getting a deal and you couldn't pay me enough money to put up with those types of people. There is ALWAYS a guy with a huge ass lens he paid thousands of dollars for at one of these things. The ones that do not pay are even worse. There is a guy here in Ohio who lives in a gorgeous location that refuses to pay models and gets mad when someone shows up not looking like their pictures. It's like; PAY A PROFESSIONAL.

The very few people I have known from those things went on to hire people like me and get ready for it; had a fantastic portfolio.

Chris Macan wrote:

I refer to "those guys" as "Dentists with a hobby",
They show up with a $12,000 Leica and matching gear that they don't really know how to use.

I used to rent out my studio to local photography "meetup" groups, and there were always a few.

YEP.

Model Sarah wrote:
. There is a guy here in Ohio who lives in a gorgeous location that refuses to pay models and gets mad when someone shows up not looking like their pictures. It's like; PAY A PROFESSIONAL.

Complaint: "The model doesn't look like her photos."

Translation: Complaining person does not have expertise on par with those who shot the model's portfolio

Audrey Rinehart wrote:
Complaint: "The model doesn't look like her photos."

Translation: Complaining person does not have expertise on par with those who shot the model's portfolio

100%

Except, I shot with this guy and the pictures he took of me were really good. I guided him and knew how to pose.

You get what you pay for. *shrugs*

Model Sarah wrote:
Excerpt: You get what you pay for. *shrugs*

"Good work isn't usually free, and free work usually isn't good." (A.Neste. #634113)

I am an amateur which is a fantastic way to approach photography. Treating model shoots as a free, creative hobby ensures I keep the passion alive without the pressure of client demands, allowing me to experiment, learn, and have fun.

In my view, it is the before and after transformation that happens to a model when professional hair and makeup artists work their magic. There have been times when a model’s change in appearance truly leaves me gob-smacked.

Audrey Rinehart wrote:
TLDR: people worry about the wrong things. Gear is less important than paying attention to what is right in front of you.

When I was poor I would have said that, yes lighting and composition is more important than the lens or the camera body.

But a lot of paying clients gatekeep "seriousness" by what gear you have. Your Canon Rebel would have been ruled out in favor of a higher end model, lens, and potentially lighting set up.

There are a lot of incentives to obsess over gear and feel like one is honing their craft that way. But yes, if you don't have to - like most prosumers at a workshop - then it is the wrong thing to obsess over.

Roaring 20s wrote:
When I was poor I would have said that, yes lighting and composition is more important than the lens or the camera body.

But a lot of paying clients gatekeep "seriousness" by what gear you have. Your Canon Rebel would have been ruled out in favor of a higher end model, lens, and potentially lighting set up.

There are a lot of incentives to obsess over gear and feel like one is honing their craft that way. But yes, if you don't have to - like most prosumers at a workshop - then it is the wrong thing to obsess over.

I once had a paying client gatekeep the ‘seriousness’ of the digital camera I had.

I shot the main brief of work using a NIKON F3 HP.  However I decided to backup what I was shooting by using a newly released Nikon Coolpix 990. The manager of the Resort saw me using the 990 digital camera and without my knowledge contacted my Ad Agency to register a complaint about the ‘seriousness’ of the gear he saw me using.

The Ad Agency was happy with the work I produced and unexpectedly included a couple of the 990’s digital files as thumbnails in the final artwork. (A bi-fold pamphlet)

BTW at the time (around 2000) the top pro Nikon D1 had less resolution than the Coolpix 990 and the D1 cost a fortune.

G Reese wrote:
I hang out in a "chat room" on Discord. They help models get signed with agencies.  We had a gearhead come in that had the nerve to say he would buy a new camera before paying a model. It toke the models about 8 sec  to ban him. roflmao
Oh, the lady that owns the chat is an agent in Paris. :-)

I'd like to get more involved with Discord groups. Are there any you'd suggest? If so, please DM me. Thanks!

G Reese wrote:
I hang out in a "chat room" on Discord. They help models get signed with agencies.  We had a gearhead come in that had the nerve to say he would buy a new camera before paying a model. It toke the models about 8 sec  to ban him. roflmao
Oh, the lady that owns the chat is an agent in Paris. :-)

Audrey Rinehart wrote:
I'd like to get more involved with Discord groups. Are there any you'd suggest? If so, please DM me. Thanks!

Me too. I set up an account, but I'm not exactly sure what I'm supposed to do there. I tried watching some Discord tutorials on Youtube but still didn't quite get it. But I'd like to figure it out.

Garry k wrote:
Live and Die with my Rebel ( for my Model Photography )

shoot Other thing with my I Phone

If I were a real Photographer I would buy a Hasselblad

But I’m not

Strange,.... could have fooled me. :-)