I'm An Erotica Photographer In The Bible Belt

Photography for me started in high school. I was taking an advanced art class for college credit. I could draw and paint and whatnot, but sometimes with drawing I found I just didn't have the patience for it. One day, I took it upon myself to talk one of my peers into posing nude so that I could do some drawings of her. That was the first time I shot a nude. I guess you could say my very first nude was illegal then, since we were in high school and both of us were underage. We don't go around promoting that too much.

When I went to college at Columbus State University, they had a photography course, and I'd already been bitten by the bug, so I just took everything I could, and learned all the technical aspects of it. The first body paint I ever did anything with, I did in college. And the girl I did it with over time grew to become one of my best friends, if not my best friend. I painted a Van Gogh's "Starry Night" across her chest.

Why nudes? Well, as it progressed, living in Southern Georgia, which is part of the Bible Belt, it was just a way to be unique. I mean, it's not difficult to be unique, but I guess I'm just the kind of person that gets a kick outta being unique and pissing people off! It makes people uncomfortable, and that makes me smile. Ninety per cent of the country would agree that what I do is alright, but the remaining 10 per cent of the ones I do it for. And they seem to have a hard time with it.