Intro to 7 club passing variations

I needed to put together a curriculum for our workshop, so, what better subject matter for the latest installment in our blog's Technical+Siteswap corner!

[Keep checking back, as I will be updating this more (if I have time to) before the convention]

From video:
4-count: triples
3-count: doubles
2-count: singles, triple/single, doubles
1-count: singles
popcorn
< 4p 4p 3 | 3 3p 4p >

To demo:
"12 down" [right hand sync'd: 4-count trips, 3-count trip/doub, 2-count to one side, 1-count doub/single]
"6-3-6" [right hand sync'd: 2-count, 1-count, 2-count to other side, 1-count, ...]

Handout [print highlights, share electronic copy]:
Passing7_only3+4: web page or .xls format
3pplPassing10_only3+4: web page or .xls format
Passing8_only3+4+5: web page or .xls format

Technical Corner: May08

Last June, I posted about juggling trick "chains". I was talking with Tim about them tonite, and I likened them to musicians running scales, and we kinda liked that name better. I'll likely use them interchangeably for a while. :)

Back to the point, Tim found them really valuable tools to practice for other tricks with, and the more advanced usages of starting from tricks one knows, and taking small steps to get to tricks one wants to know... So, to that end, I'm adding this blog, and will later add links to various siteswap related tools in the sidebar on the right.

-=+=-
Let's start with the basics... 3 object scales. Ok, this will be rather short (read: potentially boring), but it lays the foundation for adding objects to the base patterns, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Take the first simple one of the two digit sequences: 33, 42, 51, 60
{in geeky math terms: f(n)=( x+n , x-n ) ... where 'x' is the number of objects, and 0<=n<=x }

To get from the first to the second, one can do it after the '3'. To get from the second to the third, you simply throw the '5' after the '4'. Finally, you can get from the third to the fourth by throwing the '6' after the '5'. Putting that all together, one can have the useful sequences: ...333 333...333 42 333...333 4 51 2 333...333 4 5 60 1 2 333...

Basically, each subsequent pair is a 'trick' out of the previous pair. This illustrates how we can step thru other patterns to end up in an excited state pattern [ie: you can't just start throwing '51' directly from a '33' pattern, so that makes '51' an excited state from the '33' base pattern].

Now, taking that to a logical level, one can run the full sequence of transitions back to back: 34512 or 3456012. One would reorder those and come up with the sequences 12345 and 0123456. Personally, I find the first one more interesting, but both are worth trying. These will really hone your throw heights relative to each other. Any given day, your hand speed will vary a little faster or slower, and your throw heights will change accordingly. Running either of these will baseline your throw heights for that day, because if your heights are off, the pattern won't flow well, but once it smoothes out, you have established muscle memory for that day's practice.

The above example might be tricky for those just beginning, and it should be more a goal than an expectation.
-=+=-
Now, lets further explore the 42 root for other sequences.

The obvious way of extending this out: 42, 441, 4440
{geeky math terms: f(n)=( (x+1)^n , x-n ) }

Take 42 and extend it out: 42, 522, 6222, 72222, ... [kinda boring, but useful for 360s and other flourishes]
{ f(n)=( (x+n)^1 , (x-1)^n ) }

Taking 441 to the next level: 441, 5511, 66111, 771111, ...
{ f(n)=( (x+n)^2 , (x-2)^n ) }

Taking 4440 the same way: 4440, 55500, 666000, 7770000, ...
{ f(n)=( (x+n)^3 , (x-3)^n ) ... see the trend yet?}

I know, these seem boring, but there is potential in them...

Taking 51 compared to 33 { f(n)=( (x+2n) , (x-2)^2n ) } gets the sequence: 51, 711, 9111, ...
And the utterly useless 60 extension: 60, 900, c000, ...
-=+=-
Another style of sequence is: 3, 42, 531, 6330
This becomes a bit more obvious in style when written out sorta diagonally like Pascal's Triangle and for higher numbers of objects like: 5, 64, 753, 8552, 95551, a55550 or 7, 86, 975, a774, b7773, c77772, d777771, e7777770
-=+=-

OK, so "all that is just a bunch of numbers and simple patterns - now what?" right? :) Well, starting with the basics, let's "do something similar, but with one more object".

The simplest way to add an object is to add '1' to every digit in the sequence. The trivial example is '3' plus '1' gets the pattern '4', thus '5', '6', and so on. Pretty obvious, eh? :) Take '42', and one to each, and your get '53', and so on..

The other simple way to add an object is to add the number of digits in the sequence to one of the digits in the sequence. That seems a little strange, so here are a few examples:
'3' add '1' to one of the digits and you get '4'
'33' add '2' to one of the digits and you get '53' or '35'
'42' add '2' to one of the digits and you get '62' or '44'
'333' add '3' to one of the digits, and you get '633', '363', or '336'
'441' add '3' to one of the digits, and you get '741', '471', or '444'
'531' add '3' to one of the digits, and you get '831', '561', or '534'
'6330' add '4' to one of the digits, and you get 'a330', '6730', '6370', or '6334'
'12345' add '5' to one of the digits, and you get '62345', '17345', '12845', '12395', or '1234a'

Of course, both of these techniques works in reverse as well, thus giving one more options of related tricks that one might already be able to do or might pick up easily enough. One example of thought logic might be:

"I can do 441, I can add an object making it 741, then I can remove one ball and get 630, adding one back, I get 633, and removing one again I get 522, which I can add one back and get 552, and removing one I can get 441 again"

So, if one can do any of those listed, with a few minutes practice, one should be able to so any of the other related ones [even if one just sticks to the 3 object ones at first].


Therefore, you homework for this week is:
- extend out a few 'juggling scales' for your number-of-objects of choice and try them
- take your favorite sequence for however many objects, and try adding a ball to it using the above techniques

Oh, and let us know how it went for ya! Obviously I'd be glad to help you thru direct emails or face to face at juggling club sometime!

Cheers! --Crizzly

Technical Corner: Apr08

Dave and I come up with many ideas that we want to capture at a later point on film.. given the weather around here, and difficulties+time for filming ourselves, and (Dave) editing the vid, then posting it.. well, it can take months to get our really cool ideas up on video for folks to see. In the interim, I figured it might be nice to post periodic "here's our latest cool thing we want on film when we can". To that end, here are some of the highlights of the last month or so. :)
--==++==--
As you know, we've been working extensively with 7 club passing lately [in prep for the "7 Clubs 7 (More) Ways" video]... last night we realised the ease of segue possible if you had a right-right [standard, non-offset] pattern to yet another.. this is extremely common with 6 clubs, and noone gives it any thought.. obviously this is just as easy for 7 clubs, with some caveats.

There is a pattern for 6 clubs known as "PSSS PSS PS P PS PSS PSSS PSSSS".. ok, no idea what the name really is, but it switches immediately between 4-count, 3-count, 2-count, 1-count, then back up to a final 5-count to get it back to the same hands-that-pass as the first iteration. I looked at the 7 club version of 4-3-2-1-2-3, and well, it's too fast to really appreciate, even by other jugglers. :) Slowing it down tho, and you get a really sweet pattern that we actually managed to pull off repeatedly:
http://tinyurl.com/3ulmnt
[that fires up an online simulator showing the complete trick - I'll be using that simulator extensively for these posts...]

I'll break that down for the technical junkies out there:

<               [22][22] | [22]2                  > : cold start
<[25p][23]335p 3335p 333 | [23]35p 3335p 3335p 3  > : 4-count as triples for 12 beats
<   5p 335p 335p 335p 33 | 334p 334p 334p 334p    > : 3-count, straight triples,
                                                      crossing doubles for 12 beats
<    4p 3 4p 3 4p 3 4p 3 | 3 4p 3 4p 3 4p 3 4p    > : 2-count, crossing doubles {all going
                                                      to same side of pattern} for 8 beats
<3p 3p 3p 3p 3p 3p 3p 3p | 4p 4p 4p 4p 4p 4p 4p 4p> : ultimates as single/double for 8 beats
<    4p 3 4p 3 4p 3 4p 3 | 3 4p 3 4p 3 4p 3 4p    > : 2-count going to same-as-before side for 8 beats
<   5p 335p 335p 335p 33 | 334p 334p 334p 334p    > : 3-count for 12 beats
<   5p 333 5p 333 5p 333 | 335p 3335p 3 335p 3    > : 4-count for 12 beats
<                     22 | 22                     > : clean collect

UPDATE: We have found it's actually easier in the long run to just do 12 beats of every pattern as seen here -- http://tinyurl.com/12down

Other things have fallen from that too... since you can segue between any of those patterns without going thru the in between... Here are some cool examples:
Spiffy 2c-1c thing <-- This is an absolute blast to do!
Spiffy 3c-1c thing A Spiffy 3c-1c thing B
Spiffy 4c-1c thing A Spiffy 4c-1c thing B
-=+=-
There is a beautiful parking structure exterior spiral staircase just one block north of LaSells and the football stadium. Being conveniently exterior, there is some great promise for vertical passing for folks hanging over the railing. Hard to describe, so here's a sim of it:
http://tinyurl.com/39bf8h
Astute folks will note it's a '4p 2 3' style pattern, similar to an early double in a typical pattern. The sweet part about the railing heights is that the lower passer throws a triple {which becomes a double as the upper passer catches it}, and the upper passer basically misses their self toss, and it becomes a double to the lower passer. It's a bit strange to feel, but it's really sweet after a few tries...

Prettying that up a bit for someone watching {we asked the stair walkers their opinion to verify}, passing with both hands is the most pleasant to do, and the most pleasant to watch: http://tinyurl.com/3xnw5w

4-count has it's uses, in that one could actually feed it.. Take this: http://tinyurl.com/33g55v
...and extend it vertically to the next two stair levels like so: http://tinyurl.com/323zmf
Think of that last one as vertical equivalent to an "N" on the ground.

Clearly we didn't do that last one....yet... we figure it's something to consider for the convention. The biggest concern is that if a club from the 3rd or higher level hits the ground, it's basically destroyed as the bottom level is asphalt. Insert dreams of extra club catchers with blankets held between like the old firefighter thing in cartoons and silent movies...

Getting back to reality, here is something we actually want to get on film as well: http://tinyurl.com/35w797
Vertical 7 pattern... that seems totally doable, but our first night out at that location got rather cold after the sun set, so we didn't last out there too terribly long, thus didn't actually try this one yet..

Other thoughts make more sense for 7 balls -->
http://tinyurl.com/2yfll3 http://tinyurl.com/2zwpyh
Should be simple enough {read: we'll try this next time we're there again}.. the upper person could keep their hands in a claw position if that helps..
-=+=-
Going with the stairwell idea, and the convention possibilities... we are hoping to do the following spiral pattern. Visually tho, it needs some setup. The stairwell is a left hand spiral (as you go up, you make left turns). It does the typical "half story of stairs, landing, half story of stairs back to next landing which is now one level up and directly above the previous one". The simulator is in stereo, just cross your eyes until the images overlap, and you'll see it in 3D. In case you haven't figured it out yet, you can actually grab-n-rotate the simulator's image as it goes, which may help if you slowly move it around for this one.
http://tinyurl.com/2r9h7y
Here would be a great challenge for folks: keep going until you get your clubs back and then clean collect and finish...

Now, I know what you're thinking - how does everyone start at the same time?... simple, you designate the two corner folks to watch a spotter or two who are sync'ing up at ground level (ie: juggers in the 2, 4, 6, and 8 spots). To save you some thinking there, the spiral starts at the bottom with juggler 1, and goes up counter-clockwise (as the stairway does)... so the first four are positioned like so:
43
12

'1' and '2' are on same level as each other, '3' and '4' are on the half level up, and so on. '1' passes to '2' only as 4-count, '2' feeds '1' and '3' like normal, '3' feeds '2' and '4', and so on.. Clearly that can be extended to as many folks as we can scrounge. :) I smell (sorta-kinda-)annual challenge for the conventioneers!

If that works (too) well, we can include other typical feeds like 3-count (or PPS if ya like), and gorillas!
--==++==--

Well, I hope you enjoyed that little glimpse into what Dave and I have been working on of late. You should see some of this in actual video sometime later this year. :) Cheers! --Crizzly

What have Dave and Crizzly been up to lately...

I figure this is a blog, so we should use it as such, no? :)

Latest endeavors with clubs include a lot of left hand passing patterns. Basically we're working off a handout I got at a juggling convention a while back. Some of the patterns I can recall at the moment include:

PSSSSPSSSPSSPSPPSPSSPSSSPSSSSPSSSSS or 5count-4count-3count-2count-1count

Martins Mild Madness (a PPS variant where one crosses, the other doesn't, and there's one sync pass-self to confuse everything)

7 club with two ppl as 4count, 3count, 2count, and 1count

a strange six club where you start with (right hand perspective) a double to yourself, then a straight pass, then a crossing, then a self...then you do the same sequence from the left hand. {there's a hidden self pass or two in there to make the passes work, and it has a RRLL moments too, but it all works out}

There's a couple three person patterns we had a chance to do where each person does something different. One easy example is where one person passes outside every other's (like an outside triangle), another does a feed between the other two, and the last does a 2count with one person, but receives clubs from alternating people.

We also did the 3 and 4 person 'clover leaf' or whatever from the IJA newsletter... that's pretty wild too...

Lesse... lately I've been obsessed with juggling trick "chains". Basically, related tricks like:
55550
 5551
  552
   53
    4

or:
     5
    64
   753
  8552
 95551
a55550

...and so on. Obviously there are related chains for any number of balls too. So, one three ball chain would be 3, 42, 531, 6330 which relates to the four ball equivalent chain of 4, 53, 642, 7441, 84440, which relates to the five ball 5, 64, 753, 8552, 95551, a55550. We've been working thru these chains as drills for warmup and such, and discovering other chains of tricks along the way. At some point, I intend on putting a few of these on video for a 'starter pack of tricks', likely focussing on the five ball chains. Here are some other samples of chains for you to try out:

Three ball:
33, 42, 51, 60
33, 3531, 373131, 39313131, ...
51, 7131, 913131, b1313131, ...

Four ball:
44, 53, 62, 71, 80
53, 633, 7333, 83333, 933333, ...
53, 5551, 575151, 59515151, ...
71, 9151, b15151, ...
7171, 919131, b1b13131, ...

Five ball:
55, 64, 73, 82, 91, a0
5, 64, 663, 6662, 66661, 666660
55, 5753, 595353, ...
5555, 5753, 5951
73, 7571, 777171, 79717171, ...
91, b171, d17171, ...
9191, b1b151, d1d15151, ...
91, b171, b1b151, b1b1b131, b1b1b1b111
(notice this is an intersecting chain to the above two)

One can also make interesting chains by taking a large half-shower (say, the seven ball "95"), and repeating enough times to be able to drop one digit to a '1' by removing a ball. OK, that reads confusing, so let me give you an example:

Q: "I want to do a pattern like '95' but with only six balls, so how would I do that?"

A: make either the '9' or the '5' a '1' by subtracting an apropriate number of digits.

Example1: as we should know with siteswaps, one adds up the numbers, and divides by the digits to get the number of balls in a trick, so "95" is (9+5)/2=14/2=7. We can also see that "9595" works just as well (9+5+9+5)/4=28/4=7. To make that last one a 6 ball trick, the total would have to have been 24 {6=24/4=(28-4)/4 ; a difference of 4 which happens to be the number of digits in our repeated pattern}, or in other words, we can change one of the '5's to a '1' like: "9591".

Example2: We could have chosen to convert a '9' to a '1' {difference of 8} in the above example, but we would have to start with "95959595" {8 digits long} so we could subtract eight from a single '9' in there making "95959515".

The above examples could be applied twice to make the seven ball '95' into a 5 ball variant like "9191" and "95951515" (which is a really fun trick to do, btw!), or "95159515" (which is really "9515" twice), or "15959515" (which is a rotation of the first one).

So, I like '73', and applying the above methods, one can get a four ball versions like '71', '7333', '737313' and so on, and then take each of those and apply yet another chaining method such as:
71, 9151, b15151, ...
737313, 93931313, ...
(4, 53, 633,) 7333, 83333, 933333, ...

all of which can get a reduction as well, ie:
9151 -> 5151
b15151 -> b13131
737313 -> 731313
93931313 -> 93131313
83333 -> 33333

...obviously, some lead to trivialities, but then that's expected. :)
A real simple example of this would be taking the basic six ball pattern '666' and removing a single ball to make the five ball pattern '663'... removing another ball yields '633', and yet another leads to '333'... one could follow that down and do three-with-a-hole as '330', and one-in-a-three-pattern as '300', and ultimately no balls doing a '000' which you are doing right now in fact! ;)

So, yeah, have some fun with those ideas. I know it's kinda math heavy, but then, I was a math major in college... lol! If you have questions, just hit me up at the next meeting or invite me out to a chai or somesuch -- I'd be happy to explain it in terms that will help make more sense for you! :D
Cheers! --Crizzly