Do you think shooting porn is the road to riches?

If you're thinking shooting porn is the road to riches or even to making a living read this, it might save you some money and time.

I would like to state this is to help those who are determined to become porn producers and deter those who think it's easy.

Firstly, porn is a saturated market. The last figures I heard for the US was 16,000 videos released in a year, that's over 44 a day. An average magazine every month receives 10 times the amount of content they need.

The Internet is probably the least saturated section but look around at some of the prices people are working for. People are offering content to us at prices we cannot produce it for, we don't buy it because we know we can't sell it. Because the bottom of the market is flooded.

So if you're still determined to follow read on.

First decide what niche to shoot, you need to know something about the niche as those buying it, the surfer, will definitely have a clue, there is no niche called "Crap Pornography". Research, research and research again. Then learn about what you researched.

Buy decent equipment, otherwise you will look like an amateur to the models and your work will suffer. The better your cameras and lights the better your work will turn out. Crisper, cleaner, better lit, better color balanced, in focus images or video will sell. Content shot on cheap equipment is everywhere and being practically given away most of the time.

If you don't have a budget of $5,000 minimum for equipment forget about it. Even that budget is pushing it.

Now learn how to use the equipment. The new digital photography age makes life so easy. There is absolutely no excuse for out of focus, poorly lit and bad color pictures. Calling it amateur is not an excuse.

So now you know your niche and equipment. Next is your market. Take some time to research it look at what people at the top are publishing. You will never enter the market at this level, this is where you're aiming for. Be very careful what you post or email, because people will start to ask to see samples.

Next stop is models and this is the tough part. Where are they going to come from, what kind of models can you find, what will they do, what will they want to earn? All these factors need to be resolved where you are, not asking me about how I do it. Models in Czech will do more, do it better and be more plentiful than models in Afghanistan or even New York, they also tend to be better looking. Your models situation will need to be resolved by you locally.

Learning how to make a model who is only there for the money and with no intentions of fucking anyone, look like she would fuck for a pizza is the real gift of a pornographer. Each model is different, needs a different approach, different direction and different motivating. If I have to explain how to do this I seriously suggest you go practise for a year until you get this right.

This is the tough part. Learning how to get the maximum out of a model when they intend doing the minimum is the hardest part of my job. Any pornographer will tell you they are part photographer, part pornographer, part psychologist and part wet nurse, with a little bit of favourite uncle or lover thrown in. And if you think this is an easy way to get laid, forget about it.

Remember the bottom of the ladder is crowded and saturated. If you think it's going to be easy with 100 other people producing content no better or no different from what you can do then think again. If you think you can compete and make the money we make, then look at www.paulmarkham.com. This is what you need to equal to earn what we earn.