child models - any experience?

[ElliesMomma]

anyone have any experience with child modeling? perhaps you yourself, or your children, or someone you know? what's the good, the bad and the ugly?

we're not "into" it so much as an opportunity has come along, namely that our neighbor is a professional photographer specializing in head shots for models and actors. he offered to take some pictures of our 4 yo DD. she did great for the camera - i knew she would. she's very outgoing and photogenic. she loves to talk, loves meeting new people, is not shy in the least. and of course she's a cutie.

so we are *considering* looking into sending a few pictures into some agencies. we are located near a major city, so that also helps.

i do not want to "make a career of it." DD much loves her preschool, her library programs, her friends, her playdates. i do not want to spend days on end trying to get into some photo shoot for a couple hundred bucks. oh, and i also have a young son who would have to be brought along. not interested in spending oodles of time on this.

just wondering if it's possible to dabble in it, try it out, and see if she "gets lucky" and/or has a real talent for it, that can be worked into her present lifestyle without getting too heavily involved.

i'm also not real big on her focusing on her looks, am a big believer in strong women and being intelligent and doing important things in life.

so, just posting to see if anyone can offer me any BTDT advice. TIA.

[Tuesday]

I've friends who were models during their teens. I would say, based on what they experienced and the general vibe of the modelling world, if you are not interested in having your daughter focus on her looks - don't put her in modelling! The very crux of that business - whether it is capturing images of adults or children - is to get a "look" to sell a product. If anything, I'd think the modelling would only propell a child to focus on her looks.

My good friend that modelled - she did a few mainstream advertising campaigns in the 1990s and then modelled in Europe and Japan - she found it paid well but she basically thought about her face and her body 24/7. The money was good and the experience was unique but she suffered battle scars.

Another friend ... who did modelling on a smaller scale - she has been forever obsessed with her lucks to the exclusion of anything else. I'm not sure if the modelling caused this quirk but most definitely it brought it out.

I'm sure your daughter is lovely but if you are saying right now - I don't want my child to focus on her looks - then what does modelling for photographs of one's image actually do?

[omelette]

It's not something I would choose for my child.
When I was younger I was approached on the street to speak with a modeling agent/scout. I went with my mom and during the meeting they mentioned weight and not being able to gain any. I was very thin so it wasn't an concern at the time but it was mentioned. That right there would be a huge red flag for me as a parent.
Kids should be kids and they should play and get dirty and not worry about portraying an image that somebody else is placing on them which would be the result of going to any photo shoot.

[EFmom]

My nephew does it. He's a very striking looking kid and very athletic. Most of the jobs he's gotten are modeling outdoor wear or sporting equipment in a few very well known catalogs. He also loves acting and has been in an indie film or two.

He's now in high school and he's been doing it for several years. My sister has suggested that I do this with one of my dds, but I'm not interested.

First, it sort of depends on where you live or are willing to live. We aren't in a big enough city for it to make much sense, and I'm not willing to move.

You also have to have a very flexible schedule, as does your child. My sister has that. If the agency calls up at night and says you have to be in a certain place hours away at 8 am the following morning, you have to be willing and able to do that.

It also is all about your looks (and having certain athletic skills has helped my nephew). My nephew lets the stuff about how he looks slide off his back, but I could see that for some kids it would definitely be very bad for them. He is going into a phase where his age is going to work against him. As a teenager, he has to compete with young looking 18+ models, who have an advantage because they can work longer hours. Girls, I think are particularly vulnerable to having it be all about how they look, and there is a definite obsession about weight.

You also have to deal with the other parents. Many of them are genuinely unbalanced and live vicariously through their children. Some of the stories my sister tells...

He has made some very nice money doing it, which they are mostly saving for college. And in his case, my sister has some reasons why it is good for this particular child.

Oh, and you do spend considerable time on it, and mostly it's sitting around waiting for stuff to happen. So, after my sister drives hours to get somewhere, they often sit on a set all day for my nephew to work for half an hour. I'm not sure how it would work to drag a younger sib to all this.

But personally, I wouldn't do it with my kids.

[zinemama]

The way you have described doing it - just a bit, not making a career out of it, etc. all seems like a sensible approach.

However. I don't think there's any way at all to get a girl into modeling - even in that limited way - without making it crystal clear to her at a very young age that her looks are the most important and valuable thing about her, that they are, in fact, a commodity.

[EFmom]

Originally Posted by zinemama

The way you have described doing it - just a bit, not making a career out of it, etc. all seems like a sensible approach.

That may not be so easy.

With my sister's experience, if you get called, you go. If you turn down jobs, you pretty much fall right off the agency's radar, as they have a zillion other beautiful kids who will show up every time.

[madskye]

My daughter has done some modeling. Our friends launched a children's clothing line, and she's done two photo shoots with them in NYC with a great photographer. I liked it because I got tons of high quality photos of her afterward. Our friends and their children were also there, and it was lots of fun. She did not get paid, we just got free photos.

That said, I'm glad she wasn't getting paid--there are a lot of ethical issues with it.

The first time we were there, a 3 YO professional model was crying that she didn't want to take any more pix. That would have killed me if it were my daughter. The mom encouraged her to stick it out and it ended fine, but I wouldn't want to be in that position, where I was taking $$ for my daughter's time and then not honoring them commitment. I felt bad at the time and it wasn't even my child.

The other thing is my time. The two shoots we did were about 4-6 hours. Plus I drove in and out of NYC, 90 minutes each way. My DD was in and out of outfits and pretty stimulated but I was hot and bored! It was a fun experience for her, but I wouldn't want to do it regularly.

The emphasis on looks is true too but I'm not sure how much to tie that back to modeling. She gets a lot of comments on her looks that I just wish I could stop half the time. Pretty is as pretty does and as far as compliments go...it's nice to hear but I'd rather have someone notice how smart she is or how funny she can be.

[DaughterOfKali]

Originally Posted by EFmom

That may not be so easy.

With my sister's experience, if you get called, you go. If you turn down jobs, you pretty much fall right off the agency's radar, as they have a zillion other beautiful kids who will show up every time.

My friend has her youngest 3 kids modeling. She does turn down some things because they are too far away and with short notice (NYC, etc).
She does know that turning down jobs may effect her getting called as often but she's ok with that.
Her kids enjoy doing it. Otherwise, she wouldn't have them do it.

Oh, and the modeling she's involved in doesn't put emphasis on beauty or perfection. Her daughter is overwheight but still goes on photo shoots, etc. And her son isn't stereotypically 'cute' but he's great at conveying whatever feel they are looking for in photo's. As a matter of fact, he was recently in a local magazine about sportsmanship in children.

[SoulCakes]

My personal opinion is that children should be raised free of physical judgments from their parents and other adults. My daughter did a one-time modeling session as a toddler at the photographer's request, which I was ok with because she didn't comprehend any of the significance. I wouldn't pursue it today, because I feel pursuing that as an older child who can understand what's expected of her puts not only pressure on her to look a certain way, and feel like her parents and other people want her to look "beautiful" or "attractive", but also gives her a solid reason to think that she's better or more desirable than others because she's modeling and they're not. I feel the values children learn at such early ages stays with them, and these are not the values I want my daughter to come away with.

[lolar2]

I would only, MAYBE do it if we lived about 5 minutes or less from the major hub of wherever I would expect the modeling to be. For example, when we lived in "Los Angeles" we were really living in adjacent cities to LA; I only would have considered it with DS if we had been living right in the city proper. The adults I knew who were models and actors all lived within the Los Angeles city limits or else they never would have had time to eat, sleep or work out. (Unless they were very successful and rich, because that is a different lifestyle from most standard working actors.)

[LaLaLaLa]

I have a friend's daughter who did some modeling when she was young. She and her mom had gone to one of those photo places at the mall where they doll you all up and then take pictures. The photographer there commented how the little girl loved the camera and asked if they had considered modeling.

So for awhile they did some modeling. The girl got a couple of major ad campaigns and enjoyed going to the photo shoots and having people take pictures of her.

Then she lost a tooth and her modeling career was over. This was fine with everyone involved. I'm not sure if she will go back to it when she's older or not. As the situation was, it was a pretty self-limiting amount of time, since I guess it's common that once kids lose teeth and their mouths get all funny for awhile, they generally don't get jobs. It didn't do her any damage to have a couple of years during which people often took her picture and told her how beautiful she was. It was true! And she certainly heard it enough from friends and family, too.

[SilverFish]

i think it can be done in a healthy or unhealthy way. it's not really that different in my mind from a child being very good at a certain sport and competing... you are still placing value on a skill set that is outside of the child's core self worth... a child who is competing in gymnastics or hockey could just as easily come away with the idea that people only value them for their ability to do a back flip or score a goal, or look down on others who aren't similarily gifted. modeling is about the "attractive" qualities of the child, for sure, but it takes an interest and certain amount of skill to be successful as well. there are lots of really beautiful people out there that would fail miserably as models.

that said, modeling is usually an all or nothing proposition, same as it is for competitive dance or sports... there are people that successfully do it without a huge time commitment, but it's not that common. if you want to just "give it a shot" sure, it's not going to damage your kid, but don't expect success unless you both are really willing to commit a fair amount of time and effort.