Videos for suggestions and comments

[Swizzle]

If you have a Camera and need help with a trick; make a video and post it here. I mean, what better than to see someone do something and to be able to watch it over and over to try and help?

filming the same thing from different angles (front and side) helps giving tips.

Please give helpful feedback, not criticism. Ex;
I do this,
Try this,
I like this,
I heard about this,
Just practice.

not.

Try harder nub. (lmao hopefully that would never happen)

[Swizzle]

Just some basics
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMdhwMKIrH8
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Uptimes
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcxlNa1z3X0[/youtube]

[jay7]

For all of your clipper moves: Take a quick look at any video of Vasek, Dave, Jim etc, bring up your favourite. I ask you to pay special attention to their support feet, during clipper moves. You'll notice, the majority of the time they land on their toes, and perhaps their heel hits the ground, but their center of gravity is such that most of their weight is actually on their toes.

So, starting with your clipper, look at your support foot in both the videos you showed. You'll see that you often "rock" back onto your heels, and sometimes your toe simply is off the ground, at the end of the trick. I believe that if you concentrate on keeping your weight on your toes, you will have much better balance throughout ALL of your clipper tricks. This applies to toe tricks as well, but you seemed to bounce on the balls of your feet much more with those tricks. Still, on the pixie set video I noticed your toe following upward after attempts quite a few times.

For Pixie: You should push your foot upwards a little longer, and start turning your foot in whatever way you want to dex it later. The bag should be off your foot (even if just an eighth of an inch) before you being turning your foot. The upsides to this are: Bag will always go straight upwards, and it wont spin off your toe boxes before of it.

[WyrmFyre]

Gotta say, it was really strange watching your vids as you seem to be coming up against similar roadblocks that Ive been meeting Hopefully I dont give you bad advice here....

With ducking, I often found Id be neck stalling or hitting my shoulder as you do. Wether this advice works for you or not i dont know, but I always try a little hop forward when going into clipper and a little hop back when setting from it. When I was trying ducking though, Id hop into the clipper, set, then duck, then hit my shoulder/neck stall.

By making sure that I do that small hop back out of a clipper into a "reset" stance (watch the Clavens clipper vid if you dont know what I mean) then duck, then move into the opposite clipper with a small jump forward again, i find myself being able to at least foot these, if not totally seal them everytime.

Drifter, again, your the same as me. The dex looks good, seems to start nice and quickly but you always end up that one or two inches short of actually landing it. Hopefully thats just going to be down to practice

[Swizzle]

0.o, wow i completly see that i was on my heels and falling off balence now.. thats awesome... thanks alot

the pixie, i probably need to slow it down and practice it very slowly, i think i know the idea, however, it is difficult to put into play for me

___________________________

wyrmfyre, i was thinking of that hop back idea was gonna be great, but then i realized i would have to hop foward, and then when i imagined it in my head, i see how it works, sick

k thats funny that drifter i need to practice, i could swore i was doing something wrong, i saw anz tricks tutorial for it and was like i get the idea, and still couldnt do it (trying to keep the non-dexing leg straight)
Ill practice without the bag, that will get me comforatable doing that.. =P

unfortunatly i gotta do homework right now ill try them later today, they sound like they're gonna work, thanks a lot!

[Anz]

This is a good thread idea. You should add that filming the same thing from different angles (front and side) helps giving tips.

You did Pixie into Toe Stall. I recommend practicing it into your strongest downtime component right from the beginning, that way you learn the correct footwork, and don't have to learn planting and dexing seperately.

[Swizzle]

Great idea Anz, thanks, and the pixie to strongest downtime is a beautiful idea..

[mc]

yo man, something I learned a few years ago...

when rounding out the footbag in your hand before you hand toss it, make sure the motion doesn't look "jerk-offy". Watch your pixie vid again and you'll see what I mean.

I know it sounds stupid, but to a non-footbagger, it might be the only thing they notice about what you're doing. At least that was the case for me, once for sure, and probably a bunch of other times. This is definitely not the kind of thing you want to do when giving a demo or a school performance - I'm sure I've done that a bunch of times, now that I give it a thought.

Watch vasek when he rounds out a footbag in his hand. He always does it off to the side of his hip, not in front of his pelvis.

I know this isn't the kind of advice you were looking for, but, when you think about it from a performance / demo / personal embarrassment point of view, it's pretty important.

[Swizzle]

Lol!!!!!! i seriously don't know what to say to that other than well at least now i know already.. lmfao!!!

That note right there should be a sticky on the getting started section..
thanks matt.

[Dave Soderberg]

good thing I've never performed in front of a bunch of people cause I'm sure I've done it. Normally I just play in front of a bunch of drunk people at parties who couldn't care less what my hands are doing. Drunk people love watching footbag for the first time.

[akalazou]

cool idea of topic, thx

Listen to Jay, ( this is my first advise )

for ALL THE MOVES YOU WILL EVER DO !!!, SET STRAIGHT !!! thats very important !! your body has to move around the bag.3

ill give some tips as im watching the vid ...

FIRST VID

ok, for the swirl, you dont have any room to dex the bag ... your clipper is really on the side of you, try to get it more behind you.

your mom is awesome!

for the drifter, just dex faster and try to be on balance on your clipper ( you know the technical tips for the clipper right ? there are at least 6 things you must do to have a great clipper) and think about it as miraging far clipper, that might help you

for the ducking clipper, you set the bag, duck it but you dont stop it !! try to spot it as fast as the dex is passed, youll have more time to make the clipper since youll know where it will be. once again, set straight, dont throw it on the other side of your body !

for the osis, if you scoop it, it will look ugly, but if you just try to make a clipper behind your back

SECOND VID

pixie ... try to dex in front of the bag, not above the bag

fairy, i cant do them so ill shut my mouth this time

atomic set, your dex is WAY too big !!! remember that you are not dexing a basketball ball, just lift the leg then turn it inward, there is no need to open the hips, the bag must be under you at the beginning. plant the dexing leg as fast as you can and under you

and what i saw is that you try the set, but not the downtime part ...(like Anz said) because on the stepping set, you could have done ripwalk alot of times

thats it for me take whatever you want/need, its just my opinion

have fun

[Swizzle]

thanks for the in-depth response julien;
yeah my clipper need work still.. i can't get into the habit of staying balenced on my toes, although i get the idea. and holding it behind me for a swirl.. thats tough.. Lol.. I did figure out recently that keeping that bag as close to your body as you can helps EVERYTHING ALOT... seriously uptime,downtime anything..

really though.. set it straight? on everything? PDX whirl? i would like that if that is true.

i have pretty much figured out pixie, although sometimes i want to dex it way to early and end up throwing it, or sometimes i dex late and kick it with my heel.. but i like that idea in front not over.. i gotta try that. it was crazy, i tried to pixie as high i as i could and the first try i threw up to my chin.. froze.. caught it in my hand.. and stood there like WTF JUST HAPPNED.. lol

Fairy is somewhat hard lol, i can get it about waste high, (just like stepping in the video)

atomic set sucks.. set straight up, let it go under your knee.. x.x too hard =(

thanks again.. ^.^

[akalazou]

pdx whirl: set straight around tie height (spelling ??? ) turn your hips 180 degrees, dex

[Swizzle]

Awesome.. i thought that was was easier, but i thought it wasnt.. legit? or something you get the idea..

[akalazou]

its just a style matters ... if you turn your hips, its gonna be alot easier to dex the bag (like a normal whirl) but if you throw the bag on the other side of you, youll have to create more room to dex it since the bag doesnt make a straight line

you can do it both ways, but its easier to turn your hips

[Reid]

Clippers
your game does not look bad. Clippers, you can do both sides and pretty consistently which is awesome. Only thing I have to say about that is you lacked a good pivot hop for most of them. In the beginning you were doing more of a shuffle than a two hop pivot forward and back. Watch some videos, the best one is ticks of the trade one, Shults actually makes a comment about doing your clippers the right way.

swirls

For normal swirl try to focus on setting the bag first just a little bit before you attempt to go around it. I'd rather see you not getting around the bag all the way than getting used to sloppy sets. Also maybe try giving a tiny lift onto your toe with your support leg. Watch some early vasek videos up until the champions league. On ripstien he does this twice on both time when he is coming over the top of the bag. On footbag.org Ales does ripstien and he only does one lift, but it is the same thing.

For reverse swirl just keep schooling it. Swirl in general is a move that just takes going for it a bunch. Make sure to have a good knee high set for both swirls. Too hight you wont get around it, too low you'll be scraping pavement and wearing out lavers(Happens to us all).

Drifter

set lower. This is where the clipper pivot comes in as well to establish good balance. Anyways, As you do the drifter motion over the bag with one foot the other foot is going to hop and your going to turn into the side doing the clipper motion just a bit to bring your foot under the bag. Be careful, I suggest getting really good at double legovers and stepping opposite clipper before you work on this move.

osis

Go for it! You need to develop a little crank to do this well and the only way to do that is by going for it. Right now your treating it more as a half spin to a no look clipper. Watch the bag all the way until right before it hits your foot and then spin. Go slow, The crank come form not just your ankle but your knee as well, and if you rush it to fast you might feel some soreness in the tendons in your knee.

double

You should warm up with around the worlds 10 in a row both ways both feet then ten alternating directions both feet. Do this everyday. then Go for double around the worlds every other day after this and the rest of your warm up.

I didn't watch your second video, but pixies will come with good double around the worlds.

[Swizzle]

new video.. butterflys and ducking.. also some uptimes after practice.
and my right clipper seems to be pointing in towards my body more..
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tH5eqP9f0TM[/youtube]





jeese im stuck.. i keeping getting worse.... i was doing whirls fine for the past week. I almost hit 6 in a row strong side and right after i made this video i couldn't do one controlled.. i barley caught it when i did it.... ..

[mc]

butterfly-

I like what you're doing, except the initial clipper stall. You do a small hand toss right into clipper, and your support leg is planted completely on the ground the whole time. I recommend that you do a little hop into the initial clipper, and land on the ground as you are stalling (you're already naturally doing it with butterflies back and forth). So, clean up that first stall.

Otherwise, go for lower sets, set slightly closer to your body, and keep practicing as you've been doing. You're on the right track, you just need to practice it a few hundred more times. you'll get it.

[mc]

butterfly-

I like what you're doing, except the initial clipper stall. You do a small hand toss right into clipper, and your support leg is planted completely on the ground the whole time. I recommend that you do a little hop into the initial clipper, and land on the ground as you are stalling (you're already naturally doing it with butterflies back and forth). So, clean up that first stall.

Otherwise, go for lower sets, set slightly closer to your body, and keep practicing as you've been doing. You're on the right track, you just need to practice it a few hundred more times. you'll get it.

ducking -

seems like you're doing the same thing with your clippers on ducking - your support leg is planted when you start to stall. first practice doing clippers back and forth where you hop into each stall. Then, practice doing consecutive sameside clippers where you hop into each stall. Then, practice alternating clippers with forehead-high sets, then the same with sameside clippers.

So, I've been saying, hop into your stalls. When you do this, it also makes you hop out of the stall a bit. A good portion of your set height is going to come from this hopping out action. You shouldn't just be throwing the bag over your head with your stalling foot, you should be using that hop. The hop will allow you to do a smaller, more subtle movement with your clipper foot which will lead to smoother, more controlled ducking clippers.

[Asmus]

As Matt says magic hop into your clippers are really important.
Try to open your hands a little.
Doing the clipper/butterfly practice Matt suggests is a really good idea. And it is possible to do while watching television or hot girls sunbathing.
Keep up the good work.