post your aiming history

Aiming systems

Like most players I started with the Ghost Ball.

Recently I have been experimenting with TOI. I like it for a lot of shots. In particular when I want to make small adjustments from straight in (like a small backcut or worried about shape on a tiny angle with follow) it does seem easier to shift the cue 1/16" and aim dead straight then to aim 1/16" off center on the object ball 8 feet away.

I like having a specfic part of the object ball to aim at (L or R edge or dead center). The short coming (for me) is when inside English just won't work and I have to add BHE to adjust for spin to achieve position. I have an lesson with CJ coming up in a month and hope to get a better handle on that part.

In the mean time it is ghost ball and TOI.
 
I do have a technique for pocketing balls, it's my Ultimate Aiming System

Like most players I started with the Ghost Ball.

Recently I have been experimenting with TOI. I like it for a lot of shots. In particular when I want to make small adjustments from straight in (like a small backcut or worried about shape on a tiny angle with follow) it does seem easier to shift the cue 1/16" and aim dead straight then to aim 1/16" off center on the object ball 8 feet away.

I like having a specfic part of the object ball to aim at (L or R edge or dead center). The short coming (for me) is when inside English just won't work and I have to add BHE to adjust for spin to achieve position. I have an lesson with CJ coming up in a month and hope to get a better handle on that part.

In the mean time it is ghost ball and TOI.

TOI is not an aiming system, never has been, never will be.

I do have a technique for pocketing balls, it's my Ultimate Aiming System is in my first series of videos produced in the 90s. It's a "Center to Edge" system much like CTE, although I'm using sections of the cue ball, not sections of the object ball. The only two reference points on the object ball are the Center and Edge......very simple, very easy, and can produce any angle needed at will.
 
In addition to using TOI, which I have been using for most of my shots, lately I've discovered a new "system".

As a first step, I line the center of the back of the OB with the desired pocket and step 2, I line the center of the back of the CB with the same pocket; and then aim the center of the front of the cue ball (a slight amount to the left if cutting to the right and a slight amount to the right if cutting to the left) towards the center of the back of the OB. I haven't missed a shot yet and I get shape by adjusting the amount off center of the front of the CB.

Sounds complicated, but I've got it down to where I absolutely love it and depend on it.

It requires developing a "feel" for how much to adjust left or right of front center of CB.

There are still a couple of shots where I feel more comfortable with TOI, especially long back cuts, but I'm also getting the "feel" for them with my "system", too.:)
 
In addition to using TOI, which I have been using for most of my shots, lately I've discovered a new "system".

As a first step, I line the center of the back of the OB with the desired pocket and step 2, I line the center of the back of the CB with the same pocket; and then aim the center of the front of the cue ball (a slight amount to the left if cutting to the right and a slight amount to the right if cutting to the left) towards the center of the back of the OB. I haven't missed a shot yet and I get shape by adjusting the amount off center of the front of the CB.

Sounds complicated, but I've got it down to where I absolutely love it and depend on it.

It requires developing a "feel" for how much to adjust left or right of front center of CB.

There are still a couple of shots where I feel more comfortable with TOI, especially long back cuts, but I'm also getting the "feel" for them with my "system", too.:)

You are correct that an adjustment is needed to the left or right of what you have called "front center of CB," determined by a line through the CB to the pocket. Without the adjustments, the method would not be geometrically correct. But I think the adjustments are to the right of "front center" for cuts to the right and to the left of "front center" for cuts to the left (opposite to what you said). That is, the shots would be undercut with no adjustment, so you have to thin them a bit.

To find that needed contact point on the CB more directly, you could do your first step the same way, then visualize a line through the CB that is parallel to your first line. Where that parallel line emerges from the front side of the CB is the necessary contact point, with no adjustment needed (ignoring CIT, etc.). This is an age-old way of doing contact-point-to-contact-point aiming. http://billiards.colostate.edu/threads/aiming.html#contact

You might also find this related thread from a couple years ago of interest: http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?t=328156

But if you are really good at just "feeling" the needed adjustments in the method you described, maybe you've got something that works well for you (as you, indeed, said it does).
 
Just a point of curiosity. If TOI is a way of aiming, what do you call it? I sure didn't mean to insult it. :-)
 
The cue ball is the ghost ball if you can transpose it (in your minds eye) in relation to the line of the shot.
 
Yes, I do get that and like it a lot. I didn't mean to offend CJ by referring to it as an aiming system. It is more than that and I get that but it also contains a different approach to aiming. It incorporates speed, aim, angle, position all in one.

I am just wondering how he refers to it. A playing method or style or what. I don't want to mis label it. It is his system and he can surely define it as he chooses. I just need to know how he would like it to be referenced. Whatever it is, it is the most totally unique approach to playing I have seen.
 
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