Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Focused Examination: Intimate Choreography with Small-sized Characters

One of the next most commonly used positions in intimate choreography is Cowgirl. Cowgirl is a favourite in a lot of intimate choreography, though mostly commonly in those scenes written for a female-favouring viewer audience. It's a fairly flexible pose in terms of conveyance, but it focuses almost exclusively on the receiver, who is on top. It's a pose that is often ind anger of reducing the giving partner to an almost non-participating role, which is something that should generally be avoided by conscientious writers/choreographers.



Cowgirl works well for slow, romantic scenes where shots can pan across body contours and shapes that are easily visible, and it's also an innately face-to-face pose that allows for eye contact, hand-holding and most forms of close intimacy. A fully upright cowgirl is particularly favoured in a lot of intimate scenes because it easily allows the showing off of the more 'socially acceptable' nudity, while still making it easy to disguise the more overt points of the actual sexual penetration – or not if that's what's desired. For more passionate scenes, the pose is good for conveying rhythm and momentum in ways that are highly visible, yet still largely tasteful. Where the pose begins to struggle is in particularly overtly sexual scene where efforts to convey raw physical sexuality can easily become crude-seeming or tactlessly pornographic. This is a particular problem as you increase the pace of the scene – it struggles to maintain a fast, impact pace without becoming ungainly or crude – something which doggy-style, by its own basic nature, can actually achieve quite well, in contrast.

If the top partner lies forward somewhat, the pose allows for kissing, back stroking and rubbing, and other closer contact forms of intimacy that compliment a slow or gentle scene pace, and this is best saved specifically for deliberately slower, more romantically inclined shooting, as it obscures the majority of the 'action' from the viewing camera, no mater what angle you shoot from.

In most cases, the giving partner's ability to contribute to the scene is fairly limited – they can't really move very much, at least not in a way that impacts the scene visibly, and in most cases, they won't be able to initiate many intimacies, such as kissing, without their partner doing most of the work; they cannot, for example, sit up without necessarily the pose into a lotus style position (which we'll look at later). They can use their hands, to hold hands, to touch their partner's front (upper or lower zones, depending on tone of the scene), or face and neck if the top partner obliges them. If they want to contribute to the rhythm of the intimacy itself, they'll generally need to put hands on their partner's hips or behind, if they can reach.

When we substitute in a smaller-sized receiver to this pose, we hit the same problem that we've encountered elsewhere – namely that the hip width across a larger giving partner makes the pose potentially difficult or uncomfortable for the smaller partner to straddle properly, in most situations. So what are our options?



Tara, stop that! We're not looking at “unexpected opportunities with smaller partners” until later...

With a smaller receiver on top, there isn't much that the giver can do to change the pose in any helpful way – the adaptations must largely be made on the smaller partner's side of the equation here. You have a couple of main options. The most direct adaptation is to shift the top partner's stance from attempting to kneel on the ground, to simply standing on it, astride their partner.



This adjustment works by giving the receiver a solid centre of balance, as long as they remain upright, and saves them from having to stretch their thighs into what would otherwise be an uncomfortably wide force. It preserves all of the other elements of the pose that might come across from original choreography with same-sized partners, and it's a simple solution. It is, however.... inelegant. It looks and feels unclassy, and even if the scene is focused on intimate or romantic elements, attention will still be drawn inevitably to the raw mechanics of the pose, which may be an important consideration.

In this position, the other main difference is that, while the receiver's balance is solid and they will still more or less be the one required to be in control for setting rhythm and pace, they end up more or less sitting down on their partner – so where in the original same-sized pose, most of the motion would come from the hips, and the top partner could easily control depth of penetration... here, the motion will actually need to come from the knees instead, and the top partner's depth control is somewhat arrested (short of actively dismounting); these are factors that must be accounted for if the you choose to adjust the pose in this manner.

Using one hand for support, behind, on the bottom partner's leg, can help alleviate the latter problem, visually, as it gives the smaller partner an extra point of support and weight distribution. It can also shift the movement source at least partially back towards the hips, but the arm in question needs to be assisting there, and should look like it's taking weight and aiding motion.

The bottom partner will generally have all of the same capabilities they have in the original pose, here, but may have better access overall; reaching the face and neck for tender touches will be easier with a smaller receiver, and so these may become appealing choices to replace other actions in the adjusted pose if necessary. On the flip side, depending on the tone, the giving partner is in a much stronger position here to control the depth of the love-making, and can, in a more convincing manner than before, attempt to control the rhythm of the scene by using their hands at their partner's hips.

Another option for adjusting the scene – if you want to keep the receiver in a safer and more controlled pose, and keep the source of rhythm and movement predominately at the hips, is to adjust the top partner so that they are still kneeling, but not touching the ground. Here, their weight in on their partner's thighs and hips, with their feet on the inside of the larger partner's legs, to counterbalance in a stable way.



If you adjust the position this way, the top partner's centre of balance is more inclined to lean forward, rather than back, and they are able to control both the rhythm and the depth of their love-making through their hips and thighs. In this version of the pose, the top partner must be leading the rhythm, if anyone is – the giving partner cannot meaningfully do so, due to the position of their smaller partner's legs giving them much more power to easily counter anything the giver does, if they wish to, despite their smaller size. Bear this in mind when choreographing where motion comes from and who controls the rhythm and pace.

When adjusting to this pose, it will also be necessary for the giving partner to stretch their legs out straighter and flatter than the original pose may have used, but other than that there are few direct alterations that the bottom partner needs to make. If, in the original pose choreography, the top partner was depicted leaning backwards, to put weight on their hands behind them (this is a common shift as it further shows off the (most commonly female) upper body to a watching camera), it should be noted that that move is not practical or even really feasible for a smaller character using this adjustment, and a motion like that may need to be replaced. A suitable substitute might be to have the smaller partner simply arch upwards and stretch their hands above their head, inviting the giver to touch them in this manner instead – they could also use their hands to touch themselves like this, however, in almost every case, if you have the option of picking between choreography that invites one partner to touch the other, and choreography that is just one participant touching themselves, the former is what you should pick – shared contact is the far better choice.

Since the inclination for the smaller partner will be to lean forward, supporting themselves thought hand contact with their partner is an ideal way to give weight and balance to the pose while also communicating intimacy, else-wise, both partners' options for communication and contact are about the same as the original pose.

Both of these adjustments run the risk of looking a bit awkward if not shot carefully, but for a smaller receiver in particular, the pose works very well if you adjust it to let them lean forward more completely, into more pronounced closeness with their partner. By leaning forward, they are able to put their feet comfortable on the ground without stretching too badly, but can avoid any sensation of ungainly awkwardness. The bottom partner, in this situation, would offer best compliment to the adjustment by shifting their legs to be closer together and slightly raised, with the feet flat to the ground.



If making this adjustment, the top partner's actual hip position will likely shift forward slightly, and this should be accounted for. An extension of this will mean that kissing becomes feasible again, if desired for the scene, which is another positive. Like this, both partners can contribute comfortably to the rhythm and pace of the actual love-making – motion comes from the hips and thighs for the top partner, pressing back against firmly planted feet, along with the ability to rest their weight on their partner's chest for extra stability. They can use their hands to add to this motion and emphasise it by gripping their partner's shoulders, or they can easily keep their hands free to express other forms of closeness – hand-holding, face touching, etc., are all comfortable and feasible here, if needed for the scene.

For the larger partner, they can participate in the movement and rhythm in this position by using their hands to guide their partner's hips or grabbing their bum, depending on the emotion you want to convey – if you put more weight into an arm movement like this, you can show the bottom partner guiding or leading the rhythm, or show it being left to the top partner if the arm is loose or gentle. By having their feet more planted and their knees closer together and raised slightly, the bottom partner is also able to realistically contribute a bit more hip motion – the motion necessarily becomes closer to horizontal here, rather than directly upward, and will push their smaller partner towards them, rather than away – something that must be noted and borne in mind when adapting the choreography.

In this pose, the larger partner may be best assisted for comfort and flexibility, to have something to support their neck and shoulders a little – they can lie flat and lift their head as needed but the pose will look far better and feel more natural if they have something – the most obvious and simple option being the pillow-end of a bedroll – to support them. As before, their hands have the full range of freedom to express any type of emotion or physical intimacy desired with their partner – though with the smaller partner lying close, shots that show holding or stroking the back become more appealing than before.

As an added bonus, also manage to avoid having the pose look awkward or ungainly, like this – it's easy to shoot from a variety of angles without looking crude or unclassy.

So, what about having a smaller-sized giver for cowgirl poses? Well, that's more challenging. It actually becomes quite hard to convey romantic or intimate scenes with a smaller bottom partner in this pose. A direct transposition will definitely not do.



If we were to just translate directly, well, no-one is going to have any fun at all. There's no comfortable means of penetration here – and there's not much the smaller-sized partner can do about it. To maintain a cowgirl position, the top partner would need to lower their hips dramatically, and then they'd need to be in a potion where they could comfortably maintain rhythmic motion. This is a difficult position to make look good with a smaller bottom partner.

So what can we do? There aren't a lot of options for the smaller partner – any method we might use to make the actual penetration work will only make it more difficult or awkward for both parties. Instead, we would need to focus on the receiving partner. In this case, we need to find a way to comfortably lower the groin and still allow for comfortable movement. Simply widening the knees won't really work on its own – the stretch would be too dramatic to work without looking ridiculous. The top partner cannot achieve anything leaning forward, either.

If we adjust the pose to have the top partner lean back, it becomes feasible, but they will need to lean back substantially in order to achieve a position where they are both stable, and no longer an ungodly thigh stretch – though it will still be very broad even then, and pretty murderous on the knees as well. Feasible, yes, but not good.

In order to make the pose easier and more comfortable for the top partner, we need to bring the knees forward, and closer in to the bottom partner, while letting the feet spread out a little further, to take the pressure off the knees; they will still, as with all of these poses, have to rest a decent portion of their weight on their hands, for support and balance, but now the pose can actually be workably comfortable.



With these adjustments, the pose now works, and looks decently good from a number of shots. The top partner will need to be placing a decent amount of their weight on their hands for support, so the arms should look like they are taking weight. They will also be necessarily contributing to the movement rhythm of the scene – motion will come from the top partner almost exclusively, who will be relying on their arms for a good portion of it; pushing forward and up with the arms is what helps press the groin down against their partner and emphasise whatever motions they make with their hips.

What this means for the tone and atmosphere of the scene however, is that our options are fairly limited in what we can convey well. Believe it or not, you won't be making eye contact from this pose – the need for the larger partner to lean back and the scale of the smaller partner functionally blocks them from looking each other in the eye in this position. Add to that the fact that the larger partner, usually the one more free to express with their hands, cannot use their arms at all like this. The smaller partner has a very limited reach with their hands as well, and while they have some options, the net result is that close intimacy and romantic overtones are virtually impossible to capture well like this. If the original scene was romantically charged, with kisses and other forms of close contact, then it is almost certainly a better choice to pick a different pose entirely, when making an adaptation for a smaller giving partner.

Raw passion, and overtly sexual cinematography don't suffer quite as much. The top partner necessarily sets the rhythm and pace, but they are quite capable of doing so to whatever degree the scene demands, and having their hands precluded means that the most obvious and overt motion in the scene will be coming directly from the sexual action itself, undisguised by anything else – there's almost nothing else to focus on, here, so it works well for depicting raw bodily need and physicality. If you're using a frontal shot of any sort to show this off (as would be common in this instance, since it lets you show clear view of the (most commonly female) top partner's chest as well), but don't want to show the actual sexual anatomy, then having the giving partner offer a helping hand during the shot can coincidentally hide what you need to, without seeming to actually obscure anything. I wish I had more to say about this pose type, but the truth is that it becomes quite restricted in its utility, with a smaller giving partner.

One more commonly used position that's 'stand alone' before we start getting some more props involved. Spooning positions are, most commonly, used in scenes with a slower and often more tender pace, and don't lend themselves well to fast or overt sexual choreography unless you adapt them to the more traditionally pornographic variants.