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A week ago I hunkered down with ten of my fellow Australian female feminist porn makers to talk about what we do. Included in our group were filmmakers, webmistresses and models (and some were combintations of all those things) We talked business strategies, billing, search engine optimization and filmmaking techniques. We shared war stories. We also talked about the ethics of what we do. We didn’t get time to write down a formal code of practice but it’s now in the pipeline.<\/p>\n
Today I read Melissa Gira Grant’s article Who speaks for women who work in the adult industry?<\/a> In it, she discusses the idea that women taking control of the means of production is one way of creating fairer conditions for the performers in porn, short of creating a union. Certainly that’s what I’m seeing with the performers who are running their own sites and producing their own content. It’s also what I’ve experienced as a filmmaker attempting to make a better kind of porn.<\/p>\n There was also this quote from Bella Vendetta:<\/p>\n “Unfortunately, I have found that if the term feminist porn is being used, I can almost guarantee that it means I will be offered an incredibly low rate. To me, it is not empowering to accept half my rate to have sex on film.” Bella concludes: “Feminist porn is a labor of love.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I wanted to address this quote and the suggestion it gives (at least to me) that feminist porn isn’t living up to its ethical ideals when it comes to pay. While I understand where Bella is coming from, I feel that it doesn’t give the full story. To do this, I want to give the perspective of someone who is a feminist porn producer, not a performer.<\/p>\n I am an independent operator. I don’t have the backing of a major porn studio or investment company. It’s just me operating out of my home office, using my own money. In making porn, I have two motivations. One of them is idealist: I want to create positive, artistic, female-friendly depictions of sex – a better kind of porn. Feminist<\/em> porn.<\/p>\n My other motivation is monetary. It would be a lie to say otherwise. Almost everyone has a commercial interest in porn. I’m in this to make a living and – hopefully – a profit of some kind. I don’t have any other job other than making porn so I need to pay my bills and save for the future. Right now I’m trying to make money with my new site Bright Desire. It’s currently running at a loss but I hope that, over time, I can get into the black with it.<\/p>\n Bright Desire is only new. It doesn’t have that many scenes on it. To build up the base number of scenes required to even start the site I’ve had to invest my own money, time, skills and equipment and take a risk that I might never get any of it back. That’s the risk inherent in any startup. Mine is only a small site and as an indie operator I’ve done my best to keep costs down.<\/p>\n With each individual scene, I have to consider the cost of producing it compared to whether I can get my money back on it and how long it will take to get it back. Producing a scene doesn’t just involve paying performers; it also involves paying for a location, the time spent to make it and edit it plus the simple ongoing capital costs of equipment like lights, cameras, microphones, editing software and high-end computers plus hosting and billing fees and advertising. There’s also the cost of travelling to create each scene, as I can’t make them where I live.<\/p>\n Because it’s just me and my husband making porn, I carry all these costs personally. I have bought all my own equipment. I can’t afford a crew or staff so I do everything myself. It means it takes more time for me to produce finished work and put it on the site. This means I’m at a commercial disadvantage to those major companies that seem to produce a new porn scene every day. I’m only an indie producer; my work is the equivalent of a hand-knitted scarf, not a factory-produced jacket.<\/p>\n To make my money back I need to sell my product into a market that is currently very depressed. People don’t want to pay for porn anymore, they expect it all to be free and don’t consider the costs of production when they watch it on tube sites or torrent it. To make my money back I need to cover a lot of bases – I can offer the scenes on my own subscription site but I need to also consider video-on-demand, DVDs and cable TV. These options also don’t provide huge profit margins; indeed, in some cases its not worth doing. So right now, making porn is not really the gilded path to riches that the media so often make it out to be. It’s really more of a gilded path to break-even.<\/p>\n When it comes to paying performers, I do my best to offer fair rates. These may occasionally be a little lower than standard although – here’s the trick – there isn’t any official standard rate at present. There are averages and there’s also the performer’s asking rate. It can be a tricky business, negotiating pay, because I’m trying to keep my costs down (and labour is by far the biggest cost) while still paying my performers something decent. I’ve certainly never paid half. On a couple of occasions I’ve paid more than the going rate. And if a performer wants more money and I can’t afford it, I thank them and we go our separate ways.<\/p>\n I know of one feminist director who is able to pay her performers what they ask. She has the backing of a major studio so has the funding to do this. I know of other feminist porn producers who use volunteers in their productions. This is usually because they are dirt poor and are trying to achieve their vision on the smell of an oily rag. If people are happy to volunteer to be in porn, good for them and good for their producers. For me, I couldn’t use volunteers because I am trying to run a business and it would be unethical not to pay – even if I can’t pay as much as other companies.<\/p>\n I currently pay on a one-off basis. That is, I pay the performers as an independent contractor; they get a single amount for their time and the use of their image. I then have the use of that footage forever. I guess the question that needs to be asked about this method of payment is: is it exploitative?<\/p>\n If I look at it from a performer’s point of view, maybe it is. Their image is now out there permanently and can be used in any way that the producer wishes. But if I view it as a producer, perhaps not. In producing a scene, I’m bringing my skills, equipment, time and money to the table. I’m also taking a risk that I will make a loss. There is no guarantee that I will make my money back in creating a porn scene, Meanwhile the performer walks away with cash in hand, guaranteed.<\/p>\n Dare I say it, I’ve felt vaguely exploited filming a scene once – the couple I hired were difficult to direct, they fucked like rabbits, had a great time and walked away with their money. I was left with relatively dodgy footage and a much lighter wallet, wondering if I could make something of what I’d captured. My point being, the door can swing both ways.<\/p>\n As with all exchanges of money for labour, deals are done and compromises are made. The trick is to create an accord where both sides are happy. I do my best to reach that accord when I’m hiring.<\/p>\n There is only one porn company that I know of that pays up front but also gives revenue share to its models. That is Feck, the Australian company that runs I Shot Myself<\/a> and Beautiful Agony<\/a>. Feck puts aside a share of its profits and distributes the money to its models each year, based upon how popular each model has been. Making this work involves careful tabulation of page views and the subsequent calculations and distributions require the services of a full-time accountant.<\/p>\n