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Description
In the earlier days of my career I did a lot of work for Playgirl magazine, which then was only in print and not online. The editors always complained that my work was too artsy but they kept hiring me anyway and paid my day rate, which was pretty handsome even back then. One of my first big shoots was with this guy Michael who after two layouts with me went on to become Man of the Year and gave me my first cover. After our first shoot on location in Los Angeles the editors were going to have another photographer work with him but Michael said no, he'd only work with Tom. I love it when models do that.

For this second outing Michael and I and my makeup artist all piled in my jeep and drove six hours up to the Kings River in the Sierras where we spent the better part of the day taking pictures and having fun. It was late in the summer and the water in the river was low so we were able to get right out into it and play. Here's the rub: I was shooting mostly with my Hasselblad in those days - a ten thousand dollar camera and lens that should never have been anywhere near the water. But oh well, I wanted to be out in the water with Michael so I waded in with my camera held tight against my chest and hoped that I wouldn't stumble on a rock and go under. For this particular shot I got up on a big rock in the middle of the river so that I could shoot down onto him; it worked and we spent a couple of hours out in the water working, playing and having the time of our lives. At one point I was standing chest deep in the water shooting straight across at Michael and thought to myself, wow, I'm getting paid a lot of money to do this. Life is good! I hope I don't fall in because I can't afford a new camera.

I worked for Playgirl for several years and though it was a lot of fun at times there were other times when it was a pain in the butt. Erections were in one day and out the next as the magazine struggled to push the envelope without losing advertisers. As fate would have it, when erections were out I had guys who couldn't keep it down and when erections were in I had guys who couldn't get it up. Not a bad gig, you say. But honestly, battling the editors all the time took the joy out of it and I finally said thanks but no thanks and moved on. What was great during my tenure with the magazine was the access I had all the time to models, both male and female, who were open to doing nudes. I honed my craft while getting paid and had all the models I could have ever wanted for my fine art imagery.

This image was shot with my Hasselblad on transparency film and scanned from the original slide. No post work has been done on the image at all. Can you see the difference?

Description
In the earlier days of my career I did a lot of work for Playgirl magazine, which then was only in print and not online. The editors always complained that my work was too artsy but they kept hiring me anyway and paid my day rate, which was pretty handsome even back then. One of my first big shoots was with this guy Michael who after two layouts with me went on to become Man of the Year and gave me my first cover. After our first shoot on location in Los Angeles the editors were going to have another photographer work with him but Michael said no, he'd only work with Tom. I love it when models do that.

For this second outing Michael and I and my makeup artist all piled in my jeep and drove six hours up to the Kings River in the Sierras where we spent the better part of the day taking pictures and having fun. It was late in the summer and the water in the river was low so we were able to get right out into it and play. Here's the rub: I was shooting mostly with my Hasselblad in those days - a ten thousand dollar camera and lens that should never have been anywhere near the water. But oh well, I wanted to be out in the water with Michael so I waded in with my camera held tight against my chest and hoped that I wouldn't stumble on a rock and go under. For this particular shot I got up on a big rock in the middle of the river so that I could shoot down onto him; it worked and we spent a couple of hours out in the water working, playing and having the time of our lives. At one point I was standing chest deep in the water shooting straight across at Michael and thought to myself, wow, I'm getting paid a lot of money to do this. Life is good! I hope I don't fall in because I can't afford a new camera.

I worked for Playgirl for several years and though it was a lot of fun at times there were other times when it was a pain in the butt. Erections were in one day and out the next as the magazine struggled to push the envelope without losing advertisers. As fate would have it, when erections were out I had guys who couldn't keep it down and when erections were in I had guys who couldn't get it up. Not a bad gig, you say. But honestly, battling the editors all the time took the joy out of it and I finally said thanks but no thanks and moved on. What was great during my tenure with the magazine was the access I had all the time to models, both male and female, who were open to doing nudes. I honed my craft while getting paid and had all the models I could have ever wanted for my fine art imagery.

This image was shot with my Hasselblad on transparency film and scanned from the original slide. No post work has been done on the image at all. Can you see the difference?