Model Expos

I attended one of those Model Expo events not too long ago. A close friend of mine, Kori, is a glamour model and she was invited to participate. Rick, a photographer and also a good friend, tagged along as well.

I had never been to an event of this sort before and thought it might be fun. Plus, I always enjoy spending time with Kori. She's a really fun person to hang out with.

This particular event was organized and promoted by a photographer, Moses Marquez, who is a great guy and whose work you can view, well some of it that is, at his website, SeductiveVisions.com

Kori, Rick, and I arrived at the upscale hotel where Moses had booked his event. We found our way to the large banquet hall where the expo would take place. It looked much like any small, business convention that hotels routinely host: There were linen-draped tables setup throughout the hall with plenty of room for aisles between them. After checking in with Moses' people at the door, we found our way to the table Kori had been assigned. Once there, we spread out plenty of prints of Kori's work and sat down to wait for the expo's guests. Many other models were doing the same throughout the hall. Some of them had large, full-size "stand-ups" of themselves and some even had large-screen TVs that would play glamour-video footage of themselves.


The models, of course, hoped to sell prints and DVDs of their work to the expo's guests. In all, there were probably about 40 or 50 models in attendance. Personally, I didn't think there was going to be much bang-up business selling prints. Here's how I had it figured: Since most of the public attendees were going to be photographers themselves, mostly hobbyists, and they were going to show up with cameras around their necks, they were going to be more interested in photographing these models than purchasing someone else's work of them. But what do I know? Maybe there was potential for brisk, image-selling business?

Of course, I brought one of my camera's as well. I wasn't sure how I wanted to shoot some of the girls at the event. I knew I wasn't going to want to walk around and ask models to pose in typical glamour poses without the benefit of lighting (other than an on-camera strobe) and in that kind of an environment. But ya never know, ya know? Better to have my gear with me than wish I had brought it.

I noticed many of the models at the show were Asian... make that AZN which has become something of hip term for describing young Asian-Americans. I also found out many of these girls model for import-car magazines of which there are many, especially in Southern California.

Soon, the expo's public attendees began arriving. Before long, there were hundreds of them and, sure enough, they all had cameras. Some of them brought point-and-shoot cameras but quite a few of them had some really expensive gear! I saw a lot of expensive glass on the front of a lot of expensive bodies. It seemed to me that Canon was better represented than Nikon and just about everyone was shooting digital.

Before long, I became bored out of my gourd and I needed to do something other than sit at Kori's table watching her flirtaciously hustle her stuff. There were other side-line events at the show, like having individual girls up on a small stage posing for the masses as a DJ cranked some hard-beat, hip-hop music. And, of course, when the girls were on the stage many of them came dangerously close to flashing a naked breast here, or a full set of butt-cheeks there, which stimulated volleys of strobe flashes from the appreciative throngs of shooters. For me, that got old fairly quickly. Maybe I'm a little too jaded in these circumstances? I don't know.

I began walking around the room asking models to pose with one of the photographs they hoped to sell. With some of the girls, I asked them to attempt the same expressions or poses that were in the photos they held up or stood with. I don't know why this seemed like a cool thing to do but, at the time, it did.

It was a fun day. Pretty much any day with a camera in hand and a pretty girl in front of it is fun. Kori won some prize money that was part of one of the side-line events. I don't remember if she sold any images or not. I don't know if these sorts of model expos take place in your geographic locations but, if they do, you might find it fun to attend. If you're a shooter who pays models, you might find a likely model or two for your work. I noticed a fair number of shooters in attendance also had portfolios with them and, as they showed their ports to different models, I guessed they were looking to set-up some TFCD shoots with them.

My pal, Kori, is the model in the first pic in this post. She's holding a print of an image Moses had shot of her for his website. I don't recall the names of any of the other models I snapped. Pictured below is another shot of Kori. I snapped this one, using available light, in a small, landscaped area adjacent to the valet parking in front of the hotel.