cursed-photography

   Ok so hardly ever write here as I generally don't have much to say.  If I write about upcoming plans they always fall through and I hate false hope.  If I say I will have new work up and it all falls through I feel more disappointed then if I had just kept it to myself.  That being said.... a person I've known for years approached me wanting a website to promote herself (a dancer) I agreed for a small fee.  Learned wordpress (I used frontpage when I last did websites) set her up.  She decided she wanted a members site so I agreed for a small percentage.  This continued/continues to escalate... she wants me to shoot some her photos for galleries... ok.  She wants to setup a second membership site for her to put other girls on... pay them a modeling fee, me doing the photography and then putting those galleries on the new site.... ok.  So here I am a month later both sites up and running.  Domains, hosting,  memberships setup recurring through paypal, the secondary site complete, her site complete minus the streaming live chat.  She basically gives me the second site for whatever reason just asking a percentage for finding the models.  
   
   Now I'm kind of stuck as a single father of 3 working all the hrs I can get including taking side jobs for extra money (hence the not posting very often as I more or less do tfp shoots and not paying).  She has kind of backed out of getting the models to focus on her site.  Which she has also kind of lost interest in her own site for the moment.  Now not that I hadn't wanted to do this all in the past... I had thought about it.  Though haven't really thought about it in years as it can create problems... when you have kids, if your in a relationship.  This just happened to come up in the "eye of the storm" hours cuts drastically at work,  the girlfriend disappearing without saying a word (guess that's now ex), so money tight and out of no where poof a person I talk to maybe once a year calls asking if I can do this.  I start running numbers and percentages in my head do a little research.  Give her overhead prices, startup costs what is possible and she wants to do it.  

    With her backing down now has kind of put me in an odd position.  This was a possible out from the years of grinding to actually be able to pay all my bills, have some free time, get newer camera gear, and actually pursue a more professional direction with Cursed Photography.  Anything to out there would have been done under my previous name preserving Cursed Photography for the genre/niche I have made for it.  My dilemma now is with money tight and her backing out it's teetering. Don't get me wrong generally I would just walk away.  However this is something that if I can get it to go just 3 or 400 members worldwide would be a complete turn around for me and my kids.  Even 140 members would make me as much I currently make at work and all the ground work, labor, research, and learning is done.  All that is left is shooting, posting, and promoting.  It's practically a turnkey site now.  The issue is the money to pay models for the shoots (same issue I have trying to find models for my Cursed Photography cosplay/dark shoots).  The models I can post casting calls on MM, craigslist and the like.  I've also got information on the site for applying to be a model.  However I need to have the money for when/if they respond and the idea was she was finding the models and paying through me which would give me exclusive content and allow me to get members which would then in turn get me money to expand.

    So my course of action so far has been to buy the rights to a few photosets that are out there and post them.  Hoping that now I can start promoting my site and start building a membership base that will allow me to actually start doing the content myself.  Then allow me to quit my job and pursue my hobby of photography while doing 2 or 3 shoots a month for the website.  

   If you read this thanks for listening to my rant.  Suggestions or ideas welcome. 

  Ended up expanding my willingness to drive for a tf shoot to almost 2 hrs.  However has gotten me a bigger willing modeling pool.  Shot Angel Starstar yesterday.  Have just gotten another model to do Jasmine for my princesses/fairy tale shoots.  Angel is wanting to do Red Riding hood also.  So after a dry spell will cost me a bit more but have shoots in the works.  Angel shoot will be up in next day or two.

   So shooting in New Salem Saturday.  Shooting with a model who I have been trying to shoot with for a year now.  Shooting her senior pics in a few outfits.  However this shoot will be a couple locations and wardrobe changes and she is wanting around a six hour shoot.  So hopefully we will get a few other shoots in besides just the Senior pic stuff.

    New shoot coming next week.  Have another model scheduled to shoot this coming Thursday.  Mentioned some ideas and location possibilities she chose location.  However didn't mention which she was interested in so will be a surprise for all lol.

   Got to shoot with Marie Madness MM# 3084235 finally a model that didn't flake out.  She was very energetic and fun to work with.  She slid off the trunk of a fallen tree and scraped her knee open to where is was bleeding a little.  After a minute or to calming down she was back up on the tree modeling.  We are talking about more shoots in the near future(few weeks out).