| Review:
(Note: This site has since been absorbed into EvelynLory.com.
Which means this review isn't much use-Eds.)
Like all good studio/photographer sites, Exciting Illusions offers up
a lot of high quality images that express a unique personal vision of
the erotic. Photographer Roman Sluka, who has
worked for biggies like Playboy and Esquire, is interested in fantasy
atmosphere (what he refers to as his "unusual conceptions").
To hell with girl-next-door amateurs and "reality" porn. These
are exciting illusions! The galleries feature beautiful women in weird settings,
posing as spacegirls, pirates, vampires, island natives and medieval
maidens. Don't expect hardcore. The sets are usually solo. There are
galleries that feature multiple
models, but even two naked women together doesn't equal
"girl-girl" or "lesbian" here. Any men you see are props without cocks.
The photos you get are described as "max quality", and
there's no question that a decision has been made to go with quality
over quantity. Expect a lot of personal style and use of heavy colours
with the imaginary sets and costumes. Each gallery has between 20 and 50 pics. They are
all keepers. Production values are of the very highest and the pic
quality itself is great. The pics are huge (1280x850) and clear and
sharp. The models are well posed (the emphasis is on full body shots,
with few close-ups) and Roman really brings out their beauty. When we
see pics like these we are at first amazed at the beauty of the models,
but then we wonder how much of it is the photographer's magic in
bringing that beauty out. In our experience, a great photographer can
make almost any woman look good. But in any event, there's no arguing
with the results.
Navigation? There really isn't any. Indeed, the "members
area" consists of a single page, with thumbnails to each of the
photo galleries and backstage videos. Now that's simple!
The photo galleries are divided into "Pictorials" and
"Stories". Don't ask us to explain the difference. As noted,
Roman has a thing for pictorials that tell a story, but why some
galleries are considered stories and others pictorials is beyond us. The
one-page members area has its drawbacks. There is little explanation of
anything. Even Roman's welcome and other info about the site is part of the
site tour. Hell, even the forum/bulletin board is outside the
members area! Site support wasn't indicated anywhere. This is really,
really bare bones. We like simple, but still . . .
Now, as for the videos. Like most photography sites, they are
"backstage" videos taken during the photoshoots. They are
really jazzed up here with lots of editing stunts and changes in film
speed, etc. They are also high quality, playing back at around 800 kbs
(file size is in the 30-50 meg range and the clips run from 5 to 10
minutes).
What they are not is erotic. They give a lot of insight into just how
much work goes into a single photoshoot, and how many people are
involved in making it happen, but the focus is on the production,
not the girls. In fact, you see very, very little nudity. A lot of time
is spent setting things up. It's like watching the crew scrambling
around at the end of Antiques Roadshow. (Hah! So you think we've
never seen Antiques Roadshow! Well, we haven't. Just the end. It
comes on before something else we like to watch.) On
top of that, there is no time spent talking to Roman or the girls. We
just see everyone mugging for the camera. Perhaps there is a language barrier
here (which we strongly suspect, given the rough written English we
found), but there is no natural sound
or speech. Just lots of funky music. Ugh.
The site stats are posted on the main page, and you can check them
out before you join. When we visited there were 729 pics in 21
galleries, with 13 backstage videos. The site updates every
Thursday with a pic gallery and a backstage movie.
The quality here is great, but for now there are a few drawbacks. In
the first place, when we visited (please note the date) it was still a new site. Substantial
updates are occurring every week, but it still didn't have a ton of
stuff. The super-slim design doesn't offer anything in the way of extras
or options. How
about downloading in different formats? As zip files? Where can we find
out more about the models? The price is high-end even for such a
boutique site, but
we expect it to be better justified after a few more months of operation
and some fleshing out.
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