Innocent Ebay Search Leads to Discovery of Early Nude Photographer
To Uschi Digard and Beyond!
Okay, we’ll admit it. We were up late one night online, innocently browsing on ebay, perusing potential four-wheeled mistresses to become our new Broham Van. When we typed in the word “70s,” numerous things popped up in addition to the celebrated behemoths of yore. Amidst several dvd compilations of That 70s Show was an immensely more attractive set of behemoths belonging to the legendary 70s pinup queen, Uschi Digard. Needless to say our search stopped there for maybe, ummm, about five minutes. But, it then took an odd turn when we realized the ORIGINAL PHOTOGRAPHER was posting his work online and for sale! Next thing you know, we got in touch with him and asked to take us back in time to the early adult industry of 60s & 70s Los Angeles. But first, the exclusive William Melton Gala Girl Gallery:
Broham’s Exclusive Interview with Photographer William Melton
What was it like to work in the wonderful world of adult magazines?
I started doing freelance photography for the adult magazines in 1960 and those early years in the industry were really great because it gave both photographers and wannabe models a very good place to go. Back then, for the truly beautiful and busty ladies to break into professional modeling they had to be skinny and have zero bust-line to succeed. The photographer had to be connected in that industry in order to get jobs. The early days of girlie magazines were open to freelance photographers because they needed many more models than was available and they needed new ones on a monthly basis.
What was the industry like in the Golden Era compared to now?
The industry had to be very careful in those early days because the government was always looking for ways to shut them down and always tried to pin a pornography label on them so we had to be very careful about not showing pubic hair and we had to be very careful doing the posing to not to show to much. I preferred the early days because we had to be more artistic than what they do today. When you pick up the magazines today you see more enhanced bust lines ( my wife calls them bolt ons) and everything else is showing along with it. Some of my best models were small or medium busted and we had to work harder to pose them so they showed off their best assets. We saw more really beautiful natural women back then than what is in most of the magazines out today.
We saw on eBay where you had photographed legends like Uschi Digard, and Cindy Barnett in your portfolio. How well did you get to know them? Did you shoot others?I have photographed probably over 200 models over my career (some good and some not so good). I photographed Candy Samples, Donna Brown, Arlene Bell, Rene Bond, Marilyn Chambers, Annette Haven just to name a few but my two all time favorites has been Uschi Digard and Cindy Barnett. Uschi has always been my number one favorite and I have been in touch with her over the years and consider a very good friend. I first photographed her in 1969 and 1970 and then also her last photo session in 1999. She was probably the most natural model I ever worked with and was definitely the easiest to pose and work with. She is also one of the most wonderful people I have ever had the honor of working with. I saw Uschi recently and she is still as beautiful as ever. A note to all of her fans, don’t believe all of the garbage out there about her because about 95% of what is written is not true. They even get her measurements wrong most of the time. One side note, I never photographed Bettie Page but have done some printing from negatives of her and had some photos of her that I have sold.
One Comment
I’m envisioning a bearded Ron Jeremy look a like, wearing Eric Estrada glasses. Complete with very tight polyester yellow pants and a striped unbutton shirt, hairy chest, laced with gold chains. Aaaaaaaaaah the 70′s. Free Love, Lots of Pubic hair, and Shag Wagons. This is awesome!