Finding Inspiration

I sometimes notice on forums and places like Facebook/Twitter that people get in slumps and find it difficult to get new ideas for routines and tricks. So, I thought I'd write down a few themes which might be useful in order to get you thinking in a different direction and give you some new ideas. This can really apply to any type of juggling, so hopefully this post is of interest to everyone, not just contact jugglers.


1. Taking ideas from other types of juggling
This already happens a lot anyway, but when you consider the different types of juggling and all the styles within it, there are a nearly an infinite range of tricks that can be done. That doesn't necessarily mean doing a trick exactly the same with another prop, you can take an idea and try it, and maybe due to limitations or the type of prop you use find another way to do it. In doing so you most likely come up with something you would never imagine normally.

Examples:
Toss/contact
Rings/clubs
Cigar boxes/stacks? (I'm playing with this now...)


2. Taking ideas from dance.
Getting inspiration from the movement of the body and the shapes created through dance is another good choice. Choose any type of dance you can think of and find a video on Youtube. Pause it at any point and see if you can find a way into or out of that position using your props in the process. It's simple but surprisingly effective. Of course there is also the option to do a style of dance while juggling at the same time!

Examples:
This is how different contact can look with a tutting influence (Noiseassault!)


 If you want really out there stuff watch Storyboard P for some weird influence.



3. Creating shapes
Take the tricks you can do and try to create a certain shape out of them, be it a square, circle, or whatever else you can think of. Then try to think of ways to going into that shape again but in a different body position. Creating this start and end point for yourself is limiting, but makes you think in a different way than you usually would and quite often leads to new ideas.

Examples:
Yamamura Yuri (3 ball triangle shape)


Some guy (Contact style triangle shape)
http://youtu.be/rXUzWu730xc?t=23m47s


4. Using colour
This is something I've been thinking about more and more recently. Having a two coloured object or a single prop of one colour and a lot of props in another makes you think about ways of differentiating the colours, either by revealing them at certain moments or or finding new patterns that contrast/compliment the colours used. From the perspective of the viewer it looks really effective too.

Examples:
This scene from a Japanese skate video actually set me off on this...


Some guy again (sorry...)



5. +1
+1 basically means adding an extra ball or whatever prop you are using to the tricks you are doing. This is really simple but I would often not consider it for a lot of tricks, and then when I did I realised it created something new or interesting that I didn't expect (and sometimes things that are too hard to do...) This doesn't necessary mean just sticking it in the middle of the pattern to make it harder either, just the fact that you have this extra thing in your hand might mean the other method you always used will not work any more, so some sort of change is needed.


6. Mixing props
Again, this is another thing I have spent a bit of time on (particularly with RdL rings). Thinking about ways to use the other prop to throw/roll/balance on, or in the case of rings go through/around, you get a whole new range of pathways that open up which aren't otherwise possible. You can also combine two types of props and do both individual styles at the same time. Then there are bridges, new shapes etc. Go mental!

How about mixing a contact ball with thuds?


Another example (again, sorry...but it fits the topic!)



7. Putting limitations on yourself
I find limiting myself in some way a really effective way of making routines. Doing it is really easy too, any kind of limitation is fine. Examples would be only using a certain part of your body/not allowing yourself to use your hands/always keeping a prop in contact with your body a certain way etc. I could go on forever on this one, but I'll leave the ideas to you! Try to make a routine of a set length (1 or 2 minutes) in order to force yourself to keep coming up with new things instead of giving up after getting stuck. It's usually those points that lead to an interesting breakthrough!


8. Using sound
The sound of catches/making noise with your body/hitting the props against yourself or the floor is also another direction to explore. I haven't tried this personally but there are plenty of people who have!

Examples:
Wes Peden



9. Modifying your props
This might sound like a strange one, but by attaching something to your prop, be it another prop or something like a magnet or string, it completely changes the dynamic of the object and allows for completely new tricks and routines.

Examples:



10. Using the world around you
Who says you just have to stand there and completely disregard everything around you? There are no rules, so just look at all the paths/objects/gaps/hole etc. around you and fit it into your routine! A particular recommendation is going to a playground with climbing frames/various fun objects you can go in/around/on. Even if it's stupid, who cares?


11. Using your clothes
This is something I got from watching Wes's Synthetic video. Using something with a zip/hood/something baggy gives you extra places to roll or stall the objects you use and thus leads to tricks that otherwise aren't possible. This isn't really explored that much outside of the use of hats so there's bound to be a ton of undiscovered stuff still to be found.

Examples:
http://youtu.be/rXUzWu730xc?t=11m29s

12. Buying a ball/club/ring shaped object not meant for juggling
If you look around at toys for children/pets you can sometimes find some really interesting things that will also work as props for juggling.

A few good examples:
Babal ball (Thanks RdL!)





Hol-ee Roller (Lots of uses for the holes, plus if you press down on them with an object it will shoot it up quite a decent height. Expect a video soon...)




13. Look outside of juggling
Pretty much anything is ok here, whatever gets you thinking creatively. I tend to get some good ideas from skate videos, there are some really creative videos out there amongst all the generic stuff.

Examples:
Gou Miyagi


William Spencer


Daewon Song



14. If all else fails, find another person
Doing things with a new person basically opens up a whole new world of possibilities, even for the most basic of tricks due to the many different ways you can share/pass props between you. And should that ever get boring you can apply the above to get even more ideas...

Examples:
Wes & Patrik
 

Hopefully that's enough to keep you busy for the next few hundred years! If not, here's some more.

Jay Gilligan


RdL at JJF 2012


Comaba 1&2

The Jackknife Rollover and Twist Arm Rollover

As a little addition to the last post (The Outside Arm Rollover), I thought I should mention two more types of rollover that are a bit easier to do. Again these names I made up myself, so feel free to call them whatever you want.



For the jackknife rollover you want to to have your arm as parallel as possible in order to get the rolling ball up and over the other, then from there you can bring your arm more diagonal to get the bottom ball to roll out. Just try to think of it as a regular rollover but with your arm 180 degrees. Someone better at jackknife stalls could probably repeat this trick if they wanted to.



The twist arm rollover is easily the hardest of the two, as catching the ball while getting the other one back up to the stall point is very tricky (which is why I usually let that ball drop into my other hand).

I should also point out that in these positions stacks are also possible...

Outside Arm Rollovers

This is a trick I have been thinking about for a long time, but I have never managed to find a clean/reliable way of doing it. For anyone not sure of what a rollover is, this video will explain.



As you will notice, this trick is done along the "inside" of the arm. This opens up a lot of ideas/paths for multiball and generally makes it easier to get 2/3 balls to flow around the body.

After learning this, I naturally thought I should try it on the outside as well, as this would open up a lot more paths for multiball and allow for a lot of cool new tricks, such as some back to back variations or allowing you to do a regular style chestroll with 3 balls (instead of the slightly ugly inside arm version which everyone does now). At first this seemed like it shouldn't be that hard...

Which is why I am writing about this now, in the hope that someone might be able to take the idea and figure out a decent way to do it!



(Please note I posed for sections of this trick just to show how it would look in reality, it wasn't taken in one go!)

Simply having the ball on the back of the hand and bending the wrist down to do the rollover like the above pic seems like the most ideal method (and mirrors the inside arm version), but in reality it's a pretty uncomfortable trick, plus it's really hard to get the ball to roll over. To stop the ball in your hand rolling off you need to grip it with your fingers, which isn't exactly the most comfortable thing for your hand, plus you then need to bend your wrist down at the right angle so that the the rolling ball can roll up without getting jammed by the other ball. This could be made easier with a smaller sized ball, but that would mean changing everything else for the sake of that trick...

The advantage of this method is that after the rollover, the ball should be on a relatively straight course rolling up your arm again, making it much easier to go into other rolls, or go back down the arm for another rollover.

The next method I tried was a type of claw grip.



With this method it is much more comfortable and easier to get the ball to roll over, however the release of the bottom ball is much more difficult. If you can get the bottom ball out between your thumb and index finger, the next problem is getting it to roll straight from your hand, as it will want to roll away from you off the arm. Should you manage to figure that out, you just need to grab the top ball in the claw position again (NOT easy) ready for another rollover! All in all a slightly easier method but still no good.

These two ideas seem to be the best options I can think of but neither are quite there (at least for 125mm balls, the first method could work for someone else...). So, I'd like to ask anybody reading if they can think of a better alternative? Maybe some other way of getting the balls past each other that I haven't even thought of? If you have an idea, reply and make a video! If this trick gets figured out a whole bunch of new tricks become possible, so I figure it's a worthy cause.

Give it a go, and good luck!