Club Obi Wan

I was out cracking my good ol' Walt Disney World WHip when suddenly, my finger got a sharp pain......

I looked down, and have of the skin on the bttom part of my finger was rubbbed to the point that it was peeling (ewwww....)

It was a blister, as big as a quater, on my index finger.....and now..I can't even write....

Folks, listen when they say becareful working with whips, because your finger may hurt...very badly.... :evil:


- Has this happened to anyone (blister[s])

Yep, happens all the time until your hands get tough. I used to practice 3 hours at a time for a competition. I just wore gloves (Midwest are my favorites) the next day so that I could continue.

-Sergei

I used to have blisters all the time, (well, not so much anymore,) from drumsticks, sword grips, (back when I was fencing,) hammers, (when I was doing some blacksmithing,) still occasionally get them from broadcast video camera work if I'm shooting handheld for days straight, (I sometimes miss being a freelancer, darn cushey college teaching job has me going all soft!) and now bullwhips.

My best advice, (and there may be many here with medical backgrounds who will shoot me down on this. It's best to listen to them, as I'm just a doofus who's been know to do all sorts of stuff that is technically bad for me,) is don't "peel" them. Don't let them get to the peeling stage if you can help it. Peeling that skin off does nothing but expose new, tender, pink skin underneath to further abuse.

Lance them with a needle, (preferably sterilized with rubbing alcohol,) and drain them. Then let them be. Maybe put a band-aid over them if they're still really painful, and antiseptic might be a good idea as well, (though, I've rarely bothered.) They'll be tender for a while, but when they stop being so tender, you'll be well on your way to a callous, which will prevent the blisters from happening again, (until you find a new hobby that you really like, and then you'll start over again.)

I'll empart to you some great words of wisdom my father gave to me,

"It'll feel better when it quits hurtin."

Dad should have been appointed Minister of the Bleeding Obvious...

Good luck.

-Dan

thefish wrote:I used to have blisters all the time from drumsticks

...then Kentucky Fried Chicken started offering original recipe again and all was well.

Blisters from whipping: Wear gloves.

Hey Andy,

Too bad about the blisters. I remeber getting a few blisters when I started whip cracking, but now I've just got calluses.

If you do lance the blister and put a band-aid over it, you could then put a few wraps of athletic tape over the band-aid to help hold it in place and offer protection to your hands. I put athletic tape on my fingers sometimes when braiding.

I almost have your new whip done, as well. I thought I would get it done this weekend but some things came up. I should have it done and shipped tomorrow. I made an effort to make this one lighter than usual, so you should be able to get more mileage out of your arm

-Adam, www.winrichwhips.com

Makes you know your alive, don't it. That hand will toughen up with a callus if you keep whipping enough and you’ll be good to go.

Blisters from handheld broadcast camera work? I've been a professional EFP/ENG production videographer for over 30 years now, and never heard THAT one before. Regards. Michaelson

OK. It was a pretty unique and isolated incident, but it did happen, Michaelson.

I tend to shoot alot of event stuff when I get to go out anymore, and I get bored with the camera on my shoulder. A couple months ago, I was first camera op on a machine gun shoot video, (INSERT GRATUITOUS PLUG: available at machinegunshoot.com, END GRATUITOUS PLUG,) and to get some of the shots that I got, I held the camera in some pretty erm...creative positions for extended periods of time. Hands got rubbed raw, by the top handle on the JVC DV5000U I was shooting with, and that was SERIOUSLY irritated by the copious amounts of powder residue in the air, (at least 75-100 machine guns going off at once, throwing hundreds of rounds downrange every minute. LOTS of powder residue combined with sweat on my palms. Chewed my hands up pretty good, and completely wore the finish of the handle of a BRAND NEW camera!)

Got a nice, raw, red blister in the webbing between my thumb and forefinger on my left hand that refused to stop burning for about a week afterward.

And because I'm insane, I'm doing it again in April.

To bring this back on topic, and to demonstrate that it was all worth it, the machine gun shoot paid for the shiney, new Lone Star bullwhip that Joe Strain mailed out to me yesterday ;-)

Oh, and something else Andiana...Something else I do to lessen the chafing effects of leather on hands. when I condition my whip after I use it, (and I use Fiebing's leather conditioner, rather than Pecards. Don't know about the Pecards, but Fiebing's is mostly bees wax and sheep tallow, with a little kerosene thrown in to cut it, I think,) I apply it by hand, and then when I've wiped down the fall, I just rub the remaining into my hands.

I wash my hands before I eat, though. Fiebings isn't the tastiest stuff on the planet.

-Dan

Dan/thefish, maybe wear gloves for your next shoot too.

Snakewhip_Sable wrote:...then Kentucky Fried Chicken started offering original recipe again and all was well.

Just to be on the safe side, I'm going to start wearing my Wells Lamonts whenever I eat there.

winrichwhips wrote:
I almost have your new whip done, as well. I thought I would get it done this weekend but some things came up. I should have it done and shipped tomorrow. I made an effort to make this one lighter than usual, so you should be able to get more mileage out of your arm

Ohhh.....lighter...... THANX!

So I guess this is common huh?
Ya, I had trouble writing today...necause I couldn't hold my bloody pen...I hurt so much.....(my index fingure, which now has some gause and cotton and neo-sporin..)and we had to write a 5 paragraph essay on the events of
'Bloody Kansas'......well...I guess the topic fit my situation (bloody). ....

Hopefully I won't kill my self on Adam's whip....

If you're just learning whip, please do teach yourself to be ambidexterous with it. That might give you two smaller blisters instead of one big one.

oh, and wear the gloves.

The nice part about learning to use the whip with your weaker hand is that it helps you refine and clean up your technique. One of the whipmakers here recommended that to me when I just started out and let me tell you it works! It causes you to slow down a little and concentrate on your form. Even though the forward circus crack is the only crack I have down to date, I can do it well with both hands. Truthfully, sometimes I get a better crack with my "weak" hand!

bink

Fiebings has kerosene in it? If I remember back to my O-chem, that's a solvent!

Best Regards,

Paul Stenhouse

Been there, done that too, Dan, but we were blowing up 4 foot thick walls with the U.S. Army to demonstrate the ability of C4 to demolish barriers at the nuclear enrichment plant I was working at. I put my DXC6000 (boy, THAT just dated me, didn't? ) on a tripod (a cameramans best friend in ANY situation) and jumped into a bunker before a blast went off. We did this for 14 hours one day. I figured DOE could afford to replace my rig if shrapnel hit the camera. Fortunately, nothing got nailed, though we sure made a mess of the area we were working in.

Sorry to go offtopic, guys....Dan and I were just talking shop, as professional videographers tend to do. Carry on. Regards. Michaelson

Andiana148, you might want to buy a product called moleskin. I am pretty sure that Dr. Scholl's makes it, but I bet you can find generic brands too. I use this to prevent blisters when I'm backpacking. If you start to get a hotspot (an area that is becoming tender from your whip rubbing your hand that will soon turn into a blister) cut a small square of the moleskin and place it over the affected spot on your hand. That will reduce the friction between the whip and your hand enough that you shouldn't get a blister, but your hands will still toughen up. If you already have a blister do the following. For the basic blister, cut a square of moleskin slightly larger than the blister. Now comes the tricky part, you must cut a hole the size of the blister in the square. One way to do this easier is to fold the square in half and cut along the fold, like making a paper snowflake. Pull the white covering from the adhesive side and place the moleskin over the blister with the blister in the hole. The adhesive usually doesn't hold very well, so you might want to add some athletic tape to help hold it in place. I would recommend not lancing the blister unless it is absolutely necessary as you will increase your chance of getting an infection. This is especially true if said blister is on you foot and you are in the backcountry, and the only waqy out is on your own two feet. With that said, if you do lance it I agree that you should definitely sterilize the needle by heating it and/or pouring rubbing alcohol over it. I would also recommend cleaning the blister with peroxide/rubbing alcohol and soap , and then lightly bandage it.

Good lord, Michaelson! You sound worse than me!

"Man! Don't you realize how dangerous that was? You could have been killed!"

"Yeah, well, you should have seen the fantastic shot I got! Sheer art!"

Sound familiar?

To reel things back into topic, (sorta, and I might have used this patetic excuse before when Michaelson and I go of on cameraman tangents,) you know, most of the really good camera guys I've met wear fedoras, or similar wide brimmed hats. Very utilitarian, (and much more stylish than a matte box, or a french flag,) If I have any luck, I'll be getting genune Moroccan dust on the ol' Akubra Fed this summer, shooting a documentary with my wife.

I must also point out that whip cracking has really improved my ability to uncoil XLR (microphone) cables quickly, (so I'm considering putting down my whip cracking hobby as "professional development" on my next faculty progress assessment.) I haven't figured out how to get them to crack yet. If a microphone cable breaks the speed of sound, what does the attached microphone pick up?

Paul,

I'm not sure about kerosene being in Fiebing's. All I know is that some of the stuff I've read about Australians making their own leather conditioner is that, besides the bees wax and sheep tallow, kerosene's one of the things that is often mentioned.

Don't think it's much though. Certainly not enough to make it seriously toxic or caustic. There's food-grade turpentine in Fresca soft drinks, for cryin' out loud! (And just what IS "food grade" turpentine, anyway?)

Also, don't forget from O-chem that plain ol' H2O is known as the "Universal Solvent."

-Dan

thefish wrote:Good lord, Michaelson! You sound worse than me!

"Man! Don't you realize how dangerous that was? You could have been killed!"

"Yeah, well, you should have seen the fantastic shot I got! Sheer art!"

Sound familiar?


-Dan

On more than ONE occasion, my friend. Ironically, I worked with an old photographer who once told me while we were working on top of a rigid mast crane 167 feet off the floor with no safety net, that if I felt myself losing my balance, be sure to toss someone the camera and deck before I fell. I could be replaced, but the gear was on inventory. He was serious too! High regards to a fellow professional!! Michaelson

I do not like the feeling of a blister, a popped blister, broken blister or the worst blister - the one where the skin is half torn and flapping all over the place. Just tear the dang thing off and be done with it. The cool air feels good on it and it heals faster. Leave it exposed if there is little risk of getting dirt in it - otherwise cover it up to keep it clean.

The same thing with canker sores. Bite 'em off and get rid of them. The initial pain is more intense, but once gone, you are not accidentally biting them while eating and such. Rinse with hydrogen peroxide and get on with your life.

Don't sugarcoat it, Rick. We can take it....what do you REALLY think we should do... Regards. Michaelson

That Rick5150 is a true tough guy! A bite-a-leather-strap-or-bullet-and-pour-whiskey-on-the-wound sort of gent.

That's fine for Indy fans but doesn't go over so big in the maternity ward.

After reading about Aron Ralston cutting his own arm off after being pinned beneath a rock, I have tried to stop being such a baby when I get a paper cut or a blister. It kind of put things into perspective for me when I go hiking. If you get a hangnail, rip the whole nail off. No ...wait. Cut the finger off. Yeah, that's it...

Aw, heck....go for the whole arm. You have two...... Regards. Michaelson

Snakewhip_Sable wrote:
That Rick5150 is a true tough guy! A bite-a-leather-strap-or-bullet-and-pour-whiskey-on-the-wound sort of gent.

I wouldn't waste the whisky.

Thanks for the advice Shanghai Jack! I asked my dad to get some molseskin from Longs Drugstore today!



My blister is a little better, because now I am able to pick up a pencil!
thanks for all the advice and stories guys!