Pivot center

[bond007]

Is there a chance that the clubshaft bending that far forward is a optical illusion caused by the shutter speed of the camera or something? I ask because I've seen some high-speed camera slow-mo of Sadlowski's swing, and the shaft dosen't kick anywhere near where that picture has it. I know it flexes during the swing, but not that much, does it??


BTW, Jeff, here's some slow mo of Jamie, at about the 30 second mark.

I caught this slo-mo shot at the 36sec. interval (right at impact) and the shaft is pretty much in line with the left arm.
I have seen some ultra slo-mo shots that show some really distorted shaft positions throughout the swing on some players that don't come close to this young man's speed. Don't believe you would see this kind of distortion on shorter shafts. The longer driver shafts, even though they are tipped very firm, have what I believe to be a recoil effect immediatley after impact.

[Yoda]

I have seen some ultra slo-mo shots that show some really distorted shaft positions throughout the swing on some players that don't come close to this young man's speed.

Homer said that the degree of clubshaft distortion didn't matter.

"The clubshaft can look like a snake," said he, "but the sweetspot is still trying to get in line with the #3 pressure point."

[Jeff]

Bigwill/Bond007

I agree that one cannot trust what one sees when looking at capture images of swing videos - especially when the frame rate is only 30 frames/second. I have seen swing videos where the clubshaft was bent 90 degrees. The reason is due to the fact that the camcorder is operating at 30 frames/second and it has multiple moving images occurring within that single frame time period (1/30th second) and the camcorder simply recreates a composite image according to the camera manufacturer's algorithm. Even the Bizhub Swingvision camera, which operates at 500 frames/second, may result in distortion when dealing with fast club speeds.

Here are capture images from that slow-mo section of the Sadlowksi swing video.



I put in image 1 for fun - to show his amazing clubhead lag.

Images 2-5 show the clubshaft movement through the impact zone. There was no frame that captured the clubshaft at impact.

Note how blurred the clubshaft images are - I cannot trust their accuracy even though this is a slow-mo swing video.

However, there is an interesting point. Look at the clubface sweetspot in relationship to the hand angle. I can believe that one can draw a straight line between the sweetspot and PP#3 and I can believe that the sweetspot is trying to get inline with PP#3. However, that GD photo of Jamie post-impact didn't look right to me - the hand angle didn't look right relative to the sweetspot. I still think that the sweetspot should have been where I drew the yellow line. I don't think that we can resolve this issue because even the GD photos, which were presumably taken with camera that has a very high shutter speed, may be distorting reality.

Jeff.

[O.B.Left]

Jeff

Know what you mean, interesting note and with many implications. Horse racing for instance.

But the GD photos are super sharp and one normally tends to go with that for accuracy no? Could the video blur be hiding a bend? it doesnt appear so but.. Why would the film show a sharp in focus bend instead of just a blur?

O.B.

[Jeff]

The video blur could be hiding a "true" bend.

It shows a sharp focused clubshaft because the camcorder's inbuilt algorithm instructs the camera to produce a composite photo that is compositionally coherent when faced with multiple blurred moving images. It chooses one-of-many clubshaft images that occur within the time space of one frame as being a representative clubshaft image.

I think that one can trust the accuracy of the Tiger Woods Nike Commercial swing video because the frame rate was 4,000 frames/second. Interestingly, there is no clubshaft bend post-impact in that video.

I don't know if the GD photo series was made with a still digital camera, which can have a fast shutter speed of 1/8,000th second and where each image is a single frame captured at 1/8000th second. If the images were captured with a still camera operating at >1/8,000th second, then they should be accurate.

Jeff.

[O.B.Left]

It sticks out my mind that GD used the Viper digital movie camera. Not sure of the frame rate they used but super high like the retail price which is around one million dollars. The viper has a mechanical shutter for a more film like look with no blur.

I wouldnt be surprised if the Nike commercial was shot on the Viper too. The Red camera which is out now wasnt around at the time of its shooting I dont think.

Any body work for Panavision out there?

[GPStyles]

First time trying to attach photos so hopefully this will work.

Jeff, I am no LD expert, just a humble amateur. These pictures of me were taken in October 2008 by GolfGuru. I think they were taken up around the shutter speed you wanted on his Casio F1 camera that can take bursts at up to 1200 fps I believe.

Bugger, not sure I uploaded them. Idiots guide please?