How's my crosspicking form looking?

I’ve been seriously practicing for many, many months now, I can actually do this faster but it will get out of control past a certain point and sound forced, probably due to string tracking.

I don’t know if this is correct form but it seems to be working and at times sporadically feels as effortless as if I’m picking 1 string. So there are some moments of clarity.

I found the key is reminding myself to stay relaxed, play with a light pick attack, and not force it to achieve this featherlight feeling,

I feel as if I’m on the verge of a big breakthrough but still missing 20% of the puzzle.
Perhaps it’s only a matter of time.

My question is how’s it looking so far? Something to keep working on, maybe some pointers?

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The link does not seem to be working, at least not for me!

How about now? I tried copying html code to embed it but it doesn’t work. But maybe the link will work now.

Hi! I edited your post. “youtu.be”-style links don’t seem to work. So I switched it to the standard “youtube.com” version with “watch?” after it. Just put that on a line by itself and you’re good!

Playing looks/sounds great. I can’t really see what’s going on with the arm from this angle but in general, your goal with all these motions is to go fast and search for smooth. If you can do it quickly and sloppily in a way that feels smooth and effortless, then that’s the first step. If you slow it down a little bit from that speed and you can clean it up, then that’s the second step.

If you ever get stuck where it doesn’t feel as effortless, go fast and sloppy again until it feels effortless. That’s how you “find” picking motions you’re working on. If you can’t do it so fast that it’s sloppy, then it might not be the right movement. I know that sounds backwards, but an inefficient movement will have trouble going fast enough to actually become sloppy.

If you get a chance to re-film this with a camera angle with more visible arm that would be great. Also, more light, like near a window and 120fps if you can.

Good work!

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Thanks for replying Troy! It’s a work in progress. To get to the point where I am now I had to play sloppily a lot. I focused more on comfort at the beginning than on being accurate. I thought that if the movement itself feels smooth and speedy but sounds like shit it’s a matter of cleaning it up allong the way. I feel trying to be accurate from the start creates a lot of tension. I’m now at the point where I’m adjusting and minimizing my movements on the right hand to gain that 20% of the puzzle that I feel I’m still missing. That together with the string tracking to accomodate for the smaller pick strokes I’m now making sometimes causes some discomfort. Luckily I feel it’s a mental thing and that I have to remind myself to stay zen about it haha. I used big pick strokes when I started out practicing to make sure I was double escaping. It feels very much like side to side picking now eventhou that’s probably not what I’m doing. I’ll try to re-record this during the day under better lighting, not sure if my samsung s5 can handle 120 fps. Back to the shred shed!

I wouldn’t worry about “motion size” per se. What I would worry about is making the same movement that you want to get good at versus making a different one that you will have to change to something better.

For a similar reason I’ve stopped asking players in interviews to exaggerate their movements so we can see them better, because it was causing them to change their movements to something that doesn’t look like their actual playing. Instead, I’ll now ask them to play a little bit louder, or a little bit slower. This usually gets more realistic results.

In your case what are you trying to do, play faster? If so, then think about speed more so than shape or size. What you want to end up with is a motion that is more or less the same at different speeds, with only small differences, slightly bigger or smaller, slightly more or less pick, and so on. This may be what you are referring to, and if so, carry on!

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