Meet Euro Pride Con Attendee: Antonio Rodriguez #LGBT #Guestpost

Hi guys,

today we will introduce to you an Euro Pride Con attendee with a lot of different facettes. Antonio Rodriguez has been a model himself and is now a male erotic photgrapher, 3D artist and M/M author and will lead our Gay Sex 101 Panel at the convention 🙂 It is awesome that we can gather so many different people with different experiences and POVs in Munich and are able to provide a platform for them to connect. I can’t wait until July and if you want to join us there, you can find more info on the Euro Pride Con website and register HERE!

Among all commenters of this tour, we will randomly draw one winner for a $25 voucher to a book retailer of their choice 🙂

Also check out Helena Stone and Susan Mac Nicol‘s guest posts 🙂

Now, without further ado, … MEET ANTONIO RODRIGUEZ!

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I’m not really good at writing things in the first person, it feels strange writing about myself but here goes…

I’m excited to be attending the Euro Pride Con in Munich, and after long discussions with authors and fans of M/M Romances, thought I could contribute to the fun of writing and creativity by sharing some of the things I know about the genre, and adding in some interesting concepts into the mix.

I’m 52 years old, and 40 years of that I have been gay. During that time I have had some amazing experiences and met amazing people in my lifetime working as a runway model for Giorgio Armani in the early 80s and becoming a fashion photographer, then discovering beautiful guys as models, working with porn stars and erotica models, and shooting for magazines and print media for the adult industry. I also grew up in a time period when being gay was considered a bad thing, and hiding was the norm. Dealing with homophobia and such things also had a very big impact on my life, and formed my thinking about life as well. I have many diverse interests and hobbies and love trying things out and understanding how things work and why people like doing them. I guess life would be very boring if we all got stuck just doing one thing and that was it.

In the past two years I spent a lot of time learning about the gay BDSM scene, and fetishes, and after moving to Berlin, Germany two years ago have participated in the Folsom Street Festivals and other events here, and have learned quite a lot. All of this helped me with the concepts of writing M/M Fiction and understanding what others enjoy writing.

My own personal background is multi-fold, and extremely diverse, having lived around the world in different countries and cultures. I travel a lot, and love history over everything else. So when I began writing my first works, I decided up front to create something that would interest not only myself but others, and add in some very interesting things into the mix – fantasy and history. However, I decided to start my story in the distant past in the late 1200’s and move forward in time with my immortal characters, and that gave me lots of material to work with.

In researching how to create something this epic, I discovered the joys of Scrivener and Scapple, as well as a great many writers who love to share their own experiences with writing. I also met a great many of M/M Romance writers who are now good friends on Facebook, and offer me advice and tips.

I came up with an idea for a good seminar topic though while having serious talks with women authors who started picking my brain in private chats on Facebook, asking me about BDSM, or about gay sex in general, and would guys do this really, and would it actually turn them on? Amazingly enough it surprised me that many women love the idea of men together, and write about it, but actually don’t understand every aspect of how gay sex really works or happens between two men – really.

So I thought it would be challenging to have a sit down with authors who would like to write a sexual scene between two lovers, and see how each of the authors would handle particular situations which come up in real life. I discussed this with Marc Fleischhauer and several others to see if they would find this interesting, and I got great positive feedback.

So a little “how to write a really believeable hot gay sex encounter” seminar was born. I may actually make good on a threat I made to a few authors about writing a detailed scene about deep-throating, and providing bananas for experience practice, but we will see.

I also would like to touch on the subject of using 3D to test our your scenes with 3D Figures and visualize how your scenes might work. You don’t have to be a talented artist to do this, and the programs for it are free, and work on PC and Mac platforms, of course only if you are interested. Many M/M Authors find they enjoy it later and actually do their own book cover artwork with 3D themselves, and they own the rights to what they make too.

I look forward to meeting many of you and hope that you will join me for a fun time creating some interesting written scenes and having discussions about it at Euro Pride Con.

Hugs,

Antonio Rodriguez

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The Many Sides of Antonio Rodriguez.

A guy with many interests and facets, all related to the beauty of men.

Antonio Rodriguez 
Photographer 
Male-Erotica & Male Fashion photographer Antonio Rodriguez, born in Estoril, Portugal raised in the U.S. just outside of New York City, attended photography school in the early 1980’s and received his photographic degree in 1982. In the late 1970’s and early 1980’s he modeled on the runways of New York City paying his way through photography school.

In Europe he worked as a photo-journalist for the military and later worked as a freelance photographer, developing solutions for imaging on the then newly created Internet and working in E-Commerce in the fashion industry. Working for international fashion companies based in the USA, UK, Germany, France, Spain, and Italy until retiring from fashion in 2010, Antonio made his mark on the industry and discovered many male models positioning them in agencies and fashion companies over two-and-a-half decades.

Until the mid-to-later 1980s he worked secretly with adult male film companies based outside of New York City, photographing then up-and-coming porn stars who later headed to California and worked for companies like Falcon, William Higgins and many other prominent labels. After personal tragedy struck in 1987 due to homophobia, and the death of his then life partner, he left the United States and moved to Europe.

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Antonio Rodriguez (aka ProFotograf)
3D Graphic Artist & Content Creator 

Due to studio size limitation, Antonio needed to work on large scale campaigns where many models were in shoots and space was at a minimum. This resulted in the late 1990’s where he discovered the world of 3D graphics and the representation of people in 3D space. With his background in male photography and using 3D as a means to layout complex photoshoots for the fashion industry, Antonio noticed that there was a different use to 3D graphics other than design and architecture. In the early stages of 3D there was a program called Poser, which allowed human figures to be placed in a 3D (360 degree) world, and be posed in multiple positions and clothed in fantasy costumes and worlds. Discovering the world of 3D Male Art, and realizing that the industry stated that “male doesn’t sell” Antonio set out to support male figures and help them to become more photo realistic and detailed. The market in the USA for 3D graphics was based in Utah, USA, and of course was puritanically fueled – people could by “figures” called Victoria and Michael, but they were like Barbie and Ken – without sexual parts, and useless for making any type of realistic nude artwork. Being in Europe, where nudity is less of an issue than in the USA, Antonio took the opportunity of supporting the male arena of 3D and began creating 3D skins for male figures used to make male art. As “ProFotograf” Antonio is known in the 3D community as one of the creators of photo-realistic skins to make the figures look more “human”. Together with several partners in the industry Antonio was a driving force behind keeping male erotic artwork going from 1998 to the present – you can search on www.daz3d.com for either “ProFotograf” or “Antonio Rodriguez” and see all the male products he has collaborated on or created.

In 1999 Antonio created MalePoserotica (www.maleposerotica.com), an online community and webshop for selling 3D add-on anatomy and poses for making homoerotic artworks. Currently MalePoserotica is going though its third version and is available as a temporary blog showing some of the products available for male figures and containing free downloads as well, soon to be re-opened as MPE3D (planned for opening May 1^st).

Through MalePoserotica, Antonio met many artists who provided artwork for M/M Fiction book covers and artists, and met American book authors who use 3D to layout their storylines for accuracy and visuals, including NYTimes Bestselling author Angela Knight.

In 2016 Antonio will be producing a book about 3D Male Erotica and how to create your own 3D homoerotica using the free product Daz Studio (www.daz3d.com) with the Bruno Gmuender Publishing group.

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A.M.E. Rodriguez
M/M Fantasy Fiction Author & Enthusiast 

Together with his inspiration and work in 3D homoerotica, and his background in world history, Antonio started on a project to write a multi-volume M/M fantasy series of books which follows his immortal characters through history to the present day, in which they intermingle with real time events and influence real events in history and have exciting adventures and encounters with fantastic beings and immortal creatures both good and evil.

The first planned set of books encompasses 25 volumes and is being written simultaneously to keep the character traits aligned and the event references in tune with previous and later event horizons.

The preliminary book “Guardian of the Vampires” introducing the characters and the original events causing the entire series to exist will be released as Kindle and in Print at the end of 2015.

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Antonio Rodriguez
BerlinMen, BerlinMaleModels, BerlinTwinkZ, BerlinTwunkZ, BerlinBoyZ, BerlinDadz, BerlinLadZ 

Antonio works also with the adult film industry and in 2013 started photographing young male talent (Twinks/Twunks) for magazines and personal portfolios. Taking his fashion experience and turning it into adult male media, Antonio has been developing BerlinMen as a photo studio label and BerlinMaleModels as the model agency card catalog for male adult film talent worldwide.

Hosting events for various porn-stars from the UK in Berlin, Germany, Antonio met many of the hardcore fans of these performers and met many of the authors writing M/M Fiction and Romance via Facebook. Thru various male porn performers and the shared discovery of ‘fan-girls’ and ‘porn-moms’ Antonio went deeper into the world of “women and gay porn”.

This helped to form a new opinion of gay male art, and the admirers and viewers of it. Now BerlinMen will begin creating scripted films for both gay male viewership and female viewership.

During the past two years, the entire focus of the photography company and the film company as well as the modeling casting agency have been moulded to fit the needs of the female viewership and their wishes as well.

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Antonio Rodriguez lives in Berlin, Germany and looks forward to meeting everyone at the Euro Pride Con in July. Contact him on Facebook or Twitter  😉

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Some references:

Antonio on Daz3D:

Collaborations and male skin products

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Dreamboys Magazine Covershoots:

December 2014 cover and model Angel Pierce

January 2015 2nd model Jeremy C

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Cover Designs for Photographers/Print

Cover and Text Layout design for Boys of St. Petersburg photo book

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Here is the schedule for Week One ❤

CLICK HERE TO READ: Helena Stone (Author) on Rainbow Gold Reviews.

CLICK HERE TO READ: Susan Mac Nicol (Author) on The Novel Approach.

TODAY: Antonio Rodriguez (Gay Erotic Photographer and Author) on Rainbow Gold Reviews.

March 5^th: Morticia Knight (Author) on The Novel Approach.

March 6^th: Monika De Giorgi (Author  and Reviewer) on Rainbow Gold Reviews.

March 7^th: Kaje Harper (Author) on Rainbow Gold Reviews.

March 8^th: Marc Fleischhauer (Euro Pride Con Organizer and LGBT Blog Owner) on Love Bytes.