First experiences with drill?

[Shadow_7]

Wow, the staff could afford acetate sheets????

These days they make a .pdf available with the sets. To be printed by the members before camp. Unfortunately they take the same approach with the sheet music. Which doesn't work too well with the older folks who existed before computers, internet, and printers.

As I recall one winter camp BITD, where sheets were actually printed. A big ol box of 14" sheets all neatly stapled together. And before we got through stretching a wind cyclone came on by and lifted half of the box of sheets out and up and littered the neighboring blocks with drill charts. I think that's the last time they bothered printing them out.

[regisminae]

yea... it is helpful to note counts of moves where you cross yard lines also.

Learn to do the math in your head, so that you don't need to guess where the crossing counts are. It's easy once you get used to it.

e.g.: I start 3.5 steps inside the 40. 13 counts later, I'm supposed to be 2 outside the 35. On what counts do I cross the 40, and the 35?

I'll be moving (laterally) 13.5 steps in 13 counts. Thus, each count, my motion across the field is just larger than 1 step. So I cross the 40 with my fourth step (with step three closer to the yardline than step four), my eleventh step should fall just short of the 35, and I cross the 35 with the twelfth step.

Foolproof steps to doing the math:

-Determine your lateral travel distance (in 8-to-5 steps, or whatever other unit you choose) for a move.

-Divide distance by number of counts (assuming even step size, straight-line path). Estimate as needed, but know which way you're rounding it.

-The number of steps that you are away from the next yardline you cross, divded by the number you just got in the previous step (drop the remainder) is the last step that does not cross the yardline. If it comes out even, you are on the yardline at that count.

-If the remainder that you dropped in the previous step is less than .5, the step before you cross the yardline is closer to the line than the one after. Remainder bigger than .5, crossing step ends up further from the line than it started. The farther away the remainder is from .5, the bigger the disparity.

It may help to count backwards from the end, rather than forwards from the beginning, as in the example above. For the second crossing in the example, I end up two steps off, moving just over a step per count. Thus, two counts before the end of the move puts me just on the other side of the line.

Know simple decimal/fraction equivalences: halves, thirds, and eighths give you enough flexibility with your estimation to be reasonably accurate, if you know which way you're fudging your ratios.

Oh, and stay in the form.

[mckdan]

If it was the first show why in God's name didn't they just have you all march the show as is and change it the next day in practice?

We were over a minute over on time for the show! It was either change or take a huge overtime penalty.

[Barifonium]

get a piece of graph paper and mark off a football field's dimensions and yeardlines where 2 squares = 5 yards (maybe double that scale if you need to and have a ####load of sets like most WC corps do-), and each sqaure being 4 eight-to-five steps.

Then, find your dots one at a time and play connect the dots, drawing (small) arrows showing your path. You can even mark with small numbers what number your set is. Then on a separate sheet of paper, as you go, use the count structure and figure out the exact size step (__ to 5 stepsize) for each move and write it on the back of your sheet as a list. For diagonal moves you can use the pythagorian theorem. You can maybe a sheet for every movement.

And.. you can get a friend with a video camera and you can go out to a local football field and practice your drill sets and do a runthrough by yourself with him videotaping so you can watch it afterward and see if you hit your dots so you don't ahve to keep looking down.

Just some stuff I did my first season.

[JeffUsnaDB]

(Apologize if someone already said this...)

I remember my first DCI drill experience being quite an eye-opener. I had been writing my high school's drill and teaching my college's drill when I marched DCI. So I thought I knew what I was doing. I quickly realized that there are people (read: instructors) who knew WAY more than I did.

If you're marching DCI, you're probably one of your school's "better" marchers and players. You might even be a section leader or your school's drum major. Trust me, EVERYONE in your new corps is. So the first time you feel the need to glance down that diagonal and "try and fix it".... don't.

Just let the instructors do their jobs, and enjoy the experience!

Good luck this summer!!!!

Jeff

[BozzlyB]

There's also counts and special moves. M8 H4 as in Move 8 Halt 4. Sets I write every other line, the transition between sets (counts) go inbetween. There's also special horn moves, foot moves, and other complexities of modern drill. Personally I hate that stuff as a member. Mainly because it's impossible to do cleanly / well. With more defined moves, bells front and flat, bells in and flat, bells front and up, bells in and up (to the box), feet together, feet apart, it's much easier to teach and clean (fewer questions). And doesn't require a minor in dance to compliment your major in music. And it doesn't take a full month to get past learning the drill for the 2 minute opener. (for the 7th time).

Good God. I gotta say, learning drill is so much more complicated these days, lol. I also remember learning off the page a few moves at a time, and just dressing to the form after that. Never had a dot book in 4 years of marching! If there is one thing this dinosaur will readily admit to, drum corps is WAY harder than it used to be. The visual demands on marching members these days present challenges I never had to worry about.

[Blake13]

Write everything down in dot books. I'm sure everyone has said this though before though. Every horn move, visual, counts, set number, make a sketch of the form and the guide points.

And the first time learning corps drill is a b****

[LancerFi]

Hey...it was BD...our busses didn't have mushrooms growing out of the floorboards, either! (at least, that was the story told by a couple of 27th guys who moved to BD in 84)

That happened to me on my first night in BD. Mike Moxley put me up for the night the day I moved up north from San Diego. That also happened to be the first night the visual staff met to discuss drill. Mike invited me to watch and I was smart enough (first time for everything!) to keep my lip zipped.

They were going over the opener, "Bacchinalia"...remember that a bacchinale was a Roman orgy.

So they're discussing the first bit halt/hit in the show and I see that the drill's expanding. I #### my head a little, Mike asks if I have an idea, and I answer that "if everyone's coming to the orgy (Mike's actual description!), shouldn't the form be coming together?"

And THAT was my one contribution to drill for the 84 Blue Devils!! Always felt kinda pleased that people with their experience took seriously a suggestion from someone who had NEVER marched corps style...just one of the things that made me love that year....and regret that I didn't discover BD sooner.

That's a fabulous story.

What I don't or didn't like is when people assume certain things and state certain things and they have no idea what really happened. I guess I now feel like the cat that ate the canary. People are sometime in their own little worlds and talk themselves into facts that don't exist.

I'm sorry if I'm sounding a bit bitter but I hate that I did something nice for people and then they believe it was talent that gave them certain positions. I guess that's what it is.

I had some great years and a lot of them, and wanted others to get a taste of that, but no good deed goes unpunished.

Sorry for this rant!!!

[CrownLeadSop]

Run whenever they say 'reset.' Like, really. Sprint. It'll suck at first since you're not fully in shape yet, but I swear that full-out running back to sets all the time was one of the primary reasons that I lost so much weight so quickly in '08. I mean, obviously it helps to know where you're running back to, but the instructors really like it when you show that sort of enthusiasm.

Run back, but be careful about it. We had a kid snap his ankle in half running back to a set on a bad field in 08.

[DrinkinOuttaCups]

Run back, but be careful about it. We had a kid snap his ankle in half running back to a set on a bad field in 08.

Wow, that's awful. The worst thing that ever happened to me was that I accidentally got in somebody's way and they shoved me to the side.

So yes, CrownLeadSop is correct - be careful!