TucsonTied Blog

OMG! What is that HORRIBLE TucsonTied doing to me?! I like it!!

 When Pantera, Dave and I get together, it’s guaranteed fun.  The three of us are like the “Three Musketeers”…or maybe the “Three Stooges” is more appropro.    I got “Curly” nailed (bald and a…ahem…”larger” guy and all)…Dave’s the “bright” one, so I guess that’d make him “Moe”…and “Larry” never looked hotter…lol.

Her sense of humor is great too.  Dave was behind the camera, pushing me for a crotch rope…I was refusing, and she blurted out, “We can put one on YOU if you want, Dave…you can squirm around and have fun while you’re filming…” (Thankfully, he refused…lol.)  At my recent custom shoot, Dave was catching her putting on her makeup…she quipped, “Are we going to make you pretty this time, Dave?”  She’s a riot!  Although sometimes…

Hey!! YOU'RE the model here...I don't need exposure!!

If I remember right, I was finishing some above-the-knees ropework, getting on the floor to get underneath, and had just commented on how I feel like a mechanic under a car when I get in this area.  I then said that I was thankful that my shirt back didn’t seem to be riding up this shoot, exposing my lower back…she took care of that, dammit…lmao.    Too funny!!

Let’s put it this way…if you’re so comfortable with someone that you wind up with them multiple times at multiple Denny’s restaraunt locations at 3 in the morning, you KNOW you have a good friend on your hands.  Love ya, girl!

“Tolstoy”

Have a drink, Stacie...

Headed back into the “editing” cave tonight…going to be doing some of the videos from “Behind The Scenes” of my Stacie Snow work.  I love the “BTS” stuff for more than one reason…not only is it fun to film, but it gives you a look at what the models are like when the cameras are off…you get to see the real people behind the sexy. 

Stacie had never tried to do “elbows” bondage before…she had resigned herself to thinking that she couldn’t do it.  A little encouragement (and a LOT of safety) from yours truly and she was kicking it with the best of them.  The above shot is from our first shoot, and clearly shows the excitement on her face when she was not only testing her limits, but doing DAMN FINE work as she did it.  You don’t see that in the “normal” site work…I treasure being able to bring it to you. 

Some ask how I go about doing the meticulous ropework…

There ya go!  Me with fan fave, Pantera.  Strand by strand, turn by turn, loop by loop, as each and every part of the bondage goes on…with the “BTS” work, essentially, YOU ARE THERE!!  Kinda cool, no?  It also gives you a chance to know that the models are not only hot babes on a pixellated screen, but real-life women as well…that’s my fave part of these things.

Duty calls…off to remembering the fun I had hanging with these foxy, lovely and very human ladies!  You can see these “Behind The Scenes” vids at any of my usual hangouts on the net…

http://www.tucsontied.com/ Main site

http://www.clips4sale.com/store/30889  Clips4Sale store

http://bondagetokens.com/query.asp?rSiteID=215&rWebmasterID=1024 Token Page

Later, kids!!

“Tolstoy”

Ah, I LOVE my new computer!!  Vista, on-board card reader, 6 Gb of memory, Pentium Processor…and a BLAZING fast fucker to boot!  Should’a fried my hard drive a long time ago…lol.

It’s an ASUS…new brand to me, but my “sister”, former model Angel, who’s a computer genius, tells me I did good in getting it.  Not a very “bondage-y” wallpaper just yet…still getting used to having it and taking in the “new car smell”…lol.

That’s a good shot of it…that’s a statue of Marvel Comic’s Thanos bearing the Infinity Gauntlet just under the screen and a “Hot Wheels” replica of the batmobile from the first “Batman” flick off to the right.  I’m a comic book geek beyond hope.

There’s a close-up of Thanos.  Of all the Marvel villians, I identify with him most.  Grandious schemer, illusions of grandeur, and in many ways his own worst enemy who’s caused the undoing of his own schemes himself many a time.  Hmmm…wonder what that says about me?  (lol)

And here we have the Green Lantern…the PROPER Green Lantern, Hal Jordan.  This figurine came with the Best-Buy-bought version of the recent DC Comics dvd release of the movie, “First Flight”.  Hal always was my favorite Green Lantern…Guy Gardner and Jon Stewart were just pale comparisons.

I need to get a Spider-Man to balance this all out…I’m a MAJOR Spidey fan, and this desktop now seems almost wrong…lol.

Well, anyway…I need to get to the Sunday chores…trash needs a dumping, clothes need a washing, etc, etc.  Later, kids!!

“Tolstoy”

A few fun facts…   

My ideal pizza?  Pepperoni, bacon, hamburger, mushroom and onion…YUM!! (nom, nom, nom!!)

I own a 2003 Buick Century.  She’s a great car…no, I haven’t named it…lol.    She’s helped me to bring many a model to the TucsonTied “set” (most notably, Kimberly Marvel) and is a very comfortable ride.  Just like any car owner, I have a love/hate relationship with her…a routine oil change recently turned into a $283 repair bill, keeping me from going to FetishCon this year…GRRR.

Heroclix are a passion of mine.  http://www.wizkidsgames.com/heroclix/   It’s a tabletop board game involving 1 inch or taller playing pieces, sculpted very lifelike after superheroes and heroines.  I’m a pretty damn good strategist because of it…and tho I can’t stand up to veteran players, I can fare pretty well for myself.  I have some rare pieces…the “Kingdom Come” Green Lantern that I have can go for $50 or more at eBay.  I have a big, BIG collection…I need to find it some space…lol.

Video games are also a passion.  I can unerringly guide you thru Resident Evil 4 and get you every secret, secret weapon…everything about the game is not a secret to me.  My passion for vid games has (in my opinion) translated into a pretty sharp set of reflexes…for a guy my size, I’m pretty damned fast.  I’ve actually scared many a person with how fast I am.   My faves include the Resident Evil series, the Metal Gear series and the Final Fantasy series, tho the FF games actually scare me at times…to complete a game takes literally MONTHS and can be very life-absorbing…I only play them when I know I have nothing else on the schedule of life that really needs doing…lol. 

Vid game systems I have: PSII and GameCube.  Don’t much care for XBOX, tho I admit to some weakening on that front…lol.  I don’t have the Wii (almost impossible, still even now, to get here), tho am interested…when a PS3 becomes less expensive than a CAR PAYMENT, I’ll get me one…lol.

my keyboard is allergic to “caps”…i have to go back over every sentence and capitalize everything I miss the first time thru.  annoys the fuck outta me…i need a new keyboard. 

I’m too cheap to buy a calendar.  Every January, I use Photoshop Elements 4 and my stock of TucsonTied pics to create myself one.  Traditionally, my “sister” Angel (“sister” meaning, she’s a former model of mine who became close enough to me to call a “sister”) is the picture on her birthday month, mine (June) usually winds up being what I consider the best picture I took the year before.  You can see the calendar in the background of this self-portrait I took for my FetLife page…

Calendar is to the top right of my head...

 I have a notoriosly awful driving sense.  Taking Kimberly Marvel back to my place from the airport, I took a right turn when I should’ve taken a left…we wound up lost for a good long time.  Unlike other men, tho, I DO ask directions…I guess I have no pride…lol.

I enjoy playing pool, and thanks to Angel, I’m pretty good at it…

Cel phone shot of me at the pool hall...

More when I think of stuff that’s interesting about me…lol. 

Editing videos of Stacie Snow tonight, so I’m not excessively chatty (CALL THE MARINES!!  TOLSTOY IS AT A LOSS FOR WORDS!!!), so here’s some random cuteness of the two of us together for you to look at.

Me and Stacie Snow...she's on the right...lol

 Obviously, she’s the CUTE one…lol.    The vids are coming out EXTREMELY great…she’s quite the little actress; you’re all gonna LOVE her!!  Hey, if I didn’t think so, I wouldn’t have scheduled a second shoot with her already…

Tolstoy

 

“I have FANS?!”

I hear this from gals more than you might think.   

Oh, really?  C’mon, now, girl….lol. 

Stacie Snow just wrote me back from an e-mail I sent her, telling her about all the wonderful things folks have been saying about her through my Yahoo Group  (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TucsonTied/)  and other places, and that was one line from the e-mail verbatim…,”I have FANS?!”  

I guess I can understand it, somewhat…I’m still amazed that people like my rigging as much as they do at times (somebody, in a fan mail, told me that Jim Weathers has nothing on me…my reaction was, “Thanks, but come ON, now…lol”), but that’s ’cause I’m a bald, fat, dumpy guy who can tie up a model pretty well.  The models are…well, MODELS…interesting people who’re gorgeous, sexy and  beautiful…I would think that fandom was assumed and came with the package.   Eh…live and learn.

I’d write more, but I’m gonna play some at the other parts of the blog…put up an update at the “Coming Soon” and “Latest Updates” area, I suppose.

More later…

Tolstoy

I sit in a small Tucson,  Arizona apartment after watching something amazing…   Rope, gags, and several pair of high heeled shoes are scattered about the small living room area, as I sit looking at a lithe young redhead named Stacie Snow.   Over the last three hours, she was bound and gagged repeatedly by the tall, bald, brute of a man who’s now standing in front of her.  Rope marks are seen on her lovely skin…

They’re talking about when she’s going to be coming in for the next shoot so it can happen all over again.    

Welcome to the world of TucsonTied.com.  Wild and wacky, crazed and crazy…  I’ve ventured here to the Arizona desert today to interview the man behind the bondage site, http://www.tucsontied.com/ and see what makes him tick…they call him “Tolstoy” Tony.

IWPM (Interview With a Photographer Magazine): Thanks for taking the time out of your busy shoot schedule to talk  with me…um…”Tolstoy”?

TT (“Tolstoy” Tony):  Completely my pleasure, interviewer-person.  That was QUITE a shoot, huh?  When the members of my site and blog get a look at Stacie, their minds are gonna be BLOWN, let me tell ya!!  And, yah…they do indeed call me “Tolstoy” (laughs).        

IWPM: Why IS that, exactly?  My readers are going to be a bit confused…

TT : Well…it’s a nickname earned by being one of the “wordiest” people you’ll EVER meet!  I LOVE being on Forum boards, message boards, and the like…and the more “into” a subject I get, the longer the answers I type out are.  This extends to e-mails as well…heck, just the other day, one of my model friends, Kimberly Marvel, remarked that even my VOICEMAIL MESSAGE is one of the longest she’s ever heard!!   I got the nickname from a fellow producer and good friend of mine, the “Badman” of NaughtyTies (http://naughtyties.com/), and it just…well, stuck.  It’s definitely the truest of all the nicknames I’ve ever gotten.

IWPM:  Interesting.  Well, let’s talk about the website a bit…

TT :  One of my fave subjects in the world…fire away!!

IWPM: Ok.  About how long have you been at the bondage game? 

TT :  Well, I’ve been at it for about 3 years now, and enjoying every minute of it.  No better way to pass time than tying and gagging a beautiful, willing, young lass like Stacie…

IWPM:  Looked like fun, actually.  She really seemed to be having fun while you were tying her…

TT :  I do what I can to make the shoots as fun and enjoyable as I can for the models.  Witty banter goes nicely along with the tightly tied ropes…it’s the least I can do to make their “captive time” with me fun.  And, honestly, the models are some of the nicest, sweetest people I’ve ever met in life, so it just comes naturally.  

IWPM:  Stacie seemed like a total gem.  How did you get started at this? 

TT :   Well, I went to a convention in 2006… 

IWPM: FetishCon, correct?   (http://fetishcon.com/)

TT :  You got it.   That was FUN, working with the most famous bondage models out there on the net…I miss going to FetCon.  Two years running now, I’m not gonna be able to attend…it sucks.  But, anyway…going to ‘con allowed me to meet some outstanding ladies, establish some wonderful contacts, and meet a whole bunch of wonderful people.  That first con, I did 12 shoots in three days…

IWPM:  How did you manage to do all of that?

TT :  To this day, I still don’t really know.  It must’ve been the excitement of being at the con and meeting all these people…if I tried to do 12 shoots in 3 days now, it’d positively kill me!!  One thing it did do, was put the love of bondage firmer into my blood that it had ever been…I’m a “lifer” now because of FetishCon.

IWPM:  How did you devolop your rigging style?

TT :   I didn’t “devolop” it, really…I’m a master of the concept of “monkey see, monkey do”.

IWPM: What?

TT :  I watched a LOT of bondage movies and videos before I started tying my own models…mostly ones that promised “on-screen tying”.  After viewing them for the…ahem…”usual purpose”, I’d go back and watch the guy doing the tying very closely…then, I’d take what I saw and add my own “spin” to it, mainly, mainly ropework that’s very meticulous and evenly placed.  That was the way I got started at least…now, I know my own way around the ropes, and craft my ties myself…with the occasional helping hand from friends.

IWPM: Dave Annis, specifically, right?

TT :  You got it.  We met thru a mutual model about a year ago…now, we assist each other with all our shoots.  I’ve learned a LOT from him about making everything about bondage photography, from the ties to the lighting straight to the imagery itself work.

IWPM:  And now, here you are…three years later.  Three years wiser?

TT :  Dunno about that.  After all, I’m about to wrap up an interview I just did…interviewing myself. 

IWPM: Hey, that’s right…I AM you.  No wonder I liked you so much.  Wanna go grab a beer?

TT : Sounds like a plan, man….

Call this “Part 2″ of the “TucsonTied Set” entry…wonder what the aftermath of a shoot looks like?  I’ve cleaned up most of it…got just two sections left…

"Rope" chair...lol.

OK…on the top of the chair is the gag that I used on Stacie Snow (torn up bedsheet…I’ve got dozens of strips like it, so rather than washing it, I’ll probably just toss it)…on the chair itself is the rope I used on her during the shoot.  Not ALL of that white stuff got used…I unwound a 200 ft. coil of rope when the pre-cut pieces I had wound up being too short.  SOMEWHERE under all that white is the brown I used for the “secretary” part of the shoot…lol.  That bit of blue you see at the bottom is the bag I carry the stuff in when it’s all wound up nice and neat.  Gonna have to replace it soon…it’s getting smallish to hold all my rope…

Coffee Table o' bondage

Let’s see…what’s on that table?  Let’s start bottom left:  the pantyhose we used,  the “T” strap heels, inbetween the shoes are “cutoffs” of rope (extra rope cut off from a finished tie), duct tape roll, scissors, the tape gag from the black dress set (laying on the heel of one of the “T” strap heels),  ankle strap heels, peek-toe pumps from the “secretary” set, lighter (for burning rope ends…I like burning the cut ends better than taping them off…that’s just a “Tony” thing…), and a paper towel I used to dab sweat off my furowing brow…lol.

No, I didn’t “pose” these shots at all…that’s seriously how things wound up after I put the place back together after the shoot was over.  Now I just have to get my lazy ass in gear and start coiling that rope up again…lmao.

Tolstoy

GEEZ, how i’m loving having this blog so I can share all this fun stuff with all of you!!   Just got reminded of a really classic and funny “Behind The Scenes” shoot story…

Just before I was going to work with Sasha in the shoot that produced this shot…

Intense arm rigging on Sasha

I was doing lighting checks with a fairly new lightstand.  I didn’t know how big it’s footing was and how much space the silly thing took up (thank GOD I now have my lights mounted to the ceiling…lol) and when I stepped backwards, I stepped on one of it’s feet.  The “CRACK” I heard was the last thing I wanted to hear, because it told a story all it’s own…I had obviously broken the thing.

CRAP.  NOW  what?!

She was due in a half an hour…I had to do something…so I did.  I just practiced my mad rigging skillz on my problem and made it all go away…

Problem go buh-bye!!

Even tho I no longer use that stand, I kept the rope on it…the rigging is still holding it fast.  As a matter of fact, it stands even BETTER than when I bought it…lmao!! 

Tolstoy

Figured I’d go REALLY behind the scenes with all of you and show you what the “set” (meaning, my apartment…lol) for TucsonTied looks like when I’m not shooting.   How did I set up my lighting…what kind of camera do I use…what other kind of tech do I use…where do I edit my pics…all this and more will be soon answered!!

Let’s begin with:

My Livingroom...

My Living Room.  Many a model has sat bound and gagged on that couch…and many a model has slept over on the bed that’s inside that couch (it’s a sleeper sofa), most notably Vivian Ireene Pierce (remind me to tell you all that story sometime…lol).  That’s how I keep the place when I’m not shooting.  Another view…

More of the Living Room...

That case in the center of the shot leaves the premises when I put the place into “shoot mode”…y’all don’t need to see my geeky “Heroclix” collection  (http://www.wizkidsgames.com/heroclix/  go here to learn more about my hobby…).

Now, you might wonder how I light the place when I shoot.  I’ll bet you think I’m using expensive lighting set-ups that costs thousands of buckage…nah.

Just simple "shop" lighting...

See that…hanging from the ceiling?  No? Here’s another look…

Better View...

That’s just simple “shop lighting” that I bought at WAL-MART, kids…for about $9.99 a pop.  I have 4 of them placed at strategic spots along the room…the above is the first one, here’s the rest…

#2...

#2 is just outside my kitchen; #3:

#3

#3 is right outside the bathroom.  The three of them together light the main room of the apartment perfectly.  #4:

#4...

#4 is on the wall just to the right of my couch.  The 4 of these all working together make the apartment perfect for shooting.  How did I find this out?  TRIAL & ERROR, BIG-TIME…lol.  I worked at this for MONTHS until I finally found a set-up which makes the pics shine.  Oooooo…check this out:

Pic Wall of Fame!!

I keep up some of my favorite non-bondage shots inbetween shoots…top left we have a b&w Nikki Sebastian;  top center, Kimberly Marvel; top right, TucsonTied model Angel; bottom row, Kobe Lee.  And yuppers, you saw that right…

Auto-GRAPHED, biotches!! (lol)

I did have Kimberly sign that shot the last time I saw her.  I honestly think that’s my all-time fave non-bondage shot…

Now, let’s see the “nerve center” of TucsonTied…

The TucsonTied "Nerve Center"

My bedroom, where all the post-processing of all the material happens.  I rarely shoot in here anymore…too much of a bother trying to find proper angles, create good composition and such.  That’s my current computer set-up…from there, I edit my stuff using Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 (and yes, I know version 7 is out…I usually upgrade my version of Elements every other release…I’ll get the new one when they make version 8).  Videos get edited on my laptop…

My sweet laptop...

(Sorry for the lighting flash…no lighting set-up in the bedroom, so I was using flash photography for the bedroom shots…)  That’s my sweet Toshiba lappy.  She was cutting edge when I bought her…in 2006, so it’s likely a piece of crap now (lol); but it does everything I need.   My cameras and stuff…

Camera's and such...

In the center of the pic are my two Sony CyberShot cameras and my Sony Hi-8 vidcam.  Also all 2 years old…but still doing amazingly in the making of the pics and vids. 

Laptop editing center...

That’s a look at my laptop editing center…it’s just off to the right of my desktop computer.  I can have a still pic update going on my desktop and do editing on my laptop all at the same time and just a chair’s short ride (meaning, less than a foot) away from each other.  Very cool!  Finally…

Bag o' GOODIES...damsels watch out!!!

My ropebag and the brown rope I’ve been using on so many of my latest shoots.  That rope looks lonely…I need to find a damsel to use it all on.  Maybe Stacie Snow can help…???  

That’s all for now…hope you enjoyed this little walkthru of the TucsonTied “Set”.  I hope to one day do a tie for you step-by-step and show you the “TucsonTied way” to tie a damsel… 

Later, gang!

Tolstoy