poi theory, part i

i've been going crazy with the poi for the past few days, and have come up with some fascinating theories.

first of all, poi is a practice, not a theory. so the great thing is, you can try out a new idea, and get IMMEDIATE results confirming or rejecting it OR saying "try that again and this time breath while you're doing it...
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1. blindfolded poi. Since you know the length (you can feel the air in your face as the balls whoosh by) and you know the velocity (which is a direct function of 2 things: a) the force you feel pulling on your fingertips, and b) the rotational velocity, i.e. how fast that force is rotating around the axis of your fingertips... THEREFOR, you know the exact position of each poi at any second in time... in fact, the complete beauty of this system is, you also CONTROL the future position of the poi. There is little or no data visuals can give you that your fingertips don't already posess... blindfolded can work.

2. the only rule in poi (for purity's sake), is that the chain / line must remain in full tension at all times. in otherwords, the ball must remain a fixed distance (the length of the fully extended chain) from the axis (where your fingertips grip it) ... only exception being when you decide to wrap it in for a buzzsaw, or do a bounce off the thighs or something intentional... This idea flows perfectly into what I believe is the most fascinating piece of teh whol poi puzzle...

3. stalls RULE!!! and near stalls. There are SO many creative ways to do stalls other than simply as a transition between clockwise and counterclock rotations. The stall is the point of ZERO ENERGY, or PURE GRACE. It is a point of PURE STILLNESS in between one dynamic movement and another. It brings a fascinating possibility into the fray:

4. The continual stall. I am considering the possibility that a full tension (see #2, above) could be maintained by moving ones body around a stationery poi ball, as opposed to rotating the ball around a bodily access. Heavier poi would definitely be a bonus in this experiment... (STOP! Theory runs off to check this experientially) ... OK that was a good thought experiment, just tried it for real... basically it works in low orbits, but trying to do a full "levitating" poi in front of my body with arm pulling around is going to take some serious practice, and SPEED. Basically got to beat gravity on the way down, and modulate force the whole time so that the real "stall" is on the bodily bottom of the arc, and the max "force" is at the bodily apogee (opposite of normal poi, go figure)

POSTNOTE on 4: C has told me that this is called an "isolation"... but i'm not going for an isolation, i'm talking about a full stall with the human body orbiting the fixed poi head. isolations "freeze" the gravitational center if the chain between the poi ball and the fingertips. i'm talking, make your arm go in a large orbital circle, while the poi stays absolutely still in center.

So that's Thoughts On Poi, Part I.

BONUS: a fully tensioned poi path will form perfect "french curves"... i.e. continuous functions that can be expressed as bezier curves (via quadratic equations), with a clean and explicit tangent at each and every point on the path, with zero sharp corners or angles.

coming soon:

* poi as swordplay
* why fingertips rule

future investigations:

* light fire
* partner poi