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http://juggling.tv/16767- "53 ball techniques"
@ Daniel
Which - if any - variations have you been doing ever long before you knew you'd make this vid; which variations did you have to practise to be able to film them for the vid?
Which do you find hardest; which do you like; which do you use in practise?
Do you think, there's any most essential ones?
Unbroken link:
http://juggling.tv/16767
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
Thanks for the interest!
Probably the first thing I understood as an exercise was to do different heights, but even before that I was practicing to make my cascade more perfect, more symmetrical and less wrist, as many people need to learn to stabilize their 5b in the beginning.
Crossing point I first heard about in a workshop with Thomas dietz in 2010, dwell time I heard off on rec., my interests in high throws peaked around the Norwik challenge... Turning I had found out about early too, I remember seeing some video about it and Anthony Gatto recommended me to do this too, hence his name in the credits.
In my training I often do heights, walking and turning, and I fool around randomly with whatever comes to mind.
While structuring this video I realized one of the themes was "arms", and one logical exercise in this category would be wrists, especially since I worked on those before long time ago (I even posted about that on rec.). This was the hardest to execute and film, and I try to train this more now. Quite a few (like wrists) I had never done until I started filming, but I filmed everything twice on two days in a row and used the material of the second day.
Bending was fun but also hard, because I felt I could keep on pushing myself more and more.
When I practise I some times also do combinations, such as long dwell R and short dwell L, or the same with low and high crossing. I am encouraged to do these by Sakari Mannisto in school.
Most essential is that you understand the properties of patterns, then arms, then body. The most important are the ones in which your juggling is furthest from the norm, in which you are most asymmetrical or which you find hardest.
I see, okay, very interesting! Downright own little stories for some variations, and big names involved, .. amazing.
Wristy, i think, has a bit of a whip effect(!), like for playing darts, just up, not ahead.
Bending - haven't tried yet - seems acrobatic, looks queer too lol, doesn't really look like like you ``need´´ it, but surely isolates the pattern (and its front plane, and the aiming) against your centre line inclining all over.
thx 4 takin' the time 4 a longer post!
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
You're welcome. I'm sorry for writing that post on my phone, therefor it has more spelling errors, wonky sentences and weird structure than it should have, haha :p
A lot of the drills have a story tied to them, as any trick I do has an origin or a story. Some more interesting than others of course.
Yes indeed, the bending is one that is less important in that list, just a fun challenge if you want to increase your range and control.
In case you hadn't read it yet, I also wrote down some more of my thoughts here, as linked in the video description: https://www.objectepisodes.com/t/53-ball-juggling-techniques/517
Yeh, I only very rarely go there (OE), but I did read that one - the video is imo even more complete with those explanations. ( people else might not understand how important such exercises can be for mastering your ground-state, and look upon your vid as just ``played around with queer variations´´ ((i mean, one would prefer to learn a new trick, instead)), if - as a teacher - you don't dip their nose right on it \\and they can really be an eye-opener when stuck ) [ #ARTICLE ]
What I can say, is, that doing stuff of the kind was a major part, clue even, to my own improvement over the last few years.
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
The video is with little context because I don't want to teach, or impose, or suggest that I have the answers to anyone who didn't come and ask me for advice. I have advice and thoughts for those who ask, but otherwise I'm happy if my work can be used as a reference material for those who do understand what it means. I sure hope someone would have sent it to me 8 years ago when I asked how I should improve my juggling ;)
Daniel Simu - #
Juggling and Animation #article
Surprise! Here is an article for you that was not announced in the recent list :D
It is about understanding movement through the principles of animation and applying those to juggling.
http://ezine.juggle.org/2016/03/31/juggling-with-the-principles-of-animation/
I'd love to hear your opinion about this :)
Cool Article, made me wonder how a animator would write/choreograph a juggling routine or what would happen if an animator decided to animate a preexisting juggling routine.
I realised when playing with timing that speeding up is usually easyer than slowing down... especially not only slowing down the prop(s) but the body movement too seems to be one of the harder things in juggling to me.
Spacing reminded me of watching a video of an old performence of mine where i stand way to much on the left side of an wonderful big and empty stage most of the time which seemed really "odd"
The secondary actions and exagergation part reminded me of the plate juggling scene in the hobbit https://youtu.be/_JBHPFiFWRk where the focus is really on the characters, mimic and less on the juggling.
The realism part made me think about gimmicked props (we´ll honestly im obsessed with gimmicked props at the moment so i think about it all the time anyway) as well as fake/magic tricks many performers use quite often that seem to be really appriciated by audiences no matter how obvious they are...
the other thing i found really interesting is that you can find these base principles of ???anything??? in so many things... i felt like i´ve been confronted with some of these concepts from so many different angles (arts, science, circus school, acting, music)that they really seem like universal laws of life to me but sometimes if you specialise into something you loose the bigger picture and forget to "follow the rules".
Also great video choices. I wasnt aware of the Michael Menez Video so i enjoyed that one in particular
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
Yes, basic principles appear in many fields! Not always they are as clearly defined as with animation, where one book could seemingly get the support from all of the worlds animators.. For example, I also think about composition principles some time as used in painting, but there is not one complete list that is being thought.
The more restricted an art form, the easier it is to come up with these principles. I have worked as a pixel artist, and the rules of for example cluster control are very well defined and obviously very effective. However, in very broad mediums such as movies, where you have to deal with sound and visual spread over 2 hours (140000 unique frames to perfect), there is perhaps just too much to define helpful principles. Should one focus on telling a great story, or making the best possible set props?
I consider juggling performance to be one of these huge mediums. There are tricks, props, stages, music, interaction, moves, drama, soooo many ways to go! Which is why it might be more useful to borrow principles from other art forms.
Of course you could restrict juggling, for example only talk about tricks, instead of about performance as a whole. The MRL project has tried to get to some juggling principles, with a bit of success.
Nice plate juggling, I don't remember seeing that before! Of course, the juggling is indeed secondary to the characters ;)
This is a great article!
I think its really interesting to see juggling/juggling performances from different perspectives. I'm curious what the other principles of animation are though?
When I read what you wrote under 'Realism' I had to think of one performance that I can't remember the name of and/or the names of the performers.
They used a blank white or black sheet to hide behind and threw balls in a way above the sheet so that it looked like they bounced on top of the sheet - contradicting 'Slow in – Slow out'.
I hope my description of the act makes sense to you and maybe you have even seen it.
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
In the book The Illusion of Life, the 12 principles are:
Squash and stretch
Anticipation
Staging
Straight Ahead Action and Pose to Pose
Follow Through and Overlapping Action
Slow In and Slow Out
Arc
Secondary Action
Timing
Exaggeration
Solid drawing
Appeal
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12_basic_principles_of_animation
I am glad to hear you enjoyed that :).
A fantastic article - thanks Daniel. Provided an interesting and new perspective on some of my favourite juggling routines.
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
Thanks Colin!
Just read this today, very nice article thank you.
Just wanted to offer a counterpoint to the bit about exaggeration, I remember watching an interview with Hayao Miyazaki from Studio Ghibli where he said that unlike many Japanese anime studios he avoided cartoon exaggeration & went to great lengths to animate realistic natural movements because he says it is much better for expressing character. One of the examples was a short clip of a small girl running then struggling to climb a slightly too tall step which was a sweet moment of struggle which had you rooting for the character, some animators would just make the step the right size for the child to be able to step onto & miss the opportunity.
While I do still enjoy exaggerated caricatures I also love the more subtle expressions of Kris Kremo & Steve Ragatz for example which seem to be a rarer sight these days.
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
As always, know the "rules" so you can break them into perfection!
An article about subtlety on stage would form a nice contrast with my classical jugglers article too!
Daniel Simu - #
Cirque de Demain review
#article
I visited the Festival Mondial du Cirque de Demain for the 3rd time in a row, it took place last weekend in Paris. You can read my review at eJuggle: http://ezine.juggle.org/2016/02/04/jugglers-at-cirque-de-demain-2016-review/
What do you think of circus festivals, and other act competitions?
Correction: Zoomadanke's surnames are Kodama and Iijima.
Thanks for the article.
Scott Seltzer - - Parent #
Thanks. Corrections corrected.
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
Thanks :)
Nice article, thank you.
I think of these competitions as the Oscars of circus, except instead of giving out awards & listening to speeches you get to watch performances & then they hand out awards which strikes me as a much better way of doing things. I think they are good for circus & variety in general because they create a level of prestige for circus performers that is far greater than the general popularity of circus would suggest. Even non-jugglers have heard of Cirque de Demain & more so the Monte Carlo Circus Festival.
However, I also think they hold it back. If the most prestigious events in the circus calendar have the exact same format as a big top show from a century ago it doesn't project the image of a varied & dynamic art form. The notion that it's not a circus unless it's in a big top, the guys don't wear shirts & the girls wear lots of sequins is a bit like saying a magician is not a magician unless they are wearing a top hat & tails. Magic has managed to move on, but circus is largely still stuck in the same image despite the hug amount of variety that we know exists.
How did you manage to get hold of a press pass? Did you sort that out or did the IJA? Good work either way!
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
Yes, the format of these particular festivals hold back the progress. On a stage where you just get 8 minutes to shine, your best bet is to go with the "look at me, I am awesome" style, which results in similar acts.
Of course there are also festivals where companies can play their long shows, but these have not yet acquired the fame of Monte Carlo. In the Netherlands we have Circo Circolo for example, which definitely shows a varied & dynamic art form.
Getting a press pass was easy, I sent the press office of Demain an email, linking to my author profile at eZine.
Little Paul - - Parent #
I've been holding off on replying to this thread until I had time to type out how I see them. The tl;dr of that post (which I probably won't get around to writing for a while yet - if at all) is that they are a good thing for a section of the industry, largely irrelevant to a large portion of the industry, and most of the public have never heard of them.
However, I've been listening to a lot of magic podcasts recently, so wanted to pick you up on that comparison.
"Magic has managed to move on" ermmm... probably not as much as you think.
Presentation style for stage illusions? That hasn't changed much since the 80s (omg the soft rock, the hair and the sequinned box jumpers!) and in a lot of ways is more circus than circus is.
Presentation style for table hoppers and close uppers? Yeah, that's still sharp-dress-suit-and-crap-gags about "Would you like to change your mind? No? You're happy with the mind you've got?" and has been since the 60s.
Street magic? Working street performers are still running ancient routines. A modern street cups-and-balls routine is very similar in presentation to what it was 200 years ago.
Mentalism? OK, I'll give you mentalism. Derren Brown shook that up considerably by pretending he wasn't doing mentalism.
Magic competitions still pretty much follow the 7-minute-variety-act format (which is partly why magicians do so badly on "X's Got Talent" type shows - generally the producers don't want a 7 minute bit, they want 3 minutes at most and cutting out 4 minutes of choreographed jumping in and out of boxes set to an 80's soft rock sound track while the wind blows your assistants sequins around isn't an easy task.
Why? Because you can judge multiple 7 minute acts in one sitting, you can't easily judge multiple 1 hour shows with narratives, or several 40 minute cruise ship sets etc. At least, not unless you do it as something the scale of the edinburgh fringe - which is not where magic competitions are held.
I'd agree with you more if you'd writtenThe notion that it's not a circus unless it's in a big top, the guys don't wear shirts & the girls wear lots of sequins is a bit like saying an illusionist is not an illusionist unless they are wearing leather trousers and using soft bondage metaphors while physically abusing girls wearing lots of sequins and not much else
I had 100 years in my mind rather than the last few decades, I think the circus of 100 years ago has a lot more in common with traditional circus of today, than magicians of 100 years ago have with their contempories, but your point obviously still stands. I for one believe ridiculous 80s hair & over dramatic rock ballads are the greatest thing to happen to variete.
Also is there a difference between a magician & an illusionist? I use those two terms pretty interchangeably.
Little Paul - - Parent #
A lot of magic is the same as it was 100 years ago.
Your image of a magician in top hat and tails came from Robert Houdin in the 1830s yet is still with us (look at Lance Burtons dove act) and many young magicians do still think that's what a magician should be. While searching youtube for terrible examples of this I found this video...
https://youtu.be/I6M9r1xIQ6U
I really hope he's improved in the last 4 years
Escapologists are still recreating stunts Houdini was doing in the early 1900s - despite the restraints that were familiar every day objects to Houdini's audiences having no contemporary relevance today. Straightjackets aren't used for medical restraint any more and when was the last time you saw a milk churn containing actual milk?
Pulling a rabbit from a hat in an interesting one though. It's an image which is 200 years old but which magic is stuck with to the point that "where's your rabbit" is the equivalent of "where's your other wheel".
The effect is the same today, and uses the same style of hat as the original presentation... yet so few performers reference Mary Toft's story which is supposedly the original satirical inspiration of the effect.
As to terms:
"magician" is the umberella term which covers stage illusions, close up magic, birthday party magicians, street/bar magic, Derren Brown, Uri Geller etc. They're all magicians, but the venues they work in, the size of crowd, presentational style and the type of equipment used varies hugely.
"illusionist" is specifically the sub-genre which is "stage magic with large prop illusions" - they usually have the most 80s hair of anyone, and for some reason Art Deco props.
Anywho, I appear to be enthusiasticly arguing that magic is just as stuck in it's ways as circus is, perhaps more so.
Which is an odd position to argue defensively! :)
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
Well.... I am not an expert on circus of 100 years ago... but quite a bit changed:
Size, music, disciplines, costumes, animals, dramatisation.... Some disciplines like tightwire or horse acts might have stayed the same, but current traditional circus resembles more of the 80's than the 20's, right?
Interesting Topic
When it comes to the exposure i´d say that it is definitely a good thing for the exposed juggler/artist since it seems to come with quite a lot of gigs and instantly increase the monetary value of an act.
I'd also say that it is a good thing for the community to be seen by "everybody"
the demain festival has been aired on tv in germany for quite a long time and i used talking about the difference between demain and carlo quite a few time to explain what kind of circus i want to do to non circus people. it´s cool to have something most people know about and can relate too but this is only cool if demain would paint an accurate picture of what the contemporary circus szene is doing, which i don't believe it really does.
First there is this "7 min" format which leads as you mentioned to "all those weird, funny, artsy, emotional, dramatic etc" content i like being cut out in order to show "comparable" technique
then there are some other problems about the format...
as you mentioned the big top is a problem for a lot of acts that has been designed for theatre stages/street/etc
i also dislike the olympic thoughts when it comes to comparison (don't get me wrong i love that people from everywhere get a chance to present their work) but i feel like there´s kind of a cold war ästetic of europe vs china that from my point of view should not be given a place anywhere.
I also think this limits the selection process (sorry we already have an act from "insert country" but feel free to apply again next year) or (cool we never had an act from "insert country" you're in)
when it comes to the selection process i'm also generally suspicious that it´s a fair one... there are some circus schools that seem to have a "contract" for their absolvents to be usually given a place and there are rumours of acts a festival wanted being hired by promising a medal.
then as you mentioned it is difficult to compare acts from different backgrounds... a chinese french production hiring acrobats and dramaturgs using a expensive apparatus vs a flow artist from the phillipines... that doesn´t seem to be fair. not even speaking of the absurdity of taking acts from different disciplines and judging them on the incomparible techniques instead of the comparable everything else.
all this results imo in a situation where traditional acts are prefered over new ones leaving me with a feeling: this is circus today... there are traditional acts who do everything right and there are also these weird acts... who may be right tomorrow.
i already wrote a wall of text but i still like to talk about "other competitions" before i decide weather or not i think competing is good for us.
so let's start with njf because i watched the livestream and it's still fresh in my mind
what i liked about the njf is that it has been resulting in the upload of up to 5 devilstick performances on youtube every year promoting my favourite toy and giving me an overview of the dutch stick szene.
i like the better compatibility of the props competition but seeing what different styles have been used i still stay on my point of view that juggling skill can't really be compared unless we decide to reduce our technique to a few comparable patterns (wjf style)
i also like that it was/is? kind of a national competition. for each prop there are probably 50 japanese jugglers who could´ve easily won but that's fine since they are clearly not part of the competition.
but i also see some problems.
for example taking the devilstick competition serious was kinda hard for me knowing that nikki sheep was judging and could´ve easily won if she took part.
then there was again this incomparability between competitors... especially in the acts competition the difference between the "professional jugglers" (you, asaf, fabio) and the hobbyist (the rest) was really strange.
then i have the feeling it's kind of a bought title... you pay for your travel there... you pay a starting few and since there are only 10 competitors you just bought a 10% chance to win a title (more if you attended several competitions)
this is a problem i also see with the wjf and maybe the ija competition. (don´t really know about the ija competition application procedure)
if you want a fair competition everybody should be able to compete but unless somebody pays my flight, accommodation, loss of income etc i don't really have a chance to participate in a american competition. there was a wjf devilstick competition in one year with 3 competitors. markus furtner who was invited and two american stickers who've been there anyway.
then there´s also the "gatto issue". how can i make a competition claiming to find the "best" if it´s common knowledge that the "best jugglers" won´t compete.
Seeing all that you can say that i am pretty much against competitons from a theoretic point of view still leaving the question... do we have better options in real life ?
the competiton system still seems to work to gain attention and there are a lot of well established competitions/festivals that would certainly leave a whole if we just decide to not compete anymore.
on the other hand we have big companies like cirque de soleil or smaller companies like the gandinis just giving contemporary performers a job and exposing them to a far greater audience than competitons can and there are events like the fringe festival who give artist the opportunity to present their work without being judged. for example i have a brother who has no interest in circus except me being a circus artists but when my parents visited him his girlfried who also is not into the circus szene organised tickets for a gandini show at the fringe festival.
so in my point of view competitions are kind of a relict of older times and we still rely on them to present us to the puplic but i believe they should be exchanged for just hiring performers to do their work or at least giving them places to show their work to audiences without paying the theatre/tent themself
guess that´s most of my thoughts…
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
Not NJF (Nederlands Jongleer Festival) but NK (Nederlands Kampioenschap), this year also referenced to as Open Dutch Juggling Championship (first time allowing foreigners to participate)
Yes, I definitely "bought" my Dutch title. I had very little interest in a competition, but knowing who was participating I knew that I could get my Dutch title which is what I wanted for promo/self esteem reasons. This is also one of the reasons why I did a relatively bad show, I did not prepare at all and couldn't care much if Asaf or Fabio would beat me (they wouldn't receive the Dutch title anyway), and as you said there were no other real contestants..
Thanks for all your thoughts :)
& you can watch some of the festival here:
https://concert.arte.tv/fr/36eme-festival-mondial-du-cirque-de-demain
...but now I'm watching the video, despite the dates on that page this does appear to be last year's show!
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
Yep, on TV you see the shows of last year. There was no live stream this year, and I don't know if it has been recorded for future showing.. There were much less cameras present than normally and no announcements like usual about that we are on camera... :(
Daniel Simu - #
Traffic light juggling #ARTICLE
So yeah, in case you want to comment on my latest eZine writing, please do so here!
http://ezine.juggle.org/2016/01/22/juggling-at-traffic-lights/
Also, I'll be going to Cirque de Demain. Jugglers in the festival will be:
I hope I have the chance to interview some of them for my next article, is there anything specific you'd like me to ask?
Great, a welcome read and watch on what interests me!I never do more than 1 hour at a time; it is fun at first but after just half an hour I find it tiring and repetitive.
You never know what will happen and people in cars are different.[roughly cited:] 5b routine with best tricks needing concentrated focus -> 10 € versus 3b tricks + interacting with the cars --> hat brimmed
Looks like people are paying for being contacted, for your will to entertain them, unlike more than for any skill.It's not legal
On the other hand cities like to boast with a vivid cultural life in town when putting forth their image in prospects for tourists or in the media. So, cities and police mustn't be too severe with you.
Andres Holguin .. Oh, my goodness!
Watched Manuel till the end.
Pretty spectacular machete juggling, also. You made a nice choice of different videos![..] and your skill level is not as important as your humble smile.
So, .. using strong colour make up to highlight your smile will fill your hat more? :o])
I find interesting how people who wouldn't care if they saw same on tv or even at a circus, get excited (take photos, stand and watch, give tip) when they're life part of the scene.
Guess it's the unexpected eyecandy, and a setup amidst everyday's life.
I'm sure there's people taking a detour to see if the juggler's there again at that crossing.
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
I am glad you enjoyed it, thanks for the comments :).
Yes, people get excited when you are out there especially for them. However, only half of the cars pay attention to you, plenty of people just look away...
please ask the "drug passing guys" why they choose the title "drugs" for their video
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
good one, I'll do that :)
Rob van Heijst - - Parent #
Hint: It's probably the name of the song.
Daniel Simu - - Parent #
Thanks for reminding me, I knew there was something about that :p
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