For many of us, school is ending and summer is starting. And what do we do in the summer? Vacation? Haha, no. You get a summer assignment. =P This might be a bit of work for you guys... so I'm only gonna encourage you guys to do it, I'm not gonna force you guys to do it. But I know I'll be doing this for sure.
I dunno if I'll be doing any more of these "HoT HW Assignments," but we'll see how this one comes out. Then if I have another idea in the future and if this one turns out alright, maybe I'll give another one out.
Due Date: 6-22-09 You have 2 weeks to do this; I hope this is enough time. The Assignment I want each of you to take all of the other members of HoT and find some recent videos of their spinning, or as recent as you can possibly find. You can always ask for a quick FS if you want an update of their spinning. Then think about each spinner as a whole.
-What do they need to work on? Improve on? -What are they doing nicely as of right now? -How is their angle/lighting/background/mod? -What are some suggestions that you can make for him?
Then perhaps add in a simple breakdown of one of your combos (and attach the video) for everyone else to copy. This is just cause I want everyone to be exposed to different linkages because I know some of us use the same linkages over and over again *cough*mekakuridwan*cough*, and I'm emphasizing on the simple cause I realize that some of us tend to use a lottt of difficult tricks *cough*charliejamie*cough*. This is even more so optional than the analysis, but I think this would be neat to do too.
It doesn't have to exactly follow those questions exactly, but that's just to give you a general idea. How much should you write for each spinner? Well, as much as you want really. Just write as much as you have to say and as much as you feel is necessary. I'll probably write a few paragraphs for each spinner? Maybe? I'm not sure, we'll see what happens with that.
Write it as if you're talking to them directly. So, use "You need to..."
Once you're done, PM me your analysis of each spinner like this:
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Analysis here
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Analysis here
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Analysis here
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Analysis here
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Analysis here
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Analysis here
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Analysis here
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Analysis here
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Analysis here
And then on June 22nd, I'll take whatever I get, and send the suggestions and improvements to each spinner anonymously. So you can say whatever dirty things you want about their spinning, and only I'll know =] Haha. But really criticize them, I feel like this is necessary. (The breakdowns and combos, if you choose to include them, will be attached alphabetically to you in the PM, while the analysis will probably be given in chronological order (the time that I receive them))
I know that we do a lot of this already just from commenting on each individual video, so I guess if you don't have much to say cause you feel like there's really nothing left to say than "Practice," then so be it, just write a line or two. Better than nothing.
I want us to help each other improve, and lets take this chance to improve together. I know sometimes some of us takes occasional breaks from pen spinning and do other things, like me with my AP exams and Ridwan was pretty busy with school too. So, I'll wish you good luck with this assignment, and hopefully it'll be useful to at least some, if not all, of you at the end of these 2 weeks.
Then take those suggestions and knowledge and put it to use when making your UPSB 1st video, which I'm really expecting a lot of you to get into. I truly believe that many of you have that capability to, but we'll use this as polish up time.
Try to have fun with this, and help each other out. Good luck =] JC
Haha, once again, sorry for having to do this to you, but I really hope this is helpful so try to bear with me D: I'm open to suggestions and flame though ^^"
Aw, this sounds like a nice project. I'm glad you came up with the idea, JC! I'll work on it once I'm done with finals. Finals sure are stressing.
And are unique linkages allowed for a simple combo? They're not necessarily hard, just not normally done often or at all. I'm currently having fun doing midbak T3-23 and other such things. Although, if you haven't done it before, it would take time to learn but it would mean expanding linkages -- so that's a good thing.
@Baaron, not really, you can do that and keep it for yourself if you want xD @Charlie, sure, unique linkages are fine, but some unique linkages are harder than others, haha, but i'm sure we'll have a tough time doing any of your combos anyway, so just keep it simply by your standards and we'll attempt it But good luck with your finals
And I got one already GGGGGGG, you know who you are... don't say you did it keep it a secret, haha =P
I wanna make sure that everyone is NOT onlyyyy looking at a spinner's latest clip. But simply using that as a more accurate measurement of where they stand now. Many flaws, as well as good things, can be seen in previous videos as well. Point them out as flaws in that spinner as a whole and remember to find things for them to do to improve on specifically... Specifics are important here. If you liked the angle/lighting that a person used in a previous video more than their recent video, then say, i liked this angle/lighting more than your more recent stuff.. Blahblahblah...
>< I just feel like you guys might just look at a single clip by a person, and comment simply on only that one clip. =\ That's not what I'm hoping to achieve from this. You can get that from the comments that you get everytime someone posts up a new vid. This is more general, yet at the same time, poking at specifics.
are you kidding me John? I have enough on me without even filming. Sorry i'm gonna have to refuse this assignment I already have two others for school that have been yet to be completed. But i'll try getting 2 or 3 simple videos for everyone else cause we al know how i dont release....ever.
are you kidding me John? I have enough on me without even filming. Sorry i'm gonna have to refuse this assignment I already have two others for school that have been yet to be completed. But i'll try getting 2 or 3 simple videos for everyone else cause we al know how i dont release....ever.
well, i know you're busy traveling, so dont' worry, you don't have to do it... -.-'' and i know xero will most likely not do this either..
but if we can get like even 5/10 sets of opinions/suggestions per spinner, that'd be fine =P
I'll be PMing the comments to each respective spinners after you send me your assignments, but I just wanted to post my own here to give you guys an example of what I wanted. You can do less than this, or more than this. I don't really care; submitting anything would be good enough, haha.
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Your spinning has gone through much improvement during these past few months. Your older spinning looks much more hesitant. For example, like here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6H7VilGOJ_Q (1:54, 2:14, 2:17-2:23) and a couple times here: http://www.upsb.info/forum/index.php?autoc...ils&id=1982 But your more recent spinning has gotten to look much more confident, and powerful I guess. I like your interesting linkages, but I think you’re starting to spam the stylistic TF charge rev a bit too much. It’s not too noticeable though; I didn’t realize how much you used that until I watched like a dozen of your videos just now. Your tipped sonics from back then, and even now, look like they need a bit of work though. You need more wiggle in each one.
Your angle and lighting looks good; it seems like you know what you’re doing there so I won’t comment much on this. This is under control. Overall, you’re developing really nicely as a spinner, and much of the issues that I’ve had with your spinning such as finger control you’ve already fixed on your own. You’re a very stylistic spinner, and I like that, keep it up. =]
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You’re such a good spinner!! But, to be honest, your fingers aren’t too attractive. =\ But that’s alright, that’s just my own personal opinion since at the same time, there are many of other spinners who think that it’s cool and then there are also a few other spinners who have similar fingers to you. I know there was one Japanese spinner I think who has pretty unique fingers too as well as shonenbatman, his fingers are pretty similar to yours at times. Nevertheless though, I think you have very unique and distinguishable fingers which helps you stand out in the ps world if your crazy difficult tricks don’t. But your insanely high difficulty will definitely get you places.
Considering how long you’ve been spinning, your difficulty is insane already, so just work on smoothness, style, appearance, presentation, and those other aspects. But I don’t think that’s necessary for me to say since I’m sure you already know all that, haha. I don’t know if you can control it or not, but could you try to bend your fingers inwards and spinning like that? =\ Sorry, I don’t mean to take you out of yo ur natural finger position, and force you to conform like the other spinners, but just give it a shot ^^� I feel bad that your spinning is so great, but yet underappreciated by many cause of the first impression given to an untrained eye. But you can be sure that people recognize you as a great spinner having been accepted into the WT =)
Oh, and desk angles > floor angles. Your lighting’s fine.
I also kinda want to see you do a more simple combo.. just to see how it’ll look, haha. Like, could you try and copy one of mhig’s combos? Or even colt? Just a simple twisted sonic variation combo, I’m just curious to see how those look with you. You didn’t start posting videos until you were already pro D:
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First off, you need to just deal with spinning a heavier pen. I hate the Buster CYL but I used it for a bit to try and bring up my learning curve, and I think you really need to do the same. You’re doing fine with using an MX, but no offense, but I think you need to move out of the past. You’re trying to stick with the whole old Korean spinning with purely MXs, but I want you to improve as well…. And it seems as if you’ve hit a big wall. I forget whether or not you have a Key3 mod or not, but try that out. Ridwan tried that out and did some stuff that impressed me =]
Secondly, I realize you can’t fix this at the moment since you’re in Korea, but you gotta fix your angle when you get back home. You need to zoom in a lottttt. Zoom in to like baaron’s angle or something like that (try that out first), and then try zooming out a little if that’s too zoomed in for you. Your lighting’s too dark too, so lighten up that room of yours when you’re spinning.
As for your spinning, like I said before, you’ve hit a wall. Not only do you need to learn some new linkages, you gotta maybe try out some new tricks too. And when I watch your spinning, I get a nervous feeling from it most of the time. I think you’d be better off with having a more relaxed spinning (as opposed to confident and powerful). I don’t know if you’re actually nervous or not when you’re spinning, but that’s the impression that I get from it.
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First off, this is the most recent video that I’ve seen from you I think, and I must say that I was rather impressed =] http://www.upsb.info/forum/index.php?autoc...ils&id=1946 Stick with your key3 spinning, it’s good. Like I said to Mark, MX spinning eventually brought him to a wall, and it brought you to a wall for awhile too, but you’ve started to break past it with this. The thing with you though is that you use the same mini-combos over and over again (kinda like me, haha). Your spinning’s really relaxed too btw, well, for the most part, except for when you stress a bit during stuff like your 1p2h spinning (such as in Nascent). Anyway, back to your mini combos. You use the hand twisting combo noticeably here: http://www.upsb.info/forum/index.php?autoc...ils&id=1391 (00:03, 00:06)
I think you use a good deal of baks and sonics and tipped sonics, so overall, I think you include a wide enough variety of tricks…sort of. Try adding some infinities (not just t12) by watching some ippei vids and copying some of those (I gotta do that myself sometime soon), and try adding in some aerials. Bakriser > Thumbindex spin reverse 1.0 haha, but I’m biased with that, cause I just love that trick. I remember you were the one who I think showed it to me and tried to teach me it at one point or another =P
Your desk angle here: http://www.upsb.info/forum/index.php?autoc...ils&id=1391 is good, but your lighting is annoying. There’s like that glare that’s just….there. Try to fix that plox =] Then your angle and lighting will be perfect. And your quality is insane here: http://www.upsb.info/forum/index.php?autoc...ils&id=1946 Can you possibly get that in the same position that your webcam normally is D:? That would make your vids so much better. Then again, that angle isn’t that bad either actually, just center yourself and zoom in a bit. (By angle, I mean, the whole sitting on floor angle).
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You’ve greatly impressed me with your high level of difficulty like Charlie’s, such as your power pass 34-34, your bakfall 2.5, your copies, and your spreads. But I think we all know what your problem is: your stupid angle and ghostly camera D: Try out my angle, or something… I’ve noticed your arm kinda moves around a lot in some of your vids such as here: http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?yzoyyjt1eot (00:06). You should maybe try working on controlling that movement, cause although it’s smooth, I think it’s too drastic and shows incomplete control of the pen. I really liked 00:09-00:10 in that video though; that part was really smooth. Your linkage and hybrids are really interesting too =]
So, I mean, I don’t have much to say for you. Your spinning’s great. Your style’s interesting, not my fav I guess ^^â€, but it’s certainly interesting and I love all the difficult tricks that you manage to pull off. Just fix that darn angle and cam D:
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It’s weird. Your spinning consists of outbursts of fairly high difficulty (at least imo) and then other parts are such spam and the same old mini combos that I’ve seen for so long from you. From seeing you spin, it seems like you have one or two things that you wanna use in a combo and then spam the rest of it. I mean, I do the same thing too sometimes (like I almost always use sonic clip rev 23-24 ~> pass rev 24-12 > twisted sonic rev 12-23 > pass rev 23-34 > ringaround 34-34 > sonic 34-23 > twisted sonic 23-12 ) but hehe, I gotta fix that problem too. So instead of putting Easy trick > Easy trick > Hard finisher (haha, like spinnerpeem? xD)… Try Intermediate tricks > Intermediate tricks > Intermediate Finisher.
I think it was Charlie who had mentioned that your spinning looks like coco_a’s spinning, and I mean, I guess I see some similarity especially between your hands. But you gotta up your speed a bit to look more like his. And maybe that’s a good idea… to up your speed. And maybe try copying a coco_A combo, although your style with his, imo, differs a bit o.0
There was this one video that you asked me if the lighting and angle were good for the last 2 clips… keep that one. Or use that lighting with this angle: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yvzwjqvH9Q I actually really like that angle, but Mark had mentioned at one point or another that he liked your usual angle -.-‘’ Eh, I still like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yvzwjqvH9Q a lot =] Goals for you: Vary up your combos by sitting down and coming up with brand new mini combos (watch other videos and read breakdowns to get inspiration) and speed up your spinning a little bit?
Your fingers need a little bit of work too, but I suppose they’re looking better =] I had some issues with both your fingers and Baaron's fingers I think a little while back, and unfortunately for you =\ I think only Baaron’s made some major steps in fixing that problem.
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Mehh, sorry, I don’t have much for you =\ I’ve mentioned this already, but avoid s777 style… I just personally don’t like it. If you want to go for it, that’s fine, it’s just my own taste that dislikes it. Pyralux is cool, it’s nice that you incorporate parts of his style into your own while not completely adopting all of his spinning. The thing about s777 is that I feel like it lookss like he strains his fingers too much while spinning by stretching them as far as possible to get the most flexibility? Flexibility’s important, but I like it better when you relax your fingers and spin over spinning it like s777. (Again, I’m not saying that s777 strains his fingers cause I’m sure he’s comfortable with how he spins… it just looks like he strains his fingers by how far he stretches them and stuff)
You’re such a great spinner, and I knowww it’s not your fault, but your mom causes so many problems with your cam and trading D:!! Bleh =\
You have so much flare in your spinning, it really stands out and is really nice =) Good job, and keep it up!!
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Your spinning’s really smooth, has a decent level of difficulty, and overall, you’re just a really good spinner. But unfortunately, not a great spinner yet =( I was at Boston College’s orientation the other day and they were telling us a story of a comedian in some movie. It was about how the comedian was basically the best comedian in the world, but even then, he wasn’t great. He was only a really good comedian and better than everyone else. So he decided to never reuse a joke and come up with all new stuff. At first, he only managed to be able to make 8 min of his show funny with purely new material, but then it became 13 min, and then 22 min, and then 40 min, and then finally an hour of funny material that was all brand new. At that point, he became great.
So this applies to you too… but I’m pretty sure you realize that already. Your combos are beginning to look the same and uses the same mini combos over and over again. You need to use more shadows/shadow reverses. Perhaps trying out some inverse shadows too? And more bak variations? Your spinning looks very Arounds based at the moment.
Your lighting’s good, but your angle has some issues. You go out of cam every now and then and leave quite a bit of space for your right hand even when you’re not using it. Try getting a slightly more frontal view of your hand for an angle. Not a full frontal view though. Just shift your current one slightlyyyyy so that it faces more of the front of your hand. But stayyy in the middle of the cam D: It frustrates me all the time when you get out of cam.
You’re still a reallyyy good spinner though, and I love your style =]!!
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Hmm… You don’t have too many issues that I can really point out =\ I think you need a stable angle though, but that’s gonna be tough with camera placement and moving into college -.-‘’ Your spinning’s fine, but like many other people including myself, it needs a bit more variation. This pretty much goes out to almost everyone on the team, especially myself haha, but I see the same tipped sonics in the same slots and the same palm down charge rev 23 motion and inverse sonic 12-13 > pass 13-34 a lot. It might be my imagination, but I think you strain your shadows a bit quite often too. Like here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJflr7ENTNI...re=channel_page I’m too lazy to find other examples of it if any exists, but I feel like it does, I can’t remember for sure though. Don’t quote me on that, haha. Try using more tricks that have a bit more spin on them. Like midbak 1.5 (not suggesting midbak 1.5 x2, just midbak 1.5 x1 … x2 would be great, but x1 would also be nice to see =)) or palm spin 1.5/2.0s in the middle of a combo.
If you've known it, then why don't you try to fix it D: (like that anglee!!) And what did I incorrectly assume =\? that you're nervous while spinning? i said that i'm nto sure if you're if you're actuallyyy nervous, but from the audience's point of view, or at least mine, it looksss like you're nervous even when i know i'm sure you may not be nervous at all
as for the pen...it doesn't even have to be a pen.... xero cut out a piece of an arrow when i just started learning to spin you could just take a 25 cm, fairly thin, heavy tube of something and practice with that yes, it's a stick, but you're using it to practice and not for videos =\
Eh... this is why I was gonna just anonymously send it to each other and only post my own =\ so if i get flame, i hope it's just gonna be limited to only flaming me
GGGGGGG, you know who you are... don't say you did it 
keep it a secret, haha =P
Eh, do your best then =\ it's not a big deal...
I already have two others for school that have been yet to be completed. But i'll try getting 2 or 3 simple videos for everyone else cause we al know how i dont release....ever.