The photography business has been a little slow since the advent of digital cameras and their later incorporation into cell phones. There's a pickup at the start of school for senior pictures a little better than the guy who takes yearbook photos can produce, and again at prom and graduation times. Weddings bring in some business, but the time involved in photographing a wedding makes the cost pretty high for a lot of couples. They've started relying on a brother or uncle to record their special day.
I own 'Picture Perfect', a studio in the suburbs, and I while I was keeping my head above water, things could have been better. Some of the other studios had closed, but I liked being my own boss. All I needed was something to fill in the low spots and I'd be doing OK.
The digital camera boom also spawned another industry -- websites for people who like displaying themselves to other people. One day as I was looking at one, I wondered if there were any women out there who'd like pictures just for their husband or boyfriend.
Next door to my studio is a hair salon. I figured there was no better place to find out than there. I've known Virginia, the owner of the salon for several years. She's talks to lots of women every day, I figured she might have heard about something like this. As it turned out, she had. After a few cups of coffee and one dinner, we had a plan of sorts. Virginia would tell the women she thought might be interested about my studio, and I'd make up some brochures for her to put in her salon.
The brochure I worked up required some sample photos, so I went looking for a model. That was harder than it sounds. My samples had to be of a real woman, not the slender, ravishing girls made more so by advertisers and magazines with the liberal use of an airbrush or a computer program. I got about a dozen responses from girls just like that before almost giving up. When it looked like I wasn't going to find a model, I told Virginia I might have to postpone my plan. She just grinned.
"How 'bout using me?"
I don't know why I hadn't thought to ask her before, but she was perfect. Virginia is a pretty woman with a figure I like -- round and soft in all the right places. Though the loose pants and tops she wore at her shop didn't reveal much, she looked to have a pretty nice body. At around fifty, she was also old enough to show more mature women can still look desirable. We decided to do her photo shoot the next Sunday.
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I was setting up my lights when she came out of the changing room in a robe.
"This is harder than I thought it was going to be. Nobody but me and my cat's seen me undressed in a long time, and Rufus doesn't care what I look like as long as I feed him and change his littler box. You won't laugh when you see me will you?"
"Only if you say something funny."
She untied the belt on her robe and let it fall open.
"You said to bring some sexy undies. Are these sexy enough."
The light blue teddy with matching bikini panties was a whole lot more than just sexy on her. Virginia's hips were deliciously wide, soft, round and absolutely hot, and her breasts...Well, the teddy wasn't sheer, but it didn't have to be. Virginia wasn't huge in the breast department, but she was nicely endowed. The air conditioning in the studio had caused her nipples to stiffen into two firm bumps on the front of the teddy.
I took about a hundred shots of Virginia in various poses. Some were not revealing at all. They were shots of her face and chest down to the top of the teddy, and made her look soft and innocent. Some were of her stretched out on the twin bed I'd installed in the set. The black spread I put on it contrasted nicely with her pale skin and the light blue satin and lace. I tried to get a selection from mysterious, to sensuous, to erotic. I figured that would cover what most women would like.
My offer to pay her was met by Virginia shaking her head.
"Nope. Just give me a copy of the files. I want to put some of these on my dating site. Maybe they'll get some great guy's attention."
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It took a week to put the brochure together and get it to a printer, and two more days to get the thousand copies I'd ordered. A hundred of these went next door to Virginia's salon.
A week went by with no responses, then about five one night, a woman walked into my studio with one of the brochures in hand. I guessed her at about forty, and she was really cute in her shorts and tight top. She had a few extra pounds maybe, but she wore a wedding ring and I figured those pounds were left over from having kids. I asked if I could help her.
She took a deep breath.
"Can you take pictures of me that look like this?"
"Sure. That's what I'm here for."
"And they won't go anywhere else, just to me."
"That's in my contract. You can sue me if they do, but you have my word they won't."
Marylyn signed the contract and we set her appointment for three the next afternoon. I also went over a few things from my brochure that would help her pictures look better.
"Put on your makeup like you were going to a party, and especially your eye makeup. Your eyes will be a focal point of the pictures. I can ask Virginia to help you with that if you need it.
"I have a changing room in that part of the studio you can use. If you want lingerie shots, bring a selection. Since I'm taking digital pictures you can see what an outfit looks like right after we take the pictures and change it if you'd like.
"We can do anything from street clothes to totally nude. It's your choice, but the less you have on, the more things will stand out. If you want total nudity, you shouldn't wear any underwear the day of the session. That way, there won't be any strap or elastic marks on your skin."
Marilyn came in the next afternoon carrying an overnight bag. She was obviously embarrassed to be there, and blushed when she asked if she should get undressed.
"Let's just get you warmed up to the idea that you can look sexy first. Then we'll see how far you want to go."
I took twenty or so shots of Marilyn in several poses, and even the loose jeans and sweatshirt didn't take away her natural charm. Instead, they gave her a very soft, very innocent look that contrasted erotically with her smile and sultry, dark eyes.
She looked at the samples, then looked at me, and grinned.
"You can make me look sexy, can't you."
"It's not anything I'm doing. It's just the way you are. Do you like these, or would you like to try something a little bolder."
She grinned again.
"Brian isn't gonna believe it when he sees these. I want to try bolder...a lot bolder."
She came out of the dressing room wrapped in one of the big beach towels I keep there. She was nervous again.
"I've never done anything like this before. Do I just take off the towel and you take pictures or what?"
I tried to stay professional, but the shape that towel was wrapped around was making it difficult.
"Let's take it in stages again. You can ask to stop any time you get uncomfortable. Try laying down on your stomach on the platform. That's right. Now, just pull the towel up over your bottom a little so the curve of your hip just shows... little more...little more. That's perfect."
I snapped the shutter, then snapped it again. The picture looked pretty erotic to me and I told her so. She looked at it, then blushed and said, "Let's do some more...with more of me showing. I want Brian to get a real surprise."
And so it went for the rest of the hour. Marilyn walked out of my studio with a big grin on her face. She'd not really shown the camera much of her body, but she didn't have to. The poses and lighting accented all the best parts of her figure and her face gave the pictures the erotic quality she was after.
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Two weeks after I gave Marilyn her pictures, I was suddenly inundated with requests for appointments. According to Virginia, the photos had made a huge impression on Brian.
"I tell you, Harry, Marilyn can't stop talking about what she and Brian are doing since she gave him those pictures. Last week, it was sex on Saturday afternoon on the kitchen table and on Sunday he bent her over the couch...twice. This week on Monday night he stretched her out on the chaise lounge in their back yard and, as she put it, gave her the licking of her life. Marilyn said the neighbors called the cops after her third orgasm. Thought something was wrong with her. Oh, and she doesn't wear clothes in the house anymore. She says Brian likes her to be ready all the time."
The first was Hazel. She was about fifty and blushed a bright red when she said she wanted some photographs of her girls. Her girls were large, round, and had little pink nipples that got wonderfully stiff as soon as they saw the air in the studio and stayed that way until we were done. Hazel looked absolutely delicious to me. I hoped her girlfriend was going to think the same thing.
Then there was Jackie, about thirty and divorced. She made no bones about the fact she was going to post the pictures on an adult website. I'm sure the pictures I took were going to get her lots of offers. Her nipples must have been half an inch long after she played with them a little. If I'd have been a few years younger, I'd have made her an offer right then.
It was amazing what these women would tell me once they got over being nervous at displaying their bodies to a perfect stranger.
"Jim hasn't screwed me for a month. He just keeps looking at porn on his computer. Maybe he'll look at these and I can get laid once in a while. If he doesn't, I may be coming back to see if you'll do me instead."
"I'm going to leave one of these laying around the next time my neighbor, Lisa, comes over for coffee. She's been saying some things about bi girls lately, and I want to see if she'd like to play sometime."
Then there was Sadie, a seventy-two year old with silver-grey hair and a body that looked a lot younger. She'd been an avid swimmer and hiker all her life, and all those swimming and hiking muscles were still in great shape. She wanted the pictures to show her boyfriend, who happened to be only sixty-six.
"I've been telling him I want to have sex with him, but he says that's not why he's dating me. I think he's just embarrassed that he won't be able to. I've been after him to get some of those pills they keep advertising on television. Maybe these pictures will make him get some." She giggled. " I wish he would, because I'm spending a small fortune on batteries."
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My photography business was making money. There was even some repeat business, mostly from the women who'd had only lingerie shots done and had become brave enough to go further. I didn't expect that Virginia would be one of them.
"Can you take some pictures of me again, Harry? I'll pay you for them this time."
"Sure, but you can't pay me. I still owe you for modeling for me. Have any luck with them, by the way?"
"One thousand, four hundred and eighty seven offers to screw me 'til I pass out, and still counting. Most of them are young guys. Now, what the hell do I want with a twenty year old kid who doesn't know my love button from my big toe."
"You're a good looking woman. You must have gotten some better ones."
