I want to participate! What do I do?
Awesome! We love that you want to be one of the amazing humans featured in our project. To become a participant you must be at least 18 years of age and reside within the United States (for now). All you need to do is shoot us an email and tell us a little bit about yourself, your gender and where you live.
Once we receive your email we will send you an interview questionnaire and a few releases for the interview and photography. Get these back to us as soon as you can, but please be thoughtful with your interview responses! Your answers here will likely help someone else who might be struggling in some way.
From there it’s just a matter of scheduling your photography session. Our goal is to travel to all 48 contiguous states at least once. For now, this project is entirely self-funded and we will have to book travel appointments as money and time off work allow. It’s our hope to acquire additional funding so that we can reach people faster and more frequently.
We will post regular updates to our travel itinerary so follow along to see where we are and where we are headed! We are based in SW Virginia and do local shoots on a regular basis, and of course you are always welcome to travel to us!
What is the photography session and/or interview like?
Each photo session lasts approximately 1 hour and is generally in a location of the participants’ choice, or in a central location when multiple participants are scheduled for the same day. We are open to your preferences as far a more natural or urban setting, as we do want these photos to reflect YOU.
The interview questionnaire is emailed to you and must be completed prior to the photo shoot. You can simply email it back to us, or print it and fill it out by hand. It consists of several questions pertaining to your gender identity and personal experience. You do NOT have to answer any question that you aren’t comfortable with or simply don’t want to answer. We just ask that you answer as many questions as possible and to be thoughtful and respectful with your responses.
What do I get out of it?
Aside from the joy of knowing you made a difference in the lives of others and a strong sense of acceptance and community.. each participant will receive FREE, professional quality digital images of themselves to use however they wish. (It would be great if you wanted to use these images to represent our project to help get the word out, but it’s not required).
Each participant will also receive a 20% discount if they would like to purchase the hard-cover Discovering Gender print book upon the projects’ completion, which they will be featured in.
Does my gender identity count as non-conforming?
Most likely the answer will be yes! You can still fit within the binary, you can be of any sexual orientation, you don’t have to label yourself. If you have any lingering doubts, just shoot us a quick email or DM us on Instagram and we will be happy to assure you that you would be a vital part of this project.
I don’t want to participate, but want to support this project! What can I do?
That’s great! Not everyone is gender non-conforming or comfortable being photographed or interviewed; we totally understand. If you want to help out or show your support anyway that is always encouraged and greatly appreciated! You can simply share the project on social media or with those you think might be interested in order to help us get the word out and reach more awesome people. You could even donate, in any amount, or purchase one of our custom T-Shirts to help fund the project. Engaging with us on the blog or on Instagram is lovely as well! It all helps! We’re just happy you care.