Vanna White, Vegas Visitor

The Vegas Visitor was the city's premiere entertainment publication for many years and was very instrumental in Hooper's development as a photographer of women. When the publisher, Bob Campbell gave him the opportunity to shoot for the cover in 1968 he also acquired a showcase for his work. As the weekly paper became popular and more girls wanted to appear on it, Campbell made and stuck with the decision to keep Hooper as the exclusive photographer for the cover. It didn't matter who you knew or how big a star you were, if you wanted to be in that 3x12" cover photograph, Hooper had to shoot it.

To provide a cover every week gave him the chance to grow in many ways. The tall format was established early on when he was asked to photograph a six foot showgirl with feathers. It seemed appropriate to run the photo as an extreme vertical. From that early issue on the format stuck. It was sometimes a blessing and sometimes a curse but Hooper became the master of the extreme vertical.

Hooper also had to learn work instinctively. Often when a publicity director or show producer had a girl they were promoting, Hooper would go on the shoot not knowing what the girl looked like, what she would wear or what the location would be. It was a lesson in spontaneity for them both.

The models on Vegas Visitor covers were local girls like cocktail waitresses and showgirls, some were visiting girls, some were famous like Raquel Welch and Marilyn Chambers and others upcoming starlets.

The covers also gave Hooper an opportunity to test new models, so virtually all of the girls he shot for Playboy appeared on the Vegas Visitor first.

It is estimated that he shot well over 700 covers as the exclusive photographer for the Vegas Visitor cover from 1969 to the publishers death in 1983. You can find many of the covers on our sister site VegasRetro.com

All images copyright Robert Scott Hooper

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