ok, making a (little) bit of progress here.
Lightwise's post kind of went over my head, but after Bovril explained it to me I started messing around with trying to force the planes of the staff around.
warning: The following descriptions are REALLY longwinded, vague and rubbish, even by the usual standard of staff move descriptions. And the moves I'm talking about aren't actually technically impressive or attractive. So you only really want to read this if you, like me, are really really bored at work. Or if you really want to know a fairly sneaky and fluid way to change the rotational direction of a staff.
In a vain attempt to make sense i'm going to talk about x, y and z axis (axi? axises?) to describe which plane the staff is spinning in. The way i'm defining it:
the X axis is the plane in which you start spinning the staff (vertically).
Spinning in the Z axis is spinning horizontally.
Spinning in the Y axis is spinning vertically at 90 degrees to the X axis (the plane we've chosen as normal).
So usually you'd only spin in the X and maybe the Z axis, as forcing the staff into different planes isn't very pretty.
ANYWAY
Lightwise's move sounds like twisting the plane of the staff 180 degrees from forward rotation to horizontal to backwards. X to Z to X(mirrored). While i was playing with trying to do that i ended up doing pretty much the same but totally in vertical planes. X to Y to X(mirrored)
Starting from spinning forwards figure-of-8 in my left hand (wall plane), I take the staff in front of me to the other side of my body and at the same time shift it 90 degrees clockwise (as viewed from above) into Y axis.
The staff is now spinning backwards in the side plane on my right.
I now bring the staff in front of me, back to the left hand side of my body, at the same time twisting in another 90 degrees clockwise (as viewed from above). This twist is a bit harder than the first. The wrist movement required feels exactly like a shotgun (aka low doublespin).
Then I'm back in the X axis, exactly where I started, but now the staff is spinning backwards instead of forwards.
Hmm, the description took less space than the preamble. Ah never mind, a rambler I was born and a rambler I shall ever be.
Anyway, the reason I like this move is that it whacks the spin direction of the staff right round without the staff stopping or ending up with the axis in another direction. Once you work out the wrist movement, you can really do it at any speed, and the resistance of the staff to the plane change is a lot less than I'd have thought (but I am more used to poi, which change plane for no man).
So now all I need to do is to learn how to do it while spinning a staff in the other hand *whimper*
![[Eek!]](images/icons/shocked.gif)
God has anyone actually read this far? You mad bastard, I'd have given up ages ago.
[ 22. February 2003, 04:30: Message edited by: Simian ]