Object manipulation & Fire Arts movie

Here’s a short film a friend forwarded to me. Various fire artists, talking about their art, and some performance.

Some are from the San Francisco Bay Area, maybe all.

Acrylic Spheres are Lenses

One thing I experienced at the Santa Cruz Juggling Festival was getting burned when doing contact juggling with my acrylic spheres in the sunshine. That’s why you can see me there practicing in the shade. I learn slowly, but I do learn!

But my stings were mild compared to this woman’s problems. She managed to burn down her house with an acryllic sphere. She put it in a window, and it lit her television on fire.

So keep your spheres covered when you are not using them, and don’t put them down (or leave them) where there is direct sunlight.

Bowling Ball Juggling – OUCH!

If you are going to juggling dangerous objects like bowling balls (chainsaws, etc.), do it somewhere you have space, and a perimeter around you.

And if you don’t think bowling balls are dangerous, look at this. Warning, will make you wince!

Upside Down Juggling

As if juggling right-side up wasn’t hard enough, Erik Kloeker set a new world’s record for upside down juggling. The record now stands at five minutes, breaking his previous record of 4:05.

Here is a video of last year’s 4:05 second record breaker. I haven’t found video of today’s record breaker yet. Comment if you have a link, please.

Kettle Bell Juggling

Ok, it’s only one object in the air at a time, so it might technically be just tossing, not juggling, but it’s got to be a pretty good workout.

The kettle bell juggling blog says that bell weighs 16 kg/35 pounds.

Progress Report on Multiball

As I’ve mentioned before, one of my reasons for blogging was to give myself a place to track progress. Which also gives other people learning someone to compare themsleves to. I have no idea whether I’m learning fast, or incredibly slowly. (Past experience suggests slowly).

Today, I’ve managed to do a three ball palmspin in both hands, in both directions. It’s not smooth, and I still tend to drop. It’s also very clicky, but I’m working on that.

I can palmspin two balls in either direction touching, in either hand. Both hands at once just worked after I got the individual hands. I can also palm spin two balss both directions, both hands, without letting the balls touch. But I’m nowhere near as good with that. They still click one time out of four, or so. Less if I’m really careful, so I’m trying to be really careful.

I tried a four ball pyramid a few times, but haven’t successfully completed even one step. (One step = 1/3 of a revolution, if the base is three balls).

Sources for Small Contact Juggling Balls

I found some sources for the small balls that can be used for contact juggling or “finger qigong”. It was just a matter of trying some google searches until I got the right terms.

This search finally got some results. It looks like Acuspheres or Reflex Balls are terms that work. These seem to have chimes in them, so not for practicing late at night if you have roommates or neighbors.

You can also get acrylics of any size from 1/4 inch to 3 inch from Tap Plastics.

I tried Google Products and found some stone spheres. These 2 inch steel spheres look good, too.

If you have any sources that you like, please comment!

Contact Juggling Balls

I was wondering where to buy balls like those in the Finger QiGong posts.

It just occurred to me to look up snooker balls, since I remembered that snooker is played with slightly smaller balls than used in standard pool (billiards).

Interestingly, they seem to come in different sizes, unlike billiard balls. I haven’t tried them, but I would assume that they are smooth surfaced, and could be used. I’ll have to wander down to the local pool hall, and check.

More on Finger QiGong

I followed links from the video in the last post and found http://www.fingerdynamik.de. I don’t speak German, but Google Translate is getting better and better.

I don’t see any info on where to buy the balls that he is using, so I guess I’ll have to email him. If you have any ideas on good place to get balls for contact juggling, leave a comment.

Finger QiGong

I just ran across a demo of what was called “Finger QiGong” on youtube.

It seems to be a form of contact juggling (this example, not QiGong, of course). It’s rather cool. Rather than the 3 inch/ 75 mm speres that seem to be common for multiball contact, they look like about 2 inch or 5 cm spheres, and they are rolling pretty fast. Check it out.

Another interesting part is that the balls seem to have chimes in them, adding an almost music element.

Another video in the series:

There seem to be a few videos of this type, so search youtube, and see what you find. If you find anything particularly good, post a link in the comments!