Third shot session
While trying to improve my technique and changing things around, the results suffered a lot and I decided it was pointless to record hundreds of shots not lifting off the ground. I was spending a lot of time just driving to the football field, setting everything up and then recording, time which would be better spent on just learning how to shoot. Also, I felt a bit pressured when recording, like I was wasting valuable celluloid film or something.
I set up the shooting pad in the garden instead without the canvas and just practiced getting the puck off the pad with some speed and height. I found tutorials on YouTube, shot a couple of hundred pucks, looked at some more videos and tried again whenever I had some time over. Eventually I realized that I was spending far too much time collecting pucks so I put the pad about a meter from a metal netting, enabling me to practice much more efficiently.
Despite shooting a lot of pucks during a couple of days, it did not pay off immediately but at least I had a clearer view of what I should do and not do. For example, when shooting the type of shots I was practicing, the puck should rest against the base of the blade, not the tip. It was much easier getting the pucks into the air using the tip but a lot less precise. Also, I realized that buying the smallest shooting pad was not at all optimal for a beginner. Players with good technique need very little movement space to get pucks away with both speed and height. Having a short pad meant less marginal for error, often running out of pad before getting the shot in the air.
225 recorded shots. Some wind and overcast, although the sun broke through once in a while.
