Lawyers for Karl Edwin Skow, 59, swiftly launched an appeal against his jail term after a magistrate sentenced him to a maximum 18-months imprisonment for his "sly, predatory acts".

He pleaded guilty to three charges of intentionally recording an intimate image without consent.

Police who searched his Barden Ridge home found he used his mobile phone to capture intimate images of about 36 women over four months.

Skow mostly targeted women between 8.30am and 9.30am from May to November in 2017.

Police arrested him last year after reports a man had filmed up a woman's skirt while she was on an escalator at the train station in October.

Court documents said the woman confronted Skow after she felt someone behind her and looked down to see the offender hunched over his phone.

She felt a mobile phone touch her upper thigh and saw the screen turned upwards between her legs.

Skow faced Downing Centre Local Court for sentencing on Wednesday.

The prosecutor argued Skow's offending was mid-range for offences of their type and said women using public transport had a right to be safe.

"It is a sense of violation, there should be outrage. Their dignity and their privacy has been violated by the accused."

A suspended sentence would act as "a noose hanging over his head", the prosecutor said.

But Magistrate Jacqueline Milledge questioned why she shouldn't send Skow to jail.

Defence lawyer Michael Hempsall said Skow had battled alcohol abuse, depression and anxiety, for which he had sought psychological help, and a jail sentence would be manifestly excessive.

He said Skow didn't have any similar offences on his criminal record and his actions were out-of-character.

"He is deeply remorseful."

Mr Hempsall said Skow had experienced "significant consequences", including the loss of his job and financial pressures, because of his offending.

"He is paying a heavy price beyond the penalty your honour imposes today. His reputation is in tatters and it will forever be so."

Ms Milledge said Skow should have done more to address his alcohol problems and the community couldn't wait for offenders to "make awful choices that affect innocent people".

"You knew your failings and you did nothing about them."

She noted the victim who confronted him over his "predatory behaviour" said Skow acted as though he "didn't care, you were just in your own space and you didn't care what impact it had on her".

"This is humiliating. Imagine how that young woman felt being preyed upon by a man like you."

She said Skow would be eligible for release in May 2019, prompting his lawyers to immediately launch a severity appeal and a bail application.

In arguing for his client's release, Mr Hempsall said Skow had sought psychological help and was no longer abusing alcohol. He could report to police daily and not own a mobile phone if released.

Prosecutors opposed the application on grounds the community needed to be protected.

Ms Milledge said earlier brushes with the law, including an intensive corrections order for driving offences in 2015, hadn't stopped Skow offending.

"I'm concerned about his sexually deviant behaviour and what's said in [a report] about his sexual fantasies," she said.

"These are sly, predatory acts."

She refused bail. Skow's appeal will return to court at a later date.