Looking through the art-nude feed over recent weeks I've come to the conclusion that their is a dearth of talent when it comes to shooting the male nude. Just to be sure I scoured over 1,000 of the recent uploads to this feed and tried to categorize the male shots into 3 groups.

Art-nude
Attempt at art-nude
Just a Penis

The categorization was subjective of course and believe me I HAVE seen shots of just a penis that I considered to be art. I also decided that a series of shots from the same shoot were to be classified as one entry, so thirty shots by a drunk flapping his todger at his cell-phone was only counted once in the penis group. The results were as follows.

20% Art-nude
30% Attempted Art-Nude
50% Just a penis

Some point in the future I will seek out a male art-nude model (not much chance around here) and attempt to shoot some of my own stuff, but in the meantime here are some of the best I found in my research.





Regards

Terry

In my photography profiles I usually have the comment, ‘I reject the catwalk/playboy stereotype of beauty, I believe beauty is not confined to one body shape or ethnicity.’ A few people here and on other sites have asked me questions about that statement so here are a couple of the answers I have given them.

Question

You have some amazing images! I noticed in your profile you say that you reject the catwalk/playboy stereotype of beauty… how do you relate that statement to the images of models that seem to fit a lot of those characteristics?

Answer

I’ve been meaning to put the answer your question in a blog/journal/whatever for some time as the apparent contradiction bothers me too.

There are two factors that influence what appears in my published work.

1. Heavier women are less likely to put themselves out there as models, and the ones that do are often subjected to what I consider abuse. Most models out there conform to the ‘norm’ at least with regards to body shape.

2. The pool of models in my area is very small so I work with whoever is available. Even if I had the money I would still find it difficult to pick who I wanted. If I found myself in a town/city with lots of 5’2” 130-150lb models I would be a busy man indeed.

I get a reasonable amount of private work from wives/girlfriends wanting shots for their husbands/boyfriends. Many of them tell me that the deciding factor when selecting me to shoot their images was due to that statement. Even the slender girls have body issues and I feel that statement reassures them too.

Occasionally a private client will allow me to use their images and I love that when it happens, but of course they usually want their pictures to stay private and so the public never get to see.


Another question relating to the same quote on my profile

Question

Tell us about your most unusual nude model?

Answer

I don’t think I could describe any of my models as ‘unusual’, they are all very beautiful women just in different ways. I do find some models more difficult to shoot of course. I find shooting tall thin girls more of a challenge than those with a fuller figure. When I look for potential models I start off trying to find someone between 5-0 and 5-3 and weighing between 130-150lbs. Living in Shreveport however means I can’t be so selective, and in some ways it has helped me because I am forced to work harder on my images.

One of my favorite images was recently chosen to appear in a Red Bubble publication called "The City"

You can check out the publication here [link]

If you want to help out a starving artist you can always buy a print of the image chosen [link]

Terry