Yea, I seriously forgot what this thread was about… PM?
I’m not trying to be mean, or a dick, but Studio, maybe if you didn’t write a novel for every post and just stood up and threw a yoyo, you would have more practice? Again, not trying to be an ass, but that’s how I see it. 
Ive been at it since September and although I’m trying a few of the advanced tricks, boing e boing and atomic bomb are impossible for me. I’ve just skipped them and left them for later, that’s what I did with the 1 and a half mount and came back to it a couple of weeks ago and final pulled together mcbrides rollercoaster and Buddhas revenge. I feel like I can probably plow through most of them if I actually spent more than a minute lookin at the videos but I get distracted easily. I don’t see it as important to me to do a trick perfectly before moving on, since most times on a trick further down the line I’ll be doing the same element. But that’s just me, I rush thing, I wish I could stay at one trick until I mastered it but I have little self control.
Maybe if you’d work a 20 hour day 365 days a year and 90% of that time is stuck behind a computer, or the rest of the time is stuck behind an audio desk.
What am I doing right now? I’m on a conference call with a client who screwed their network, and they are not listening to what I am telling them to do, and hence, I cannot get into their network, and I can’t use the “back door” because some bean counter cut off the phone line for the modem on the console port since best he could tell it “wasn’t being used”. They are also refusing to do critical troubleshooting steps and are denying me information that I’ve been requesting. Hey, if they are paying, I’m stayin’.
I got up at 6AM. It’s 12:16 AM. I completed 2 video projects earlier today and have been trying to repair my media publisher. On top of that, I’ve been trying to collect a $700 debt from an old lady who wanted me to do her transfers but didn’t want to pay it. I’ve been trying to collect an $800 debt from this other lady who refuses to pay me for the time I had to spend to do stuff she refused to do. She’s not happy that her crappy home videos have duplicates and she didn’t want direct transfers now, and she’s not happy with the 6-hour DVD’s from her 6-hour EP recorded worn-out VHS tapes(not realizing I can’t enhance crap). I also have been in a 4 year battle with a woman who won’t pay me for the 14 hours of Super8 film I had to transfer, because I can’t tell what was worth keeping and NOT worth keeping. It’s a bunch of crap of people fishing and shooting the breeze. I can’t tell what she does or doesn’t want to keep and she won’t provide guidelines. I also have to collect on a 2-year old debt of a reel to reel transfer the guy wanted a rush job on and hasn’t bothered to pick up. Oh, and then there’s the client who pays on a Net45 term contract, but always pays late, and as a result, well, thanks to my father in law getting killed recently and as a result, my bank accounts getting drained as a result, christmas at my house is cancelled.
Oh, and keep in mind: this was a good day.
Oh, and I have to watch my 4 kids during the day, who enjoy fighting and screaming and amp it up when I’m on the phone.
So, don’t criticize if you don’t know the situation.
As I wait for these engineers to figure out how to do their jobs, there’s not much I can do productive. I can’t work on another video project right now because it’s a concert and I want the volume up and the wife and 4 kids are asleep, so that would be inconsiderate. I can’t do the quote for backline rental for the show I have in about 3 weeks since the place that does these rentals is closed now. I also have to scream at Guitar Center AGAIN to get a bit of gear swapped out on the extended warranty I paid for. I am also working on issues and logistics for gigs in January, February, March, May, July, August, October and December 2012. I’m also working on new lighting design issues and an animatic presentation.
I’m making the most of idle time. While I sit around while people are in a panic and not doing what they are being told to do, I might as well do something useful or productive in some manner.
Also, my middle section of my right middle finger is all torn up right now. Cracked skin. I don’t feel like bleeding all over my string.
Again, you don’t know my situation. I’ll be crawling into bed in 4 hours, get 2 hours of sleep and get to start it all over again tomorrow. Sound fun? I’ve grown tired of being able to throw at 2AM. And the time I do get to throw during the day, I have to dodge 4 kids and 2 dogs that want to be “in my face/in my space”.
My only relief I got today was a phone call from TMCertified. That was my 15 minute salvation from the insanity I’m surrounded with and believe it or not, the highlight of my day.
Or, have you ever been in an environment where people will FOLLOW you around the house and making as much noise as possible while you try to get away from them? Shall I share the story how I had to jumpstart my truck, warm it up and then drive away while on the phone in order to try to salvage a business call? Yes, that’s the kind of effort I have to make to salvage business.
Or maybe, just maybe, you might want to consider that my wife can’t understand how I have to work when the work comes in, and how my “day” doesn’t end at 5PM like magic. WAN connections fail when the are gonna fail. Drives fail, computers fail, power supplies fail, network equipment fails. Calls for audio tech support round the clock(people work all around the clock in audio/video).
So, where’s that time to throw a yoyo?
The last time I got some decent time to throw was when my father in law died, since I was forced to go to mysterious services that I don’t understand in a language I don’t speak/read/write/understand and was otherwise excluded from. So, all I could do was throw. I’m lucky most days if I get 5 minutes a day.
Novel done? Maybe you need chapter 2.
No, you’re not being an ***, and you’re not being a jerk and you’re DEFINITELY not being mean. You don’t know the full story. So, due to technical difficulties beyond your control, you are by definition, ignorant. Not “ignorant” in general, just ignorant on a very narrowly defined topic: my so called life.
So, now if you don’t mind, while I typed this up, the following occured:, one of my kids just peed their bed and won’t stop crying since she needs her blanket and she can’t get it until I wash the pee out of it(and her sheets and her mattress pad, pillow and I even have to strip off the mattress protector). I gotta change her sheets, and put on another mattress protector. The baby is screaming and I can’t give her the bottle because the doctor said “don’t put her down with a bottle” because she’s 10 months old and NEEDS to sleep through the night, but hey, we had that all worked out and then stupidly went on vacation, came back and my father in law went and off-ed himself, and we’ve had no chance to get back to normal. So, I’m running the washer, waiting for that cycle to end so I can dry the blanket and get her back to sleep. After I get done banging this out, I gotta wash the bottles. I told my client that I can’t sit on the phone if they aren’t going to listen to me and get me the answers I need. I called their supervisor and woke him up at home to explain the situation. He didn’t know, and I’m sure this means someone screwed up and was trying to do the CYA thing, but when my bill arrives, someone is going to have to explain something. All I know is I’ll be on the phone again in an hour dealing with this again.
Ah, another day at the Studio42 homestead. No day is complete without being told off by someone who doesn’t understand the situation. My wife missed that today. Thanks for picking up the spare for me. I feel complete now! So thank you. No need to apologize. You filled a much needed void that almost went unfilled today. Life is good!
Phone ringing. Gotta go.
There are a few basic tricks that I have spent an extra amount of time on to because I wanted to get a really good understanding of them. For suicides, I spent about a good week solid working on them. And by that I mean it was the only trick I did. When I started, I could hit it once in a while, but when I did, it felt like more luck than skill. But after a lot of hard work, I got to the point where I could hit several of them in a row. Now it’s one of my favorite tricks and I love finding interesting variations of it.
Another trick that I did this with was jade whip. Again, I probably spent about a week on this.
A third one was black hops. I was on vacation and had a ONE with me, so I spent all of my free time practicing black hops (again, pretty much the only trick I did the whole time I was there)
Getting proficient at those 3 has helped a ton with picking up new tricks quickly. Now any tricks that involve suicide catches, whips, or hopping from string to string is much easier to learn. It’s more a matter of remembering what to do and then smoothing it out rather than fighting and trying to get the yoyo to go in the right place.
Wow. One thing I have to say is you can definitely write. Especially with all that chaos with a job like that. Hope you get some time to rest during Christmas
Christmas is just another day in the week for me. I record the Disney Christmas day parade, slice out the commercials, convert it to PAL via render, then burn it to a Region 0 DVD and ship it to a friend in the UK.
Rest is over-rated. What’s funny is when I am doing events, I have “kids” working for me, mostly people under 24. Man, I’m almost 40(not much longer, 2 more days), and I’m running and running and running, while they are dropping! Must be the love I have for what I do. These kids should be smoking me. Then again, I did a show with a real big back issue and I could barely walk, yet I got the job done, and in the fastest time ever.
I enjoy being here. I learn, I help. I enjoy learning, I enjoy helping. I can see people saying “shut up and throw more”, but they just can’t understand how my day goes. I’d love to throw more.
Rest assured, I’m working on BIG stuff for yoyo. In fact, yoyo has become a big factor in my life. This stuff I have planned is a massive way to give back, and you know what? I’m gonna lose money, I’m gonna get beat up(metaphorically) but I’m gonna love every second of it. Because: I get to do sound, and I get to be surrounded by yoyo, yoyo players and the whole yoyo culture and community.
I’m kind of angry I can’t open up some funds for the Studio42 YoYo Orphanarium, which could help put money into hands, in exchange for their yoyos they want to unload.
What I do for work, I love. I’m lucky that way. It’s hard, it’s chaotic, but I love what I do. I guess if you want to look at it a certain way, I don’t think I’ve ever worked a day in my life.
i didnt necessarily learn every trick… but i got most of them… paying special attention to things like magic drop, lacerations, tricky tech tricks, and i did use other tuts too… but i think what is really important… at least once your at the level of tough string tricks and they dont seem tough anymore, is to leave the tutorials behind, if you see something you like of course you can learn it, but what im saying is to rely on your own creativity… make your own origional tricks, even if you discover someone else does the same thing, thats ok… be yourself… yoyoing is an art work
I see the tricks as a foundation for being able to do your own thing. I agree that there’s no hard rule that says “you MUST DO THESE”.
For me, I need the structure of the existing tricks. But, it’s a matter of discipline. I work hard for everything I do. Audio and computers and networking comes easily to me because when I simplify it, it comes down to signal flow. Even so, there’s still fundamentals The tricks here are the fundamentals. If you get it, then wonderful. If not, then choose your own path. The odds are that you’ll come back to the tricks for one reason or another anyways in order to acquire skills and essential tools.
There’s no single right way. There are wrong ways, but there’s more options in regards to what’s right. For me, following the trick list is the way to go for me. I know how I work and how I do best. If that isn’t right for others, then they should follow a path that works for them.
let’s say you enjoy playing piano. is it possible to be a good pianist without learning to read music or play classic, established works on the instrument? sure. is it possible to MASTER the piano without doing so? personally, i don’t think so.
for your understanding to be well-rounded, i think you need to understand where your art comes from. the history or yo-yoing is written in our tricks, and i think having an understanding of canon is as important and helpful in understanding the nature of the art as having good technique or a good sense for trick-creation. honestly, all of those things inform each other.
i don’t think it’s important to learn just the tricks on yoyoexpert or sector_y or kwos.ca… (although basically all of those tricks are worth learning), but i think as a yo-yoer, it’s worthwhile to spend several years learning others’ tricks, as it gives you a better sense for what people have done, where you fit, and how you can take the art forward. the same is true of anything. to be a great painter, you should be able to paint an apple using a variety of styles/media. later, you can paint it however you want because you’ve taken ownership of your skill. to be a truly solid guitarist, you should spend some time learning others’ songs so you can establish what you feel a good song IS or ISN’T.
learning others’ tricks is kind of like an apprenticeship. unfortunately, not many people are up for that anymore. everybody wants to be a master and nobody wants to begin. being a novice has this toxic stigma where a hundred years ago, people would spend a decade as an apprentice, learning fundamentals long before they ever dreamed of expressing their own original ideas THROUGH the medium of the art.
tl;dr: yeah, learn all those tricks.