My first photo shoot for Matt’s Models.

I found the girl through one of the first agents I ever worked with. How did I find that agent? I called Hustler Magazine and asked for the “Talent” department. A women came on the line. I asked: “Where do you get your models?” She said: “Call this guy” and gave me a number. Now I’m only guessing she may have been new at the job, but as the adult internet developed it became a cardinal sin to reveal your sources of models or to refer models to your competitors. To this day it boggles my mind why she gave me that guys number but I’m really fucking glad she did. He and I ended up having a long and fruitful business and personal relationship. He was the source of a huge number of the best girls to ever hit the industry.

At the time I was hiring a photographer to shoot models on film in Los Angeles exclusively for some of the first adult sites. I rented houses in Hollywood, sat around a pool and watched my photographer shoot naked girls (There’s worse jobs right?).

Digital cameras had just started arriving so I went to Fry’s Electronics and bought a Canon 1.3 megapixel digital camera. I started experimenting with some behind the scenes stuff on my clients shoots.

All I can remember about the first shoot / model was I thought she was really sweet and probably at least bisexual if not lesbian (guessing). I still wondered if there was a chance I could have sex with her?

In my first days of shooting I was constrained by my virtually nonexistent budget. So I would make the most of my location (usually the living room, bedroom, bathroom, balcony and garage of my condo). Sometimes I would use some local outdoor locations or in my car. I didn’t know a single thing about the technical aspects of photography.

I still know very little.

Very shortly after this shoot I was spending much of my time in L.A. hotel rooms just one hour from my home shooting for my own website. As I’ve stated before: I’ve spent more time in more hotel rooms with more naked women without getting laid than any other red blooded straight male on the planet. While this is sort of tongue in cheek, in what other context would you find this relational situation?

There are some really interesting little details on these first crappy photo shoots. You can see I was shooting out of my condominium in Orange County. To this day it’s harder to find models in nice affluent suburban areas like the beach cites of Southern California so I’d have  them commute from L.A. / San Diego or I would have to make the drive and rent a hotel or house.

You can see my old computer, my floppy disks, thick unwieldy phone  books .We didn’t have cell phones and internet photos were mainly being scanned from 35mm. Digital photography was in it’s infancy and video was non existent. In fact the internet was pretty much a mystery to most people back in those days. Models figured nobody they knew would ever see their nudie photos.

Also evident is the first stages of development of my “style”. With my clients shoots I would print out cheat sheets of poses or I would bring mens magazines to my photographer and say: “Make sure you get this pose or that position”. When I finally got behind the camera I started shooting pretty organically. It was a combination of getting the traditional Hustler Magazine style shots with whatever I personally thought looked good through the lens. I knew I wanted shoots to start with some type of clothing, lingerie or bikini and progress to nudity. A sequential strip tease. Yet I didn’t want the girls to look like strippers, rather the girl-next-door.

These girls are some of the first Internet nude models. The bold and the brave. Pioneers in my book. Hats off! (or clothes off I guess).