Last week, I shared a few suggestions for making a good self-vid. None of it was rocket science — just a bunch of simple, common-sense tips I’ve picked up over a lifetime of avid viewership. What can I say? I take notes.

I was going to post the rest of my suggestions the following day, but then Liz Taylor died, and I wrote about it, which made all the sex talk slightly uncomfortable and awkward — even though, to the best of my knowledge, Liz was not an avid reader of this site, nor did she ever make a sex tape. More’s the pity.

But whatever. That’s behind us now, so for those of you still bound and determined to share your smutty side with complete strangers, here are the rest of my ideas — including my #1 super-serious most important rule of all time. Don’t say I never gave you anything.

P.S. Remember: Xtube embeds are iffy. If something’s not loading, click it to watch it in its original milieu.

P.P.S. Yes, mom, you can stop reading now.

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DO: SPARK IT UP WITH A LITTLE DIRTY TALK
Good sex is all about good communication, even if that communication comes in the form of grunts and safewords. That doesn’t mean that you have to give constant direction to your partner(s) — which can be a real turn-off, BTW — but laying there like a knot on a log doesn’t usually rev anyone’s gears either. Well, except maybe guys who like to roofie their dates, but I’m not talking to them.

IMHO, the best way to communicate in bed is with some deeply dirty sex talk. It provides the opportunity for you to put on a slightly different persona, which can help put shyer folks at ease, kind of like wearing a mask.

Sex talk can be very, very hot in videos, too — provided it’s audible and not too over the top. Gruntandpoke excels at the chatter:

http://cdn1.static.xtube.com/embed/scenes_player.swf?xv=1

DON’T: PLAY MUSIC SO LOUD THAT WE CAN’T HEAR THE AFOREMENTIONED SEX TALK (OR MOANING OR WHATEVER)
Have you ever been watching a porn film with a blaring techno track and thought, “This would be so much hotter if I could just hear the action”? Most of the time, that’s because certain directors — who shall remain nameless — are so busy coaching their actors (“Raise your leg! Lick his balls! Now suck your big toe and shove it in his ass!”) that the studio can’t use the ambient sound in the final cut, so they have to cover it up with music.

I fail to understand why that would be the case in a home movie, but it happens there, too. Tesseg, for example, is an attractive daddy with some major benefits, but the music is un peu trop, n’est-ce pas?

http://cdn1.static.xtube.com/embed/scenes_player.swf?xv=1

DO: THINK OF THE VIEWER WHEN YOU’RE ARRANGING THE SHOT
Keeping your camera at the right height and angle can make or break a self-vid. Midlands Man clearly had his viewers in mind when he set up this one:

http://cdn1.static.xtube.com/embed/scenes_player.swf?xv=2062

DON’T: FORGET WE NEED TO SEE THE ACTION
I like the camera angle in this clip, but because our horny friend is standing beneath a ceiling fan (which seems slightly distracting/disturbing), he’s backlit. And backlit means we can’t see his front side. And when it comes to sex, there’s a lot of neat stuff on the front side.

http://cdn1.static.xtube.com/embed/scenes_player.swf?xv=1

On the flip side: you might think that overexposure is the whole point of a self-vid, but you can have too much of a good thing:

http://cdn1.static.xtube.com/embed/scenes_player.swf?xv=1

And of course, beyond your camera angle and lighting, there’s another important factor to consider: which hand do you use to get off? For reasons that should seem obvious, try not making it the hand nearest the camera:

http://cdn1.static.xtube.com/embed/scenes_player.swf?xv=1

DO: HAVE FUN WITH IT AND OFFER SOMETHING DIFFERENT
Once you’ve perfected your audio and video issues, it’s time to focus on content. I’m all for straightforward j/o clips, but you earn brownie points (not a sexual allusion) for thinking outside the box (totally a sexual allusion). This clip may or may not be staged, but seriously, who cares?

http://cdn1.static.xtube.com/embed/scenes_player.swf?xv=1

Even if you can’t drag an alleged roommate into your self-vid, you can still have a good time on camera. The “buddy” talk in this one is maybe a little much, but he seems like the kind of guy you’d wanna grab a post-Manhunt mojito with.

http://cdn1.static.xtube.com/embed/scenes_player.swf?xv=1

DON’T: MAKE IT TOO DIFFERENT
Grainy video aside, I draw the line at any self-vid with “guillotine” in the title:

http://cdn1.static.xtube.com/embed/scenes_player.swf?xv=2062

DON’T: FORGET THAT THE INTERNET IS FOREVER
This, folks, is my #1 rule for self-vids. In fact, it’s my #1 rule for anything that might potentially be captured in video/audio/words/pictures and posted to a website.

Here’s the thing: over the past few decades, much of the Western world has become more tolerant of sexual behavior in public spaces. The sexual liberation movement of the 60s and 70s has been accelerated by the internet — especially by social networking sites, fueled by humankind’s need to overshare.

As a result, when Paris Hilton’s sex tape broke in 2003, it was kind of a big deal, but most “scandals” to come along since then have been met with a combination of yawns and “Yeah, great, could you pass the sugar?” By the time photos of Brett Favre’s nether region surfaced last year, most folks were more interested in the size and shape of his wang than in debating the (in)appropriateness of Favre sending said photos to an uninterested woman.

Now certainly, there are limits. If you find yourself working at a conservative company one day, your Xtube dalliances could have repercussions. And let’s not even broach the topic of lost inheritances from prudish aunts and uncles. In the eyes of some people, every self-vid is a bad self-vid.

But for a growing part of the population, those videos fall into a gray area. It’s the same gray area that homosexuality often falls into — the “I don’t care what they do in private” area — except that in the case of self-vids, the private has become “private”.

So, if you DO make a sex tape, and if your boyfriend/girlfriend/dungeon master DOES leak it to the web — as they invariably will — the biggest strikes against you will likely come from a poorly done video, or one with particularly raunchy content, or one that makes you look like a total douche.

For example, if there’s a clip of you floating around the internet that’s fairly well-lit, and you’re looking good, doing the nasty in a traditional way, that’s one thing — especially if you’re a guy (cf. Rob Lowe, Fred Durst).

If, however, that clip involves you hogtied in the woods behind a rest stop, gangbanged by a bunch of condom-phobic, morbidly obese truckers in gorilla costumes, that is another matter. Also not good: politicians having sex with mistresses or pious right-wingers caught masturbating for their boyfriends. And if you’re a rugby star who likes having his nads licked by dogs, well, you might need to leave town altogether.

Bottom line: if and when you choose to make a self-vid, by all means spend a little time planning it. It could mean the difference between life in the secretarial pool or a corner office in the sky. And if you need an objective third party to review your tape for quality and content, I’m always here for you.