Basic planes

And while on topic, can someone plz explain why i MUST spin clean planes?

you don't *have* to spin clean planes mr dragon

clean planes are something i and many others are pretty anal about in our own spinning (eg. glass, bluecat, knoxious and lots of others) - most of us consider we don't have a move solid until we can perform it with clean planes and are then free to use deliberate body movements to enhance it.

i think specifically for performers, clean planes are a must.
i think that visually, clean planes are more far more pleasing, but that may just be me...

as for swinging clubs, it wasn't what initiated my love of clean planes - i think it was my natural choice to strive for this and the people i learnt from instilled those values in me.

Written by: taniwhadragon7

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in maori poi, there are planes but there are also freestyle moves and not all moves are patterns. Which confuses me watching alot of people (from other countries) and they spin...strangly ...its like the planes are more important than the move, or the they are so focused on the pattern they spend no time on body movement and function.

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for some (strange ) people, it *is* more about the pattern than the body movement - the body movement is a function of the pattern rather then the other way round.
if you see what i mean.


and for tidyness' sake - for a demo of dave's cross techniques, as described above, look up ben-ja-men's video thread (in the video section) and go get 'knox doubles 2'.
clean double staff planes all over that video and double staff isolations to die for.

I planes.

and hammers.

and screwdrivers.

But most of all, I chisels.

Having a clean plane is very important. Not only does it makes it smoother, but it also means you dont get nasty splinters. Remember to video (or infront of big mirrors), or get a friend to watch you planing so you can find out how dirty they are. Then go back and blow the dust off.

i'll plane you in a minute.

i don't know what that means but if you imagine me saying it in your mum's voice and it should lend it the threatening tone i was aiming for...

is this a staff or a poi thread?

I like planes cos you can get things very flat with them. And getting things very flat is hard. You have to check then go back and readjust your plane and try again. Sometimes you even have to sharpen your plane. Or try a new plane to get it flat.

Before every session you should take apart your planes (they're quite simple mechanisms) and put them back together again, to make sure they aren't getting rusty anywhere.

And everybody knows hard things are harder to learn than easy things. And therefore, hard things are harder. (Substitute better for harder if you are a technical spinner.)

I may have taken UCOF's plane/plane pun too far. Should I post this? Oh well, too late.

meg, after that staff thread you wrote, you could post random swearwords all over hop for the rest of your days and i'd still think you were the coolest person here

to answer your question, this is a spinning thread - it has everything to do with poi and staff spinning and little-to-nothing to do with joinery.

however, you are as anal about planes as i am i think so i have nothing to teach you apart from:
when using your plane, always employ a sturdy workbench or pair of vices to keep your object perpendicular to the floor and completely inanimate while you shave bits off it using long, slow, even strokes...
okay, this isn't even an extension of a pun any more, its just general woodwork advice so i'll quit while i'm confused enough to not care

so has anyone seen a dragon around today?

i think he's ignoring my posts...

probabl gone aqua-planing. or to the family planing clinic. or is offering (ahem)plane-tive cries about bad puns.

(oooh my i'm helpful today aren't i)

Planes are good. If you keep working on having your toys stuck to the walls of a glåss box, then eventually you can wear white gloves and stick yourself inside an invisible glass box, and that's when you've truely reached the top. I hear you're also allowed to take invisible dogs for walks, but that may just be a rumour

what I really like about planes is that actually getting them flat is very hard. There is a natural tendency to curve down in the middle, like telephone wires, so that you have to practise plane on a crappy bit of wood, till you get it right then plane your actual wood, (and in a certain order of sides) and practically recalibrate your planing for each side of the wood.

Now taking invisible ferrets for a walk, WHILE you isolate yourself, that's skill.

Planing should always be with the grain. I think this is a lesson all spinners can relate to. <nods wisely, hiccups and falls asleep>

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so has anyone seen a dragon around today?

i think he's ignoring my posts...

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Nope...i dont ignore posts on purpose, only if they are antagonistic. And then id be the the perp and id have to ignore myself

Im not going to blindly back unclean planes, i have spent along time on keeping planes clean, i just though that by now many of you would have been bored with plane control and wanted to expand. There are good merits to proper control and nice patterns, i dont disagree with that or the fact that you HAVE to learn good planes before delving into the mess with any idea of what you really doing.

Its just that to ME, artistic flare and higher levels of expression are most important, even before performance style's. Only because i try to keep it on a spiritual lvl and be free of "kata" type patterns. I like meg's description of

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Before every session you should take apart your planes (they're quite simple mechanisms) and put them back together again, to make sure they aren't getting rusty anywhere.

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And yes im takling about poi/staff

Im talking about stripping away all the moves untill you are just using transitions, putting them back into any combonation but NOT making it into "kata" with set forms. I want to make the form as i spin without muscle memory, it is the only way to freely spin and expand my mind imo.

And dont get me wrong because in not saying that kata/ combos are crap, they are valid untill you reach a stage when you think you dont need them any more.

These are just my ideas, there is no right and wrong...and if u think there is...then maybee your missing out on alot of creative ideas and fun.

"Empty your cup"

and after watching afew of the videos, i find it amusing that some of the people who posted about good plane control, in reality have nice atomic inverted angled planes

Ok it took awhile, but i think iv managed to empty my own cup and change my mind on this topic

My planes were really really crap! Well not all of them. I striped down all my moves and when i put them back together, i decided they needed some order. That and watching myself on video and seeing my circles wearn't in the "right" places.

Mainly watching alot of your guys videos and seeing how you use [planes].

Now it left me with alot of problems. (I really really really really want to learn and get better with this so plz bare with me)

(1) what ARE proper planes. I mean i know they have to be clean but alot of the effects are 2d! not 3d!?! How can you show me (or anyone else) what the proper planes are?

(2) Im guessing that planes are ONLY good from a camera perspective or a stage (or making clean circles). Say you are watching from the left corner of the stage. The planes are going to look out compaired to someone sitting in the middle row. Or Imagine there are people all around you?!? Where do you "put" your frame? Or plane point?

(3) You can do the moves in alot of different places, do you have to turn your body or aviod some moves, you know will be out to the camera/ audience? (say you are facing me and decide to do weave, now i cant see your circles)

I have some ideas but im not sure how to lay them out... Main idea is, if you are facing someone (face to face) to try and keep it so they can always see the full circles. Which would mean leaving out alot of moves unless you turn side on.

There are quite afew holes in my style that i would like to patch...

Any help plz Cole? Blue? Nx!

Heh i feel like a n00bie

i have no planes, it makes LazyAngel cry i am trying to control them, but when im just spinning on my own, i dont really see the point, and im not a performy person, so its only really me who see's....from the inside lol, i just let go and spin and twirl where and how i want! im a free-poi spirit!! (dont hurt me, i love planes really!:P)

God I wish I found this thread when I was having heaps of trouble understanding fountains! how on earth did i pass it by?

I did a Durbs - honest!!!

for mr dragon,

1. proper planes to me suggests there are a set of planes around the body that are parallel with each other and ideally, perpendicular to both the floor and the viewer/audience.
transferring spinning poi between these planes with minimum deviation denotes a certain cleanliness/tidiness of the move.
how can i show you what good planes are to me?
easy, make a video filmed from directly above the spinner

2. not necessarily. no, you won't see perfect circles if you are watching clean plane spinning from an angle.
but at least the variation from a circle that is seen is consistent throughout the spin (rather than seeing circles some of the time and randomly shaped ovals when the planes happen to go wonky).
also, from an angle clean transitions between planes are more obviously 3d.
like just about every performance art, there is a best viewing angle and if on stage, you would normally present this straight forwards, towards the middle of the audience.

3. like i tried to explain in the first few posts of this thread, you don't have to ever bend your planes.
do a bf facing me with flat planes, then stall one poi and change its direction - you are now weaving and your planes are still perpendicular to my line of sight
if you start with flat planes, only if you bend your planes will you start to get ovals and eventually, side-on circles.
but yeah, you're right that you can't do wheel plane moves while facing someone if you want them to see your circles!
most commonly, for wall plane moves the performer faces the audience, for wheel plane moves the performer is side-on to the audience.

the reason we have been having babies about arashi's atomic techniques is that they are so obviously 3d compared to vertical clean plane spinning.
the only trouble is, they mess with your head so much because they are in contradiction to weave and bf plane theory (they are perpendicular planes sets, not parallel) yet are controlled with a hybrid of weave and bf technique.

side-on circles is the main reason i never bothered with horizontal moves - i just didn't think they were that visual unless you had an audience above you.
conicals however are a different story entirely - using gravity to create sets of cone faces that the poi spin in rather than planes is again, a whole world apart from the way of thinking i set out in this thread.

hope that helps dude.


tink - i hid it well didn't i...

cole. x

Bad Cole

Yes that helps ALOT

But there is still a spanner in the works... "floor plane"

Ie corkscrew/ split horozontal moves

For me...thats why it all comes back to movement or dance...because there are moves that dont have patterns. And that stuffs the whole plane theory.

Any ideas? Do you guys just cut them out totally???!!!???

glad that helped man

as the wise monkey said, i don't spin flat horizontal planes.

i play with conicals a bit - i think as long as the angle that each of the the poi make with the horizontal plane are equal (i.e. both poi describe the same size/shape cone), then this looks much prettier and gives you a much wider scope for pleasing patterns.


cole. x

OK that is a totall mind

Give me a minute to get my head around that

i thought i'd chuck this link in here since its sort of related:

link to post with video

that post is right in the middle of a discussion about defining plane transition sequences (planeswap).

you can ignore most of the text, but the video has a few nice examples of plane placement in the wheel plane and also shows a couple of moves that use inside and inverted planes.
those planes are described a little in the post.

for those that just want the video, right click and save as here.


cole. x