New York- “How to Shoot Your own Live Adult Video,” a workshop in lower Manhattan, is one of many classes given across the country on how to profit from a porn industry that grossed billions of dollars last year.

Erika Kole stood topless in front of the class, discussing the finer points of Title 18 of the U.S. Criminal code, section 2251, which governs how old actors have to be to appear in adult sex videos.

Kole, 25, and 28-year-old Nikki Napoli then acted out a live sex scene. But the 30 students, who each paid more than $200 for the three-hour lecture, appeared more interested in what the blonde model told them about Web site design, product distribution and the porn business than what they were doing in front of the camera.

Held in Lower Manhattan, “How to Shoot Your own Live Adult Video,” is one of many classes given across the country on how to profit from an adult industry that grossed billions of dollars last year. Most classes are in large cities like Los Angeles and New York and taught by pornography professionals.

“If you want to make money and you have the talent, you can do it,” said Joe Gallant, an actor-director who said he has taught 15 of the classes with models like Kole in the past three years. “Since there is so much porn, I really encourage people to put their own stamp on their work and create something original.”

The number of commercial pornographic Web pages on the Internet has increased nearly 18 times during the past five years, according to the Internet filtering company N2H2. The Seattle company reported 260 million Web pages of adult content in their September study.

“Starting a sex business is just like launching any other business, except the product is sex,” said Shannon Mullen, who worked as an advertising executive for Smirnoff and Daimler-Chrysler before she founded www.safina.com, which markets sex toys as bath products. “But just because it is sex doesn’t mean it will sell — you have to have your own angle.”

Mullen teaches the class, “How to Start a Sex Business of Fun or Profit in New York.” The students, including medical professionals, merchants and designers, use the session to bring more focus to their ideas for selling sex. There are no live demonstrations in the business class, which costs $54.

Elizabeth, a middle-aged lawyer, and her husband wanted to develop a business plan for their idea for a “foreplay” Website with underwear-clad models having pillow fights.

“Since there is so much hard-core pornography that not everyone likes, we are hoping to make something arousing that couples can enjoy and not be scared of,” Elizabeth said.

Christine, a chiropractor, was interested in manufacturing glow-in-the-dark sex toys and in scented candles shaped like erotic parts of the human anatomy. Another student who gave his name as Mark said he wanted to shoot his own amateur porn videos and sell them on a Web site, an idea he came up with after reading one of the thousands of spam e-mails that flood his in-box.

“There are so many of theses sites and they look easy to do,” Mark said. “They wouldn’t exist if they weren’t making money.”

Mullen, who began teaching the class three months ago, said several of her former students are actively developing their ideas into actual online businesses.

Getting into the adult business is relatively affordable as industry-standard technology becomes cheaper and more miniaturized. For $2,000, prospective directors can buy a portable digital video camera, similar to those used by journalists in the Iraq War. Props and technical services can run an additional $1,000, and adult models generally work for $500 per shoot, depending on the scenes they act out.

A former sound designer on the soap opera “Guiding Light,” Gallant works with a film kit that fits into an oversized black duffle. It cost him about $10,000, including three collapsible light stands, a digital video camera and lenses and a tube of colored light filters.

He began teaching the class after he founded his own porn production company and Website, www.blackmirror.com, where he sells individual video titles and adult content to subscribers.

The trick to succeeding in the competitive adult industry is a creative approach, he said.

“I can’t tell you how to make a million dollars in porn,” said Gallant, whose next porn film will feature lusty vampires and the CIA. “But I can tell you how to make an innovative product that people in the industry will be interested in.”

Kole, the blonde model, had some ideas of her own. She said she had recently completed her own Web site, www.thenakedchic.com. Meanwhile, Gallant fielded questions about lighting and camera work.

As the class neared its end, Kole and co-star Napoli mounted a folding particle-board conference table at the front of the classroom. They began to act out the scene as Gallant filmed, occasionally changing the lighting and directing the two women.

The audience stared intently at contorted models balanced on the rickety table, their images projected on a nearby television as the teacher shouted his filming tips to the class.

“The thing that screams ‘amateur’ is poorly lit genitalia,” Gallant said. “Amber filters work the best for all skin colors, pink just looks too fake. Remember that when you are shooting.”