NSFW Pod 031 - Rhowdy Digital Images

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[00:00:00] Matthew Holliday: Good day, everyone. And welcome back to the not safe for work photography podcast. There are thousands of models and photographers, creating an adult content using modern platforms and taking control of their own creative lives. Today we're interviewing Wilbur Walk, who is the owner of rowdy digital images. 

This is a little different than our normal interview. We've typically in the past interviewed models and photographers and examined the relationship between amateur photographers and paid models. What was doing things a little bit differently as he is targeting mainstream America with his boudoir photography. 

So Wilbur, how did you get where you are in photography? Doing boudoir photography, professional. 

[00:00:50] Rhowdy Digital Images: It kind of found me two years ago. I had, find myself out of a job. I'd been a marketing graphic designer for 13 years and I started hanging out at a hot rod shop and offered to do their online media marketing stuff. While they did some work on a motorcycle for me. And while doing that, I would offer photo packages as a prize for the crews in winners, you know, bring in your hot rod classic car or whatever. 

And I had some friends that did pin-up modeling and winter free photo package. These guys who. Tens, maybe hundreds of thousand dollars into these cars. Not one of them took me up on a free photo session,  

[00:01:46] Matthew Holliday: Hmm. 

[00:01:47] Rhowdy Digital Images: but the wives were all like, wow. Pinup sounds like it would be so much fun. love to do that. I love those pictures. So whenever I left the hot rod shop and moved into my own studio, I just kind of. Cars fall by the wayside and started offering the pinup and booed war shots for the wives. And that's been close to five years now.  

[00:02:17] Matthew Holliday: It's like you're up on it. And I'm very surprised that kind of the wives came forward and did that. 

[00:02:21] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah. I mean, it's, it's all these cars are their pride and joy and they can't go five minutes without polishing. But yes, they, they don't want photo session to a poster of their own car with a beautiful woman standing beside it in their garage.  

[00:02:42] Matthew Holliday: Oh there, my flare wife might be unhappy about that if she's not the beautiful one, but that's what you should have done. You should have done a poster session with their wife in the car. 

[00:02:50] Rhowdy Digital Images: That was part of the offer. But  

[00:02:52] Matthew Holliday: Yeah.  

[00:02:52] Rhowdy Digital Images: just  

[00:02:54] Matthew Holliday: Maybe they're jealous their wife leaning on their car. 

In the past, we mostly talked with photographers who she paid models. So I assume you've done some of that as well. I think I saw some models that I recognize in your portfolio, correct?  

[00:03:09] Rhowdy Digital Images: Oh, yes.  

[00:03:10] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:03:10] Rhowdy Digital Images: there's there's a that have been your desk before me. That  

[00:03:15] Matthew Holliday: I recognize Dayla for sure.  

[00:03:17] Rhowdy Digital Images: Oh yes. She  

[00:03:18] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. That's that's what I've been told. 

[00:03:22] Rhowdy Digital Images: Hopefully get her into the new studio again here. Once it's all set up and going.  

[00:03:28] Matthew Holliday: So let's talk about the difference between shooting models and shooting normal people or civilians. However you might call them for most models. They're typically very comfortable with telling you what their boundaries are. How do you determine a boundary for a civilian? Do you, I imagine you must have some sort of conversation with them before you start shooting and really kind of feel out what they want and what they're looking for. 

[00:03:52] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah, it's I have, you know, IB a book, so I'll call them the discount your local Barnes and Nobles that have 1,001 pin illustrations and a of sports illustrated. Swimsuit issue and books like that. And just, I even have, you know, some old easy rider magazines, you know, look, we can show off your like this or whatever, and you kind of pay attention to what they flip past quickly and what they you know? 

Okay. Is this the kind of thing you're looking for here? And then as. The session progresses, you know, start at I usually do a backdrop set of they wanted the studio that day, because obviously those are their comfy clothes. And then keep moving and moving and, you know, near the end of the session hour and a half, two hours later, like, okay, would you want to try something a little more daring, something like this? What about we just imply something? There's been few that I have come back a couple of times and I kind of liken it to getting a tattoo that this was their new addiction because I've had probably half a dozen. Women who come back for three, four different sessions. And if they're really timid in their first one, and then they see those photos and they liked them, then the next time they come back are a little bolder and they want to try something more. So it's really just about helping them find where they're comfortable at. And every once in a while, there are some. Some surprises in there.  

[00:05:56] Matthew Holliday: What type of boudoir photos do civilians usually want? Have you noticed a real, any patterns and the types of photos they want or poses that they prefer? 

[00:06:05] Rhowdy Digital Images: I don't see any real patterns, but there's some that they tend to, like more than others. My studio has four or five different areas set up. And the, edgier, the more shadowy high contrast the photos are, they seem to like those more than anyone's setting or anything because, you know, no one really walks around on a sunny day lingerie, in their sunroom, sipping a cup of tea. Most of the section that goes on. Dimly lit room with a lot of mood and atmosphere to it. And so that's what I try to bring out in, work that I do.  

[00:06:57] Matthew Holliday: Yeah, that's a good point though. I mean, a lot of the fine art photographers and even some of the erotic photographers, they tend to do a lot of, you know, like outdoors. You know, waterfalls and trails and buildings and stuff like that. But in reality, most people really seem to confine their activities to the bedroom. 

[00:07:18] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah. I mean, I, I get the, the fantasy and the Harlequin romance book cover feel, but Yeah. 

But If the popularity of a shades of gray taught us anything, it's that there's a little secret frequenting in everybody. 

[00:07:45] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:07:46] Rhowdy Digital Images: And so then they want their, their fantasy to be a little more gritty and grounded. 

In reality, I guess you could say.  

[00:07:55] Matthew Holliday: It's interesting. I would not have expected that I would have expected you to have gotten a lot more kind of, not weird exactly, but you know, just a little more daring, but. 

[00:08:07] Rhowdy Digital Images: I've done some fetish shoots done some couples stuff there only white candles as lighting gets a good response. People want a little bit of. Mystery and maybe even dangerous thrown into it.  

[00:08:28] Matthew Holliday: So I have two questions actually about that. First of all, trying to take pictures with just white candle light. Do you bet, I imagine you've got to back it up with some other kind of lighting or do you just, just use the candles? That seems like a real tough technical. 

[00:08:45] Rhowdy Digital Images: It is. Takes a while to get it down. And I'm not sure that I have every time yet, but the model light on a strobe, the low model light on a strobe pointed at the wall to get just enough reflection that you don't really notice that it's not the candles light. For awhile, I couldn't figure out why the pictures are taken, had a red tint to them turning it But they had this weird red tint to them. And then I realized one day that it was because I was shooting by the exit sign over there. And whenever I I cut out the main lights and just lit with the cameras. 

It was getting red glow from the exit sign.  

[00:09:37] Matthew Holliday: That's funny. 

[00:09:38] Rhowdy Digital Images: It gave it a real hammer, film, kind of feel, which is actually kind of cold, but.  

[00:09:44] Matthew Holliday: I mean, yeah. My second question, actually, this isn't on the list and I apologize for springing on you, but I didn't even think about your studio. You said you've got three or four different setup, and I know you mentioned you're between cities at the moment, but what are your general, what setups do you have? 

Kind of pre-made and ready to go. 

[00:10:02] Rhowdy Digital Images: The studio that I moved to Florida was about a 20 by 20. Cinderblock room. And along one of the long walls, I had a painters draw cloth, that heavy canvas kind on a pool that served as one size fits all backdrop that I could throw gels on and stuff like that. Or I could hang a backdrop in front of it. So that was my backdrop area in one corner. I put up Rick paneling with those padded leather headboard squares, and frame that in red curtains to kind of make a, a stage area you know, a padded room area, room kind of thing. Right beside that, I had five pieces of the corrugated steel man into the. There was a recessed window, not far from that. So I could use that they use natural light on the corrugated steel. Plus I could have the model sit in window and I had, I was ground level. So I had frosted on the windows for privacy and turned that window into a giant softbox. So it gave this real nice magazine lighting on the face and soften everything. So sitting in there, you know, behind it, white curtain and peeking out from it. A lot of the women like that.  

[00:11:37] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. Is that the, I think I see some of those on your Instagram. 

[00:11:43] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah there, I lucked into a clawfoot bathtub that I could just slide around and put anywhere I wanted in the, in the shooting area. 

[00:11:54] Matthew Holliday: Yeah, I've definitely heard. I've heard multiple models say how much they really want to do something like that. 

[00:12:00] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah. It's a lot of fun. Turns out real, really great. The place I'm moving into we'll have hot water. So that will be a plus. 

[00:12:13] Matthew Holliday: So you can actually do actually do baths instead of. 

[00:12:17] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah. You know, the space on the other side of yours. Two bay garage, hot water, really isn't first priority. So I kind of. 

went without it for a while.  

[00:12:30] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:12:32] Rhowdy Digital Images: and I had one area where I took it's a bulletin board paper. That's one of the, a distress brick wall. And I got some. Adhesive and straight down the drywall with that, put that up there. 

So that was, I could like that with a, spot and it would look like a street light in a back alley somewhere.  

[00:12:57] Matthew Holliday: Sure. 

[00:12:58] Rhowdy Digital Images: I had a school desk I could throw in front of it. And it looked like in an old school building, I think. So I had a couple old wingback chairs if one of them. Really wanted to do a bedroom scene. 

I had three different headboards, a bed frame, and an air mattress that I could, which I've been to different take different bedrooms. So the smoke And, mirrors, but it all out well.  

[00:13:31] Matthew Holliday: and and that's really cool. That's a good idea. Sorry. I'm actually, I'm actually checking out your Instagram feed and noticing like the different backgrounds, like, oh, that was shot in front of the corrugated steel and, oh, there's the leather squares he was talking about. 

[00:13:46] Rhowdy Digital Images: And what the original landlords of my old studio were really, really nice to me. They had a pet grooming place across the street that the upstairs. Second floor was a gutted apartment. They had a hoarder in there  

[00:14:05] Matthew Holliday: Oh, 

[00:14:05] Rhowdy Digital Images: they had a strip it down to the floorboards and the studs in the rafters were like, if you want to shoot up there, go right ahead. 

So there's a, if you see the pictures of a girl with a black angel wings, that was, that was shot up there and it got an apartment. Down over the hill, there was railroad tracks cream graffitied underpass. And if you went the other direction, there was the back end of an auto salvage yard. So it was kind of like a nice, nice little creative campus out there that we'll probably end up bootlegging some time in the future as well.  

[00:14:47] Matthew Holliday: Yeah, that's just, you're seeing. 

Yeah, I'm looking at at the moment. They, the angel wings, Karen James carrion, James. Yeah. That background is wacky. What was the back? What did you, was that at cloth that you laid out across it or was that the actual like destroyed? 

[00:15:04] Rhowdy Digital Images: The one where she's standing up with the black angel wings and everything.  

[00:15:07] Matthew Holliday: I don't know. This one's a kneeling. 

[00:15:10] Rhowdy Digital Images: Oh 

the background is like a black and white kind of pattern. 

[00:15:14] Matthew Holliday: Yep. 

[00:15:17] Rhowdy Digital Images: Some weird remnant fabric that I found at a local surplus store.  

Thought that's, that's really interesting. I don't get yards of that and see what I can use it for. 

[00:15:26] Matthew Holliday: I see the one where she's standing now. All right. Yep. Yep. That one's a little further down that one's Kirsten Miller. Okay. So there's a couple of different, so the wings just hanging around the the wings are not the models. The wings are yours.  

[00:15:37] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah.  

[00:15:38] Matthew Holliday: So where do you find all your props and stuff? You mentioned a surplus store. 

Do you just kind of, you head up flea markets and stuff or. 

[00:15:45] Rhowdy Digital Images: We markets surplus places, not sure. Where, where your average, if you ever heard of a place called  

[00:15:55] Matthew Holliday: Sorry.  

[00:15:55] Rhowdy Digital Images: L I E S  

[00:15:56] Matthew Holliday: Oh, my mother loves it. My mother loves these. 

[00:16:02] Rhowdy Digital Images: That's where I get my, curtains and I got the. The laminate flooring for the studio and stuff from, and it's basically just a, I hit up Goodwill and salvation army for stuff. If I see something that I think, Ooh, that's kind of interesting. 

I'll nine times out of 10. I'll get it and just put it somewhere in the studio and see what I can use it for. And I've, I've gotten an old Footlocker. All my cares and the food trying to have come from Goodwill. So it's all about repurposing something when you find it. 

[00:16:45] Matthew Holliday: I started doing a little bit of that occasionally. And then I realized that I did not have any space, but if I had a studio, maybe a, well let's move on. Let's talk about why, why do people approach it through to our photography? 

[00:17:01] Rhowdy Digital Images: There's a multitude of reasons. Big life events. They just had a child they're about to get married. One woman came in because she had just lost. I think she said close to 300 pounds. After having the gastric bypass or whatever done,  

Had one model come in, she had suffered a late term miscarriage and she in her words wanted to get her sexy back,  

[00:17:33] Matthew Holliday: Hmm. 

[00:17:34] Rhowdy Digital Images: to do it while she still had some of the, the baby fat on that way, it was kind of paying homage. To one thing. Wow. Capturing another. Yeah. And it's, a lot of different reasons. Some of them just think, oh, this would be fun to do. Especially, especially when I throw in what I call my tattoo showcases where it's kind of. Sleight of hand. if you always like, I see you have nice tattoo that goes up your arm and across your shoulder blade, but it's always covered up. You can't see it without looking in a mirror or looking at it upside down. Here's here's my card. Why don't you come in? And we can do something special with that. And they seem to really like that. Every once in a while, I can. Set up a vendor space at different shows. And in October there was a tattoo expo over Pittsburgh. That was one of my best events ever, because those people are all about looking at their ink and being proud of their artwork and got lot of response from that better than an entire summer of showing up. Like weekends and trying to get a better word, biker checks, interested in what I do. 

[00:19:02] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. I want to talk a little bit about the biker stuff later. And I saw a couple of photos around that, but let's let's keep going. Let's keep, let's keep going through these questions and we'll hit that later. Have you ever had to deal with jealous partners of any of your clients? 

[00:19:14] Rhowdy Digital Images: Not in the studio. I know there's any book you up it on shooting booed war or glamour shots, however they want to word it. They always say about don't let boyfriends come to the shoot with you because it will just get sorts of butt hurt and ruin the session. And I found the opposite to be true. I encourage. People to bring one friend or their significant other if it's not a surprise with them, because it, it distracts them from me and what I'm doing, and it gives them something to play off of. One of my favorite shots is of a girl that brought her. Daughter. I think she might've been at the time, five or six into the studio with her. And the was playing with one of my props and we heard this thud behind us and I broke it. I happened to at the very. That mom's face reacted to that. it's one of my favorite shots because it's that, it's just so natural and organic. know the story behind it, no one else does. 

And they're just like, oh wow. That picture's really cool. I really liked, oh, well, let me tell you the story behind that. So there's, there's all sorts of reasons why to have someone come in with you, if you're doing something like. Because it, you know, I'm not even delving into the protective part of it, which unfortunately is part of what we do, but just the there's, there's three people there. 

So that means two people. We're going to be telling you how great you look whenever you dive that you do. And so it's majority rules and it makes things. The only real jealous spouse I had to deal with was I was a, a bike weekend and this guy came by and he's looking at the photos I had on display. And he said that woman there in the pink, you have other photos. Oh, Yeah. 

And I flipping through my arms going here's this one of her and she really liked us. Yeah. That's my ex-wife. She didn't start doing this kind of stuff till she lost, lost a lot of weight and then she didn't have time for me. 

[00:21:58] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:21:58] Rhowdy Digital Images: And oh, okay. I kind of, you know, took a step back to put the table between me and him. And later on that night, You know, for as upset as he thought he was, he seemed to have no problems bringing his friends around and going, that's her right there. that picture. That's her right there. yeah. 

Hey, thanks. Thanks for bringing people by my booth power. I appreciate you that  

[00:22:27] Matthew Holliday: Wow. Yeah, that'd be real interesting to have that.  

[00:22:33] Rhowdy Digital Images: yeah.  

[00:22:34] Matthew Holliday: So, how do you build your business as a visual art photographer? Do you typically do local advertising? Do you rely on word of mouth? I, you have a studio. So I imagine there's a certain number of people that pass by social media. 

[00:22:45] Rhowdy Digital Images: It's mostly social media. 

And getting out to vendor shows, bridal expos showing up at the local Harley dealers weekends when I can get in there. The tattoo expo this summer, I'm going to be no, I, that seems to be real popular to have one weekend a month or two weekends a month, for cover band, come in and on a show at local venues. one of them I'm going to be a vendor of their, their summer series. So there's eight or nine shows that. All right in front of the rock and roll crowd of the area. I've ran some Facebook ads which is a strange experience that I haven't quite got the handle it yet. It seems, you know, I get nothing locally, but they love me and Columbus and New Jersey and  

[00:23:45] Matthew Holliday: Ah, 

[00:23:47] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah, it's your, I, I guess it's the big city people looking for someone who's not charging big city prices. I'll take.  

[00:24:03] Matthew Holliday: That's fair. That kind of leads into the next question. Is there, I mean, you're still making a living doing this, but does this, how does this compare to some of the other types of photography, weddings and, you know, senior pictures and portraits and that sort of stuff. Is this more or less? 

[00:24:19] Rhowdy Digital Images: I would say it's less? 

viable because not everybody wants it and you're not going to turn these into. Oh, maybe you could, your, your Christmas card and grandma a copy of these. But my side of the screen is a lot less crowded than those who shoot the weddings and the senior pictures and everything because they, they, they crop up everywhere. 

I mean, you won't walk into your local if they have a community bulletin board or the back. Your local Sheetz or Wawa or whatever it might be in your area. If they have a bulletin board for people to put up stuff, and you'll probably find at least four or five, you know, Joe Smith, photography, business cards printed out, tacked up there. So I like being a big fish in a little on. I was a graphic designer alarm large independent weather service, we'll say. And that was one of the lessons I learned there that it's better to be an expert at thing than it is to try it. Everybody, the old adage of, everything is in bold letterings and nothing is so I, I like being the only one that focuses on this and being the in quotes expert  

[00:26:08] Matthew Holliday: Mm.  

[00:26:08] Rhowdy Digital Images: on it.  

[00:26:10] Matthew Holliday: Yeah, I actually, it's funny. I actually have that. I've been having that discussion in my current job, not even in photography. I went from working at a very small bank where, you know, I was the expert in security and then I'm now I'm working at a very large company where there are a lot of experts in security. 

And I think I liked it better at the bank where I was the one who knew everything. And so there's definitely something to be said, like everybody's got to kind of choose their own path.  

[00:26:38] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah.  

[00:26:40] Matthew Holliday: I imagine that building your portfolio as a business presents some interesting challenges, mostly because since you're targeting, you know, mainstream people, civilians, normy is however you want to call them. 

A lot of them probably don't want their pictures end up on your website. They want, you know, their copy of the pictures and they want all of their copies destroyed. So how do you build your portfolio for what. 

[00:27:03] Rhowdy Digital Images: I asked them outright. Do you, you mind me posting some of these or they'll say, right off the top, I really want to do this, but no one can ever find out. I have one client who said she really wanted to do this, but she really wanted her privacy. And I said, oh, that's fine. Post anything, if you don't want me to, she's like, oh no, if they're good, I want you to post them. Just, I don't want you to show my face.  

[00:27:35] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:27:35] Rhowdy Digital Images: of the photos I have of her, her face is in complete shadow, which is really kind of cool. It takes it into the, the body scape area of it all. So, you know, and her session plus her heart. Spent probably 45 minutes on me trying to nail down the light, shining through the Venetian blind, creating the, the slat shadows on, or, you know, working out all the books of that drill. 

We got the shots that I pictured in my head, but as long as her wasn't trying, she was happy with it. Can probably, I say that there's probably only ever been three, maybe four. Women who said that I don't want these going anywhere, but here and there there's some that I hesitate to post, or I give a, a long grace period to like, if someone comes in and one day in the spring, I did two bridal sessions back to back. And those women, because. They were meant as a special gift for somebody else. I am holding off on posting any of those until I know it's been at least a year. That way it's, it's not pimping out their special day for my purposes. And then I want them be genuine pictures like. She's my getting married because there's, there's that much of anti-marketing in me that I want it to be genuine.  

[00:29:32] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:29:33] Rhowdy Digital Images: So I definitely want to post some of these whenever it's time, because they were genuine brides coming in for that jet genuine experience. But I don't want to be real quick about it to where someone's coming up saying, Hey, here's your RSVP? 

And I saw your pictures online. 

[00:29:56] Matthew Holliday: I imagine that can get a little awkward. 

[00:29:58] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah. I had one client contact me months after the fact Hey, can you take down my pictures for a while? she had some ugly legal stuff going on in her life. And so she just wanted. Kind of erase that footprint for a little bit.  

[00:30:17] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:30:17] Rhowdy Digital Images: I asked her a problem doing that. I mean, in the end, it's all about being human too.  

[00:30:21] Matthew Holliday: You mentioned, you mentioned that you asked the, your clients. How about if you, the professional models you shoot with, do you put them in your port that you show potential clients, or do you think that having a more professional models tend to scare away customers that don't have that body type? 

Although I've noticed that you do, when you shoot with models, you shoot with models that have a variety of body types. 

[00:30:43] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah, I know are welcome. Shape size, creed, you know, anything, you know? I'm pretty much all inclusive. Now, if I could just get some men to step up and come in, I, I can find that. But but yeah, no, I don't think  

[00:31:06] Matthew Holliday: I'd come by and I'd come by and be your model. But I think my curves are in the wrong place. 

[00:31:16] Rhowdy Digital Images: Oh, I've, I've had some guys come in or be there at a show. They're like, oh yeah, I'd love to do this. And I'm like, you know what, you'd be my first in and I'll copy the session. Really? I'm like, yeah. Okay, cool. And we emailed back and forth. And then as soon as I say, what date and time would you like to see. Poof ghost me. And that's it. So any guys out there listening? I am willing to shoot war as people have called it. It's  

[00:31:56] Matthew Holliday: Heard that. 

[00:31:58] Rhowdy Digital Images: no one has been brave enough to step up and actually do it.  

[00:32:04] Matthew Holliday: I think I was talking with a fallen angel photography fellow, the fallen angel photographer about that like six months ago, she was talking about the same thing. She'd only found one man who wanted to pose for her. And that's pretty much it. So there's just not, there's just not a lot. I mean, there's some, there's some model looking guys, but most normal, I don't know. 

Have you seen most normal guys? I think the rest of them all look like me. We're all thick. 

[00:32:32] Rhowdy Digital Images: I I've never been happier than I was whenever I heard the phrase dad bought, because finally.  

[00:32:38] Matthew Holliday: It's my time. It's my time. 

[00:32:40] Rhowdy Digital Images: Do show the professional models in my display and everything because I do shoot a great variety. And there's, there's one. Woman that her and I actually say share the same birthday. So she's years old and out there killing it and she looks good. And that's my, no, you're not too old for this because we look at her here.  

[00:33:06] Matthew Holliday: Hmm. 

[00:33:07] Rhowdy Digital Images: You're younger than that. I, I, I kind of liked the shuffle through my display debunk all the, I'm two Nope. not too curvy because here are these. No, you're not too short. You're not too old. You're you're not too mom because you know, everyone is, is sexy. I mean, you wouldn't be a mom if someone didn't find you sexy. 

So why not? You think you're too old? Well, you're as young as you're ever going to be again right now. So.  

[00:33:44] Matthew Holliday: you're not wrong. Like there's a lot of people out there that are getting laid, but do not look like models. So people find them sexy.  

[00:33:52] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah.  

[00:33:52] Matthew Holliday: That goes, for the guys to. 

[00:33:54] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah. It's all about attitude. Now. There's a lot of Instagram posts out there that say. Sexy. Isn't a size while it it's It's not a size, it's not an age. It can't be quantified. It it's how, how you feel about yourself. I don't, I love having 

when someone's like, well, what should I bring in? And I say, bring it in. 

What ever makes you feel sexy? And it, and it could be a concert shirt. It could be a dress. It laundry could be nothing at all. And now that's when you, that's another way you get an insight into what their, limits may be. If they show up and it's not been the t-shirts and jeans, you know, you've got a little bit of work. But it all works out because I do keep a small stock, wardrobe there. 

Why don't we your favorite pair of black jeans with this pair of shoes? And here it is now one, one of my favorites is a men's best from. Like a three-piece suit  

And just this, because it, it still feels like you got a shirt on, but it's, it's not on a corset, but yeah, visually it is. 

And so find the mid ground there and work around and works with magic.  

[00:35:46] Matthew Holliday: No. 

So on kind of the next one, I was poking around your webpage, done some research before we had this interview. And I noticed that you, as a photographer, I have a newsletter. I have also seen a couple of models do this. Now I'm curious. Is it worth the time? What do you put in the newspaper  

[00:36:08] Rhowdy Digital Images: The newsletter right now until. Really hit my groove on it is pretty much, Hey, since you've come in and had a session with me before I know your birthday's coming up. So here's, here's a little discount. Why not come in and commemorate this year? Until they're till there's news to be put in the newsletter? 

it's really kind of a promotional tool.  

[00:36:35] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:36:36] Rhowdy Digital Images: Senator one, know, earlier this month for the past month for day one, I'll probably be doing something for, You know, send out beginning of may for June bribes to come in for probably war because brides, you know what they're spending on their wedding photography. So if they can come in and get something extra for a fraction of that price, instead of being tacked onto their main photographer and videographer, that then that that's always a good thing for me anyway. So right now the newsletter is just a, a hair away from. Just getting an ad in the mail. I'm not a blogger. So the offering a newsletter of sorts seems to be a good trade because I, with, I have a who's a successful playwright over in Europe and he blogs. He said about how it gets to the point where like by 11 o'clock, if you don't have something posted, people are like, Hey, I haven't seen your post for today. 

And I just got, would end up being, you know, 364 posts of today is Wednesday. It's 10 o'clock my post. And that'd be it. 

[00:38:11] Matthew Holliday: You know, this actually reminds me of, have you ever read the four hour workweek?  

[00:38:16] Rhowdy Digital Images: No.  

[00:38:17] Matthew Holliday: So it's, it's, it's the title is mostly bullshit, but he did have a couple of interesting things in there. One of the things he talks about is if you're trying to figure out. How much interest there are in a particular product put up a webpage that says you're selling the product, or some are says that the product is coming soon. 

And then put up a little box with an email address and say, you know, sign up to hear when it's released. Our signup to be the first one to hear when it's released. And you can use that to judge how much interest there is in the products. That kind of sounds to me like that's how you're using the newspaper newsletter really is it's about you to build up your contact list and people that are kind of interested in your photography, regardless of how often a newsletter may or may not come out. 

[00:38:58] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah. and oh, that sounds like three quarters of the ads that pop up on scroll through Instagram about some new, tech item that you can get in on the ground floor. And  

[00:39:10] Matthew Holliday: Yeah.  

[00:39:11] Rhowdy Digital Images: launching in spring.  

[00:39:15] Matthew Holliday: Yeah, then. Yeah. That's like a step further. Cause if you can put people to put money down on it, then you can, you know, pay for your manufacturing ahead of time if you're doing that. Yeah, no, that was a big part of his a four hour workweek was creating a job where you're basically drop shipping stuff from China. 

For whatever your special, your niches or whatever. Like if you've like, you know, we're in photography, like maybe we figure out some gizmo or gadget that makes photography a little bit easier. We would set up a website, we would advertise the photographers, have them sign up and yeah, pre-order for a buck or two bucks or 10 bucks or 10 bucks down to hold your spot and then go and then sell that. 

Although that's kind of falling apart now because there's so many other resellers in China that as soon as you get a good idea, like they just copy it and sell it themselves. That was, that was a good business model back in like 2004. 

[00:40:03] Rhowdy Digital Images: Along those lines, one of the things I do whenever I'm set up at a vendor thing is I have a heart shaped face where you can sign up to win a photo session. And that's a good promotional tool because I get people who are already. Halfway there. If I walk up his phone and hand him a business card and say, Hey, I want you to think about this. 

I'll be like, oh, okay. Put it in their back pocket. But  

[00:40:37] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:40:37] Rhowdy Digital Images: the time and effort to fill out their name, email address, phone number and put it in the jar, then there's something in the back of their head that says, yes, I want to do this. So that, that is a really big part of. Building my client lists, then promotional tools right there.  

[00:41:01] Matthew Holliday: You mentioned one of the places that you get, those emails is from attending shows. You talked about that a little bit before, and as we talk about later, and it turns out that now it's. I saw on your Instagram, you look like you attend a couple shows pretty regularly. I know you mentioned something about motorcycles and there was another one called the meeting of the mark. 

And you were showing off tattoos, showcase images. I assume you go to shows then quite a bit. You mentioned, you mentioned wedding shows as well. Do you do, do you spend a lot of time going to shows. 

[00:41:32] Rhowdy Digital Images: During the season, because Pennsylvania will weathers. It driving over the mountains during snow squalls and ice storms. So between April and say November, I'd like to do at least one, maybe two vendor shows. 

a month just to get at and. Okay. In front of people. One of the last part-time gigs I had was I was the annoying guy at county fairs, trying to get people to sign up the Winfrey windows for their homes. And I kind of took that as best course that I never paid for, because I learned a lot about how to market myself at those things. So. They say that usually takes people, seeing you out somewhere times before they trust you as being a legitimate or business.  

[00:42:38] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:42:39] Rhowdy Digital Images: I'd like to get out and be seen as much as possible, especially here in middle-size town USA. Where people same people go to different events, just for something to do. The more people that see me, more chance there is that somebody will be interested.  

[00:43:02] Matthew Holliday: Yeah, I can definitely see where that kind of sits on your mind for a little bit, the second and third time. You're like, ah, maybe that wouldn't be, yeah. 

[00:43:09] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah. The motorcycle shows. I've always love motor sports and hot rods, custom motorcycles, all that stuff. So going to those is, is a lot of fun for me because get people there who just they're a little outside, the, the edge of suburban living. They're there, you know, takes a different kind of person to ride a motorcycle. 

I know there's. Doctors and lawyers out there that put on their Harley jackets every weekend and think they're a biker, but there's people come and breeze through then leave. But the people who hang out at the show, especially the show, I was just at this fall over in Pittsburgh glory days, they're all. All custom bikes. I would say most of the builders are 40 and younger. So it's a younger crowd building seventies, era looking bikes out of vintage Honda's and stuff like that. And it's just a lot of fun, but you get those people who live in those kinds of creative circles. Who come in and think about things a little differently. And they, they to really be interested in products like mine. And of course, 90% of them are also inked up, which is something that I can pitch at them while they're there. They have beer girls going around, promoting things they're. Young models who want to build a portfolio. So I can pitch to them. The vendors shows like that are, are really good crabs. 

[00:45:07] Matthew Holliday: When you go, do you find you. It's to make it worth it monetarily in sales, or is it more about the awareness? And like you said, like meeting the other people that are there, getting your name out in front of them multiple times. 

[00:45:19] Rhowdy Digital Images: It's more bad getting out there in front of them and getting them familiar with me. Handing out business cards so that when they clean out their purse and they find my card, they go, oh yeah. Okay. I do want to do this. Because really right now, anyway the only people I'm selling to are the people that come in for the sessions, even whenever it's professional models, I'm not selling prints to. It's a random person who just likes to bono  

[00:45:50] Matthew Holliday: Gotcha. So the, so the pictures of the pictures of the, like the wall of photos at your booth are there for examples. They're not saying. 

[00:45:58] Rhowdy Digital Images: yes. That's there, there also a display kind of like, yeah, you read over my price sheet and you can see the sizes and everything. But if I wanted to, I could go through and I go, get one of these, two of these and three of these and pull them down. And lay out in front of them, what they're actually getting and covers the table and they think, wow, I'm getting a ton of photos here along with the digitals. So it's a good, good physical selling coal as well, but haven't, haven't quite hit the selling posters and prints phase. Especially since a lot of them are personal pictures.  

[00:46:47] Matthew Holliday: Right. Yeah, no, I wasn't. I wasn't expecting that you had cell client prints, but since you shot with professional models, I thought maybe that was what the prints were, but now it makes sense. It makes more sense to have them as. Examples. Here's the types of things that you will see. Here's the types of shots that we do, et cetera, et cetera. 

[00:47:04] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yep.  

[00:47:05] Matthew Holliday: All right. So I think we're just about out of time. So we've got a couple of, two more questions to finish up. Do you have any active projects that you want to share with the world? 

[00:47:14] Rhowdy Digital Images: The big thing I want to accomplish this year is I want to have a gallery show artists that heart still first and foremost. So I definitely want to have a place where I can have a one man show and showcase what I do. Yeah. So I'm, I'm always willing to take on any models who want to come in and shoot and build their portfolio while helping me hit that goal. And that's, that's my big push. So 2022.  

[00:47:48] Matthew Holliday: No, actually that made me the way you just said. I meant to ask earlier about the, about the. Studio and I didn't. What'd you say that the studio is really been totally worth it for this? Actually I'd say probably a C it's probably a requirement for the way you do business. People probably don't want you to come into their house and take the. 

[00:48:08] Rhowdy Digital Images: It's a because I can have. Standard sets and props and areas all on hand with our having to move any of them. But before and now what I'm between studios? what I do we'll do is book a bed and breakfast comes, you know, era decorated. And usually during the week, during the day, there's no. Every time I've shot it. Bed and breakfast. the. 

owner has been like, okay, I got to go do my day job, or we're going to go shopping, just leave the key in the mailbox whenever you leave. And we have the place to ourselves, which is really awesome.  

[00:49:00] Matthew Holliday: Interesting. 

[00:49:02] Rhowdy Digital Images: The emic mansion and your Pennsylvania is where I shot the ballerina. That's on my page and her warm-up outfit she has on it. That's is in quotes, booed war as we got that day. they're just such cool shots because here she is doing her ballerina type poses and this lush, Sitting room with a fireplace. And just that that's still one of my favorite sessions, just because it's so such a strange juxtaposition. You don't see many people in tutus and tissues on their front stoop striking a pose in the middle of town.  

[00:49:59] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. Yeah, I've been looking at some of the Airbnbs in this area and most of them are so just like boring, super boring environments. I have not yet been able to find a good one, like a good, cool looking Airbnb or, or regular BNB for that matter. 

[00:50:18] Rhowdy Digital Images: Yeah. I really try to stay away from hotel rooms because there's chain you can spot instantly because. One wall in the room, always be painted this awful burnt Tangerine color. You know, I  

[00:50:36] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:50:36] Rhowdy Digital Images: know where they're at. And so I, I try to stay away from them as much as.  

[00:50:43] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. The hotel thing, like there's really, yeah, it's really overtime, nearly overtime. Let's go ahead and close this out. Where can everybody find you on. 

[00:50:53] Rhowdy Digital Images: Well online, you can just Google Digital images are H O w D Y. And same thing for Facebook and Instagram. It's at R D I G I M G no abbreviation for variety digital images. And I do have a Twitter account, but I don't use it much. It was of like, ah, I register for this just to preserve the name. 

So no one else can pretend they're me  

[00:51:23] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. 

[00:51:23] Rhowdy Digital Images: If you look up ready, digital images Twitter, you can send me a message through that as well. And I've got the basics  

[00:51:31] Matthew Holliday: Yeah. Yeah. And with that, we're done. Check us out@thensfwphotographypodcast.com on Twitter as NSFW photography, Instagram at the NSFW photography feed podcast. And subscribe on your favorite podcast app.