Equipment

When I started out shooting women in 1997, I used my original Sears 35mm camera (made by Ricoh) which I bought in the early '80s. I added a number of Pentax K-mount lenses, and even more Ricoh bodies. There was only one place locally that would develop nude photos, so I used them. They soon added the ability to scan the negatives to CD during the printing process, and instead of making poor scans of prints, I eliminated the prints all-together and had them burn all my rolls to CD.

But this was getting to be ridiculously expensive. It's not like I could run to the drug store and have these done for much less. As I'm sure you're all aware, we live in incredibly conservative times. My only recourse was to go digital.

I currently use a Pentax K10d DSLR. I had an older 6 MP Pentax, and was quite happy with the factory 18-55 lens that came with it. However, I decided to sell the other camera like I bought it - as a kit. The version I have of the 18-55 from the new camera & lens bundle is not nearly as good as the one I had. Most of the time I shoot with a Tamron 70-300.

My lighting gear consists of a couple standard fixtures on poles. I slap in daylight-balanced compact florescents which - believe you me - ain't that compact! Each one equals a 500 watt "regular" bulb, and is approx 1 foot in length. I back those up with a couple smaller, 100 watt daylight CFs in clip-on fixtures. Rarely used any more, I also have a nice set of strobes made in the 1960's.

I shoot nude women, but I lust after camera "kit" (as the Brits call it). No sooner had I gotten the 10 MP Pentax with anti-shake technology built in, than they came out with a 14MP version. And, since I'm retrofitting the loft of my barn into a studio, I'm on the prowl for additional lighting and assorted erotic props.

I do all my shoots in RAW mode, and process them with LightRoom(tm). Anything I want to put on the 'net is usually resized down to 96 dpi, and 800 pixels on the longest side. With the K10d, I can get very nice 20 x 30 prints from even just 50% of an image. It's a much better camera than I am a photographer, frankly!