Legends Assemble.

 

Yaz – Brick Touching.

 

Today I decided to get out of my cave and go to town, on my way limping to the bus stop I had second thoughts about going at all. The bus had drove past me before I got to the stop and I waited for the next one to arrive. I got to town and found Pete, Will and a few others already training at Crowne Plaza. A short while later Zain arrived happy to see everyone and surprised to see me out for once and shortly after followed by Yaz arriving. Me, Zain and Will waved in his direction but a woman in front of him on her phone masked our waves to him and so we kept waving even though she looked completely gone out at us. When Yaz got closer he then realized what we were doing.

I explained to Charlie that my ankle is screwed and so no more training for me again. I watched others train, spoke to the guys and felt bored and sick of Plaza and so had Denis who complained about us being there. After a while of being there me, Will and Yaz went up to the houses are where I got a few shots of them doing tic tac cats/cranes and k2ps. We made our way back to the Atrium where the others were now training at and even bumped into Stefano who was passing by as he walked into town. I felt like the day was over for me, with the few people out and others leaving for home. Zain, Will & Yaz were doing some sort of pain challenge where they all did a circuit of movements involving a same level diving kong followed by rolling on concrete and repeated it in single file until the last man was standing.

 

Will – Kong Precision.

 

They did a few more circuits like this one involving a pop wall climb straight into precision across a flowerbed. I took some photos of them during this and also decided to see if I could still climb up,

One day, one angle. (Video).

I have just finished uploading a new video which was filmed on Wednesday 30th November 2011. Much to my frustration with uploading it to YouTube what with my internet speed still being really slow due to it being newly installed.

The video was filmed at amphitheatre/ Royal Standard Place/ Audo. (The place has quite a few different names which people use for it).

There is a side entrance to the area which also leads down some steps to the apartments and at first glance all there seems to be is a Catleap/ Arm Jump and Precision to practice. I set my camera up on the tripod and began to record, I did various movements in the area with no real set time limit. I spent a long time just working things out, having to wait as people walked up and down the steps. I did as many movement as I could think of at the time and which were within my capabilities. It was tough doing movements over and over again non stop, it really did keep me warm on such a cold day.

Some movements I failed on a few times, others I did fine. Looking back though, I could have done so much more which I didn’t think of at the time of filming and so in retrospect I can’t exactly change that.

The only down side to the angle I chose is it came out rather dark, even though at first glance it seemed to be just fine. I guess that happens from time to time with filming. I tried to colour correct and change all the settings in Premiere Pro but in the end it didn’t make that much of difference! I am happy with what I did film and for one day and the few hours I was out training, I think I did pretty well considering!

I used a different kind of beat, one which many will recognize and know of. I didn’t want to use the same old Hip Hop tracks and seeing as it was a video of training I didn’t want it to have a overly serious tone to it.

 

 

00:18 Was the second thing I did of the day and when I went for the precision I felt like I was going to miss it due to jumping higher rather than to the desired landing spot.

00:27 I like this part of the video of me sitting down, then falling into a roll. It really is a cool way to get up from sitting and looks funny too when people see you do it.

00:31 I only do the 180 Catleap/ Arm Jump from right to left due to there being a very small gap at the side of the signs and I didn’t want to damage them coming back across and landing on them.

00:42 These walls really were too small for me to be doing palm spins on hence why they look a bit sketchy with the hand placement and landings.

00:48 I hated trying to do the 360 Wallhop on that wall as there was a rail directly to the left and only had enough space to go up and land without smashing my arms into the bar. I failed various times on it because I was so aware of the bar being there.

01:07 Is a nice Catleap/ Arm Jump to do but can be quite heavy impact and force if you don’t do it right. This was probably one of the fastest movement I do in the video.

01:26 Checking and wiping my Kalenji’s and thinking, ‘oh no I’m wearing away the grip with all these landings on walls from cats and tic tacs.’

01:36 Is me doing a cat/ arm jump to the rail the only thing I do not like about this is that it looks like my arse touches the floor due to having extremely baggy jogging bottoms.

01:49 For anyone who hasn’t seen me wearing or know about the Npk T-shirt take a read I think it’s pretty accurate to what we do a lot of while training. I also look more bearded due to not having a shave since start of Movember.

02:03 Enjoy all the little extras of me failing.

Chains, Precisions and Parkour. (Video).

I have just finish editing a new Npk video of Saturday’s training. If you have read the previous post called Chains, Precisions and Parkour it’s a video related to that day.

I wanted to capture some movements from the day primarily of myself to put a small video together of my training. I did this and all is explained in the previous blog post called Plyo and Strides.

As a secondary objective I decided to film others training so that I had some footage to edit and see what I could make. I was happy with what I did film and felt it came out as a great video. Obviously, looking back there is always room for improvement and things which I could have altered and so forth.

I enjoyed the intro I made with random clips from the day which I felt helped ease you into the video. Diogo makes me laugh how he says to Denis, ‘it’s retarded!’ in one of the clips.

I normally struggle with titles of videos. Although, it has become easier because I blog so much, I always have to come up with a post title and so I thought that was also fitting to call the video the same as the blog post title. That way it won’t cause any confusion in relation to the video and blog post combined.

Again I used some soft instrumental music for the video, which I think worked well with the video but not entirely. I’ve came to accept and like it for what it is but felt at first that maybe I should change it to something I normally use with lyrics, like a rap/hip hop track.

 

 

00:37 I like the shot of Zain from underneath doing a precision and diving kong. There is just something about it which is cool.

00:46 I included the two shots of me doing precisions and Catleaps/Arm Jumps rather than have them over edited like they were in my video. I had them as singular shots in this one.

01:12 I like James’ rail precision and wished I had some more shots to experiment with for the video.  I also really liked how the beat changed as soon as he landed on the rail.

01:21 Yaz’s stride run at High Pavement I enjoyed filming, even though you can’t see the starting slabs he lands on, you have an idea of how far they are spaced from the way he strides and the fact you see them earlier in the video from James. I also like the ending shot of Yaz scaling the window and building.

My only disappointment with this shot is on the first take I was below him as he cat the window and it was a great shot then panning up as he climbed the building. Sadly, he didn’t carry on and stopped on the bars and so that shot had to be scrapped and replaced with the one you see in the video.

01:42 Denis doing a webster at an angle off High Pavement wall was different. He seems to have a habit of doing awkward movements. I like the shot of him as he lands on the pebbles then runs off.

01:51 I had a few shots of Sonny doing the kong clear, although, on the others he stumbles on the landing and it didn’t look as clean so I blended the two better takes. I like how he just remains tucked in the air.

01:55 Lastly is Yaz and his turn vault, drop into cat then does the 180 cat. I really do love this shot and the way I panned down the wall for the movement. As you can see in the last clips he was having a particularly rough time getting traction on the wall for the 180 cat as expressed with the loud outburst about him keep slipping.

I hope to make a few more videos like this over winter and shall keep everyone posted.

Plyo and Strides. (New video).

Today I spent most of my time editing a video of Saturday’s training session. The video itself is short and sweet – I didn’t realise I had filmed so little. Although, to be fair after training at IBM/Precision Triangle for hours it was not too long until it was getting dark. I improvised with what footage I did have and worked with it. My aim was to acquire enough footage from the day to produce a small video of my training.

The video has a different feel to the usual montages I have made in the past, even from what you see out there at the moment. The music was different to what I usual use but I felt it worked well within the video. It reminds me of music played in the background of computer games. I’m more open to music without lyrics and which have a more chilled feeling to them, I think they work really well with these sort of videos.

I wanted to film it all as naturally as possible without the aid of a fish-eye, which are so over used in the Parkour community. I am also guilty of using them in the past with videos, not to make gaps look big but because they are an easy option of getting up close and personal with filming.

I feel simplicity is beauty and I would like to make more videos using this concept perhaps over the winter period. That way it keeps me warm by practising the same movement over and over again, constantly improving the overall technique. Also in winter you tend to not be able to do as much training wise, so I revert back to basic movements and conditioning.

 

 

In hindsight there are some things that I would have liked to change in the video, they are listed below.

00:43 Could have get more angles at High Pavement of the strides (I thought I had loads and it turned out I hardly had any). As I felt it was rather over edited or cut too much on viewing it.

01:36 The angles are great, although, I would have liked to get the buildings roofs in and perhaps some sky as well.

I would have also liked to get some more variety of my Precision and strides at IBM overall so had more things to add in the video.