ACEBOYS™ Presents: Male Fashion Model Mason

Male Fashion Model: Mason

ACEBOY™ MODELS is proud to present male fashion model Mason in his first commercial photo shoot. Although he hasn’t logged a ton of hours in front of the camera we think new comer Mason will have no problem booking gigs. “He (Mason) has the strong silent type thing going on and the camera picked up on it immediately. Couple that with mysterious eyes, a strong jaw line and you’ve got a killer combo that will sell product and that our clients will respond too”said Chris Berns noted male model photographer and director at ACEBOY™ MODELS in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. ACEMALEMODELS.COM launched Mason’s first commercial Male Model Portfolio earlier today  Brandable stock photos of Male Fashion Model Mason will be available for commercial and small business websites in the coming weeks. If you’re interested in purchasing photos of Mason or featuring Mason as a brand model for your webbased / print media, please see his male model portfolio page and click on the book me link. Check him out and let us know what you think.

Adult Webmasters: Don’t Compete On Price In 2010 – CREATE CONTENT!

Aces Entertainment & ACEBOY™ MODELS provides pay sites with high quality licensed and custom adult content. We’ve learned a lot over the years about what converts adult website traffic into paying subscribers and more importantly, what keeps them paying month over month. Believe it or not, it’s not always low price points!

How Will Your Adult Website Compete in 2010?
In conversations with adult webmasters, ACEBOYS™ asked “What will your competitive advantage be in 2010?” Many said it was going to be price – offering more adult content for less. More updates, more photos and video sets AND lower current membership pricing or offer more generous trial membership options. That’s a great approach if you’re offering a commodity product, like chewing gum, but adult content (especially high quality adult content) should never be viewed as a commodity and should never be reduced in price to compete for new member sign-ups. Just ask one of the big webhosting company CEOs – competing on price (especially in the adult space) is a recipe for disaster. Instead, compete on quality and creative content that engages subscribers and keeps them paying. Let the tube sites give it away, because there will always be a market for top quality, high resolution adult websites and adult content – ALWAYS.

ACEBOYS™ Offers Erotic Blogging, Copy writing and Outsourced Social Networking Services For Adult Webmasters. Our models write and network for your site!

Avoid Price Wars In The Adult Industry, Focus Instead On Providing Your Members With Diverse Adult Content:
Going into 2010 we want to challenge adult web masters and adult pay site owners to consider a different approach to increase membership revenue and reduce member churn. Why not consider 2010 a year of creation and focus on the quality and diversity of your adult content not lowing prices. Instead, add some new interesting niche sets that may stray a bit from your target niche, also, consider adding some non-traditional content like erotic short stories and or erotic blogs.
In this economy the people who are paying for access to your adult content site value quality. Let’s face it, there’s literally tons of free content they can access all over the web, but your customer base has chosen to pay. Think about that for a minute … (ok you’re minute is up) … I could choose to groom my own dog, but I choose to pay because I know I will get a better quality cut. I could choose to get free web hosting for our business websites, but we choose to pay for feature rich add free server space. Your customer’s could get off by watching all that home made adult content on the tube sites, but they choose too pay to view your top quality content. And to take it one step further, there was something about your website, they liked and decided to make a membership purchase. Literally, they are counting on you as the adult site owner or adult site webmaster to provide them with top quality adult content, not to lower your prices.

Ok Ok, no we are not scientists nor do we have marketing MBAs from The Wharton School, but we do pay close attention to what’s working for our adult webmaster customer base. Although we don’t have quantitative data here, it does stand to reason that lower prices is NOT what your members are looking for. They’re looking for top quality and top value.

So What’s The Bottom Line?
We here at ACEBOY™ Models feel the best way for adult pay site owners to compete in 2010 is TO NOT COMPETE AT ALL BUT TO CREATE. Create by updating your site more regularly with better quality adult content (minimum of 4x per months is rapidly becoming the industry standard). Create by adding a blog section to your adult pay site which focuses on trends in your specific niche. Create, buy including short erotic stories or providing model profiles that allow your members to get to know your models better through comprehensive profiles (not just stats, but hobbies, favorite foods, etc..).
By moving into a creative mode instead of a competitive mode, you’ll be offing your member base more value, and more options than your perceived competition. And, before you know it, you’ll be in a position to discuss price increases as opposed to price decreases that other adult webmasters will engage in this coming year.

New For 2010: ACEBOYS™ Offers Erotic Blogging and Erotic Short Story Writing Services:
Aces Entertainment, INC & ACEBOY™ MODELS In addition to high quality licensed and custom adult photo and video content, Aces Entertainment, Inc and ACEBOY™ models offer’s outsourced erotic blog writing services and erotic short story writing services for our adult website customer base. For more information about our products and unique photo and video marketing services please visit our male model photography website

We wish you much love, and tons of targeted traffic that converts in 2010 ☺

Best Regards, The ACEBOY™ Models Crew – Ft. Lauderdale, FL.

Sex Still Sells in 2009! What small business can learn from Abercrombie’s sexy approach to photographic marketing.

With the unveiling of Abercrombie’s 2009 Christmas Catalog on A&F.COM this week, it seemed like a great time to focus on one of our favorite positioning statements – Sexually charged advertising photography sells products and services online!

Sexy Marketing Photography Sells Product!

Abercrombie’s Use of Sexually Charged Marketing Photography:
Love or hate them, Abercrombie & Fitch (A&F) has proven itself a purveyor of more than just t-shirts and blue jeans – a lot more – in particular the A&F brand has helped define an entire lifestyle for the 20 something crowd in the 21 century. Sure, many weary parents and conservative legislators have criticized the firm’s marketing methods, but year over year, millions continue to pay premium prices for the A&F brand both in their retail shops and online at http://www.aandf.com.

Behind all the success lies a consistent & simple marketing strategy – sexually charged advertising photography. From the racy catalogs (now out of circulation in the U.S.) to The main marketing image that lies against the front wall facing the entrance at each store – sexy and strategic marketing photography is what’s driving the A&F brand.

Much of A&F’s product marketing photography is shot by Bruce Weber who is renown for the super sexy advertising photography he did for Calvin Klein & Ralph Lauren in the early 1990’s. Per classic Bruce Webber style, A&F marketing and catalog photos are generally rendered to grayscale and feature mainly outdoor, beach, or college campus type settings. And the icing on the cake are the super hot male models who often times aren’t even wearing the garments they are hired to sell! The photography has such an appeal that Abercrombie & Fitch shopping bags have become collectables-of-sorts, and its image synonymous with “all-American”

Growing Brands Can Deploy The Same Sexy Techniques:
So if A&F can do it why can’t your start up? Well the answer is simple – It can and it should. With 2010 just around the corner and an economy that seems to be eating entrepreneurs and big business alike for lunch – perhaps it’s time to take a closer look at the images on your website, in your catalogs, direct mail pieces and within your shopping cart and see if they could use a little spicing up. Many start-ups go directly to the stock photography warehouses during the web design process and select images that “kind of” meet the needs of the business. But if you’re serious about building your brand or establishing your product online you should consider deploying custom photography (at least to some extent like on your home page and in your banner ads for example) on your site. And, whether you’re a Dentist, Plumber, Fashion Designer, Inventor or anything in between, you should stay away from hum drum, lack luster marketing photography that doesn’t really captivate and sell your product or service to it’s target audience.

Sure, maybe semi-naked male models and scantily clad females aren’t what your small business marketing plan calls for, but attractive brand models who are photographed showcasing your product or demonstrating your service is going to be a benchmark that separates the men from the boys (if you will) when it comes to engaging your target customer base.

ACEMALE MODELS & Aces Entertainment, Inc. help bring customized brand and marketing photography within reach of small business of all sizes across many industries. Our diverse advertising and brand models and talented photographers can help your marketing materials grab and keep the attention of your target audience. And for much (MUCH) less that you’d expect to pay for custom advertising photography. The process is easy, the costs are low and the ROI will speak for itself.
Are you interested in learning more about our sexy branding and marketing photography services & how it can help attract, retain and convert website visitors into paying customers? Of course you are and we’re interested in talking to you too – shoot us an email and we’ll go from there …

Our Models & Photographers Help Sell Your Products & Services!

About ACEBOY MODELS:
Aces Entertainment, INC & ACEBOY Models is an emerging leader in the marketing & advertising photography industry, working to improve website and direct mail marketing, member retention and sales for our clients through stunning photos and video of the hottest male models on the web today. For more information about our products and unique photo and video marketing services please visit our male model photography website

Purchasing custom photography content from us can be a cost effective way for your website to connect with your target audience & stand out in a sea of stock photography infused websites. Drop us a line. We love talking to website owners about this stuff. It’s fun, affordable and can make a big difference to your bottom line. Thanks

Adult Webmasters: Are You Listening To Your Members? Your Competition Is!

Your bottom line objective as an adult pay site owner is to grow your membership base – it’s really that simple. It was true 10 years ago when you were just getting started and it remains true today. But adult webmasters beware – the rules of the  conversion and member retention game are changing and changing fast.  The introduction of free tube sites and file sharing networks are changing the adult landscape and now, you’re having to compete with FREE.
We believe there is still tremendous opportunity to grow a profitable online adult site, but you do need to understand some key trends that are shaping how people make sign-up / cancel decisions and be ready to take action.

Adult Webmasters Must Keep Up With Web 2.0 Trends!

The Adult Content Revolution:
There is a powerful revolution-taking place in the adult content market that serious adult webmasters and pay site owners need to be aware if they want to continue to play in the adult entertainment space in the not so distant future.
The revolution is an undeniable shift away from producer defined content and toward adult content produced specifically for customers based off feedback gleaned directly from the customers themselves through things like content rating applications and comment boxes.
Content rating and commenting applications embedded into the more web-2.0ish adult sites are proving invaluable to the adult site owners who are not only willing to deploy such technology in their websites but (more importantly) are committed to watching and listening to what their members are saying about the models and take action based on this valuable input.
This transformation is so new and so dramatic that many adult webmasters aren’t even aware of what’s happening.  However with a little effort to better understand what your members want to see in terms of updates, you can stay out front of the transformation and stand a better chance of securing your space in the new, user defined adult entertainment industry.

Let’s take a look a the traditional producer defined way of sourcing content for your pay site vs. the more modern member defined approach.

Old School – Producer Defined Content: In this scenario, adult site owners selected the models to be casted or purchased the content to be published in the member area of their site. There was little to no input from the member base as to whether this is a model they want to see or not. The pay site owner, much like the TV station program director made decisions on behalf of the member base.  If a member liked it, great – if not, oh well – there will be another update next week. Weekly updates are simply not going to be enough going forward.  In the world of online social networking, your members expect to be more involved. A couple weeks of less than popular site updates and you can pretty much count on your cancel rates going up.  This model worked in the past, because we had not real alternatives. Enter the more modern approach to choosing content for your adult pay site ..

The Future – Adult Site Member Defined Content. You’ll need weekly updates alright, but you’ll also need to be deploying next generation feedback applications so that you can allow your members to help you define which models get published in your members area and more importantly which ones do not. Do this and watch your member retention statistics start to trend in a positive direction fast.

Read this 5 times over if you have too. If you want to stay competitive in the adult entertainment industry and keep a firm lead on free tube type sites, your adult pay site will have to do a better job of getting feedback from and listening to your membership base. I’ll take this one step further and argue that the most successful pay sites in the future will go as far as to engage the member base to participate in the casting and production process to an extent. It’s that simple and that complex at the same time.

Examples of Applications You Can Deploy To Better Engage Your Members:
Let me give you a couple examples of baby steps you can take now to get your members more involved and improve your member retention stats and over all bottom line.

Site Visitors Should Be Able To Rate Models Easily

1)    At the very least you need to deploy a content rating application / script for each content set you have published. This will do two things for you fast. First, it will tell your members that you care about what they think (Do Not Under Estimate This!). Second, after a short period of time you will begin to see some trends that may impact some of your casting and or licensed adult content purchasing decisions. One model set from that past may emerge as a clear winner and would in turn be a model you would want to re-cast or seek other sets from your content provider – Think “ Back By Popular Demand Here” .. For an example, check out how we get feedback from site visitors on our male models here.
And check out this link for some PHP scripts that you or your webmaster could deploy to get you started: http://pennyhit.com/myratings.html

2)    Once Content rating is in place consider comment and voting type applications for each set. Keep it simple and just ask your members to vote yes or no to a simple question like .. “Would you like to see more of this model?” Here’s a link to a content comment and rating application for joomla site users: http://www.reviewsforjoomla.com/

3)    A third and slightly more advanced idea is to allow your members to play casting director to a certain extent. Publish head shots of potential models who have applied or models sets you are considering purchasing from you licensed content provider and get your members to decide who they want to see. Think “hot or not” here and watch yourself legally here!! But if done right, you would have a raving fan base on your hands fast.

Conclusion:
Ultimately, the responsibility still lies on you the pay site owner / content director to provide your members with hot fresh content that is updated on a regular basis. Based on our experience producing and selling adult content to some of the most successful sites on the web today, What matters most here is that you take steps to engage your customer base, seek out their opinions and develop a community of inclusion with your members and you had better be willing to act on their feedback.
We feel the future is bright for our customers who are embracing this shift to member defined content and deploying simple technology in their sites to seek member involvement. This is just a trend that we are noticing and wanted to share to other webmasters and paysite owners that may benefit from our experiences. Again this is only an opinion and we’d appreciate feedback and counter arguments from other industry pros.

About ACEBOYS:
Aces Entertainment & ACEBOY Models is an emerging leader in the wholesale adult content industry, working to improve member retention for our clients through stunning photos and video of the hottest male models on the web today.  For more information about our products and services for adult webmasters please visit our male model photography website
Purchasing licensed content from a professional content provider can be a cost effective way for your adult site to compete with the big players, but you have to be ready to address the needs of a target audience – you simply can’t be everything to everybody anymore.  Considering talking with an adult content provider that will truly partner with you and help you publish content that your members will love and pay for year after year.

ACEBOY MODELS Presents Fashion & Adult Male Model Keith Conner

ACEBOY MODELS PRESENTS: KEITH CONNER

ACEBOY Models is excited to present male model Keith Conner. Keith headlined on adult mega site boycrush.com earlier in 2009 and is quickly establishing himself as an up & coming name in the gay adult industry.  “This photoshoot proves he (Keith) has the look and vigor to take a leap into main stream male modeling, he has a commercial look that will sell products in print and web based media” said Chris Berns noted male model photographer and director at ACEBOYS in Ft. Lauderdale, FL.  ACEMALEMODELS.COM launched Keith’s first commercial Male Model Portfolio earlier today and plans to release a licensed adult set of Keith on it’s adult wholesale content website later this month (http://www.aceboys.com). Brandable stock photos of Keith will be available via ACEMALEMODELS.COM for commercial and small business websites in the coming weeks. If you’re interested in purchasing photos of Keith for your website (either adult or commercial), please see his male model portfolio page and click on the book me link.

Introducing Male Fashion & Fitness Model: Christian

Fashion & Fitness Male Model: Christian

Aces Entertainment, Inc. and ACEBOY Models is excited to introduce new male fashion and fitness model Christian to our growing portfolio of commercial male models. Christian stands 6’3″ and weighed in at 180lbs. He has incredible blue eyes and a show stopping smile. Christian is available for fashion, fitness, product, brand and underwear gigs. If you’re looking for a male model to help sell your products and services online, You’ll definately want to consider Christian. Special thanks to David from Coconut Cove Guest House for introducing us to him. If you’re interested in getting commercial quality custom product photos of Christian for your website, please see his male model portfolio page and click on the book me link. One of us will get back to you fast with booking and / or shoot information. Thanks & We hope you enjoy Christian’s male model portfolio page.

Male Model Beach Photography – Tips For Taking Your Beach Photos To The Next Level!

Summer’s just around the corner, so we here at ACEBOY MODELS want to provide aspiring model photographers with some tips for taking killer photos in one of the most popular places to find hot male models this time of year – The Beach!

Beach Photography poses many challenges, but when you get that killer beach shot, it’s often showcased in both model and photographer portfolios.  The harsh sun, blowing sand, squinting models and chubby, sun burnt tourists all contribute to the complexity of a beach photo shoot.  But there are some simple tips and tricks we use when shooting our male models on the beach – give them a read and them give them a try. . .

Beach Photo Tip #1: Schedule The Photo Shoot Early Or Late In The Day:

Experienced photographers will agree that the best time to shoot is when you’d rather be sleeping (sun rise) or dining with friends and family (sun set). We know it sucks, but getting up early can provide you and your male model with some of the most stunning photos imaginable. The soft, golden light of sunrise is nearly impossible to replicate post production (ie: in photoshop).  So beach photography tip number one is to check the weather and schedule at least one sunrise photo shoot this summer. You’ll also benefit from fewer nosey tourists drooling over your male model that early in the day.

Beach Photo Tip #2: Work With The Sun Not Against It:

Obviously you can’t control the sun like you can your studio light, but don’t settle for the typical, over exposed and front-lit beach shots that you see all over the place. Instead of moving the light around your models like you would in the studio to get lighting diversity, proactively position your model around the sun. Get several shots in each of the following lighting conditions:

ACEBOY MODEL TIM - SHOT WITH FULL FRONTAL NATURAL LIGHT AND FLASH

Front Light: Basically, in this lighting condition the sun is coming from behind the photographer and is shining directly on the male models face and chest. Most of the beach photos you see are done using natural front light which is unfortunate – whith just a little awareness about where the light is coming from and creativity in terms of model and camera placement, a photographer can create an intirely different look and feel, avoid ‘squinty’, over exposed models and take the photo to the next level (see side and back lighting ideas below). Of course there will be situtaions where front lighting conditions on the beach are unavoidable, if so consider using your camera’s electronic flash to get rid of strong shadows under the models eyes, nose and mouth that happen when the sun is high in the sky and bright. Also, here’s another little trick we use in bright sun, frontal lighting conditions … have your male model close his eyes while you frame up the shot and then open them slowly on a count of three – sounds silly, but it will relax the mdoels eyes, dialate his pupils (to the extent possible) giving you a more relaxed, natural and professional shot when you go to print. This is just an ACEBOY models policy, but if your serious about getting stunning beach shots, Please Please Please … (Unless your’re doing a shoot for a Oakley) avoid allowing your model to wear sunglasses in the photos- eyes are too beautiful to cover up and your photo will loose appeal because of it.

ACEBOY MODEL Christian facing north with natural side-light.

Side Light: Mastering side lighting is the key to getting some great commercial / catalog type shots on the beach that your models and clients are sure to publish.  Natural side-light from the sun when it’s low in the sky (dawn / dusk) produce natural highlights and shadows on your model’s face and body that add depth and a sense of dimension you won’t get from front or back lighting.  Natural light from the side can create a sense of 3 dimensionality that seems to pop off the page once published. So to get some great, almost 3 dimensional looking cover shots, face your model to the north (or south) when the sun is low in the sky and fire away!  Be sure to play with angles as even the slight change in your models body position can have a dramatic effect. To really add to the 3-D effect you get from natural side light, have your male model learn forward a bit (or a lot depending on the landscape). If you take just a moment or two to capalize on a low sun, side lighting condition, you’ll be amazed at how mother nature does what photoshop can do, only 100 times better. Try it!

ACEBOY MODEL HAYDEN - Shot with natural back light at dusk. Flash used to prevent underexposing model face and body.

Back Light: Many think back-light comes from behind the photographer, but the opposite is true, when professional’s reference back light, they are referring to a condition in which the light is coming from behind the model!!  Like front lighting, back light can pose a challenge because if you’re not careful you’ll end up with a silhouette of your male model instead of a crisp clean photo. To avoid underexposing your model in a back-light condition, the easiest solution is to use your electronic flash (which is what we do 99% of the time) or if your comfortable with your SLR settings you can meter for the light behind the model and get the same result. When shot properly, your back lit model will almost seem to glow and be in sync with his surroundings, producing a calm, warm image. Some of our most popular (and profitable) photographs have been shot using natural back light at sun set or sun rise (mostly sun set since we are usually pretty hung over in the morning). In the photo to the left, ACEBOY Model Hayden is shot with the warn natural light of sun set coming from behind him, we used a speed like to prevent his face and body from being underexposed and viola! nature and technology coming together to get a hot shot of a beautiful male model on the beach

Beach Photo Tip #3: Step To The Side Amigo – Apply The Rule of Thirds At The Beach:

How you position your male model within the frame can make the difference between an amazing cover shot and a pic your cousin Gary plasters all over Facebook after a few miller lite’s (gross).  Enter the rule of thirds, a photography 101 concept that surprisingly few photographers practice. Here’s how it applies to a great beach photo. As you’re looking through your view finder, imagine the image in quadrants.  Be sure to make sure the horizon is in the lower quadrant and step to one side or the other so that your model is not dead center in the frame.  Position him so he is off to the left or right of the frame. Just because your model is not in the center of the image does not mean he’s not the center of attention.

So there you have three simple tips to help you get more engaging photos on the beach this summer. Get your lazy ass and your lazy ass models up early at least one day this summer for a sun-rise shoot. You’ll hate us on the way to the beach and thanks us for years to come once you see the results. Once there, don’t stand in once place. Work your models and your camera around the sun to get several front, back and most important side lit shots. Finally, apply the rule of thirds and you’re well on your way to being a bonafide ACEBOY MODEL Photographer – kinda. If you get some great shots,  please share them with us along with your techniques. You can  upload them to our amateur male model community site and get friendly, honest feedback from our models and photographers.

If you’re an amateur photographer wanting to take your skills to the  next level on the beach or in the studio, please consider attending one of our Male Model Glamour And Nude Photography Workshops where you’ll work side by side with our photographers and male models, learn some great new male model photography techniques and build up your photography portfolio.

If you’re  a male model (amateur or professional) looking to get some great beach shots for your portfolio this summer, please consider attending a Male Model Portfolio Building Work Shop. You’ll learn some great skills, get some great shots and have a lot of fun with our talented, professional team.

All of our male model and photographer workshop participants receive great discount rates at Ft. Lauderdale’s most popular gay guest house Coconut Cove.

Check back for more great beach photography tips – we’ll post them as we think of them

Happy Summer Shooting!  Chris Berns / Male Model Photographer / ACEBOY MODELS / Ft. Lauderdale, FL. / http://www.acemalemodels.com

INTRODUCING ADULT MALE MODEL: TYLER WOODS

Say hello to the newest male model Tyler. He’s 21 years old, about 5’9″ and approx 130 lbs. Special thanks to Arron and Sebastian for introducing us to him. If you’re interested in getting photos of Tyler for your adult pay site website, please see his adult male model gallery page.

Marketing 101 For Male Models … (Chapter 1)

The winter term is winding down, and you’re probably day dreaming of your upcoming summer on the lake, but aspiring male models should take advantage of the down time this summer and work on a little self promotion between semesters. There are countless ways for male models to market themselves to potential clients but here’s what the successful male models are doing now to get noticed and more importantly, get paid.

Before we go to far here, you need to make sure you’re portfolio is up to date and ‘client ready’. None of our male model self-promotion tactics will help you if your portfolio was shot with your iphone. Take a hard look and if your not happy, check out our page on building a killer male model portfolio you may find some helpful tips there. You may also want to consider attending one of our Male Model Portfolio Building Workshops this summer as well to make sure you’ve got the right shots to get you noticed. Also .. You need to make sure you have active profiles on all the major social network sites for aspiring models (see below for some examples)

Now, assuming you’re portfolio is red hot and you’re linked in on the modeling social networks, here’s some tips to get it in front of PAYING photographers, designers and studios around the country.

Brand Yourself:

Your ‘myspace’ and ‘facebook’ pages are hot and show how popular you are, but no scout or photographer with real demands has time to sift through all that. You need to brand yourself and you need to stand out from the crowd. One great way to do this is by getting a personalized domain name and launching a very simple, male model portfolio website.

You can search for domain names at places like godaddy.com. Try to incorporate you name (or stage name if applicable). For example do a search for yourname.com or your-name.com. Or trying adding some key words to the domain name for example malemodel-ashton.com.

With a cool new domain name you can start to look for hosting services where you can park a simple portfolio website. If you don’t have basic HTML skills, there are companies out there can deploy a professional looking male model portfolio website at very reasonable prices. Check out …

With a personalized male model portfolio website up and running you’ve moved yourself into a whole differnt leauge. Be sure to go back and update all of your social networking portfolios (MYSPACE, FACEBOOK, MODELS.COM, MODELLAUNCH, OMP, MODELMAYHEM, MALMOD, ETC..) with a link to your new male model portfolio page.

Who knows, if you’re hot enough, you may even end up with your own male model portfolio page here at ACEBOYS. Good Luck and send us links once you’re up and running. Check back or subscrbe to our Male Model Blog for more self promotion and branding tips.    Chris / ACEBOY MODELS / Ft. Lauderdale, FL

Avoiding Scams In the Adult Industry – Tips For The Next Generation Of Adult Male Models

We’ve all seen the headlines on craigslist and countless other online classified boards: “MODELS WANTED FOR ADULT SITE – UP TO $1,500.00!!”  If you’re an aspiring adult male model, here are a couple things to keep in mind to make sure you stay safe and avoid scams. Some of this is common sense, but some of these tips are things that a new comer to the industry will probably not know.

IF IT SEEMS TO GOOD TO BE TRUE …
You can probably finish that sentence, but the old adage your grandpa told you is true, especially in the adult male modeling industry. Sure, many of the top adult studios do pay large sums of money, but those are probably not the ones posting on free online classifieds. Most of the big players in the industry get models through word of mouth and don’t need to spam forums and message boards. Now, I’m not saying that all these ads are scams. All companies start out small and god knows we placed a few ads in our day and may again in the future. The point here is that as a studio grows, so does it’s reputation (good or bad) and it’s connections in the male model community. If a studio treats their male models professionally and keeps their promises, the need to beg for models starts to subside. Hands down, our biggest source of new male model talent comes from past models that refer friends. The guys out there hitting the boards are most likely head hunters of sorts who simply get a finders fee for delivering you to one of the major studios. So be aware and try to identify early on if you are dealing with the primary producer / studio directly or if you are dealing with a 3rd party like and agency or talent scout. Sure, the agency may be scouting for a major studio that pays $1,500 per set, but probably won’t be so fast to mention that they plan to keep 30% of YOUR earnings.

GO DIRECT TO THE SOURCE:
Virtually every adult paysite has a model recruiting or model casting section on their website. Unlike mainstream commercial modeling, aspiring adult models can easily connect with casting directors by searching for the site you think would be a good match and find the “Be A Model” type link. You really don’t need an “Agency” taking 15, 20 or even up to 30% of your pay to do something you can do on your own! If the AD states something like “We work with the biggest players in the industry” .. guess what, you can too by simply finding the adult sites that interest you and completing a few model applications.

AVOID ADULT MODEL AGENCIES THAT WANT TO CONDUCT A TEST SHOOT:
This is a classic scam that we’ve seen time and again in this industry. If you get the “come by my apartment for a test shoot” line, run in the opposite direction!  Here’s the bottom line, the talent scouts have no business taking your photos, they can just as easily pass the photos you submit on to the casting directors for a decision. The real producers in the adult industry don’t have time for test shoots, furthermore, they have enough experience working with male models that they can look at your photographs, facebook and myspace galleries and make an informed go / no go decision. I can assure you the top photographers at studios like seancody.com, cockyboys.com, collegedudes247 and boyfun.com don’t have time to ‘test shoot’ and I can also assure you they don’t need the practice.  So if you get the “let’s to a test shoot” line, be very cautious and be sure to understand exactly why the test shoot or screening necessary. There’s about a 99% chance it’s not!!

GET MODEL RELEASE FORMS, SHOOT SPECIFICATIONS &  PAYMENT AGREEMENT IN WRITING BEFORE YOU TRAVEL:
Look guys, read this 10 times if you have too – It’s important. Any real agency or true production studio will be able and willing to provide you with model release documentation in advance of any booking. You need and deserve time to read these documents before you are on location. If the agency is reluctant or can’t provide you with these documents in writing – you need to seriously consider it’s legitimacy. You should also get shoot specifications in writing that list exactly what acts you will need to perform to earn the agreed upon pay. Finally ask if there are any conditions under which you may NOT get paid – for example if you take off work for 4 days to go shoot and the other models don’t show up or the photographer gets the flu – do you get paid in full, nothing at all or some something in between?  These are real life scenarios that more experience models have faced. Any professional adult model agency or production studio will have policies they can provide you in writing and should proactively offer this information to you.

You may be asking how is ACEMALE Models different from the 3rd party companies we’re discussing here. We are not an agency and we do not accept finders fees for sending models to a studio nor do we take a percent of a models earnings. We are a production studio and are contracted by our clients to produce still and video content. We make the model casting decisions, we book the travel, we shoot the content and we are the primary producers with all the legal responsibilities that go along with it. The goal of this blog entry is in no way to bash agencies or scouting companies – there are some dynamite agencies out there that can help you. The goal here is to offer some insider advice to the new generation of  adult male models that we have learned over the years.

Finally, there are watch-dog type organizations that help protect both male and feamale models in the adult industry. BPAV was founded by a senior publisher at xbiz.com and would be a great place to start if you ever were to be a victim of a scam. We fully support the BPAV mission. You can learn more here:

So the moral of this long ass story is this … As in any industry the adult male model industry if teaming with smart, focused and successful people looking to grow legitimate businesses safely and responsibly, but, as in any industry, there are scams, fakes, posers and people who could be down right harmful to your career and even your health.  By keeping these tips in mind and doing a little homework, you can set yourself up for a great experience, meet some amazing and talented people and earn some great cash. Oh, you might even have some fun along the way too. Be Safe!   Chris / ACEBOY Models / Ft. Lauderdale, FL.

As always, comments, questions, critisims and counter arguements are welcome . . .