Forums > Beginner Poi Moves > How to do anti-spin flowers

Posted: 9th Aug 2007
Yeh i know what you mean. I jsut practice in front of a window using it as a mirror outside or inside in front of a mirror. Try and look for when the poi sort of 'come together' chase flowers ive found harder than slipt time butterfly flowers. Antispin you just sort of look when they come together.

I know that probably doesnt help much but you will see what i mean when spinning

Posted: 9th Aug 2007
One of the little tips that really helped me when doing flowers in general, but especially for antispin ones, is counting the beats as they pass your shoulder, NOT as they point down or up. It really helps to have a singular non moving point of reference. Your shoulder never goes anywhere nor ever changes its position relative to you. So no matter what angle you are or what direction you face nor what kind of flower you are doing, the beats work the same. If you counted beats the way you count em for a weave (i use pointing down for weaves) you'd have a MUCH harder time since you'd have to count 2 seperate beats or drill a lot more. In split time flowers, one poi points up while the other points down so it's much harder.

Also, practice one handed. I drilled planes for antispin flowers for ages one handed in front of a window outside (so ya kinda get enough reflection to see yourself). Most peoples problems it seems are with the part of the flower behind you. The back 180 degrees of the flower require more work to beat into muscle memory than the front as you can't see your hand the whole time and you have to turn your wrist anyway. And the poi essentially change direction of spin relative to your HAND but not your body.

A lot of people try and do flowers without any turn of the torso, just use their shoulders rotation to work the flower. This is a BAD idea. You should always turn at least some towards the arm that is going back behind you. If you think about it, this is the only way that makes any sense if you want to stay in plane properly.

Just as an experiment stand next to a wall facing parallel with it, your shoulder just touching or an inch or 2 away. Plant your feet solidly, then move your arms in long arm circles like you are doing flowers. Make sure and keep them 180 degrees apart. Spin both directions, I call em Backstroke and Breaststroke for simplicity (like swimming). Drill into your body to do the motion so your arm just brushes along the wall the ENTIRE TIME A)without coming away from the wall and B)without putting pressure on the wall and C)without moving your feet. This will force your body to turn into the wall as the arm closest goes behind you. Turn and face the other direction and repeat. This exercise REALLY helped me learn flowers properly. If you think about it, how can your poi be expected to stay in the correct plan if you arms can't even stay in the same plane? This little difference usually is a significant contributer to the wobbly flower problem, once you get off plane its hard to correct without reseting the flower (at first).

Then once you've got your drills and got your beat counting down, put it all together and just count ONE poi as it passes your shoulder. I used to say to myself "pass, pass, pass, pass" as the poi head passes my shoulder. Then I just worked on them over and over till my verbal timing matched the poi passing and it was all even. In ALL split time and butterfly time flowers the poi pass your shoulders at the SAME time.

Another thing to do is stand next to that same wall (ya want one with nothing attached/hanging on it...) and this time WITH poi do the flowers, or at least one arm. You will of course have to stand a bit farther out to allow for the poi. Of course you should probably use soft poi for this...

One final thing before I end my lil rant o' flowers here... learn multiple timings of flowers, 3, 4, 6, 8 are my favorites. but I feel that 3,5,7 beats look cooler due to the odd number. There's different ways of making the beats, you could slow down your arm rotation and keep the poi spinning at the same speed... could speed up the poi rotation and keep your arm speed the same, or change both. This takes practice. I HIGHLY recommend working on different beat number early on so you don't get your body locked into one number (like I did) and have a harder time adjusting.

oh, and lastly, Poly rhythm flowers are fun to work with. Think 3 beats with left arm and 6 with right arm etc. Numbers that are multiples of each other are easiest since they will still pass the shoulder at the same time, numbers which are not will have different timing and be harder to pull off. But work up to them.

Good luck with the flowers, they are one of the most beautiful moves to take pictures of and theres SO many variations in them. I didn't even get into butterfly time and short versus long arm versions etc etc.

I once learned every move that there was,
Every style, Every technique.
Then I woke up, and forgot it all,
So now I struggle to dream.

Posted: 9th Aug 2007
Ooo, flowers, my favourite topic!!



The key to getting nice flowers is learning to count them properly, and that's especially true with antispin. It really helps to count the beats when the poi goes past your shoulder at each of the 4 points (top, bottom, front and back), instead of at the bottom of each circle.



So, when you hand is at the bottom of the big circle, count the beat when the poi head is directly above it, when your hand is at the top, count the beat when the poi head is directly below it, etc. It means the poi is actually only doing 3 whole circles, because each poi is doing 3/4 of a circle between each point, and there are 4 points.



Practise spinning in split time with your hands at each of those points (ie top and bottom, left and right) and then practise moving from one point to the next. The hard part is to coordinate both hands, but keep at it! I personally found it helps to switch which poi your attention is on too, so try and count for example your left poi as it comes up your front, then past the top, then switch to the right poi and count it as it comes up the front and past the top. Don't know if it will work for you, it did for me though.



The other thing to remember is to turn your body as well. At the vertical points, you're spinning in side plane, but as your arms come down either side of you, you're pretty much spinning in side plane. The end result is you turn side to side as the pattern goes round. This really helps with planes, cause your arms are always out to the side of you, never in front or behind.



Hope that helps, and all of that is pretty much true for any flowers (forward, backward, antispin, butterfly etc). Good luck!



Edit: Looks like Imbalance got there before me!! Basically, what he said.
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Posted: 9th Aug 2007
also theres a flowers tutorial by meenik (nick woosley) on youtube thats great help for flower basics have a look

Posted: 9th Aug 2007
All about even timing and flat circles

Practice spinning a circle in any position you can think of, and be concious of making the plane straight.

Take some time to go over the basic of basics, and that'll make your flowers a LOT better.

Empty your mind. Be formless, Shapeless, like Water.
Put Water into a cup, it becomes the cup, put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle, put water into a teapot, it becomes the teapot.
Water can flow, or it can Crash.
Be Water My Friend.

Posted: 10th Aug 2007
Cheers guys exactly what I was looking for, especially that bit about using the wall

I'll go give it a try and hopefully not end up with too many bruises before I get it. I. Will. Get. It *exits, repeating mantra*

Buy gerbils cos you can't spin with hamsters