Friday, January 21, 2011

Shirtless Backs Ache For The Lash

Have you ever seen a shirtless young man running, throwing a Frisbee, or engaged in some other physical activity, and thought to yourself, “He has a back that just aches for the lash”, or “I’d like to see him writhing at the end of a whip”, or “I wonder how many lashes his back could take before he screams”?

Whenever I see a shirtless young man, my mind instantly goes to how he would look being whipped—and how he would take it.  Like OKLASH said in his comment to the Jan 12 post, “The ancients observed that a muscled male back was built for the whip…”, and the back of a fit young man simply cries out for welts from well-applied leather.  Young men cannot resist the desire to test themselves—that’s why so many play sports.  What drives them isn’t just competition with other men; it’s an internal desire to push themselves beyond their established limits—to create new higher ones.  Which is why they are perfectly suited for the whip.

If you’re reading this blog, you probably have seen the WhippingDudes videos I have posted to YouTube.  That means you have watched me, Buddy Olive:  Seized up and shirtless, writhing under the lash.  When I review those videos, I keep thinking about how to make my body better for the next session—I want to make the most visually appealing videos I can while pushing my own limits of pain and fear endurance.  My desire to show my audience a fit and muscular man taking the whip is what keeps me motivated to workout at the gym.  I still have a long way to go to satisfy myself in that regard, but I don’t think I will ever really be satisfied—which is a good thing.

For the most part, I have been disappointed with the flogging videos I can find—when I can find one.  The back-only flogging videos I have found all contain nudity or feature a fat dude (naked), tied up and being whipped by some sad dominatrix.  Not exactly an image to summon up the blood.  The notable exception is the “Chained Muscle” series, especially their “Corporal Punishment” DVD.  Muscular and/or lean-athletic backs are exactly what I want to see take the whip—and those videos did provide that, but I always thought that the men took it too passively.  Sure, I like to watch a man endue his punishment, but there didn’t seem to be too much “action”, by which I mean the videos didn’t provide a sense of dreaded anticipation in the prisoner—it’s almost like they took it with a resigned sigh instead of a genuine scream.

When I set out to film my floggings, I wanted to create something that people would watch again and again, finding pleasure in the variety in the different clips (different whips, different number of lashes, different setting, etc), and gaining an appreciation for the willful and authentic suffering of a man who strips off his shirt to endure the test of the lash.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Flogging The Blog: Comments

We have had some really good comments over the past few days, and they have been spread around the blog, attached to various posts.  I am glad that there are so many people as passionate about flogging as a topic as I am—and are feeling increasingly comfortable in posting comments.   I would like to point out a couple specifically:

Congratulations to OKLASH for his comment yesterday on the “Flogging As Entertainment” post (Jan 12).  He paints quite an image, not only of the scene of a muscular back under the lash, but of what a man endures—and why—when he strips off his shirt.  Well done!

Curious One also made well-thought out comments on the “Video Inspirations” post (Jan 18) concerning elements of my most recent video, Soldier’s Punishment: Flogging.  I am grateful for his rating of at 4.5 out of 5 stars.  He points out some of the weaknesses of the video, such as the script having the Prisoner pronounce “punishment completed” (because only an official overseeing the punishment has that authority) and the technical aspect that the green screen didn’t zoom when the camera zoomed in on the Prisoner’s back after punishment.  The problems with the green screen effects I had noticed during editing, but I didn’t want to waste the video and not publish it for some cosmetic problems—it was a good hard flogging and deserved to be shown (and seems to be very popular on YouTube). 

have had comments both ways concerning the background used. Some liked the "dramatic" effect of the brick wall, while others have said that they liked the "erotic" (their word) black background found in my previous two videos. I am actually greatly encouraged by the differences of opinion coming from the audience on this matter:  While it does mean that I won't please everyone all the time, it does open up the opportunity to create a variety over time.  I have other backgrounds in mind—including truly outdoor scenes—so rest assured that your patience will be rewarded.

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Video Inspirations

I left the post from Jan 13 at the top of the blog through the long weekend (Monday was the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday in the US) to see if we could get more of a conversation going—and it worked:  We have a few new people beginning to make comments.  I ask everyone to go back and check out the comments on the earlier posts to see if there are new ones you might have missed.

I especially encourage everyone to read Richie’s comment on the January 10th post, “Discipline of the Lash”.  It is a powerful and detailed piece, and raises the important issue of the whip being used for behavior-modification.   I’m sure many of the regular readers will find something to remark upon—and I encourage you to get involved and post a comment!

I would like to thank everyone who has made comments on various aesthetic issues with the videos I have uploaded.  I have received some interesting input through the comments sections of this blog and the WhippingDudes YouTube channel, and through private messages and emails.  I really do appreciate the feedback—and have been working to incorporate those suggestions that I think will enhance viewer experience.  For example, on the latest video “Soldier’s Punishment:  Flogging”, we had the Prisoner count the strokes as they were laid on—this was not actually suggested as so much demonstrated by newlatigazos on one of his now-defunct videos.  We liked that element, so we used it—to popular effect.

I have received a few suggestions to have the whip laid on from both sides.  However, we are not yet able to film the whip coming from the right-hand side.  My Inflictor, being right-handed, doesn’t have the control for a hard left-handed application and doesn’t feel comfortable with the accuracy of a back-handed use with the right.  Until I can find a left-handed Inflictor, we are going to have to stick with a right-handed flogging from the left.   We do want to incorporate this aspect, but we just don’t have what we feel we need to pull it off yet.

Also, there have been several requests for what I call “dramatic” elements prior to the flogging, such as the reading of the sentence, the prisoner stripping off his shirt (or having the shirt ripped off), the prisoner being tied up, etc.  Because we are doing this for fun, and the current non-mainstream nature of this sport, we are concerned with how this might be viewed amongst our professional peers (if they should somehow happen across our videos), so we are proceeding with an abundance of caution and are careful not to have our faces filmed.  Some of these features (which are part of my long-term vision and would greatly like to incorporate) are incompatible with those concerns—for the moment.  Rest assured, though, that I am working on finding a way to incorporate as many of these dramatic elements as possible into future videos, while maintaining the anonymity of the actors.  Stay tuned!