I have to go to sleep, but before I go I thought I'd share that if you consider the compressed angles that occur when comparing the 1/8 ball aims, you realize that the first 6 aims encompass half of all available angles. 45 degrees away from a full ball aim is the 6th aim, which is 3/8 ball (1/8 off of half ball.) You can measure it below with a protractor. The brown line, which is a 49 degree shot, is only 45 degrees away from the straight in yellow. Again, the reason the angles compress is that the ghost ball, and hence the cueball aim line, moves from aim to aim.
Patrick, your diagram makes sense, but it just doesn't feel right. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because the vast majority of shots we actually choose to shoot are under about 45 degrees. If not, we try a different pocket.
This is a fair point if you also take into account that other pockets may be blocked (or "behind" the OB) or you may choose the thinner cut for position play. I don't accept that the system should choose your shots for you.
And since the shots over 45 degrees, especially those approaching 90, contain most of the contact points that are actually available, in practice we eliminate most of the problem you present.
LOL. How many is "a ton" again? But another valid point is that we tend to favor shots more as the cut angle gets less, so maybe some weighting is in order for shots in various ranges of angles, say 0-30 degrees, 30-45 degrees and over 45 degrees. This could make a noticable difference, but I'm pretty sure it won't change the conclusion that these systems leave large percentages of shots uncovered without adjustment.
And as for "minor adjustments", that's exactly what I'm saying is needed with these systems. The fact that some adjustments are more minor and some more major doesn't mean any of them are covered by the system. If they're outside the system, we don't know if they're minor or major adjustments except by feel - the system tells us nothing about that.
I'll think about weighting the calculations based on severity of cut angle tomorrow.
Absolutely Hu. Patrick's post is just caffeine-induced slide rule mania and nonsense. And as YOU know...the use of english,for example can massively reduce the number of required angles since the line of departure of the OB can be massively adjusted from ANY ONE of Patrick's cut angles.
I didn't use any english at all for my testing. With english the gaps would have probably disappeared however that would have defeated the purpose of my testing. Likewise, the proponents of SAM sometimes use smaller divisions such as SAM 2.5 once someone has a grasp of the main positions. However I only wanted to know what percentage of balls would be pocketed with the main SAM positions. What I found is that there is substantial adjustment in the hit as the angles between the cue ball and object ball are changed. Contact between round balls seems to be self compensating to a large extent as angles between the balls change, something I didn't anticipate.
I can't begin to explain it well without diagrams but the proof was in the pudding, I couldn't argue with what I saw with my own eyes. I do my best to test objectively but sometimes we intuitively expect a result. I expected far poorer results than I received leaving no doubt that the testing did not give the expected results but far better results than I expected from SAM. I did repeat the test just to be sure and got the same results although just going around the full half circle was a double test in itself since one quarter of a circle actually tests all of the angles or the mirror image of all angles.
Simple as it sounds the key to fractional aiming systems working is that we see different areas of the object ball as the angles change. A one-quarter ball aim with the ball in one position does not send the ball in the same direction as a one-quarter ball aim with the ball in another position. Difficult to explain but compare it to the moon orbiting the earth. We never see more than one-half of the moon at one time yet before we went into space we had accurately mapped about 7/8th of the moon due to different perspectives.It seems to me that the different perspectives have a huge impact on these systems working, It could be called an adjustment but it isn't one we are making, The adjustment is inherent in the changing position of the balls and the stationary positioning of the pockets.
Afraid I have spread more fog in my efforts to explain something that is very hard to visualize but the proof is to be found on a pool table if someone simply accepts what happens without trying to make adjustments that aren't needed.
Whether the system works better for beginner or better for pro is debateable but one thing for sure is the system does works. Just from my own experience, I've seen new player that Ron has taught for 1-2 years that played pool like she have been playing for a lot longer.
I just thought that it would be much harder for a better player (Advanced/Pro Player) to break their playing habit over their years of play to learn this system. I could be wrong as it was just my own general assumption. I'm still trying to grasp this system and have been using only selectively on shots that works for me or shot that gave me trouble with my natural aiming ability. I'm at a point where my brain seem to know where to hit the ball to pocket it but on some shots where I don't really trust my feel for the shot (the system works). It's been hard to adjust to this system and it threw my game off for a few months. I honestly don't think it will take me a few month to learn this...probably 1-2 years. I'm a little slow plus I can only play 1-2 hrs a week if I'm lucky so maybe 1-2 months is possible.
Regards,
Duc.
av84fun said:
Duc...first...I think the post you quoted from Colin was from quite a few pages ago. I rarely miss opportunities to sing Colin's praises so I mean no disrespect when I reiterate what I posted earlier to Colin...that being that he does not understand the basic dynamics of the system...either Hal's version or Stan's Pro One version.
As I have stated, Colin and MANY others have fallen victim to the massive amout of misinformation posted here and eleswhere purporting to explain the method but personally, I have not seen a SINGLE post that does justice to an explanation.
Regarding whether Pro One/Center-to-Edge can more readily help beginners than amateurs, I would most strongly disagree. When explained correctly the better the player the more readily they will SEE POINT BLANK that the method is extremely sound.
It is also common knowledge that several top speed pros are now using the method...including Bustamante as Spiderwebcomm verified in an earlier post.
Stevie Moore uses it...as taught by Stan Shuffett...and there are MANY others who are taking instruction from Stan and Ronnie but who those "students" are is their business.
And it takes nowhere near 10 years to adopt the method. Ironically, the most difficult aspect of it is that some shots LOOK wrong vs. your old aiming method and it takes a while to get your brain to TRUST the new look because it is CORRECT.
As I have mentioned, it also takes some time to acclimate to the use of certain types of english but ramping up to full compliance with the system should take no more than a matter of months...not years.
Much of the method will be accommodated almost instantantly. It is the "finer points" that can take some time.
So, IMHO the better the player the FASTER they will ramp up to full performance...not the other way around.
First remember that your seventeen points are on one half of the cue ball making them twice as close together. The other thing is that these contact points change as the angle between the cue ball and the object ball changes relative to the table so that we actually have an infinite number of angles available to us.(seventeen angles per shot in your example, but a different seventeen for every shot)
I would guess most corner pockets are around 4.75 to 4.875 inches now with the side pockets wider. Of course there is an additional "fudge factor" since a round ball will slide off of the corner of the cushion and fall in the pocket. At a guess the effective width of the pocket is probably at least 5.5 inches wide, maybe larger.
All of these things contribute to the fixed point aiming systems working better than I anticipated.
Hu
Patrick Johnson said:
I don't mind the skepticism, Hu. I think this diagram might help you visualize this - it shows an object ball in the middle of the table with lines going to the pockets to show the size of the contact areas that need to be hit to pocket the object ball into each of the pockets. Where the lines pass through the edges of the object ball is the size of the contact area - the "magnified" ball shows the same thing in a size that's easier to see.
The center of the object ball is 25 inches from the side pockets and 60 inches from the corner pockets. Look at the contact areas and imagine how many of them it would take to cover 1/4 of the object ball's circumference. That's how many cut angles you need at that distance to make every possible shot into a chosen pocket.
pj
chgo
P.S. This diagram has 4.5-inch pockets. Each contact area would be ~25% bigger for 5-inch pockets (2.75 vs. 2.25 inches of "slop"), so you'd need ~20% fewer of them.
All good stuff Hu...and I used a variation of SAM as my baseline aiming method....until I did two days with Stan!
But I guess my main point...given the subject matter of this thread, is that Pro One and the up-to-date Houle center to edge methods are NOT fractional aiming systems in any way shape or form...but SAM is and was a system that Mr. Houle taught quite some time ago along with MANY other systems.
Ball fractions are not even mentioned Current Center to Edge or Pro One. (except the center of the CB obviously).
And the whole pivot aspect is misunderstood too. The most proficient adopters of Pro One don't even use an obvious "mechanical" pivot once the method is internalized. They use an "air pivot" which is really no pivot at all since they just come to SEE the center to edge line and place the correct portion of their bridge hand on that line such that a mechanical pivot is no longer necessary.
Stripped down...here's the deal.
1. The CB is round.
2. By placing the bridge hand on the table in "front" of the CB ,an infinite number of physically natural lines of aim can be achieved...simply by moving the bridge hand around the circumference of the CB.
3. The dynamics of Pro One simply force the shooter (who is executing the system correctly) to place his bridge hand in the ONE correct position and to thereby achieve the EXACTLY correct line of aim through the center of the CB.
4. Up to this point, there is no guesswork...no adjustments, no years of experience...and no voodoo. You could EASILY teach an 8 year old how to AIM most shots in half an hour. STROKING the shot once aimed is a WHOLE different matter obviously.
5. English applied on the horizontal centerline...up to .5-1 tip requires no adjustments.
6. More side and/or high or low DO require what I consider to be intuitive adjustments or "feel" or practice or whatever one might want to call it.
That is why Patrick's uncalled for assertion that I had suggested this system was a be all/end all was yet another of his fabrications.
However, I submit that it is better to BEGIN the adjustment process from a KNOWN correct baseline than to play entirely by "feel" (which no one does in FACT) which is GUESSING given a differnt name...and then ALSO guess about how to adjust.
If you found it surprising (and I assume pleasantly) that SAM worked more often than you suspected, how do you think you would feel if you reached a point where you were actually QUITE SURPRISED that you missed even VERY difficult cuts?? Cuts that the TV commentators would shout "WOW" about?
Now, if there was ever a SYSTEM to guarantee a perfect stroke...shape and safety play and making a couple of balls on the break!!!!!!!!!!!!
Kidding of course but those issues are precisely why NO aiming system will make champions out of ANYONE who cannot execute those other disciplines. For any aiming method to work, ya gotta get the white ball into a position where you HAVE a shot to apply the system to!!!
FINALLY... below is just an example of a shot where Pro One will not work if your intended pocket is the upper right corner. Why? Because Pro One knows there is a side pocket there and directs the ball to that side pocket.
The system is geometricaly sound but does not read minds. So that is one of the situations where you must adjust but the need to adjust is obvious and often...as is the case with this shot, is required by the lay of the balls and shape considerations not because of any fundemental deficiency in the system itself.
I didn't use any english at all for my testing. With english the gaps would have probably disappeared however that would have defeated the purpose of my testing. Likewise, the proponents of SAM sometimes use smaller divisions such as SAM 2.5 once someone has a grasp of the main positions. However I only wanted to know what percentage of balls would be pocketed with the main SAM positions. What I found is that there is substantial adjustment in the hit as the angles between the cue ball and object ball are changed. Contact between round balls seems to be self compensating to a large extent as angles between the balls change, something I didn't anticipate.
I can't begin to explain it well without diagrams but the proof was in the pudding, I couldn't argue with what I saw with my own eyes. I do my best to test objectively but sometimes we intuitively expect a result. I expected far poorer results than I received leaving no doubt that the testing did not give the expected results but far better results than I expected from SAM. I did repeat the test just to be sure and got the same results although just going around the full half circle was a double test in itself since one quarter of a circle actually tests all of the angles or the mirror image of all angles.
Simple as it sounds the key to fractional aiming systems working is that we see different areas of the object ball as the angles change. A one-quarter ball aim with the ball in one position does not send the ball in the same direction as a one-quarter ball aim with the ball in another position. Difficult to explain but compare it to the moon orbiting the earth. We never see more than one-half of the moon at one time yet before we went into space we had accurately mapped about 7/8th of the moon due to different perspectives.It seems to me that the different perspectives have a huge impact on these systems working, It could be called an adjustment but it isn't one we are making, The adjustment is inherent in the changing position of the balls and the stationary positioning of the pockets.
Afraid I have spread more fog in my efforts to explain something that is very hard to visualize but the proof is to be found on a pool table if someone simply accepts what happens without trying to make adjustments that aren't needed.
Yes Duc, it is true that old habits need to die for Pro One to completely take over and such a process will be different for most players.
For example, significant back cuts have never been my favorite shots. My tendency is to over cut them....but not all the time...just 20% or so which makes me afraid of all of them but STILL I make quite a few.
So, Pro One...to me...makes the line of aim look too full and so I was "cheating" the system and, of course...over cutting!
I'm now to the point where such shots STILL look too full but I shoot the Pro One aim line anyway and they go in the bucket. Hopefully, soon my brain will adjust so that the shot LOOKS right as well as BEING right!
(-:
Landon Shuffett told me that it took him 8 months to FULLY internalize the system and as we all know, he had a very sporty game before his conversion to Pro One.
Personally, I see no harm in doing what you do...use the system whenever your "feel" approach seems iffy but with the CORRECT instruction, I think you would migrate to the view that if it works on the shots that are most difficult for you, it should work on all shots and would then adopt the system exclusively.
For sure, using it for all shots is the fastest way to internalize it. And done correctly, it shouldn't mess up anyone's game...at least not after a few WEEKS of practice. What will happen is that you get down on the shot using what you think is the correct Pro One set up and if it doesn't look right...just get up...chalk up and get back down the way you always have.
For me, the system was immediately beneficial since most shots looked right when using Pro One and shots that I might miss 30% of the time were going down like I knew what I was doing!!!
And my banking percentage has gone through the roof. Using Pro One I make A LOT of them and threaten the pocket every time from ALL KINDS of positions that I would never have dreamed of banking before.
(1 rail. Supposedly, the system can be adapted to 2 and 3 rail banks but I don't play bank pool and won't spend much time on such banks because they don't come up much in 9 Ball.)
FINALLY...after all this commotion about Pro One...and just so everyone knows where I'm coming from...we should all spend 5 times as much time practicing shape i.e. pattern recognition and CB distance/direction control than on aiming because advanced shape skills makes advanced shot making nearly irrelevant.
I wish you well in your progress.
Regards,
Jim
Cuemaster98 said:
Hi Jim,
Whether the system works better for beginner or better for pro is debateable but one thing for sure is the system does works. Just from my own experience, I've seen new player that Ron has taught for 1-2 years that played pool like she have been playing for a lot longer.
I just thought that it would be much harder for a better player (Advanced/Pro Player) to break their playing habit over their years of play to learn this system. I could be wrong as it was just my own general assumption. I'm still trying to grasp this system and have been using only selectively on shots that works for me or shot that gave me trouble with my natural aiming ability. I'm at a point where my brain seem to know where to hit the ball to pocket it but on some shots where I don't really trust my feel for the shot (the system works). It's been hard to adjust to this system and it threw my game off for a few months. I honestly don't think it will take me a few month to learn this...probably 1-2 years. I'm a little slow plus I can only play 1-2 hrs a week if I'm lucky so maybe 1-2 months is possible.
My post was just trying to explain what I found in testing. Basically aiming most shots is not nearly as complicated as we(I) make it out to be. The same things that make fairly coarse angle choices work are also what makes fairly coarse units of pivot work I believe. I may be able to see the pivot in action before too long. If so I will be far better able to judge. However Landon's recent national title and JoeyA claiming a major jump in his game from Pro One looms large in my mind. Joey has focused intensely on improving his game for longer than anyone I know of. I honestly didn't think he could find any one thing that made more than slight improvements in his game.
As you say, having a correct line to compensate from is a huge start even when using english. Since you quantified how much english you can use before usually having to make adjustments I have to ask what kind of english do you use? BHE or parallel?
Interesting stuff here and I probably would have dismissed it out of hand without my earlier testing.
Hu
av84fun said:
All good stuff Hu...and I used a variation of SAM as my baseline aiming method....until I did two days with Stan!
But I guess my main point...given the subject matter of this thread, is that Pro One and the up-to-date Houle center to edge methods are NOT fractional aiming systems in any way shape or form...but SAM is and was a system that Mr. Houle taught quite some time ago along with MANY other systems.
Ball fractions are not even mentioned Current Center to Edge or Pro One. (except the center of the CB obviously).
And the whole pivot aspect is misunderstood too. The most proficient adopters of Pro One don't even use an obvious "mechanical" pivot once the method is internalized. They use an "air pivot" which is really no pivot at all since they just come to SEE the center to edge line and place the correct portion of their bridge hand on that line such that a mechanical pivot is no longer necessary.
Stripped down...here's the deal.
1. The CB is round.
2. By placing the bridge hand on the table in "front" of the CB ,an infinite number of physically natural lines of aim can be achieved...simply by moving the bridge hand around the circumference of the CB.
3. The dynamics of Pro One simply force the shooter (who is executing the system correctly) to place his bridge hand in the ONE correct position and to thereby achieve the EXACTLY correct line of aim through the center of the CB.
4. Up to this point, there is no guesswork...no adjustments, no years of experience...and no voodoo. You could EASILY teach an 8 year old how to AIM most shots in half an hour. STROKING the shot once aimed is a WHOLE different matter obviously.
5. English applied on the horizontal centerline...up to .5-1 tip requires no adjustments.
6. More side and/or high or low DO require what I consider to be intuitive adjustments or "feel" or practice or whatever one might want to call it.
That is why Patrick's uncalled for assertion that I had suggested this system was a be all/end all was yet another of his fabrications.
However, I submit that it is better to BEGIN the adjustment process from a KNOWN correct baseline than to play entirely by "feel" (which no one does in FACT) which is GUESSING given a differnt name...and then ALSO guess about how to adjust.
If you found it surprising (and I assume pleasantly) that SAM worked more often than you suspected, how do you think you would feel if you reached a point where you were actually QUITE SURPRISED that you missed even VERY difficult cuts?? Cuts that the TV commentators would shout "WOW" about?
Now, if there was ever a SYSTEM to guarantee a perfect stroke...shape and safety play and making a couple of balls on the break!!!!!!!!!!!!
Kidding of course but those issues are precisely why NO aiming system will make champions out of ANYONE who cannot execute those other disciplines. For any aiming method to work, ya gotta get the white ball into a position where you HAVE a shot to apply the system to!!!
FINALLY... below is just an example of a shot where Pro One will not work if your intended pocket is the upper right corner. Why? Because Pro One knows there is a side pocket there and directs the ball to that side pocket.
The system is geometricaly sound but does not read minds. So that is one of the situations where you must adjust but the need to adjust is obvious and often...as is the case with this shot, is required by the lay of the balls and shape considerations not because of any fundemental deficiency in the system itself.
This is a fair point if you also take into account that other pockets may be blocked (or "behind" the OB) or you may choose the thinner cut for position play. I don't accept that the system should choose your shots for you.
Well, we don't avoid all shots over 45 degrees, but some percentage of them. I'll think about that.
LOL. How many is "a ton" again? But another valid point is that we tend to favor shots more as the cut angle gets less, so maybe some weighting is in order for shots in various ranges of angles, say 0-30 degrees, 30-45 degrees and over 45 degrees. This could make a noticable difference, but I'm pretty sure it won't change the conclusion that these systems leave large percentages of shots uncovered without adjustment.
And as for "minor adjustments", that's exactly what I'm saying is needed with these systems. The fact that some adjustments are more minor and some more major doesn't mean any of them are covered by the system. If they're outside the system, we don't know if they're minor or major adjustments except by feel - the system tells us nothing about that.
I agree that adjustments need to be made to make all shots, but if one can visualize the path lines of the 1/8 aims, the adjustments are easy.
I used to think that a single aiming system was the goal, but I'm noticing that some are easier for more severe angles while others are easier for straighter shots. The fact that with the 1/8 increments, most shots can be aimed, with center cue ball, on the object ball or just outside of it is a very attractive quality of fractional aiming.
Having 5 equally spaced 1/8 ball aims to cover only about 27 degrees(from full to half ball) makes it a valuable aiming technique. Splitting those reference aims yields 10 shots. If I'm dividing correctly that means that we have 2.7 degrees between shots without any further adjustments.
Also consider that the closer the cue ball gets to the object ball the more compressed the angles become from aim point to aim point. I don't know if this is a good thing, since cueball to object ball distance is another factor that has to be taken into account, but as for shot coverage, the closer the better.
I think we're alienating people who wouldn't want to sift through 300 posts to catch up if we don't move this topic to a new thread. If you agree, can someone name a new thread appropriately and post a reply here redirecting to the new thread.
It's an interesting topic that shouldn't get lost.
I think we're alienating people who wouldn't want to sift through 300 posts to catch up if we don't move this topic to a new thread. If you agree, can someone name a new thread appropriately and post a reply here redirecting to the new thread.
It's an interesting topic that shouldn't get lost.
I got lost a LOOOOOOng time ago. Good idea!!!!! LOL
No offense guys,but you might as well be taking about atmospheric effects of the solar system, cuz its way out there!!!!!!!
I think we're alienating people who wouldn't want to sift through 300 posts to catch up if we don't move this topic to a new thread. If you agree, can someone name a new thread appropriately and post a reply here redirecting to the new thread.
It's an interesting topic that shouldn't get lost.
After all of these posts, responses and questions about the nut of Hal's system, his students remain mute - in respect for Hal. I still can't make his one aim pockets all balls work.
We should discuss SAM with slight adjustments for the infinite cut angles or Doubling the Distance to share with inquiring minds - this at least is understandable without a phone call to Hal.
I got lost a LOOOOOOng time ago. Good idea!!!!! LOL
No offense guys,but you might as well be taking about atmospheric effects of the solar system, cuz its way out there!!!!!!!
To bring things back down to earth, step out to the curb and find a round street light post or anything round. Bring a pencil or marker with you and make a mark 1/4 of the distance in from the edge of the pole. Now walk part way around the pole and make another mark 1/4 of the distance from the same edge of the pole from this perspective. You aimed 1/4 in on the half section you could see each time yet the marks are in totally different places.
As obvious as that is when we look at it we don't always consider this when crunching numbers. This is how our set small number of aim points actually becomes an infinite number of aim points all dependent on what angle we are viewing the object ball from. Every time we aim at a different object ball we have a new set of points. Even a single aim point and pivot system has a change in the absolute aim point we are aiming at as we align our cue stick with the cue ball and object ball in different locations. A very simple concept but far easier to show than to write about. We are always aiming at the edge or center of the ball from the perspective we are viewing it. Since we are looking at a point on the outside of the ball this changes with every angle we view it from.
This is obvious when we take time to model it out with poles, coffee cups or whatever is handy but it can be less than obvious when we are crunching numbers. This isn't complicated, the opposite may be true. I figured it had to be something arcane or possibly simply BS so I went a long time before modeling what happens. As soon as I realized the fixed cut angles were not the same absolute angles from shot to shot things clicked into place.
I now believe that the fractional aiming techniques such as SAM and the pivot techniques discussed here can work with comparatively few of either to learn. With experience then the player can split any two points they are comfortable with to further refine the system.
I now believe that the fractional aiming techniques such as SAM and the pivot techniques discussed here can work with comparatively few of either to learn. With experience then the player can split any two points they are comfortable with to further refine the system.
Do you believe that a SAM #3, which most people call a half-ball hit (center-to-edge), can make any cut shot between 22 and 37 degrees? Or is it just a reference to be adjusted?
I didn't have a way to measure exact angles but I could measure the distance of the hit in from the edge of the object ball accurately. The exact same hit in from the edge of the object ball did indeed pocket the object ball for a far wider range of angles than anticipated. This is because the edge of the ball that we are measuring from is an ever changing point on the object ball as the angle and our perspective changes.
Without having the software still available or a way to measure angles and distances I can't answer your question definitively right now. I can tell you that the "automatic correction" I have described above and in my post to Milo means that we make far fewer adjustments of the type I believe you are talking about. I have to go out in a bit, perhaps I will score some coffee cups if it isn't raining to diagram what I am trying to say.
Where can I get images hosted? For some reason I can't get in my own ftp.
Hu
PKM said:
Do you believe that a SAM #3, which most people call a half-ball hit (center-to-edge), can make any cut shot between 22 and 37 degrees? Or is it just a reference to be adjusted?
I didn't have a way to measure exact angles but I could measure the distance of the hit in from the edge of the object ball accurately. The exact same hit in from the edge of the object ball did indeed pocket the object ball for a far wider range of angles than anticipated. This is because the edge of the ball that we are measuring from is an ever changing point on the object ball as the angle and our perspective changes.
Without having the software still available or a way to measure angles and distances I can't answer your question definitively right now. I can tell you that the "automatic correction" I have described above and in my post to Milo means that we make far fewer adjustments of the type I believe you are talking about. I have to go out in a bit, perhaps I will score some coffee cups if it isn't raining to diagram what I am trying to say.
Where can I get images hosted? For some reason I can't get in my own ftp.
I just chose those angles because they're about the farthest from either side that you might use a SAM 3, if a 3 is approximately a 30 deg cut.
Think of it this way: forget about the pocket for a second. If you shoot a half-ball hit, it will do a 30 deg cut everytime, right? Of course the contact point is changing if you move the cue ball, but how could a half ball hit continue to hit the correct contact point for the center of a given pocket? As the cuetable shows, it would no longer be a half-ball hit once you move the CB from a 30 deg angle.
To bring things back down to earth, step out to the curb and find a round street light post or anything round. Bring a pencil or marker with you and make a mark 1/4 of the distance in from the edge of the pole. Now walk part way around the pole and make another mark 1/4 of the distance from the same edge of the pole from this perspective. You aimed 1/4 in on the half section you could see each time yet the marks are in totally different places.
As obvious as that is when we look at it we don't always consider this when crunching numbers. This is how our set small number of aim points actually becomes an infinite number of aim points all dependent on what angle we are viewing the object ball from. Every time we aim at a different object ball we have a new set of points. Even a single aim point and pivot system has a change in the absolute aim point we are aiming at as we align our cue stick with the cue ball and object ball in different locations. A very simple concept but far easier to show than to write about. We are always aiming at the edge or center of the ball from the perspective we are viewing it. Since we are looking at a point on the outside of the ball this changes with every angle we view it from.
This is obvious when we take time to model it out with poles, coffee cups or whatever is handy but it can be less than obvious when we are crunching numbers. This isn't complicated, the opposite may be true. I figured it had to be something arcane or possibly simply BS so I went a long time before modeling what happens. As soon as I realized the fixed cut angles were not the same absolute angles from shot to shot things clicked into place.
I now believe that the fractional aiming techniques such as SAM and the pivot techniques discussed here can work with comparatively few of either to learn. With experience then the player can split any two points they are comfortable with to further refine the system.
Thanks Hu. LOL Sorry, I was just kidding around. As different as this must sound, I will tell you how I "envision" the shot. Ya know when you go to the fair and you see the the people who show you the new products on the market to chop and dice fruits and vegys, and the guy on the mic has a mirror above him so people can see whats he doing? Well, thats how I see shots, banks, etc. Dont ask me why my mind started doing this, because I have absolutely no idea!!!! LOL Along with experience of millions of shots and balls I have hit,and seeing the shot in this manner, I feel I am pretty consistent. I have never used systems. But to each his own. Everyone has their own way. Hey wait, that is a system, isnt it?? LOL. I should write a book!!!!!!
I used the "hit a million balls" system too. Probably still the best but humans being humans we chase short cuts. Now when I start flowing I make balls. When things aren't clicking after a few decades layoff I try to work out angles using conscious thought. The result is often U-G-L-Y !!
Milo said:
Thanks Hu. LOL Sorry, I was just kidding around. As different as this must sound, I will tell you how I "envision" the shot. Ya know when you go to the fair and you see the the people who show you the new products on the market to chop and dice fruits and vegys, and the guy on the mic has a mirror above him so people can see whats he doing? Well, thats how I see shots, banks, etc. Dont ask me why my mind started doing this, because I have absolutely no idea!!!! LOL Along with experience of millions of shots and balls I have hit,and seeing the shot in this manner, I feel I am pretty consistent. I have never used systems. But to each his own. Everyone has their own way. Hey wait, that is a system, isnt it?? LOL. I should write a book!!!!!!
I used the "hit a million balls" system too. Probably still the best but humans being humans we chase short cuts. Now when I start flowing I make balls. When things aren't clicking after a few decades layoff I try to work out angles using conscious thought. The result is often U-G-L-Y !!
Yes, I agree. It is the best way. I have to stay in stroke though, I do realize that. Even a short break, will mess me up sometimes.
I am still open minded on aiming systems. I just havent found one I understand yet. LOL
so maybe 1-2 months is possible.
