Koryn wrote:
My first ever shoot was nude.

It was not arousing then, nor has it ever been.

*shrug*

I guess it was just a job.   

Lovely Day Media wrote:
Think back to the first time you shot nudity (from either side of the camera) .... was it arousing for you? How many times did you have to do it before it wasn't arousing anymore?

Hell no. I have never had the thought using my 300mm f/2.8 as a sex toy. I mean...that thing is so big, it would inflict lot of pain for my booty.

Lovely Day Media wrote:
Think back to the first time you shot nudity (from either side of the camera) .... was it arousing for you?

No.  I expected to be, but I found that because I had kind of an idea of what I wanted the images to be, didn't have much time to shoot all the images I wanted, and was struggling with the flash equipment to get that right.  I did think that the figure I was shooting was a heck of a lot better looking that I thought it would be: it didn't do much more than increase the pressure to produce.

The shoot was successful - I got a bunch of images that went over well.  What a relief!

BobBarford Photo wrote:
I was concerned with camera settings, composition, and lighting!

This. And did I have enough film...

Risen Phoenix Photo wrote:
The question is a bit insulting, like nudity only correlates to sex.  It does not.  I shoot about 200 shoots a year they are all nude.  I have never been arroused.

I do however focus my mind on the technical aspects of the camera and what I intend to capture.  I look intently for beautiful body line , form, shadow and light.

You can appreciate the beauty of the human body in a respectful and artistic way

Why is this insulting to you? Nudity and sex are not the same thing, however, to have sex, there usually needs to be nudity. I don't think it's all that unusual to think of sexual things when one sees nudity ... until and unless one can get it in their mind that though there is nudity, there isn't anything sexual to be seen.

For instance ... if a doctor is working the ER one night and there has been a terrible car accident, Julia Roberts may come in on a stretcher in dire need of medical treatment. To administer said treatment, the doctor or perhaps a nurse will be required to cut her clothing off her. The doctor will have to see her completely nude.  We realize this isn't a sexual situation as one small misstep and she could die. What if this doctor is a young person who is early in his career and has not seen many women naked because he has spent the vast part of the last 8 years in school studying?

One would hope that he'd be able to put his arousal aside until at least the treatment has been administered and it is known that she is going to make it. What he does on his own time is his own business.

Photography isn't nearly as life critical most of the time and a person has to start somewhere. The human body is or can be an artistic thing but as a human being with thoughts and emotions that are typical of human beings, one can say it's unprofessional to get aroused in a particular situation but if one is photographing Julia Roberts (or someone equally as "interesting" completely nude and especially for the first time) it seems like one can focus on shutter speeds and apertures until they're blue in the face ... at some point they have to see what/who they're shooting.

I'll grant you that I'm not one who has ever shot nudity, real or implied, as yet. I had this discussion with someone else who is not a photographer or a model. They asked me how a person turns this off. The answer is I don't know myself well enough to convince them so I thought I'd ask those who might. If asking is insulting, what would it be if I showed up on a set to shoot my first nude shoot and had a complete tent in my pants?  It seems like that would be insulting (and many other things, too) even if I didn't say or do anything that was anything but professional.

Lovely Day Media wrote:

Why is this insulting to you? Nudity and sex are not the same thing, however, to have sex, there usually needs to be nudity. I don't think it's all that unusual to think of sexual things when one sees nudity ... until and unless one can get it in their mind that though there is nudity, there isn't anything sexual to be seen.

For instance ... if a doctor is working the ER one night and there has been a terrible car accident, Julia Roberts may come in on a stretcher in dire need of medical treatment. To administer said treatment, the doctor or perhaps a nurse will be required to cut her clothing off her. The doctor will have to see her completely nude.  We realize this isn't a sexual situation as one small misstep and she could die. What if this doctor is a young person who is early in his career and has not seen many women naked because he has spent the vast part of the last 8 years in school studying?

One would hope that he'd be able to put his arousal aside until at least the treatment has been administered and it is known that she is going to make it. What he does on his own time is his own business.

Photography isn't nearly as life critical most of the time and a person has to start somewhere. The human body is or can be an artistic thing but as a human being with thoughts and emotions that are typical of human beings, one can say it's unprofessional to get aroused in a particular situation but if one is photographing Julia Roberts (or someone equally as "interesting" completely nude and especially for the first time) it seems like one can focus on shutter speeds and apertures until they're blue in the face ... at some point they have to see what/who they're shooting.

I'll grant you that I'm not one who has ever shot nudity, real or implied, as yet. I had this discussion with someone else who is not a photographer or a model. They asked me how a person turns this off. The answer is I don't know myself well enough to convince them so I thought I'd ask those who might. If asking is insulting, what would it be if I showed up on a set to shoot my first nude shoot and had a complete tent in my pants?  It seems like that would be insulting (and many other things, too) even if I didn't say or do anything that was anything but professional.

You can appreciate but to be arroused is taking it to another level and not a welcome one.  Ask nude models what they think of photographers who arroused during a shoot.  And if you told them you were arroused that would not be professional .

To see nudity as indistinguishable from the sexual, is a by product of our puritanical history.

I hope you could walk around a nudist camp and not sport an errection.  (Just an example this is not drected in any derogatory way to you.

In photography we are focusing on many other aspects of the shot , not that the model is "smoking hot" 

This is what GWCs, do shoot only to see girls naked.  They don't seek to improve the quality of their work and they collect traveling playboy models like baseball cards.   

I see the body as an element of art a sculpted buy his/her movement and the light.  In art photography there is also an element of emotion that the model conveys.  So maybe it depends on the genre of nude photography you do.

Perhaps you should hire a model and shoot nudes so you get the sense of what dynamics are in play at a shoot. 

Just a thought.

Risen Phoenix

Risen Phoenix Photo wrote:
You can appreciate but to be arroused is taking it to another level and not a welcome one.  Ask nude models what they think of photographers who arroused during a shoot.  And if you told them you were arroused that would not be professional .

Perhaps you should hire a model and shoot nudes so you get the sense of what dynamics are in play at a shoot. 

Just a thought.

Risen Phoenix

I understand that arousal is not a welcomed idea. Unfortunately, I was male and attracted to females long before I was a photographer. As I said before, I'm sure that a nude model looking at a photographer with a tent in their pants is not what they had in mind when they got to their state of undress.  I'm okay with that. I'm just asking because I want to know if it's something one just does when they are attempting to shoot pictures (as opposed to just seeing women naked) or is this something that one has to build up to over time (turning the sexual part off).

If I should hire a model (for cash or pictures if someone would shoot TF) to do nudes and I were to get aroused, then what?

Just a thought.

Lovely Day Media wrote:

If I should hire a model (for cash or pictures if someone would shoot TF) to do nudes and I were to get aroused, then what?

Just a thought.

This sort of question is better suited to your Father or Uncle.

Lovely Day Media wrote:

I understand that arousal is not a welcomed idea. Unfortunately, I was male and attracted to females long before I was a photographer. As I said before, I'm sure that a nude model looking at a photographer with a tent in their pants is not what they had in mind when they got to their state of undress.  I'm okay with that. I'm just asking because I want to know if it's something one just does when they are attempting to shoot pictures (as opposed to just seeing women naked) or is this something that one has to build up to over time (turning the sexual part off).

If I should hire a model (for cash or pictures if someone would shoot TF) to do nudes and I were to get aroused, then what?

Just a thought.

Most of the models I shoot with would laugh or be appalled.  Really I have been attracted to females my whole life also, As I had have had instructors say.  Get you mind out of the gutter. 

You have to act professional and arrousal is never professional  unles you are a horn dog like Terry Richardson.

Carle Photography wrote:
This sort of question is better suited to your Father or Uncle.

Unfortunately, my father and uncles are gone and they weren't photographers even while they were here.

Risen Phoenix Photo wrote:

You have to act professional and arrousal is never professional  unles you are a horn dog like Terry Richardson.

This. And, if a doctor is aroused at seeing a patient in an ER he is in the wrong profession!

It's not a matter of turning it off but a matter of not letting yourself get turned on. If you can't do that then don't even think about shooting nudes. For you to even ask this question is very telling.

Isis22 wrote:

This. And, if a doctor is aroused at seeing a patient in an ER he is in the wrong profession!

It's not a matter of turning it off but a matter of not letting yourself get turned on. If you can't do that then don't even think about shooting nudes. For you to even ask this question is very telling.

I have been working around Doctors and nurses for about 20 years all over the country and I hear them say they get turned on all the time.  I never hear anyone make a big deal that it happens, the important thing is not acting on it or behaving inappropriately.

Lovely Day Media wrote:
Think back to the first time you shot nudity (from either side of the camera) ....

Back Side of Camera - It was not arousing.

Front Side of Camera with Female Photographer - It was not arousing but it was exhilarating, liberating, and interesting.  None of these 3 were present from the back side of the camera except for interesting (but at a lower level).

But just one worthless opinion.

JLC Images wrote:
I have been working around Doctors and nurses for about 20 years all over the country and I hear them say they get turned on all the time.  I never hear anyone make a big deal that it happens, the important thing is not acting on it or behaving inappropriately.

eww. hence, the smocks and scrubs?

JLC Images wrote:

I have been working around Doctors and nurses for about 20 years all over the country and I hear them say they get turned on all the time.  I never hear anyone make a big deal that it happens, the important thing is not acting on it or behaving inappropriately.

I worked in nursing for 5 years. I had one doctor act very inappropriately towards me while I was performing CPR on a patient in the ER. I should have reported him because there were plenty of witnesses. As I said before, you have no business being in that profession if you can't keep yourself under control.

Isis22 wrote:
I worked in nursing for 5 years. I had one doctor act very inappropriately towards me while I was performing CPR on a patient in the ER. I should have reported him because there were plenty of witnesses. As I said before, you have no business being in that profession if you can't keep yourself under control.

trying to summon some inner perv, to even fathom how that scenario could even be considered remotely worth perving out on...nope, i got nuttin'.

jesus h.

Isis22 wrote:
I worked in nursing for 5 years. I had one doctor act very inappropriately towards me while I was performing CPR on a patient in the ER. I should have reported him because there were plenty of witnesses. As I said before, you have no business being in that profession if you can't keep yourself under control.

Acting on it is VERY different and I don't know anywhere that would tolerate it (anymore).  I was speaking more about being aroused or sexually attracted to not crossing the line.

GK photo wrote:

eww. hence, the smocks and scrubs?

And the low clipboard

Model Sarah wrote:
WTF.

Yeah nude = sex. Right.

I seriously cannot stand people like you OP.

Where did I say nude = sex?

If you seriously can't stand people like me, might I suggest sitting down and/or not engaging in the conversation?

Lovely Day Media wrote:
Where did I say nude = sex?

If you seriously can't stand people like me, might I suggest sitting down and/or not engaging in the conversation?

Someone else already called you on it but I'll go ahead and quote your response to that because your OP is CLEARLY stating that.

Lovely Day Media wrote:
Why is this insulting to you? Nudity and sex are not the same thing, however, to have sex, there usually needs to be nudity. I don't think it's all that unusual to think of sexual things when one sees nudity.

I'm also pretty damn sure you are the idiot that used to go around here saying parents that have children who have autism should take their kids outside to cure it. You've changed your name so many times I can't keep up.

Isis22 wrote:
It's not a matter of turning it off but a matter of not letting yourself get turned on. If you can't do that then don't even think about shooting nudes. For you to even ask this question is very telling.

Isn't turning it off and not letting it get turned on the same thing on some level?

If this is very telling, what is it telling? That arousal is something that happens with me sometimes? I don't see how that's a terrible thing. It may be inappropriate at times and highly unprofessional at others but if a person is new to something ...

A woman I know used to do pedicures. She said the most annoying thing was when someone couldn't sit still because she was rubbing their feet and they were highly ticklish. I can see how it would be annoying with them moving around and laughing hysterically, but how does one turn that off? I haven't figured that out after all these years.

Model Sarah wrote:
I'm also pretty damn sure you are the idiot that used to go around here saying parents that have children who have autism should take their kids outside to cure it. You've changed your name so many times I can't keep up.

I don't know how you're pretty sure of that. I'm yet to change my name on here even once and I don't know who said anything about taking autistic children outside to cure it.

In any event, I didn't say sex = nudity. I said when one has sex, there is usually nudity and when one sees nudity, one usually thinks sexual things. Maybe I should clarify and say I do, maybe others do, too. Is it a terrible thing? I don't think it is.  I understand that some people have double standards going on in their heads where a woman who thinks sexual things is a _______ (fill in whatever nasty name you like) where a guy who does it is "normal".

Whatever the case, I started this discussion as a way of both ending the problem before it starts AND to have more talking points with that other person as I wasn't able to convince even myself that it can be turned off (or not allowed to be turned on if they're not the same thing).  If this makes me an idiot, I'm that but I don't think I am.

Lovely Day Media wrote:
Think back to the first time you shot nudity (from either side of the camera) .... was it arousing for you? How many times did you have to do it before it wasn't arousing anymore?

Well..........I am not sure what kind of answer you would get other than

1.  Model:  Hell no, that is gross.  What do you think I am, you perv!!!
2.  Photographer:  I was just so into creating my masterpiece, I don't have time to get a boner. 

Would you expect a model will come here and say:  Dear Penthouse, In my last nude photoshoot, my panties got so wet.....  Within 30 sec, her inbox will be complete full.   

Then along ago Helmut Newton said:  Any photographer who says he's not a voyeur is either stupid or a liar.  If you look around here on MM there are hundred of couple who met on the photoshoot.  We are all human, shit does happen.  If you got turn on on the set, just be discreet.  If you must, take a break or take a cold shower.  You don't need to advertize or  communicate to the other person.  Getting arousal is not a bad thing, at least you know you are normal; the thing functions properly.  What so unprofessional about it.  It is part of the body function.  Making a big fuss and telling the model you have a boner is unprofessional.   

So stop being a hypocrite.  Remember what Helmut said.  We are not a five yo here.