I have to catch a plane in a few hours so I’m going to combine two shoots in this edition of From the Editor’s Desk.
First we have a rope primer by Osada Steve that I mentioned earlier. This will end up as a DVD that will be included in the package when one purchases a complete set of official Osada Steve Shibari rope.
This tutorial isn’t a How To on Japanese Shibari. Rather, it goes into such things as proper rope maintenance, wrapping and coiling techniques as well as simple and complex knots. I think in the future Steve may be putting out some How Tos as well and I’ll let you know if and when this comes to pass.
Steve actually put together a fairly intricate script prior to shooting the movie. He didn’t have to refer to it at all as we were shooting, though. This kind of thing just seems to come second-nature to him.
I learned quite a lot about rope myself as I was shooting and editing this video. There’s more to this kind of thing than most people would think. Here’s a snippet from the original script:
This rope is custom-made for bondage. It is used by top Shibari professionals in Japan. For over five years now, I have been using this type of rope with the exact same specifications.
If you treat it nicely you will have many years of enjoyable bondage time ahead of you.
One interesting thing I learned is that Shibari rope comes in set lengths and, once a rope artist chooses a particular size, he should remain with this length for the rest of his career! By the way, the length of rope one chooses is based on the dimensions of the rope artist, not on the size of the person being roped.
Here’s something else I found interesting and informative:
This rope is what they call in Japanese, Asanawa. The Japanese vocabulary does not make a distinction between hemp and jute. When using online dictionaries the word Asa will usually be translated as hemp. However, this rope is NOT hemp rope. It is jute rope. In Japan nobody is using hemp rope. Though jute and hemp may belong to the same family of fibers, and they both have good properties for holding knots and for not stretching, they do differ in looks and especially in smell.
This video is a must-have for anyone serious about improving his knowledge of Asanawa.
The second item I have for you today is a Studio SIX shoot I recently finished editing. This video features Miss Kotone. I think you will find this video tantalizing. Kotone has a beautiful body and she has a rather interesting tattoo on her back as well. I only have some screen captures to show you here. They aren’t as large or as good as regular photos, but they will give you an idea as to what’s contained in the video.
KabukiJoe
