It stretches the skin. It does this when it's told.

Antique Hoosier said:

I am soon to start up my own youtube channel where daily shaves, auctions, and antique shop stalking will be chronicled. Coming soon!

Click to expand...

Really? Must see youtube tv!

I learned a lot when I went to a barber for a proper shave. The skin stretching is very gentle, so the skin still has some give. It isn't drum head tight, but rather it just isn't slack.

Once you get in the habit of doing it, it feels so natural that you will use the same technique of skin stretching with a DE razor shave too.

I'm with you, also guilty of not stretching my skin. I have tried it a few times and it just feels awkward. Guess it's time to start practicing so that it becomes second nature.

Brianskeet said:

I always stretch, but on many parts of my face I don't need the other hand to accomplish this. I can use "shaving faces" to pull the skin tight. If you move those face muscles you will be surprised at how effective you can be and the goofy faces are fun.

Click to expand...

+1. As Geo Fatboy said, we're (most of us) not on camera when shaving, so free to making whatever awkward face best stretches the skin, "puffing" the cheeks up with some air, pushing with the tongue, etc. I've found using such technique to be less (visually) obstructive than using my other hand, so never really gave it a fair chance. I posed the question however because I'm open to the possibility that using the other hand might still result in an even closer shave... important since I skip the ATG pass.

Sando said:

Really? Must see youtube tv!

Click to expand...

As will I. While watching one of many shaving videos online a while back, I decided to glance through the comments during a re-lathering part or something. I saw a comment that made me laugh. Something to the effect of "so I'm watching this video when suddenly I think, 'I'm watching a man shave on the internet... my god, what am I doing with my life?'"

Hilarious, but many of our fathers used cartridges... gotta learn somewhere! Which reminds me, I've almost got my father to the point of converting. Probably to a DE, but we all know how that can go on the Straight Razor forums!

Well, it's hard to put solid numbers on things in this discipline, but I'm pretty sure my shave this morning was about 15% closer using my other hand to do some stretching on top of my usual facial/muscle contortions. Thanks again for the feedback, gents.