488 replies to this topic

[Felix Mottram]

I can see that these manoeuvres look amazing, but - with the cross stop in particular - it looks as if there will be a lot of crossed/pulled strings... To me, the highest risk factor is instability (myself or another flyer) when we are all mutually dependent and there is no clean exit available. Visualising the line crosing and line twists is much more difficult with the 2 dimensional representations available to us, without a lot of real-life experience to back it up.

So I do like David's idea of a Richter Scale for moves - this could be very helpful for encouraging and developing novice teams and MegaFly opportunities. Defining the factors leading to difficulty and a Request For Comment on a Quad-line MultiFlier Richter Scale format could be spawned to another discussion thread? [I'd guess that STACK or other multi-line competition formats have developed some of these elements in the context of smaller numbers of participants.]

Andy,

The idea of the Super Sixteen came about somewhat spontaneously at Long Beach when conditions became less than ideal for the grid fliers given all their different capabilities. The Sixteen volunteers quickly showed an ability to cope with the light breeze keeping the kites moving across the window and throwing in the manoeuvres as called by Stephen and John B (as I recall).

It seemed a good idea to up the ante and try to develop the framework for a 'performance' that could be presented when a 'sufficient' number of capable fliers were available even if conditions were not suitable for the full grid mega-team. There would be a need to document the moves that could be components in such a performance and invite suggestions. (The same applies to the full grid mega-team obviously.) John M asked me about threading and as The Decs had recently flown the 8 person 'sprocket' his proposed move did not sound completely impossible. <grins>

I think that everyone is aware that wrapped lines and no clear exit route are a significant threshold in the development of the grid mega-team. Getting a core of fliers together who can cope with that situation seems to me to be the way to gain experience and develop the possibilities.

I hope that this makes sense!

Felix

Edited by Felix Mottram, 15 November 2010 - 12:42 PM.

[RevWizard]

Felix,

The start step of the zig-zag is now available.
As shown it would probably need 200 ft lines. I need to start it much closer to be more practical for 120 ft lines.

Felix,
May I presume that the start of the Zig-Zag is what you were describing?

[Felix Mottram]

Felix,
May I presume that the start of the Zig-Zag is what you were describing?

John,

Not sure I'm following you there. I was not intent on describing anything in particular. Andy had questioned the viability of the 'cross stop'.

Felix

[RevWizard]

John,

Not sure I'm following you there. I was not intent on describing anything in particular. Andy had questioned the viability of the 'cross stop'.

Felix

Felix, I was referring only to the Zig-Zag animation that I created yesterday.

[Felix Mottram]

Felix, I was referring only to the Zig-Zag animation that I created yesterday.

Of course! It looks fine but as you say, looks like it is on very long lines. I think that any diagonals will be very much shorter in practice. Some moves may have to be 'step, stop, step'.

Felix

[RevWizard]

Sorry, I have been a bit swamped the last few days on other things.
I did manage to form 4 mini diamonds from the zig-zag and then rotate 90 cw and back 90 ccw. I hope to have more for this, maybe Friday night gmt-8.

[Felix Mottram]

Sorry, I have been a bit swamped the last few days on other things.
I did manage to form 4 mini diamonds from the zig-zag and then rotate 90 cw and back 90 ccw. I hope to have more for this, maybe Friday night gmt-8.

John,

No rush, it's not as if there is any time frame!

By the way, my comment about the squares/diamonds in the zig-zag was not completely serious. I look forward to seeing what you have come up with.

Felix

[RevWizard]

Felix,

The start step of the zig-zag is now available.
As shown it would probably need 200 ft lines. I need to start it much closer to be more practical for 120 ft lines.

An updated ZigZag is now available at: http://gyraphicdesign.com/Super16
The motion is at 24 FPS(Frames Per Second).
A feature for step to next and also step to previous frame has been added.
The attached file has all the rotations listed for the particular ZigZag mentioned above. This might be useful in developing the calls. I used it to insure that there is never more the a 360 degree twist in individual line sets.

This ZigZag has four mini pinwheels incorporated with in it to show one of the many possibilities of the ZigZag start.

Attached Files

•  zig-zag_01l_calls_turns.pdf   140.05K   89 downloads

[Felix Mottram]

An updated ZigZag is now available at: http://gyraphicdesign.com/Super16
The motion is at 24 FPS(Frames Per Second).
A feature for step to next and also step to previous frame has been added.
The attached file has all the rotations listed for the particular ZigZag mentioned above. This might be useful in developing the calls. I used it to insure that there is never more the a 360 degree twist in individual line sets.

This ZigZag has four mini pinwheels incorporated with in it to show one of the many possibilities of the ZigZag start.

Great work John. I'm wondering if the whole thing could be rotated by 90 degrees. I'm also wondering how to morph from the 16 square to the 4 squares vertical or horizontal without the shift prior to the ZigZag.

The other thought now is how to link the moves together in a sequence... <grins>

Felix

[Stone in Shoe Bob]

Do these animations require a plug-in to play? I was able to play them in the earlier stages of this thread but since they went to the http://gyraphicdesign.com/Super16 web page selection, all I now get is a white screen in my browser, (Google Chrome) when I select the individual animations.

edited for punctuation.

Edited by Stone in Shoe Bob, 20 November 2010 - 02:51 AM.

[play365]

Me to ..I right click on the one you want and open link in new tab and it plays ?

[play365]

An updated ZigZag is now available at: http://gyraphicdesign.com/Super16
The motion is at 24 FPS(Frames Per Second).
A feature for step to next and also step to previous frame has been added.
The attached file has all the rotations listed for the particular ZigZag mentioned above. This might be useful in developing the calls. I used it to insure that there is never more the a 360 degree twist in individual line sets.

This ZigZag has four mini pinwheels incorporated with in it to show one of the many possibilities of the ZigZag start.

my take on the calls would be something like ....from the zig zag ..morf to 4 person balls ..right tips in rotate 1 place clock ..to left tip back to where you started back to ball ..back to zig zag 180 to opp zig zag and back to start

[andelscott]

my take on the calls would be something like ....from the zig zag ..morf to 4 person balls ..right tips in rotate 1 place clock ..to left tip back to where you started back to ball ..back to zig zag 180 to opp zig zag and back to start

You volunteering to create the animation Gary?

[play365]

You volunteering to create the animation Gary?

No John is doing a Fantastic job i wouldnt know where to start ..............................but as your not flying at the mo ?

[Felix Mottram]

my take on the calls would be something like ....from the zig zag ..morf to 4 person balls ..right tips in rotate 1 place clock ..to left tip back to where you started back to ball ..back to zig zag 180 to opp zig zag and back to start

That sounds about right to me. The fact that John has calculated the wraps makes it all seem viable. The eight-up configuration is, as it were, within limits but I suspect that the animation shows too much distance covered before the ZigZag is formed. That is by no means a criticism of the animation!

Felix

[Stone in Shoe Bob]

Me to ..I right click on the one you want and open link in new tab and it plays ?

Thanks Gary.

[RevWizard]

Great work John. I'm wondering if the whole thing could be rotated by 90 degrees. I'm also wondering how to morph from the 16 square to the 4 squares vertical or horizontal without the shift prior to the ZigZag.

The other thought now is how to link the moves together in a sequence... <grins>

Felix

Just wait until you see what I started last night. It might give you even more ideas.
Four vertical diamonds morph into two larger vertical diamonds, then morphing into a single large diamond.

[Felix Mottram]

Just wait until you see what I started last night. It might give you even more ideas.
Four vertical diamonds morph into two larger vertical diamonds, then morphing into a single large diamond.

Good thinking...

Felix

[RevWizard]

Do these animations require a plug-in to play? I was able to play them in the earlier stages of this thread but since they went to the http://gyraphicdesign.com/Super16 web page selection, all I now get is a white screen in my browser, (Google Chrome) when I select the individual animations.

edited for punctuation.

You would need the Flash plug-in to run them.
I know personally that it works well with Firefox, Safari and Internet Explorer. I have not tried my animations on Chrome. Personally I prefer Firefox because it runs well on Windows, MAC and all kinds of Unix and Linux platforms and still looks and handles almost identical. I work on all of those types of platforms regularly.

[RevWizard]

Me to ..I right click on the one you want and open link in new tab and it plays ?

It won't play automatically. You will have to click the Play button at the bottom of the gray window.

The window size is 700x700 thus if you have a small screen with low resolution, you may have problems. As I work in the photographical and graphics design branch, I have rather large high resolution screens 1920x1200. It is kind of tiny for me.
Most screens today can at least handle a resolution 1024x768 or even 1280x800. If you have one of those small monitors, you might have to right click and use the zoom out.