CONTINUE
-
GMSMA EVENING November 13th '97
MY
NOTES TO PROMPT MYSELF WHILE TALKING
The idea of the Mind's Eye
... being able to visualise the action from more than one point of view
at the same time offers all sorts of possibilities. Some writers manage
to convey this effect, but in your private fantasies you are your own
writer, director and sometimes actor in your own 'Theatre of the
Mind's Eye'. How complicated or simple is this Process?
Later on
I'll talk about conventional cinematic picture editing ... the Visual
Vocabulary ... but for now, it's talk about me.
Early in
life, being a self-indulgent sort of person I started to visualise being
in three places at once while my secret, personal erotic preferences
were being acted out ... and tonight my dreams become reality.
INTRODUCE
REHEARSED SEQUENCE FROM 'SCENARIO'
When I
trained as a television director, almost the first thing they told us
was that the audience doesn't listen when something visually interesting
was happening. "A picture is worth a thousand words" - not
a cliché - a truism.
USING
HAND-HELD CAMERAS TO PROJECT CLOSE-UP IMAGES OF THE LIVE ACTION BEHIND
ACTORS AS THINGS HAPPEN.
AS
SEQUENCE ENDS THANK ACTORS (should this text be included on
this web page - or as a description of content?)
To end
the scene so abruptly there ... brings me to two new topics ...
1 ... Stories that leave you to choose what happens next ... and ...
2 ... Collections of random images that can group and regroup to tell
different stories
Unresolved
stories drive some people crazy.
Others like them because you can edit out elements that don't suit your
personal preference ...
and load the story from you're own Julie Andrews list.
I'll have some more to say about unresolved scenarios that late ...
... if there's time.
Constructing
a picture from random images ...
This can be done in a lot of different ways ... collage ... montage
... storyboard
Whether they're down-loaded from the Internet, cut from magazines, or
photographed in your own bedroom by video or digital camera ...
... you can personalise the collection and make it tell the story you
want it to tell
People
who want to be spoon-fed need to rely on the editor of the magazines
Manifest Reader or Bound and Gagged being generally on
your wavelength.
The
process of selecting and editing your own preferences ...
whether it be as slide show, collage, pin-up board ...
is not only satisfying - it can help to clarify shifts in our tastes
-
or it can illustrate to someone else, exactly where our preferences
lie.
It can
be a means of communication as well as something stimulating to spark
our splendidly perverted and individualistic imaginations ...
and one can while away many hot and happy hours in the process.
Visual
Vocabulary
I said I'd get back to this but this - but it's a big subject ...
and we've got things to see ... so I want to keep the talk to a minimum
this evening.
Visual
Vocabulary is a professional term to describe the particular visual
style chosen to tell a story in pictures.
We all grow up with the current style of movie editing. The mix of long-shot,
close-up and conversational mid-shots.
Unconsciously, that's what we're used to ... the cutting rhythms and
angles.
Some quirky
editor or director might then come along and throw jump-cuts, distortions
and split screens at us. This has a temporary shock value but we soon
adjust to it and it becomes part of our Visual Vocabulary when watching
professionally made TV or movies ...
So - unconsciously
we often visualise and fantasise in conventional cinematic terms - which
is fine - but when we watch a porno movie, showing improvised action
on a single camera with dodgy lighting ... it is seldom completely satisfying
to us ... perhaps not because the action is puerile and the models ugly
... but because the Visual Vocabulary is so basic.
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ADDITIONAL NOTES - MIGHT SQUEEZE IN SOMEWHERE
We often do this in our fantasies ... we visualise from more than one
point of view at the same time
We can
star as hero, victim or villain ... or all three plus being the camera
and audience ... watching in long shot and close-up at the same time.
You may
think what I'm proposing sounds too complicated for something as straightforward
as jerking-off.
The VISUAL
VOCABULARY of Hollywood is something we all grew up with. TV, videos
and wide screen extravaganzas all use the same basic mix of shots and
cutting rhythms. Even when trendy editors and directors introduce quirky
jump-cuts and split screens ... these soon become part of the cinematic
visual vocabulary ... and ...
... almost
unconsciously, those of us who consciously fantasise, unconsciously
visualise in cinematic terms.
-------------------------------------
One
person who consciously tried to break this mould was Andy Warhol.
Some of his experimental footage was very interesting - boring, but
interesting because he just set up a single camera and let it run.
For example
he'd focus on the side of a building, above first floor level so there
was no traffic or people to watch. You heard the traffic, but saw only
a wall of windows. Very occasionally someone might appear briefly at
a window and disappear again. Soon you welcomed any slight movement
... and when a pigeon suddenly few through the shot the audience practically
fell of their seats.
During
this period he made a short film called Blow Job. I only saw it only
once, but as I recall it the camera was static on a young guy - a hustler,
seen from the waist up ... and although he doesn't move much we know
that - out of shot - someone has approached him - knelt down - unzipped
his pants - and slowly and methodically sucked him off ... but all you
see is body language and facial expression ... the rest is in the imagination
of the viewer ... and we may all be seeing something different.
The
Mind's Eye - and body language
This brings us to our next live sequence - but not action-packed.
Body language is something we read all day everyday, often without realising
we're doing it.
As a bondage enthusiast, part of the kick I get is from watching someone
immobilised and virtually motionless. Virtually ... but not quite
I videotape
hours of what some people see as NON-EVENT footage.
The slight flexing and straining ... And testing ... and returning to
a possibility of escape or at least relief of tension.
A still
photograph of someone who's just been tied-up and then another still
taken after ten minutes - and an hour - and four hours and perhaps longer
...
Even if they're haven't moved, the differences are considerable.
Video footage
of such a situation is a lesson in mind-reading.
If left alone and undistracted by the camera, you can literally read
thoughts as they cross the mind of the person immobilised there.
So - because
I wanted more footage of men immobilised and dealing with it - the Endurance
Bondage Experiment came into existence.
This
situation is elaborated on in a sequence from the 'Sensual Adventure
Story' HOUDINI CONNECTIONS (see 'STORYLINES' via Home Page)
THE
GMSMA WORKSHOP CONTINUED INTO ANOTHER PERFORMED SEQUENCE FROM 'SCENARIO
FOR A LEATHER FANTASY'
COMPARE
THIS TEXT WITH
'GET CLOSER TO YOUR FANTASIES' workshop