Starting my journey

Technique Critique
#1

Hey everyone,

I’ve been playing guitar on and off for years with some long breaks and have gotten back into the swing of things over the last year or two. My picking hand feels very different than it used to and I’m trying to get a sense if my approach seems alright. I am super interested in diving into a bunch of Troys content and have already watched a tone of videos on youtube! But obviously watching videos and trying to analyze your own technique is very different. I’d love some feedback on a random video I shot that shows my picking hand in motion.

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#2

Turn your amp on.

Are you picking entirely with downstrokes?

#3

What I see is a kind of unique way of playing. It looks like a rotational forearm movement but more pronated than usual which almost gives it the potential to become a double escape motion where the pick rises above the plane of the strings on both up and down stroke. It’s hard to see if that’s the case from this angle. I not very good at determine but there might be some jumping involved also.

It’s clear that the motion isn’t super smooth and one thing that can cause this is trying to do very controlled small movements before the motion is burned in. It almost seems like you want to stay as close as possible to the strings at all times. I’m not sure this is the case here, only you can tell. So how does it feel if you were to describe the motion?

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#4

I think you hit on alot here. This has developed over the last year or so with my attempt to try and make my picking motion as small as possible. I think i used to be more of a wrist picker, but this rotation started as I tried to control the pick travel.

I feel like Im using my wrist but clearly when I see videos i can see the rotation Im doing.

#5

I think for starters Im going to try and adjust my picking so more of the motion is coming from my wrist with the forarm rotation added as a supplement

#6

Wanted to add a new video with better quality. Im still doing the same rotation movement but tried changing the angle to more of a neutral or downward motion. Feedback would be greatly appreciated!

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