Here's some screencaps from a video from Lenny Sorge with Renna, Nicole/Taylor, and a couple other models whose names I don't know. Sorry for the crappy quality on these, but these are screencaps from a video I purchased from Lenny's store, and the video actually does look this bad. Way too much compression, but I guess it was made for a different age when broadband wasn't all that broad.
And, in notably better quality, here are some screencaps from a Christmas-themed video Renna shot for Anglefan. In the large majority of her videos for Ken, Renna was slimed first and pied later. As a pieromaniac, I much prefer it the other way around, hence this is the video I have selected to highlight here.
Enigmahood said: Does anyone else think Lenny's pies just seemed better than any other producers? What was his secret?
... or was it because his videos were from a time with low res and the pies only seemed better because the videos were grainier?
Yes and yes. But also they were butter cream pies that would cost you about $6 apiece (or more) from a bakery. Lenny got a discount, but still, he's paying about 5X for pies what Ken is (all shaving cream, 3 pies at $1.25/can) so they SHOULD look better or he's wasting his money.
Also, Lenny could afford that because it was the era where people were paying 3 grand for custom scenes and he was making 5 figures a month from his DL Store. So he could absolutely drop $10,000 on a shoot because that money would be coming back.
Nowadays you're taking a huge risk spending even $500 on one scene. (Take it from someone who knows.) So forget using 30 buttercream pies for a single scene unless it's a custom paid up front.
you are SO RIGHT S.S. i swear, i have been trying to find ways to make the "mystery substance" which isnt really a mystery, cheaper bc so many ppl want such a large amount of it and fuck, if i do it on my own with clean up and all that....jesus....
also, what is this BUTTERCREAM in pies everyone talks about? is it buttercream icing?? bc i looked that up and it just looks like regular icing....can someone please explain? im sure i couldnt afford to use them all the time but id like to try it just from seeing messygirls times using it, the coverage is REALLY NICE!
lenny has some excellent vids and his pies hits always seem to turn out REALLY nice.
Enigmahood said: Does anyone else think Lenny's pies just seemed better than any other producers? What was his secret?
... or was it because his videos were from a time with low res and the pies only seemed better because the videos were grainier?
Yes and yes. But also they were butter cream pies that would cost you about $6 apiece (or more) from a bakery. Lenny got a discount, but still, he's paying about 5X for pies what Ken is (all shaving cream, 3 pies at $1.25/can) so they SHOULD look better or he's wasting his money.
Also, Lenny could afford that because it was the era where people were paying 3 grand for custom scenes and he was making 5 figures a month from his DL Store. So he could absolutely drop $10,000 on a shoot because that money would be coming back.
Nowadays you're taking a huge risk spending even $500 on one scene. (Take it from someone who knows.) So forget using 30 buttercream pies for a single scene unless it's a custom paid up front.
Two points here: What's your opinion on them? No offense to MK, but he also used a lot of buttercream and his hits generally weren't on the same level of Lenny. Do they need to be put under a heat lamp or something? Have you used them much?
Secondly, I wanted to elucidate my earlier comment, that somehow the videos being grainer made this hits actually seem better. That might not have made much sense.
My thinking is that sometimes you see someone get pied and it appears great. The shot might be a bit back and by all appearances, the victim was destroyed and it's that perfect hit in my book where they get clobbered and don't really wipe with all you seeing are a couple eyes and their mouth, everything obscured by a great pieing otherwise.
.. however, then sometimes, the camera pans in and the hit really wasn't as good as it seemed from a distance.
With grainer low-res videos, it might make all the hits seem better. Sometimes our minds fill in the blanks with our idealized version of things. If you can't wholly make out a pie hit from a distance or low res, you kind of fill the blanks in with perfection.
Regis said: Has she never gotten muddy? That's an oversight.
As far as I know, the only WAM producers Renna has worked with are Lenny and Ken. Ken certainly doesn't do mud shoots, and I don't think Lenny ever did them either, so Renna may well still be a mud virgin.
Enigmahood said: Two points here: What's your opinion on them? No offense to MK, but he also used a lot of buttercream and his hits generally weren't on the same level of Lenny. Do they need to be put under a heat lamp or something? Have you used them much?
Secondly, I wanted to elucidate my earlier comment, that somehow the videos being grainer made this hits actually seem better. That might not have made much sense.
My thinking is that sometimes you see someone get pied and it appears great. The shot might be a bit back and by all appearances, the victim was destroyed and it's that perfect hit in my book where they get clobbered and don't really wipe with all you seeing are a couple eyes and their mouth, everything obscured by a great pieing otherwise.
.. however, then sometimes, the camera pans in and the hit really wasn't as good as it seemed from a distance.
With grainer low-res videos, it might make all the hits seem better. Sometimes our minds fill in the blanks with our idealized version of things. If you can't wholly make out a pie hit from a distance or low res, you kind of fill the blanks in with perfection.
Maybe.
--You're not offending MK, aka Mark, aka WAMTEC.... ALL his pie shoots were done with Lenny, whether or not they were released as "WAMTEC" shoots or "Lenny" shoots. So if you didn't like the hits in a particular Mark video... Well, Lenny was having a bad day. But yes, same pies, same location, often same models. Lenny could probably chime in with specifics, but this is based on what Mark told me several times.
--Buttercream is... fine. It's very expensive. The pies are heavy. You can still get a good hit without hitting them particularly hard (or well), which comes in handy for models pieing other models. Basically, the pies are like mini-cakes (similar to frosting) and I'd just rather use actual cakes. Also, as others have mentioned (and Mark confirms), the pies did NOT come off easily. The girls had to scrub with dishwashing soap for 30 minutes sometimes. For the average model, they're probably too much. Obviously, Lenny was using pro (sometimes porn) models who were very well-paid so they were gonna soldier through it... But you can spot the girls who were one-and-dones because those pies were just too much.
--Random note: Pretty sure Doodmon's pies were bakery pies and mostly buttercream. For his purposes they made the most sense: You're finding girls in the moment, who probably won't agree to more than a couple pies, so they need to count. And you're driving around with the pies in the car in the heat, and buttercream doesn't melt like whipped cream or dissolve like SC.
--I totally agree with Enigmahood about the "grainy" nature of SD video sometimes improving the hits. HD shows a LOT more detail, which can be good and bad. It's honestly the reason I don't use SC as much as I did in the SD era.... Do SC right at 480p and people can't tell if it's real whip cream or not. (Believe me, MANY asked over the years.) But HD is unforgiving. Ken gets around this by shooting in HD but releasing in 480p, so the grain disguises the SC pies somewhat. But if you're releasing in 1080p, you can spot SC right away. On the flipside, stuff like cakes or real pies look better in 1080p... You get fine details, bit of crust or filling dripping down, etc. I love it. I suspect the buttercream pies would've actually looked BETTER in HD, honestly, although we'll never know because I think Lenny's stuff stayed SD?
I remember being there helping film and clean up Lenny's Florida shoots many times. He knew a baker that would make all his buttercream pies and drive (I believe over an hour) to Tracie's house with a trailer full of like 300 - 500 pies. Those damn things were friggin heavy and we would sort by colors.
Lots of fun but a lot of work to clean up. By the end of the first year I was an expert. lol
I forget who it was but a local model with blonde hair came to the shoot with one of the other models I believe and was watching one of the scenes.
She told Lenny, "I don't care what it takes but I need to be in one of your scenes!" I thought that was so cool. Lenny can chime in if my memory is not at good as I think it is.
Since (some) people here are crazy for those buttercream pies, here's another extravaganza of them from Lenny, featuring Renna, Persia, and two other models. Unfortunately, some very poor model placement or camera-work means that you can't actually see Renna take her first pie to the kisser in this melee, but I think buttercream fans will enjoy them anyway...
Just read all the kind words about my videos and I appreciate it
To get things correct I will comment on people's points
Yes I used colorful buttercream pies alot. Jayce is correct that its frosting basically but Publix used a special formula of icing. i forgot the number they used but it was the icing they put on cakes and for color used food dye
Some scenes the pies did not stick well because they were the first scenes of the day. The pies were delivered refrigerated because it it usually very hot in FL Those first pies were stiffer so more force was need to stick. But as the day worn on the buttercream would soften and get to a very gooey state and work perfectly
As for you stop go contact me. Havent seen you in a longtime buddy!!! Hope all is well for you. The blonde you are thinking about is Renne. She was my favorite model because she would do anything and I mean ANYTHING
As for cost of shoots Yes spent a lot on models. Pies were cheap like $3 each because I did have a deal worked out with the baker I used and we became good friends. I almost got his good looking wife in one of my scenes
Yes used Renna a few times with her friends and I pied her MOM. She is the Florida FLapper video (blonde) She was a very lovely lady
Finally Mark did very few pie videos with me. However When Mark started out he did not use buttercream pies. It was Mike the pieman that got him to use them. I dont know if Mike was the one who gave the recipe to Publix baker but I used those pies in some of my videos. Mark is an water person and me a pie person so eventhough the models were paid well just think about it they would go from my pie scene to Marks water scene back and forth back and forth in a 10-12 hour day so if you add up all the scene the models would shoot the price was never too bad
Rich is right you have to out of your mind these days to shoot any scene like I did
The food costs have doubled the models are all sick in the head for the prices they want for a scene and with this new generation of young people (some were not born when I started) they want instant gratification for FREE. And with youtube and P**NH**+ (dont want to offend anyone with the name) stealing everyones material its just not worth the effort. As Mark said we went from 5 figures a month to 4 figures a month now I am down to 3 figures a month
In conclusion it was a fun time The shoots eventhough a lot of work was really fun work with all the helpers I had and the models for the most part enjoying themselves. We used to take them around FL after the shoot was over and everyone had a great time
I miss those days and with my age, not so good health and the costs of everything these days is the reason I have given those kind of shoots up
I have a friend who wants me to do a shoot in Nov but it would be a little thing with only 2-3 models for a day and at this point I am still mulling the idea
Well most of my pies are shaving cream, unless you're Kerri Taylor or some others who prefer real pies. I've done all real pie shoots many MANY times and have used whipped cream on paper plates as well (with Amber and some other models). By the way, LOVE all these Renna pics Pieromaniac!
I do agree with Lenny that models are sick in the head and are in a fantasy land to demand the kind of money/fees they want during this extremely down period for wam sales and business. IF it even is a "down period". These days it is BARELY lucrative to pay a model $25-$50/HOUR to shoot something and make a lot back on it, nevermind $400-800 for a single shoot that nets somewhere around 5-7 scenes.
Also, I did gravitate towards slime-first scenes with Renna Ryann only because she loved getting slimed (she always said she loved the feeling and that it smelled and tasted amazing) first over being pied first. Renna's reactions to getting slimed first were better and that's what we did, with a little variety of slime colors and textures thrown in!
wow...great post! I've seen her on Southerncharms over the years, but never put two and two together. Thank you for sharing, she looks absolutely stunning both clean, and messy!
In a post a few years back, Lenny mentioned that the Renna videos he shot didn't sell as well as most of his other videos, which strikes me as very odd for reasons amply on display above. However, as far as I can tell, Renna was always one of several girls featured in the Lenny videos she did (there are four models in each of the Lenny videos I've screencapped above, for example), so I'm not sure it's fair to blame their low sales on her. Frankly, she's always the best looking model, often by a long shot, in these group videos. (At least in my opinion, anyway, but I may be biased.)
Ken has mentioned in the past that Renna was a delight to work with, thoroughly professional, cheerful, and never complained about the fact that she was getting buried in pies and slime in one scene after another. He even said that she really pushed him to give up shooting on mini-DV and switch over to HD cameras!
Yes!!!!! Probably 3-4 shoots in a row back in 2010 Renna was always telling me to upgrade to HD cameras with built in hard drives. And that they can accept memory card flash drives if they ran out of storage. She was definitely a pro and had been using HD tech long before that as well. I finally made the upgrade based on her recommendation. I remember seeing her in FL at one of our last shoots and telling her which cameras I was considering, we went over some of the tech details, and she made some recommendations for me. She's one of the best models I ever got a chance to work with!
Anglefan said: Yes!!!!! Probably 3-4 shoots in a row back in 2010 Renna was always telling me to upgrade to HD cameras with built in hard drives. And that they can accept memory card flash drives if they ran out of storage. She was definitely a pro and had been using HD tech long before that as well. I finally made the upgrade based on her recommendation. I remember seeing her in FL at one of our last shoots and telling her which cameras I was considering, we went over some of the tech details, and she made some recommendations for me. She's one of the best models I ever got a chance to work with!
I'm very curious that Renna's videos underperformed in Lenny's store. How did her videos sell for you, Ken?