April 1st, 2011
Filming - Panning Techniques
March 30th, 2011
Coleman Slides
Coleman slides are a key slide for any longboarder. There are many variations of this heelside slide originally invented by Cliff Coleman, and knowing at least one of them is nearly essential. The coleman is a heelside slide that involves tucking your back knee down, putting your front hand down behind you and kicking your back leg out while throwing your hips to initiate the slide. Some people prefer to either grab rail with their back hand when doing the slide or throw the hand outwards into the air. If you choose to grab rail, be sure to do so directly in front of your back foot, never in between your legs. Grabbing in between your legs is known as grabbing stinkbug, and not only does it take away the integrity of the coleman (you can't really consider it a coleman if you grab stinkbug), but it makes the slide much harder than it should be. Regardless, coleman slides are either a 90º slide or 180º to 180º back (this is sometimes referred to as a heelside pendy or heelside pendulum). They can be done quickly as a check or held out longer for style and to shutdown (stop completely). In order to do a coleman slide, you should be comfortable with riding and carving hard. The coleman should be one of the first slides you learn, alongside pushup slides (I'll cover that at a later time), as its considered one of the simpler slides out there. You should be on a hill, not on flat, as a hill makes it easier to suck the slide back in and ride away on the fall-line (the straight line from the top to the bottom). Once you have your slide-gloves on tight, start riding until you hit about 10mph. At this point, get into proper position (I'll include a picture for reference) and carve as hard as you can heelside. As soon as you begin your carve, put your hand down on the ground directly behind the center of your board. If you put it in line with your front truck you will be more prone to lose control and not be able to bring the board back in. At this point, twist your hips towards your heelside edge but don't twist your shoulders more than 90º. Always keep your head looking straight downhill. Keep your sliding hand no more than about 2' from your heelside rail but don't keep it too close or else you will be prone to highsiding. Push out slightly with your back leg and stop applying pressure when you want to bring the slide back in. Don't try to go more than 90º for a while because until you get used to the slide your wheels will probably hook up and you will end up going switch while in the middle of a slide... not a good thing.
This is not the only position you can use for colemans. This is just what I do, but many people have their own preference. To find your most comfortable position, try doing what I did, just getting into position while stationary. Some basics to work from are to have your back knee tucked at least a little bit and to be in a mild squat.
I'll try to make a Coleman Trick-Tip video in the future for further explanation. Hope this helps, and thank you for reading todays edition of Nerd Talk!
March 29th, 2011
Filming - Panning Techniques
Today I'll discuss different panning techniques I've picked up on while filming. These are very helpful if you want to make your video look professional. First off, you're going to want to have a tripod, preferably one that can pan (look side to side) smoothly. One of the most basic but awesome methods to making a video look good is to pan slowly from left to right, right to left, or throw a twist on it and pan from bottom-left to top-right, etc. There are a few ways to do this, some of them including panning with a tripod, making a camera slider (a mount for a tripod that slides from side to side smoothly), or in an editing software. I usually use my editing program (Final Cut Pro 7) to pan since it removes the possibility of human error, but in order to do this I:
- have to keep the camera stationary while filming, so I may miss out on tricks occur outside the window of view
- have to zoom into the footage on the computer in order to give more room to pan, thus putting much of the scene out of the shot
I would prefer to pan with a tripod or a slider but I usually don't think I do it steadily and smoothly enough because of my OCD. Regardless, if you watch any well made videos by the hotshot longboard video crews out there (Loaded or Original), you'll see efficient use of the panning technique. Give it a shot in your next video and get the ladies all over you.
March 30th, 2011
Coleman Slides
Coleman slides are a key slide for any longboarder. There are many variations of this heelside slide originally invented by Cliff Coleman, and knowing at least one of them is nearly essential. The coleman is a heelside slide that involves tucking your back knee down, putting your front hand down behind you and kicking your back leg out while throwing your hips to initiate the slide. Some people prefer to either grab rail with their back hand when doing the slide or throw the hand outwards into the air. If you choose to grab rail, be sure to do so directly in front of your back foot, never in between your legs. Grabbing in between your legs is known as grabbing stinkbug, and not only does it take away the integrity of the coleman (you can't really consider it a coleman if you grab stinkbug), but it makes the slide much harder than it should be. Regardless, coleman slides are either a 90º slide or 180º to 180º back (this is sometimes referred to as a heelside pendy or heelside pendulum). They can be done quickly as a check or held out longer for style and to shutdown (stop completely). In order to do a coleman slide, you should be comfortable with riding and carving hard. The coleman should be one of the first slides you learn, alongside pushup slides (I'll cover that at a later time), as its considered one of the simpler slides out there. You should be on a hill, not on flat, as a hill makes it easier to suck the slide back in and ride away on the fall-line (the straight line from the top to the bottom). Once you have your slide-gloves on tight, start riding until you hit about 10mph. At this point, get into proper position (I'll include a picture for reference) and carve as hard as you can heelside. As soon as you begin your carve, put your hand down on the ground directly behind the center of your board. If you put it in line with your front truck you will be more prone to lose control and not be able to bring the board back in. At this point, twist your hips towards your heelside edge but don't twist your shoulders more than 90º. Always keep your head looking straight downhill. Keep your sliding hand no more than about 2' from your heelside rail but don't keep it too close or else you will be prone to highsiding. Push out slightly with your back leg and stop applying pressure when you want to bring the slide back in. Don't try to go more than 90º for a while because until you get used to the slide your wheels will probably hook up and you will end up going switch while in the middle of a slide... not a good thing.
I'll try to make a Coleman Trick-Tip video in the future for further explanation. Hope this helps, and thank you for reading todays edition of Nerd Talk!
March 29th, 2011
Drop-Deck Construction
Drop-Deck construction is found in both freeride boards and downhill boards. Basically what it is is when the footspace of the board (the wood in between the trucks) is dropped by any distance, although you usually see a few inches being the most extreme drop. This dropped platform extends the whole wheelbase and is beneficial in several ways, as well as effecting the construction of the board in ways other than by making it looking different. By using drop-deck construction, most of the board is being brought closer to the ground. This makes the board more stable (lower center of gravity), as well as making slides easier (the lower the board is to the ground, the easier it is to break traction and initiate a slide). This is why drop-deck boards are found commonly in the realms of freeride and downhill, as the board remains stable at high speeds but will slide predictably when needed. A trait that comes along with drop-deck is stiffness. All drop-deck boards are incredibly stiff and usually have a high number of plies (around 10 or 11). This is helpful for the speed that is reached on drop-deck boards as well as preventing bottoming out (when the ground or any foreign object found on it makes abrupt contact with the bottom of the deck, usually results in either damage to the deck or loss of balance/a fall.)
Popular drop-deck boards include the Landyachtz Switch, the Landyachtz Evo (this board features wedged and dewedged kics - when the nose and tail are angled), the Bustin Maestro, or the Rayne Demonseed.
Keep updated to see what I write about tomorrow... today's topic was a bit elementary, I will admit, but I'm sick and not in the mood to go in-depth about anything too complex.
