I wish female nude models would just say that they like my work and want to have an idealized beautiful version of themselves immortalized on film or whatever their actual motivation is. I feel like I used to just shoot my friends and members of my community who I had enough in common with that it was likely we would become friends.

I feel like now I constantly have to deal with girls who do that stripper thing of pretending they really really like me and want to be my friend and then they either don’t invite me unless they want me to bring a fucking camera or they send me a bill for their theoretical friendship. Dressed models do not do this and male nude models do not do this.

I am an artist and I don’t think I can hack how much of a competitive business this erotic photography thing has become.

Models change their minds and try to change the deal after we have already done it. Other photographers should be my colleagues, but they are mostly just competitive. If I talk about my motivations in an interview or whatever, I always see them being parrotted by some new membership site within a month. I have objections to many of the publications I could shoot for and the ones I really like shooting for, every competitive jerk I run across is trying to bump me from, as near as I can tell, mostly because I’m doing it.

I know the vast majority of people I deal with are cool and positive and I should focus on the two thousand plus cool people I have photographed and the thousands of images with happy stories and not on the handful or jerks I’ve worked with and the associated pix. And I know a lot of people take envy as a compliment.

Ugh, Before I completely transition from being really private to just being really irate, I think I will go back to bed.

–Amelia G