How to start a career as a model

Tyra Banks' show "America's Next Top Model, has sparked a lot of interest in becoming a model which is a good thing for our girls...and boys.

A brief "how to" follows- any other questions can be made in the comment section.

You should start a portfolio. You need a good photographer, not an expensive one either. To start, you will need in your portfolio, a head shot (your face and shoulders), a product shot (you holding a product, i.e. Cell phone) and wild card shot- something you like doing, maybe you dancing, skating or sky diving or tweeting.

You can study fashion magazines for different poses to try, the photographer is only going to take your picture. They will only give you minimal advice on posing.

Your completed portfolio will include "comp cards".

This looks like a post card with a thumbnail of each of your pics, head shot, prod. Shot), this is what you take to the modeling agencies.

You can register online with some agencies.

My contact photographer is John Manning. His company is John Manning Photography and his online shop is OneModelPlace.com.

You should check it out and once you get some pics, unload them and register with his company.

John got work for my daughter and her friends that we referred to him.

Your photos should be young and fresh. Do not go for sexy or punked pics yet.

If you need help picking out clothes to model, I can assist you there too.

Your mom or dad can act as your agent at first, actually a glorified secretary.

Do not pay for expensive photo packages or modeling/charm school rip offs, they are ripoffs.

If you do not know or cannot find a good photographer in Canada, let me know.

I can contact John for a referral. He also travels and may plan to visit your city soon.

I think I covered everything, but after you read this, feel free to ask any other questions you may have.

Good luck

One more thing, you can start your portfolio with as many photos as you can afford to pay for. The package above is a "basic" package or the minimum pics you will need.

When you start working, ask for some of the pictures from the job you completed. They will be happy to give them to you. This shows potential clients the different kinds of work you can and have done and your portfolio will get bigger, letting clients know you have a lot of talent.