I think the webmaster, James, has explained that the lack of zips is to discourage file sharing which is understandable, but yes, it's a shame and does make saving things very hard. With a site like this I normally cherry-pick my favourite photos from sets I'm less keen on, and save zips for the few that I love - with the amount of content it's quite overwhelming!
No problem with the WMV files, thanks for explaining. I downloaded them, but only because it was the first file format my cursor wandered over to, so I don't mind either way.
I think the way you're easing members into Bryci hardcore is absolutely brilliant - it's artistically done and the perfect tease/introduction. Looking forward to seeing her site head into a new direction.
Current Member for less than 1 month (at the time of review).
Pros:
- Excellent balance of photos, videos and bonus content
- Consistent quality of content throughout the sites
- Membership to 7 solo sites, 5 of which are regularly updated
- Updates are dated (including recent updates in Preview area)
- Good mix of girls – huge, buxom babes and more petite girls too
- Easy navigation, whether across whole network or by site
- You seem to stay logged in without username/password prompts
- CCBill with no pre-checked cross-sells
- Outstanding softcore content, and Bryci now does hardcore
- Webmaster is very ‘hands on’ and keen to listen to feedback
Cons:
Mostly minor. Points marked with * don't personally bother me:
- Video previews are a bit limited
- Regional pricing
- No ZIP files for photo galleries
- Most updates biased towards Bryci, Katie and Talia
- Automatically generated username/password*
- Download limit of 20gb per 24 hour hour period*
- Some might find content a bit samey as mostly softcore*
- 6 of the 7 models appear to have fake boobs*
- Very strict piracy policy that might catch out innocent members
Bottom Line:
This is a huge network of high quality solo websites. You can either join via the girls’ individual website, or direct via Bella Pass – either way you get instant access to every site in the network.
Content is all dated and downloadable. The network takes a hard line against piracy – there’s a download limit of 20gb per 24 hour, and they’re clear and transparent about their policies with warnings before and after you join, and in the confirmation email you receive.
Browsing the network, you have the following categories across the top:
Photos, Candids, Videos, Behind the Scenes, Archives, Babechat, Vlogs, Our Sites, Our Models, Wallpapers and Bella Webcams.
There is also a very well designed search function where you can also search by category (eg, masturbation, hardcore etc) and by site. You can also view just a single site using a drop-down menu.
VITAL STATS:
Bella Pass currently has 52,006 photos, and 941 videos, of which:
All sites have categories for photos and videos. In addition to this:
- Bryci, Katie, Talia, Monroe and Ava also have webcam archives
- Bryci, Katie, Talia and Ava have behind the scenes content
- Bryci, Katie and Talia have regularly updated blogs
- Bryci and Katie have in-depth bios and also wallpapers
Video content is downloadable in the following formats:
(WMV doesn’t appear to be available for Bryci’s newer hardcore content)
Photos are normally 4000px on their widest side, although 1500px on candid galleries.
SUMMARY OF EACH SITE/GIRL:
BRYCI is the most popular girl on the network on the basis of content alone. She is absolutely stunning and has an incredible body. Her boobs are fake but despite being gigantic don’t appear disproportionately large.
Her site is mainly stripteasing and softcore such as masturbation/toys, but she is making her first moves into hardcore with two videos already posted within the last week. Both have been artistically shot, but it’s the perfect tease as they introduce us to hardcore Bryci, and future videos will show everything, including POV.
In addition to this, there is lots and lots of behind the scenes footage, candids and a regularly updated blog. Bryci’s site on its own is one of the finest solo sites out there.
KATIE BANKS is a curvy but slim big-boobed babe with bags of confidence. Her site is the second-largest on the network with a great mix of videos, photos and bonus content. You can read more about Katie Banks in my review.
TALIA SHEPARD is cast from the same mould as Katie and Bryci. Her site is packed with photos, videos but also candids and behind the scenes footage. Like Katie and Bryci, she has substantial fake boobs, but unlike those two, she got hers mid-way through the site. Approximately 70% of the galleries include her fake boobs, the rest feature her more natural (and rather lovely!) cleavage.
LEXI MASON is, unlike the other models here, petite and all natural. She is an absolute stunner with a gorgeous complexion, perky boobs and is a refreshing change from her less natural colleagues. Unfortunately her site shows up one of the weaknesses with Bella Pass in that it seems a bit overlooked compared to the ‘big three’ – her site is relatively new, and regularly updated (once a week), but not quite with the regularity of the others.
HUNTER LEIGH is also a relatively new model to the network. The content is softer (no toys/masturbation/spreading), but she's stunning,. Her website doesn't have much content yet, and lacks the bonus features from the other sites. You can read more about Hunter Leigh in my review.
MONROE LEE is a pretty blonde with a massively curvy body and fake boobs. Although her site includes pictures and videos, it is no longer being updated and quality isn’t up to the standard of other sites in the network. It’s not bad, but it feels a lot more amateur, and although this is a great bonus site, it’s hard to be too enthusiastic about a model when the site is no longer updating.
AVA DAWN is another big-breasted babe. Her site is no longer updating but there is a good amount of great quality content available, including webcam archives and behind the scenes footage. Like Monroe’s site, this is a great bonus site on top of five that are regularly being updated.
Yep, definitely, hence my '...if it wasn't for the terrible download restrictions on there' comment. Will not be letting my membership recur, but will keep an eye on the preview area of her XXX site to see if it looks like there's any improvements in time.
I think for nearly 5 months' of content, the radio of hardcore is pretty disappointing, but beyond that the quality of hardcore is pretty bad too.
I would definitely recommend her other site over this one if it wasn't for the terrible download restrictions on there. There's more content, it's easier to navigate and it was one of the best in its niche excepting the fact you can't download anything.
Once a day, normally, although more often if there's a topic I'm following, a discussion I'm taking part in, or I have just added a review for example.
It's definitely disappointing, but I wouldn't call it a scam.
Photo-wise it's pretty bad really. Only 4 galleries are 'hardcore' with the hardcore aspect in each gallery only making up for about 10% of the content, and like I say, the pictures are all kinda the posed HC pics (dick in mouth, after the cumshot etc)
Video-wise the recent street walker one is definitely hardcore by any definition with them having sex in bed. It does feature quite a bit of action including a moneyshot, but that's the only video like that.
The outdoor fuck video is OK, but it just kinda ends, no conclusion or moneyshot and same with a lingerie BJ video which was shot outside - the description said they were interrupted and to look out for part 2 'soon' but it was posted in November and no sign of it yet...
I'm sure it'll get better, but if anybody's joining for the hardcore aspect I think they'll be disappointed.
Current Member for less than 1 month (at the time of review).
Pros:
- Well known, established web model, now doing hardcore
- Lots of outdoors scenes in risqué outfits in very public places
- Billing by CCBill with no pre-checked cross-sells
- Discounts on softcore site ($15.95 recurring instead of $34.57)
- Good interaction via website comments system, Twitter etc
- All content is downloadable
Cons:
Points marked * don’t personally bother me:
- The amount of content doesn't currently justify the price
- Hardcore scenes in a minority and seem incomplete
- Sure that a lot of content is recycled from her old site
- Preview section shows 'live' webcam... this is fake
- Slow download speeds compared to other sites
- Navigation is not very refined and rather inconsistent
- Most galleries don’t have downloadable zip files
- Some galleries you have to download the zip to get all pics
- Lack of download options on videos (one format, one size)
- Large watermarks on images
- Excessive Photoshop filters on images
- Automatically generated username/password*
Bottom Line:
I’ve followed Ann since before she even went topless, so to say I was excited by the prospect of her going hardcore would be an understatement. Sadly, at the moment her website is currently pretty disappointing.
Joining is simple. They warn you to make sure your phone number is correct as they will call to verify you’re a ‘real person’ with the call possibly coming from Ann herself. At no stage is there even the option to provide your phone number, nor (of course) do you get any call.
NAVIGATION:
Unlike her old site, navigation is inconsistent and cluttered. It uses a Wordpress template, and the member’s homepage has the most recent updates featured. You can view photo updates by clicking ‘gallery’ at the top, but to view video updates you have to go and find them – easiest way is clicking ‘updates’ then clicking the ‘videos’ tag on the right.
Other options at the top include news (not updated since November 2012), contacts (web form), webcam (LiveCamNetwork video chat) and her Amazon wish list. Updates are tagged with keywords such as blowjob, toys, video, etc, but the layout isn’t as intuitive or straight-forward as you’d expect. To give a few examples of inconsistency:
Not all galleries have zips. Those that do are only ‘preview galleries’ meaning you have to download the zip. To get into galleries on some pages you can click the thumbnail, but on others this pops up with a preview of the gallery, and you have to click the gallery title instead.
Also, some galleries clicking the photo thumbnail doesn’t take you to the high-res picture, you have to click the thumbnail, then a slightly larger thumbnail to get into the full-size image. So that’s two clicks per photo just to get the high-res image.
It just seems quite cluttered, a problem that will surely get worse as the amount of content increases.
CONTENT:
Currently, there are 44 galleries of around 100 pictures. They’re arranged 12-to-a-page with a thumbnail and gallery number. Photos are downloadable and are 2048px on their longest side and are good quality. Some seem to have been overly Photoshoppedd, and there’s a pretty big (1000px wide) watermark in the bottom right of images regardless of whether it covers anything.
Content-wise, many galleries are shot outside, but the lighting is good and I love the sense of danger this gives. Ann has always been amazing in this aspect, and galleries are shot in broad daylight in extremely racy outfits in public (albeit quiet) parks.
Ann is a confident, charismatic and engaging performer. She has a great body, and her solo stuff is still her strength as her webmaster/photographer/videographer can do her justice in this respect as he’s also the stunt dick which limits his ability to film the action.
Videos are shot from multiple angles, normally from a single fixed camera angle, and then a POV. Although the POV angle is shot with an iPhone, I have to say the quality isn’t too bad.
All are downloadable, and the video is embedded onto the download page as a Flash video which you can skip to any point in while it still loads. The only downloadable format is M4V, and there’s no options for quality which is a bitter pill to swallow when some are over 1.5gb and download speeds are slow at best (150kbps)
THE HARDCORE ASPECT:
Obviously, the selling point of this site is the fact it’s Ann’s gone hardcore.
At the moment, the ratio of hardcore content is pretty disappointing. Gallery-wise, around 10% features hardcore, and there’s three videos on top of this. More disappointing than this is that the hardcore content even in the hardcore galleries is pretty minimal.
Most start off pretty conventionally with her posing, before a few dick-in-mouth style pictures towards the end. The most recent hardcore gallery, for example, has 109 pictures, only 5 feature a dick, then 11 of a few spots of cum on her stomach.
The hardcore aspect seems a bit half-hearted at best. Most of the videos don’t ever really end in a money shot or really any conclusion at all, they just peter out. It’s not even really a case of them teasing us, it just all feels a bit rushed and lackadaisical, although I have to say the most recent video, Street Walker, is a definite stride in the right direction. But one good hardcore video does not a hardcore site make.
UPDATES:
There doesn’t appear to be a published update schedule. In the main, updates are pretty regular and reliable, but at times it can be flaky. All updates are dated, and you’ll normally get at least one or two updates a week, although there have been periods where there haven’t any updates for a ten-or-so day period, and promised updates have been late by several days.
SUMMARY:
Beyond the excitement of Ann going hardcore, the site is bit of a letdown. Recent updates hints that things might get better, but the hardcore content is largely disappointing and makes up a tiny percentage of content. The cluttered navigation and limited download options also frustrate.
Current Member for less than 1 month (at the time of review).
Pros:
- Perfect balance of picture and video content
- Immediate access to Bella Network including six solo sites
- Consistent quality of content throughout the site
- Updates are dated (including recent updates in Preview area)
- Additional content including blog, candids, behind the scenes
- Katie has an phenominal body, and seems to love modelling
- Easy navigation either via Bella Network or her own site
- You seem to stay logged in without username/password prompts
- CCBill with no pre-checked cross-sells
Cons:
Points marked with * don't bother me personally:
- Video previews are a bit limited
- Regional pricing
- No ZIP files for photo galleries
- Automatically generated username/password*
- Download limit of 12gb per 24 hour hour period*
- Katie has fake boobs*
- Photoshopping of her moles in photo updates
A note on Bella Network's piracy policy: Bella Network has a very strict piracy policy. They are extremely clear with this and spell it out in black and white prior to joining, in the confirmation email, and on the site. Occasionally legitimate members MIGHT get blocked - Bella have listened to member feedback and have made improvements to their customer service so that this can easily be investigated and rectified.
Bottom Line:
Katie has an incredible body, lots of enthusiasm and her site, like all in the Bella Network, is slick, high quality but still has the character of a amateur solo model site.
Once you're in the member's area, you see content and updates across the whole Network. You can filter by photos, videos, behind the scenes and archives, and sort by date or name.
You can also choose to view updates from a single site (ie, just Katie's) and there's also a search function where you can filter by category, or search by site. It's the same navigation style as Tia Ling's website, but it has been set up properly with content correctly categorised.
Currently the site advertises 13,738 photos, and 287 videos (51,445 photos and 935 videos across the network). On average, there's at least an update a day across the whole network, a consistent history of updates, and probably on average an update every 2-3 days on Katie's site alone including bonus content.
Bella Network is the best network of solo websites I have ever been a member of.
Katie is a softcore model. Most content is shot in and around the Bella Network house, so often in the bedroom, bathroom etc. Content includes masturbation, extreme close-ups of her tits, between her legs etc. Often sets will be a strip tease and masturbation from normal outfits or lingerie, but there's also themed sets such as Wonderwoman, Mistress etc.
Across the top are the following options:
VIDEOS: Currently 117 videos. When you click into 'videos', there are 20 updates per page with a short description, running time, date added, member's rating and an animated thumbnail when you hover over it. Click into the update, and there is a very short and rather generic description with the option to add to favourites or view comments.
You can watch the video as a Flash video (which you can skip to any point in, even when loading), or can download in many, many different formats, including:
Video size ranges from around 100-500mb - a superb range of options. Most follow the usual striptease then play formula, but there's a lot of more specialised videos such as focusing on her (ample!) boobs.
The most annoying aspect of the animated thumbnails is that they only reflect the first few minutes, so don't really show you much about the video. The best way to preview the video is with the Flash video, but of course that involves extra clicks which all add up when you consider the amount of content.
The video section also includes behind the scenes videos.
ARCHIVE: Currently 138 webcam videos. Most a decent, if slightly grainy quality and have approximately an hour's running time. Videos are downloadable in Flash format (approximately 250mb).
PHOTOS: Currently 179 galleries, averaging around 100 photos. Galleries are arranged as 20 per page with a thumbnail, description and date. The thumbnail animates when you hover over it so you can get a gist of the gallery.
Click into a gallery, and pictures are arranged as thumbnails with 20 per page, a short description and the option to view photos as 1500px- or 4000px-wide when you click on thumbnails.
Zips aren't available due to piracy concerns, and you can't right-click thumbnails and 'save target as' because the full-size photo is on a webpage, not just a JPG on its own. There is a medium-sized translucent watermark on full size images.
This might seem an unusual complaint, but Katie has a large mole under on her left boob. From what I can tell this is photoshopped out of all photos, but obviously appears in vids.
BIO: Vital stats and a very impressive and in-depth, 800-word biography - not the usual banal "I like sex" (although of course this is touched upon).
BLOG: Frequently updated, and as far as I can tell, by Katie herself. This is also very in-depth, features previews and personal thoughts.
CANDIDS: Currently 139 galleries of varying sizes. Features trips to zoos etc, flashing in public and self-shoot topless/nude pics. Very impressive.
BABECHAT: Chatroom for Bella models. Katie Banks and Bryci both take part in chats every couple of days, normally at either 7pm or 9pm EST.
Also included is WALLPAPERS/FAN ART and BELLA WEBCAMS (live sex chat webcams).
BELLA NETWORK: If you like Katie, you'll love the other sites:
Bryci - biggest site on the network, comparable to Katie Hunter Leigh - beautiful model, relatively new to Bella
Lexi Mason - extremely petite, relatively new to Bella
Talia Shephard - similar to Katie again, frequent updates Ava Dawn - site no longer updating but has over 50 videos
Monroe Lee - super-curvy but site no longer updating
This is a fantastic site, part of a fantastic network. Some might find some of the content network-wide a bit samey, but this is a high quality network with high quality models and a great mix of content, including great peeks into the model's lives via candids/BTS.
Oh yes, definitely sometimes. Not all the time, though, but one of my favourite aspects of (for example...) Karla Spice's website was that you actually got a chance to enjoy her personality as much as her looks.
Just to address the 'axe to grind against the site' point, I'd like to say although my review was brief, it did reflect my previous membership on the site. I gave credit where it was due (Bryci is incredible) but my membership there was a disaster. I was sorely disappointed but my review did still take into account the positive aspects of the site.
Having said that, I'm currently a member again having been reassured by Bryci's webmaster, and a new review will be forthcoming soon. So far I'm really impressed.
Thank you exotics4me for such a great review, though. I fear mine will end up being quite similar to yours, and I'm glad that Bryci's webmaster encouraged me to give her site the benefit of the doubt as so far I'm really enjoying my membership.
Thank you so much for the review. This site is incredibly high on my wishlist, and I would have joined it already had it not been for the sporadic update schedule.
Anna is amazing, really looking forward to enjoying her content.
Thank you for your email, James - it goes a long way to reassuring me that you've addressed my criticisms. I'm sorry that I've been airing my dirty laundry in public but appreciate the attention you've been giving PU members who have had complaints. I'm looking forward to rejoining Bryci, and I will make sure my review reflects my membership at her site.
It definitely wasn't over 9gb in 24 hours, so if you're saying I'm not telling the truth, then I can't work out how you're not saying I'm a liar, but it's all semantics.
It's good you've increased the download limit and are listening and responding to feedback, but for me, it doesn't make a difference because I would never download that much anyway. Not from Bella, not from any site (even Tia Ling's where the file sizes are huge).
Just looked at the email I sent where I broke down what I downloaded over the course of my week-or-so of working membership:
I emailed support, didn't get any reply, emailed them again and in the end I emailed you and CCBill and only then did I get a reply personally from you (in January 2011... yes, I'm *STILL* going on about it, haha). You said in the email "Why are you emailing me? I am not tech support" - can copy and paste the conversation here if you wish.
I really, really, really wish you had entertained me and emailed me screenshots as proof, in fact this was something I asked for - proof. I knew that if you investigated it, you would have seen that I wasn't telling lies. I think in the end you basically told me to stop emailing, which to be honest I don't actually blame you for because we were just going around in circles and I was probably getting ruder and ruder out of frustration.
I am an honest user and I'm not sure I've ever been so angry before over a customer services related issue. Bryci's site is magnificent but I was left pretty disillusioned by the whole experience.
Thank you for the reply. I say you've called me a liar based on the following statements you've directed towards me in the past:
"10 or so videos does not get you banned Marcus"
"Why is it when someone breaks the terms of service and the server removes them for abuse, they can never man up and admit they were in the wrong?"
"If you were a good member, you'd be on the inside still wouldn't you be?"
I dispute all three of those statements. You might not have said the word 'liar', but you might as well have done. I don't think I've never downloaded 9gb during an entire MONTH on any website, let alone in 24 hours! I am not someone who ever downloads everything, I'm picky about what I download as frankly I don't have much storage space and not every single video is of interest to me.
It's good to know that you do look into why members are banned, but I never got the impression this was done with me. In one email it was suggested I shared my password, but in another that I went over my download limit. Unless somehow I was hacked, I don't understand how this would have happened.
When I was banned I wasn't surprised as my internet connection was woeful at the time, and I'm sure my IP number would have changed (within a range, presumably?) as I rebooted my router (which I've since replaced). I explained this, but just got talked down to. I totally appreciate 1st line support perhaps being terse as I imagine a lot of people do try it on, but I was at my wit's end and felt so hard done by as I had done the honest thing, bought membership, not shared my password and came nowhere close to the download limit.
Funny how so many members here at PU have the same problem. Yet the webmaster always says it's everybody else's problem but his.
I didn't even get near the download limit and I was locked out, presumably because I had a dodgy internet connection at the time and my IP number changed.
Webmaster ignored my emails until I got CCBill involved, then he was very quick to start preaching about the terms and conditions without actually telling me which of the terms and conditions I broke.
But yeah, whatever, his system is infallible (apparently), he never receives our emails (apparently) and of course, it only affects 99% of members (but 100% of PU members it seems...)
I've always been quite fussy and on my laptop, SD videos are normally OK for me. Anything up to 500mb I'm fine with, over 500mb I'm fussy with, and over 1gb It'd have to be a really special video for me.
Thank you for the review. The stealth upsells that people have been mentioning in the comments have completely put me off the site, despite the positives you list. Also my jaw dropped reading about the scrolling watermarks in the videos - they must be losing the plot if they think these things are what paying members want to see.
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