It's called a square knot ... you're welcome!

I get asked a lot how I keep my knots from coming undone when I'm using nylon rope. First of all it's called a square knot: learn it, live it, love it. Don't waste your time looking it up. Just remember to go over then under the first time and then reverse it to under and over the second time. If you pull from one side it gets tighter. If you pull from the other side it gets tighter. You're welcome!

Oh, the second thing is keep your nylon rope fresh. The fibers break down after so many uses and once that happens youre on your own. There are plenty of knots that work great with worn out nylon but if you need those then try explaining how many girls sweat is built up in that rope you're wrapping a model up in. In fact that's a great rule of thumb. If you're nylon rope won't hold a square knot anymore than it's time to toss it out. Seriously, models wear self-tanner, make-up, glitter and other girl-magic. I'm funny that way, I treat ropes like hotel sheets. You just want to know they are super-clean before the mention of crotch-rope comes up.

And since I brought it up what is girl magic? Girl magic is when someone who looks perfectly fine goes into a bathroom, opens something with a zillion cases full of stuff you've never seen because you're not allowed down that aisle at the department store and then starts using a combination of what could be loosely considered part artist tools and part torture devices. When the door opens again they've gone from looking cute as can be into something that would make a cartoon wolf's tongue roll out onto the floor and his eyes pop out with an "aooogaaaa" sound.

Speaking of that, if you like "aooogaaa" and nylon rope and square knots all in one place take a peek at Nyxon.

We give the studio a test run

The fun thing about having a revamped studio is that when someone says, "let's go shoot some fine art, I'll let you do some shibari after that" you can just go do it. There's no moving couches or setting up backdrops or spending on hour on lights. Almost everything is all set up already. A process that used to take a half day to set up takes minutes.

It's been a blast not only because it's a pain in the ass to destroy the house to shoot and that pain is gone but because we shoot so much more now. If I have a cool idea odds are we'll shoot it. If Angelique needs some updates for her portfolios it's as easy as grabbing my camera. And as with today's scenario she will always let me get a clip in afterwards.

An added benefit is that before everything was in closets, tubs and boxes. If you had a cool idea searching for the components was a nightmare and almost not worth it. Now when shibari came up I had the hemp right there and some spare rope to make a nice gag to go with the position. Folks who do this regularly know what I'm talking about. You can spend 3 hours to shoot 50 shots and a 15-minute clip. We spend 30 minutes shooting all of that. That means more energy, more productivity and the rare opportunity to have a light bulb go off in your head and just go shoot it and see what happens.

The moral: I love the new studio. Angelique does as well but you couldn't tell from this image we shot and put up today. I called it 240 Feet of Hemp Rope Hogtie Hell. It was a tough one, but we're finding those are easy to do now. When you don't have to worry about clean-up you'd be amazed just what a gal will let you put her through!

A trio of firsts!

This has got to be one of my favorite images of all time. I mean, it's of my wife the lovely Angelique Kithos but I liked it before we even started getting serious. It breaks my heart to this day that there is no video of it, but that's what happens. You shoot video and go to yourself, "that would have made a great photo." Then you're taking photos and you realize that you're missing on on great video. Regardless, I got a wonderful photo and that's all that matters.

The first thing that jumps out at me are that Angelique's expression is perfect. I asked her how she could pull it off and she said at the time she literally hated me. Photographers do this thing that really piss models off. They say they need 5 more shots and then they see an angle that is just too good to pass up so they take 3 more shots. I think this was the 14th or so shot past that, but it was worth it. Anyway, she was sore and hurting and pissed off. She didn't call the safe-word though, so she must have know the material was going to be good.

The next thing that makes it special is that she has wonderful legs. The angle makes them look even longer and they run right up to those pulled-down panties. The really special part is her breasts and arms. She had done some tough bondage, but I was the one that got those elbows to touch. I also convinced her to do real breast bondage. So there she is, shoulders on fire, breasts aching, panties at her knees, drooling on herself and almost 20 shots past the point where she absolutely couldn't take it anymore. And yet she let me keep shooting. It's not a bad day of shooting when your first shoot with someone ends with her elbows toughing, her breasts bound and her naked ass sitting on your couch.

Ted Michaels

A very tough tie

I've always been a fan of lotus ties because they somewhat achieve their normal goal. Traditionally the position is used to align the body in such a way as to allow for meditation. Well, the tied version certainly does align the body in such a way but I'll be damned if you're going to be doing any meditation. As I've said before I love contrast, and the contrast between this position allowing alignment but preventing meditation is wonderful.

I do the position two basic ways. The mean way and the really mean way. Poor Stacie here got the really mean way. The year before I used the position on her but was nice and tied her ankles to her torso by the chest. This puts all the stress on those strong back muscles. The really mean way I go around the neck. It doesn't choke or anything dangerous but it puts the strain on the back of the neck which forces the damsel to use her abdominal muscles to help relieve some of the pressure. If you look at Stacie's face here the strain and slight redness isn't from the ropes causing pressure, it's because she's been doing crunches for about five minutes!

If that's not bad enough I put her on her side on a tiny ottoman. Her elbows are welded, she can't use her legs for support and her face is crushed down to her feet. Combine that with a ballgag and you have some fun almost-struggling. She commented that she couldn't move at all :)

A Lotus That Gave Her Something to Think About with Stacie Snow. Enjoy!
Ted Michaels

Panty gags it is

I'm not really shocked that my recent poll had panty gags as the winner. If I like something I have to assume that other people will, but it's handy to know that they are the favorite. I used to say I'm putting panties in your mouth to some really odd responses. Now I'll just say that fan polls suggest this is the way to go. Hard to argue with statistics. Even harder to argue with panties taped into your mouth.

It fits in with some of the storyline material I'll be shooting the next couple of months. I've cycled back to classic damsel in distress as of late. I moved away from it for a bit because of an ankle injury that has healed up. It's really hard to do a take-down, on-screen restraint and then carry a girl around when you can't push off on your left ankle. That's not an issue anymore though so the last couple of shoots have featured a lot of hands-on action. I just love shooting a full take-down where the girl is caught unaware, is bound with items on hand and then just can't seem to attract any attention despite her best efforts.

My favorite scene has always been the heels-only motif. A girl starts clothed, gets grabbed, forcibly stripped and during all that ends up bound and gagged with some element of her attire in her mouth. Socks, cloth strips and panties packing pretty faces just doesn't get any better. One of my favorite experiences was shooting Nyssa and Taylor. I grabbed Nyssa sleeping, wrestled with her, stripped her and eventually she was tied and gagged with her own panties wearing only high heels. While being mauled by me Taylor enters to endure the same fate as Nyssa rolls around.

The sequence really speaks to me because of the raw nature of the take-downs and restraints plus the realism. Girls are caught unaware, gagged with their own panties, tied with elements on hand and stripped down to almost nothing. The appearance of a roommate doesn't mean help, it just means two girls sharing the same fate. Pretty panties no longer guard virtue but provide silence instead. Even if they could hop to a window, they are naked ... freedom means showing it all for everyone passing by outside. The mix of realism and potential shame is wonderful. The girls have the choice to let everyone see them naked. Do they days trying to free each other or do they spend hours getting to the window and providing a peep show get free? The choice is up to them.

Image courtesy of Trouble for Two: Ropes, Gropes and Orgasms!

Pink on white just ain't right

You might notice a few things about today's image. Angelique looks hot as hell, pink latex and perfect hair on a beautiful gal. The restraint is fine, crisp and neat. Angelique's hair looks wonderful. The bitgag is sunk deeply as a bitgag should. Oh yeah, it looks like she's in a basement. Actually for that set we wanted the look of an area under renovation, but that's not the final plan. It's a set space, so we need it to look like a completely finished corner ... an any-room. That's just my term for a set area that you can re-paint and re-furnish for shoots. One shoot it looks like a living room, the next it's a bedroom and the next it's a secret laboratory.

Our old house was terrible. It was about 25 years old, had dated looks everywhere and couldn't run an A/C unit for more than a week without breaking down. The carpets were this sickly blue that was faded and I'm sure the height of rug fashion in 1982. Maybe Duran Duran would comment kindly if they ever visited but for shooting it was a terrible color. Everything was dark. The windows were small and none of the hardwoods had been pruned in over a decade, so shade was everywhere. It was a rough living space and an absolutely dreadful shooting space.

The dining room was a different story. It had beautiful hardwood floors, earthy red and green walls, crisp white trim and actual light. That was because of Angelique though. She had me go out and take down three of the sickliest beach trees you'll come across. That's a post in itself. If you've never dug out the root system of three trees I would recommend paying someone to do it or investing in dynamite. With the trees gone sunlight invaded the hell maw and we had nice, even lighting in the dining room. Even better the colors suited models well and were easy to light. Earth-tones tend to absorb light instead of reflecting it and fair-skinned models hate when blue or green walls make them look like something 13 minutes into a zombie flick.

That's the plan for the set space, and my task for today. I get to spackle, paint and add trim until we have a convincing corner of a dining room. Well worth it I'd say with Carissa Montgomery being the first to become a tight little bundle there. Unfortunately for her having two complete walls as part of the set means the suspension rig is secure and totally safe. Might be time for that upside-down duct-tape mummification I've been planning.

Brought to your courtesy of Pretty Tied Up in Pink with Angelique!

Everything but the kitchen sink

I have a lot of boxes in my office, and each has a tiny label on it. I used to keep everything in boxes without labels which sucked a lot of time out of my life. Where did I put those stress balls? Damn, I know I bought some cotton clothesline. I could swear I made a larger black ballgag. Moving out of my last house gave me the opportunity to change that. Normally if you empty 60 boxes onto the floor you make a gigantic mess and end up with a non-functional house. When you move though you don't really care about the mess because the house is non-functional anyway. I said the hell with it, brought box after box into the living room and started making piles. I went through every box, sorted things into logical groups and then re-boxed everything with labels. It took a long time, but when someone stops by and I want to do a nylon encasement I know EXACTLY which box has all the extra-large pantyhose. Yes, I'm referring to you this coming weekend Carissa Montgomery!

My shooting boxes have some mundane names like chargers, tape, cables and of course rope. A couple of them though have some interesting names. One even has a label that says, "Throw This Stuff Out Packrat!!!" Another says, "Quick Kit" and to no surprise has about 100 feet of rope, a roll of tape, a ballgag and a blank DV tape. One in particular has become my favorite. It has the label kitchen sink because when it comes to tying someone up it has everything but the kitchen sink. As you tie people up over and over you amass odd collections of small bits of things that can't be used for a full restraint. I don't want to throw out those two red ropes, or those three brown ropes, or that one black rope. That electrical tape roll still has a couple yards left one it and that belt needs to go somewhere. Before I knew it I had a box full of enough bits and pieces that alone made for a lame restraint but together made for a sweaty and wiggling bundle of going nowhere.

My last couple of shoots that box has gotten a lot of use. I've grown fond of seeing someone in crisp, neat restraint made from odds and ends. My latest clip with Ashley Graham, The Robber Stole More Than My Television, has made the best use of it yet. Instead of just tying her up with contents from it I cycle through as many of the odds and ends as I can. Four types of gags, five colors of rope, a couple belts and some tape on top of that made for a challenging 30 minutes for the poor gal. She got to appreciate the difficulty, but I got to enjoy the fun of restraining her with a realistic hodgepodge of items that a real burglar might cobble together. I don't think I'm the only one though because the second I uploaded it has become one of my more popular clips. Of sexy lady in a classic blouse and skirt combination certainly doesn't hurt!