Straight from the lab...

I've been spending a little too much time watching Scott Bass's (of Ampisound) videos over the past few weeks. They're all great - you should go check them out.

...but not yet! Wait! First watch the results of this experiment Sean and I conducted yesterday:

Scott's oeuvre has made me realize my own videos have all been universally awful. Well, not awful... just thoughtless and boring. If a picture is worth 1000 words, I think a video can be worth 1,000,000.

You all know my tenancy to be didactic. I will happily talk about health, fitness, food, and Fifth Ape for hours. But even after an hour (or three) of talking, I don't think I can do a particularly good job of explaining what Fifth Ape is and why it is important.

Perhaps a well made two-minute video can accomplish what I cannot do with just words? If I can put a viewer in the middle of the action and give them a visceral sense of what skillful, powerful, agile movement feels like, well, then they might just begin to understand.

Plus, it'll be a ton of fun for me, the ex-film-school guy, to play with some decent cameras again. The video above is our first experiment with using a counterweighted handle to allow for smooth hand-held tracking shots. We began as simple as you can get... i got my cheap-o tripod, telescoped the arm out all the way, put the cheap-o camcorder on it, found the spot on the handle where the rig was balanced, and held it lightly there.

The results? After a bit of experimentation, I think we got some good stuff! Up-and-down jiggle was much improved. There was still some issues with side-to-side jiggle, but we got better. Given the simplicity of the setup, I'm pretty happy. Now that I'm actually paying attention to video quality, I get to complain about the quality of the Youtube version... the "real" version on my computer has much smoother motion. Grumble grumble. I think the most impressive shot in the video is about 40 sec. in when Sean follows me down a pretty sizable level transition. One-handed parkour while holding a camera rig is not easy folks. And it looks decently smooth!

I'll be paying a visit to my favorite place soon to get the parts for a more complex rig I want to build. Stay tuned for more experiments... hopefully leading up to a video that will actually be good.

Let me know what you think?

Progress?

This has been a great week. Our trip to the Boy Scouts was a ton of fun, all class members have been doing really well, and my own training has been progressing. Weeks like this make it a privilege to do what I do.

***

I was out training until fairly late yesterday. At one point I was intently focused on breaking a new obstacle (getting it for the first time) when I noticed a police officer standing behind me watching.

Normally this means an end to training. These days, displays of dynamic movement outside of a professional sports arena are so unusual they're seen as deviant. There's also our cultural obsession with liability and a whole host of other factors... to sum it all up, when the cops show up either you leave voluntarily or they make you leave.

(To be fair, I've had nothing but positive interactions with Chapel Hill Police and UNC's DPS. Amazingly, if you are polite and respectful to them, they tend to reciprocate... fancy that. Part of our responsibility as traceurs/urban climbers/MovNaters, etc. is to engage with the community positively. That's the best way to promote change.)

So I waved and said hello, fully expecting him to tell me to move along. Here's how the conversation went:

Me: "Hello."

Police Officer: "Hello. Are you practicing for something?"

Me: "Just training. Trying to get stronger."

Police Officer: /Nods.  "Sounds good. Have a good night." (he turns to leave)

Me: "Er... wha?.. um, thanks! You too!"

Police Officer: "Be safe."

Two minutes later I broke the obstacle for the first time. Wouldn't have been able to do it without my new favorite cop. So, thanks random awesome policeman. You helped me get better and I am grateful.

***

While we're telling stories, I have to share one more. The scene is the checkout line at Whole Foods where I was about to spend way too much money, as usual. I was getting ready to pay and the girl behind the counter was bagging everything up.

Something you need to know about me first... I make sound effects. I've done it since I was a little boy. I can't help it - it's really fun and you should try it. It's why I studied sound design in film school and spent way too much time in the Foley room. I'm usually pretty good about not doing it in public. Usually...

Me: (swiping my credit card) "Shwoosh!"

Checkout girl: "..."

Me: "..."

Checkout girl: "...did you just make a shwooshing noise as you swiped your credit card?"

Me: "No." ... "Yes..."

Checkout girl: "Hmm..."

Me: "I used to make sound effects... in Hollywood... for the movies..."

Checkout girl: "Yep..."

Me: "So, um... thanks... have a good night..."

And then I fled. And then I felt silly. And then I felt silly for feeling silly. What's wrong with making sound effects? It's fun! And, dammit, from now on if I feel like making sound sound effects I'm gonna do it! In public! So there!

...

Shwoosh!!

Fifth Ape + Troop 845 = Awesome

Last night Sean, Eric, and I made our way over to the Carrboro United Methodist Church where we put on a Parkour seminar for Boy Scout Troop 845.

It was a fantastic evening. All of the scouts did really well and I'm sure I speak for Eric and Sean when I say we had a great time teaching. The Boy Scouts and Fifth Ape share many of the same philosophies, so we felt right at home.

We opened with some introductions and I gave a quick overview of Parkour. Guys, I think I actually managed to be brief - progress! Then we headed outside for a group warmup and an introduction to proper landing technique. I confirmed my suspicion that I really liked this group when they enthusiastically joined me in making sound effects during our landing drills.

From there the scouts split into three groups and rotated through three stations. I did jumping and precision landing, Eric handled tacs and wallruns, and Sean supervised vaulting. (a big thanks to Duncan for lending us his cherry bomb vault box)

All too soon the session was over and we were packing up. A big thanks to everyone at Troop 845 for hosting us - we hope to see you all again soon!

An extra big thanks to Brian Burnham, who coordinated the event. He took some great pictures... check these out:

You can view the rest of the album HERE. The photos are also up on our Facebook page, so comment and tag away!