Today’s Post by Blue Moon Staff
From time to time we hear from photographers and models who have posted tasteful glamour or boudoir images on social media only to have them deleted by the platform’s censors or maybe just to pacify the prudes who haunt social media in order to have something to complain about.
Why social media sites continue to prioritize such harassment is obvious; it encourages “engagement” and, in turn, makes them money from their advertisers. One thing appears obvious: If anyone on a social media site complains about your photograph it will be deleted no matter how tasteful it may be or that you think it is.
The truth is that most social media platforms have rules prohibiting nudity although their “rules” seem to vary widely in both application and enforcement. The exception seems to be Twitter, where apparently anything goes.
How I Made this Portrait: I photographed Ashley in my 11×15-foot home studio. The backdrop was a 5×7-foot Photo Grey Savage Infinity vinyl background.hung from JTL background stands. The lighting was from a Paul C. Buff DigiBee monolight with Plume Ltd Wafer softbox as main light and placed at camera right, an Alien Bee monolight with a 16 x 30-inch Westcott Apollo Strip soft box was at camera left with another Digibee with a 48-inch Dynalite Quad Square black/silver umbrella located in the back of my studio. The camera used was a Panasonic Lumix GH4 with G Vario 14-45mm f/3.5-5.6 lens at 45mm and an exposure of 1/125 sec and f/5.6 and ISO 200. And no social media site would ever let me run this image. except maybe Twitter aka X.
So what do you do if you want to post any of your glamour or boudoir images on social media? Here’s some suggestions:
The people running Instagram and Facebook too seem obsessed with women’s nipples. But if they are partially covered by either a see-through garment, the model’s hands or anything that partially covers a woman’s nipples that seems to be OK. Except for Black Tape (look for a post about this genre soon) images, for some reason. Photographs of models wearing see-through images seem to be (key words) acceptable with the censors. But then again it depends how popular your Instagram feed is; the more popular it is, the more likely you are to be censored or have your image deleted.
Read All About It
There been so much on-line frustration with Instagram that a 300-page book called, “Pics or It Didn’t Happen” edited by Arvida Bystroemand and Molly Soda was produced using images that were banned from the social media app. Having received many takedown notices themselves, Bystroemand and Soda asked Instagrammers to submit their own censored images for inclusion on its pages. The book provides a fascinating picture of 21st century society’s complex views on the image of the human body and censorship. It’s a fun read for $24.95 with used copies starting at around six bucks.
If you’re a woman who would like to give the Flying Fickle Finger of Fate award to social media and would like to have your own sexy portraits of yourself, contact us via the Contact tab above and let’s schedule a photo shoot. And in case you wondered we are open and accepting of all lifestyles including LGBTQIA.
