Retired - Victoria Swinger

[Steve]

She did not do a DP scene in the new shoots I have. She did not do anal. As I mentioned she hates doing that and as it was her site she decided against doing those scenes. She also refused facials.

There are only actually two hard scenes of which one is so dire that its probably impossible to create a scene from. The majority is soft scenes because she was not well enough during most of the shooting to work with others.

Still gonna go ahead with the festival stuff first as I have cleaned up around 30gb of footage (i.e. removed the interlacing and used a minor brush filter on the clips to clean them up). Yes, although its a little known fact you can airbrush movie clips. Its called video noise reduction and you can smooth the footage and blend in high speed action.

Most people associate airbrushing as a photoshop phenomena. Its not restricted to simply still photos. Take the recent hollywood movie 300 for example. Every bit of that was shot in a studio wearing plastic armor. Just check out the awesome post processing on that movie.

[Steve]

Just for the record, some of the things you can do with the CCD footage is quite a lot of fun.

Take the standard 720x576 sony DV codec footage recorded at 25fps (i.e. what the original source is recorded at) and do this.

Re-encode using a 720p codec at 50fps (not 60 as that will cause mega sync issues). Pop the bitrate passthru to about 25,000 bits per second. Okay, you need an extreme machine to do this but I use a liquid cooled Quad Core x6700 extreme with 4gb 800mhz RAM, 1.5 terrabyte drives and twin SLI 8800 GTX and physx processing.

Now, you have the same footage with 50fps. Now put into a video editor and decrease the speed by 75% and encode again using 50fps. Do it once more and then using the footage you now edit the scene. Footage per minute is probably something like 5gb. Add some slow motion frames to the clip and they will be awesome. That is the only real way to create fantastic slow motion clips using a CCD based video camera. If you tried to do very slow motion with standard footage it would have the same effect as watching someone walking around with a strobe light... lol

[dap-addict]

The typical video cam used on a production has a max resolution of 720x576 (i.e DVD quality or sometimes 420p quality). Pro SLI cameras are usually 6-10 megapixel or 3200x2400 with dedicated still photo lenses and hefty flash guns.

Thanks a lot for this explanation, Steve.
Concerning photo and computer knowlegde you are about 100 light years ahead of me, I guess.

[superduper]

If the website stuff is not much good as porn, it might be best to do it with the bts stuff a bit like a documentary, with intertitles, for Day One (the date and time), then showing the action being shot along with the bts footage.

Might be interesting to see the difference each day in VS.

[sbando]

Thank you for the always compentent and insightful posts, Steve.

[superduper]

So, everybody's coming out with it now and saying VS wasn't all that great as a porn queen.

But is she an iconic figure ? EBI says she is "one of the most prominent babes", which sounds like the image was greater than the person or the performer, which often happens.

Could the movie become the fall of an icon ?

Nice VS to nasty VS in seven days.

Mind you, bts footage, what would other porn queens be like bts ? Are any of them real angels when the pressure is on to film a performance ?

[Steve]

She was never nasty and I am not overly sure where that impression has come from. She was just under a ton of stress and you can see how it effected her over the period of the shooting.

One thing I can most definitely say about Victoria Swinger was that she was never unkind or nasty to anyone.

Also, it was not seven days, more like three months

[dap-addict]

I guess those of us remmebering you praising Victoria Swinger in high words in the old forum may be just a bit puzzled about how you sound now, Steve.
I guess something terrible has happened to both of you in the meantime; I sound it may be a very personal thing, but maybe I am mistaken.

Not digging too deep it´s basically marketing or the lack of it. But byond that every porn fan could make up his own mind about Victorias porn performances. Thus for sure she never was a big as Simony or Angelina Crow in the porn fan community.

[superduper]

Yes, it would have been stress, which sounds as if it was more extreme than usual.

You did say something about how she became impossible to work with, and lack of professionalism.

Also, about being lazy.

But she built up her own head of steam, about a great career, and then was not able to deliver, so the stress and strain of that will be what is apparent, because she might feel she was letting other people down. And also, you said she had an illness at the time, which would have caused extra stress.

It would take a saint not to show some of the strain on her, and if she was never nasty at all to anyone, that shows a good side of her character.

You did imply that away from porn she was a nice pleasant person, so it might be the stress of expectation (a lot of which she put on herself) that caused her career to fall apart.

People do not like to disappoint themselves or others.

This might turn out to be a bit like a Bergman film, the bts stuff, quite a serious business.

[Steve]

I wont be doing the bts stuff as any kind of movie. The material was made for a specific purpose and it will be edited for that purpose. Its definitely good enough to stand alone so I don' think I need to make it into a biographical about her life (of which would be a waste of the material to be honest, prefer to let someone else do that with her other stuff).

Being lazy, unprofessional at times and not overly great at the business does not make her a mean horrible person. Maybe a misguided person who was told continuously that she was great and never received criticism. She was actually always critical of her own stuff (apart from her mikes apartment shoot which she said she really enjoyed).

In Hungary she was definitely bigger than Simony. Simony is not an overly big star in her home country (then again, neither is Sandra Shine, Eve Angel, etc). It was Victoria Swinger who was a celebrity star on "Who wants to be a millionaire" in Hungary, not Simony. I think this is mostly down to the fact that Victoria lived for the attention and the fame, whereas Simony shunned it.

I am not sure what difference it honestly makes who was bigger out of Simony or Victoria, or out of Silvia Saint and Monika Sweetheart, etc. Who honestly cares. Personally, I liked Victoria and never found anything appealing about Simony. Thats my opinion but I will not go into what other people think purely based on the fact that I am not other people! Saying "so and so is bigger than so and so" is impossible to prove, biased on a persons own opinion and ultimate a waste of time

Take whichpornstars rather useless voting. Ever notice how some stars rapidly rocketed each month when they were sometimes not even peforming anymore or were in some cases dead. Wanna know why? Easy, the voting system on WPS was based on a javascript file on their server. Each time it got a hit, it knocked up a vote. Now, anyone knows that a .js file can be downloaded easily with a bit of searching.

So, download the .js file, choose a model you want as the big thing that month and stick that .js on another site so that anyone going to that site unwittingly sends a vote for the chosen model for that month. Problem there is that javascript is a client side language and not server side so it executes on the visitors machine, not the server and is therefore highly exploitable. A simple php script containing $voter_ip= $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR']; and then record $voter_ip with a md5 token in a database with a timestamp would eradicate all but the most persistant exploiter. Php is server side and is executed on the server and therefore no one can steal your code and modify it without having root or FTP access to the site files.

To be completely open and honest about the theory of the "most popular model" then I would have to say "no one knows". You will never have a totally 100% accurate poll of who is the best because a) about 20% bother voting, b) 99.99% of people know only a few models and therefore are biased, c) you will never get everyone who enjoys porn to vote and d) peoples preferences change so by the time they have voted and the polls are counted I would think 10% or higher will have already changed their minds.

[Steve]

Oh, while I am on about polls and voting. I personally thing thats about the most annoying and irritating thing that a fan can ever do. I see often polls on here about "best girl of the month", or "Dap competition part 1" and so on....

Ever considered the effect that your juvenile votes and polls have on the loser. A real confidence booster for them I think not. And then other comments like "I don't like her cause she has a big nose, or big ears or funny toes, etc". What the hell do you want her to do, cut off her nose to gain you favour?

They take enough stick in the business (no pun intended) and have some pretty awful days so I am sure finding out that they recently came last in a poll on a pornsite really cheers them up.

There will always be a winner, I agree but there will always be a loser. And trust me, its a lot more depressing for the loser than it is cheerful for the winner. Ultimately, the polls and votes are a negative and I would like to see a fucking lot less of them!!!

[Steve]

For the record, yes... I am in a strange mood cause its too bloody hot in my office and trying to program in 34 degree dry heat is horrible (and thats with an aircon unit trying to compete with my PC's which are all venting out 70+ degree heat from dual graphic ports... )

(ever noticed I always post about 4am GMT and I am UK based. Now you know why, its too damn hot in this room so I work at night.. lol)

[dap-addict]

In Hungary she was definitely bigger than Simony. Simony is not an overly big star in her home country

I wasnt thinking about Hungary, Steve, but porn fans all around the world. As Mr. Peter recently pointed out well, Eastern European porn fans have too little money to really keep this biz running.
I was neither thinking of polls. I basically share your view on those various online polls. And if I stage them I always made clear that I do think all girls takeing part are great girls, i.e. there is no loosers, and also I dont vote about girls, but the way certain girls perform certain porn acts.

Victoria Swinger, to put it short, got once a lot of advertizement (from you, too!) but despite of this any porn fan watching a bit more than just an odd dvd per month was able to judge for himself if her performances are really that good.
Me, personally, I was never a fan of VS, but that doesnt matter in this discussion.
But btw. I just found a very nice and really good scene by her!

[Steve]

I am responsible for a lot of the advertising that VS received. Her agent usually takes credit for making her into what she became but he knows also that most of the press she received was due to my continuous pressure on making her known.

I think her fame came from the advertising and work that I put in trying to make her famous and the frequent stories on Machomedia combined with the fact that she was one of the first models to start posting on these forums (sometimes it was her, honestly).

I was asked to make her famous and I did my best to achieve that goal. Through the free trailers and clips I often posted, the coverage of festivals on the sites and through posting her name on US boards, and Euro boards is where most of her popularity came from. Then her agent sat back as the phone started ringing and would claim "I got her a new job".

When her site closed in July 2005 and I stopped working on the advertising and promotional work, she received not a single assignment in over three months.

When the whole thing finally finished in Feb 2006, she managed to get a few photograph shoots with Simon Scans, one movie (anal dancing, of which she wrote the script and did the casting) and the final two installments of pornwars, which were obvious she would get....

So, yes I am guilty of hyping her so much that she was pushed into a league where she should not rightly have been. It is an interesting point though because it shows what just one persons dedication can do to make someone else famous. Imagine if a whole group of people started doing the same for a model...

[Steve]

Hmm, which scene of VS would you like? I am thinking. I know you like anal, so I can easily remove 50% of her stuff. You liked the lusty legs scene which is probably one of her hardest ever. I doubt its the rape scene as that one has got itself buried underground and the version floating is a really bad quality version.

I would go for her first hard scene in "The Cult" by private, or her recently rereleased Hi-Def HC scene on "handsonhardcore" which was extended considerably over the original version (however, they chopped a bit out in the new version which I used to think rocked... lol).

You know, considering how able Victoria was with English and could easily have a conversation with me for hours in English, her scenes really lacked any thought in regards to what she would say. Right, lets go through the complete script of VS in regards to all her hardscenes "Do you like it?", "fuck my pussy", "fuck my ass". and sometimes "ahh, yeah".

The bit on the new Handsonhardcore re-edited scene made me chuckle. Nick lang is doing her anal reverse cowgirl and he pops it out and gapes her. James Brosnan is standing nearby trying unsuccessfully to get a blowjob. She suddenly looks down at her gaped pussy and ass and looks at Brosnan and says "Do you like it?". So question for the day!!! If you were Brosnan, and you were in that position and had just been asked that, what would you say?

Most witty or pedantic answer wins! I'll think of some VS memento to email to you if you win.