Judging class design

[Dean Pappas]

All good points Eric ...
Since you open up the question of how the course ought be taught, let me add a bit.
All the discussion I hear is about "what" to judge: which downgrades, how much, what is the maneuver supposed to look like, was it a break? etc.
Also under this heading falls the issue of unconscious biases: we simply say gaurd against it!
The "how" is often neglected. What system do you use to accumulate your downgrades? How do you communicate this to a scribe?
How do you build a system that works, for your nervous system, to avoid unconscious biases. The rest could be learned with a book or a tape! (Granted not easily)
Regards,
    Dean
p.s. thanks for the note the other day

-----Original Message-----
From: Henderson,Eric [mailto:Eric.Henderson at gartner.com]
Sent: Friday, January 09, 2004 11:56 AM
To: discussion at nsrca.org
Subject: Judging class design


     One thing that I have always wished we could do, with judges training, is run through each schedule with the specifics for each maneuver. The thinking being that it is OK to learn all the possible down grades, but it is easier to remember a set of down grades for a schedule. There are the usual generic downgrades like angles and centering etc. But each maneuver has a list that is probably worth going through. There are classics like which way the pull or the push is on a Humpty, or which way up the cross line is in a reverse top hat. Breeding familiarity with the 2004 schedules might be beneficial.
 
    As regards tools to help do the job. I think that a video of each schedule, not necessarily flown perfectly, would be more fun to go though than just the basic rules tape. I have tried to make them and was not happy with the results. Recent feedback showed me that I was shooting for perfection. A perfect rendition of a schedule is not really possible. Especially when the camera often makes a bad maneuver look right and vice versa. I am beginning to think that we should give the observer more credit and trust them to allow for camera bouncing and angular distortion due to non parallel backplanes etc.
 
    Most of us fall into three learning groups. We hear, we see or we try it. More "eyes-on" experience could improve our judging and make us feel better about the "guy" behind us at a contest. 
 
    Some things that became clear during two filming sessions were. You need a very steady and patient camera person. You need to fly the maneuvers much, much closer. That means that you need to accept that you can't draw good separation lines. Smaller planes flown close in reduced the camera waving/shake/wobble
 
    If you try and segment maneuvers such as stall turns and snaps you need to keep the camera on track and not follow the displacement of the plane. (Also set auto focus off and select infinity). Spins have to be dome very low and or the camera needs to be on top of the "clubhouse". You just can't get the plane to look level. Often we could only do one spin we were so low trying to get a good result.
 
I would appreciate any feedback from anyone who is giving this a shot.
 
Regards,

Eric
 
 

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