The people we’ve taken on as guest contributors over the years are awesome people.
When Kyle, Wes Peden, Moon, or MCP make a new video, you know it’s going to be good.

So this is a thank you, from me (Ryan) to the rest of the M.o.M crew. You guys rock, seriously. Thanks for stopping in and adding your favorite stuff here on M.o.M and thanks for your commitment to your disciplines. You are all phenomenal artists and we want to see more of you here!

Click below for 4 videos (never posted here before) reminding you why our contributors are awesome.
(more…)

www.MinistryofManipulation.com welcomes new guest blogger Wes Peden.

Anyone who has been watching this blog for a while knows that we talk a lot about him. And lately he has been emailing us suggesting things for the blog (and creating some brilliant stuff himself!),  so we’ve given him a set of keys and now he can come and go as he pleases.  So just sit back and wait for the awesome, everybody. Wes Peden is here.

There is a very special Christmas tree at www.contactjuggling.org.

Every year (since 2004) users from the site create new videos and place them under the tree for the delight of all contact jugglers worldwide on Christmas morning. This years tree (LINK) is set up to be awesome, with a new batch of videos ready to be uploaded and will be appearing in the thread very soon!

Previous Years

2004 , 2005 , 2006 ,  2007 , 2008 , 2009

Are you a fan of the annual tradition? Post youtube links to your favorite videos from past DotOrg Xmas Trees, and I’ll embed the videos in the comment section.

Browsing circus videos at the Ministry of Manipulation just got even more addictive.

We’ve installed a ‘related videos’ plugin to help you discover some of the past content that has been featured on our site. Click the post title, and just above the comments for each video our super-intelligent MinistryofManipulation.com robots (from Japan!) have prepared suggestions for past videos that are just as awesome as the one’s you’ll find on the front page of our site.

Every new video leads to MORE awesome videos you may not have seen yet. Check it out! (and let us know what you think in the comments)

Kyle Johnson can roll a ball from his foot to his head like nobody’s business. He has a great eye for juggling and manipulation videos too, and so he is joining our crew here at M.o.M. and will be contributing videos alongside myself, Drew, Ed, Moon and MCP.

Kyle can also hold 9 balls up for an impressively long time… which makes us all feel a little insecure.

Welcome Kyle! glad you could join us!

Kyle Johnson: Previously on MoM

Hi di hi campers…
We know we’ve been silent for awhile now, sorry about that, too busy with other proejcts to post at the moment.
We’re looking for some guest bloggers, (and some ideas as to what to do next with the ministry project).
If you think you’ve got what it takes, to find and post videos or articles of high quality skills with movement, dance, juggling or manipulation, five posts in a week for 1 or 2 weeks, send a copy of what would be your first post to: drew @ this domain . com .

Hi everybody! I’m writing here to share with you what I’m working on in this hot summer here in Rome (with playing banjo ). I’ve been inspired by Ryan with his cube in an old vid, and also Shay in ALTER EGO has tried to use a cube as a new object to manipulate. I respect so much their work, and they helped me a lot to find new way to use cubes. I’m a multiballer, so why don’t try to morph with cubes? I had some ideas working with 8 (90×90x90, very big and HEAVY), and I think it could work, and maybe it could be (or maybe not .__.) an interesting innovation in morphing and multiobjects contact juggling (considering contamination spheres-half spheres- cubes too).

So..I’m studying how to morph the same patterns I can do with balls..with CUBES I’ve tried the CUBE (obviously), DIAMONDS, PYRAMIDS and RINGS. I can’t spin (yet, I hope ) them, but…here on this page you can see some photos!
(more…)

On the front page of JTV at the moment is MoM’s very own Jea9, rocking the British Juggling Convention 2007 – higher resolution and download link available on JTV.

An Instant bodyrolling classic. The audience is about 2000 and that sounds like me cheering VERY loudly at the end of the routine. Perfect, she totally nailed the performance, so good we even clapped for the web video 2 years later!

We’ve been a bit slack on posting videos from JTV, the new releases they have been rolling out recently is golden juggling and manipulation.

Please pardon our appearance while we do some re-arranging round here….
Update: It’s a little bit better, beta release should alow us to show better resolution on the videos, it will do for now. I can see a few minor glitches to fix, if you’ve got any big issues on the site, please flag them up, and I’ll fix them over the next few days. If you’ve not got a 1680px widescreen monitor – don’t worry, you’re not missing anything out to the left.

[Ninja]

Mmmmmmmministry Berlin 2009…

Oh my god it was an amazing experience. we had people coming to us all the way from Australia and the United States… not to mention most of Western Europe being represented there. Such a large group of friendly, inspiring and interesting people helped to make the week in Berlin the huge success that it was.

Take 40 jugglers from all over the world, add in a twist of Jea9, a squeeze of Moon, a handful of Kelvin, A sprig of Colin and Ed, and then season with a pinch of Meg, and you end up with an official workshop of epic proportions. My brain is only just recovering, and I was one of the teachers! I hope the students will be able to come and give us their accounts soon too, but I think we melted their brains pretty bad…

Anyway, in the meantime whilst the we take the time to separate all the awesome moments that make up one amazing week in order to bring you a more coherent review, I’ll leave you hanging some more with the video trailer, sent to us today by Lhupo, who was commissioned by the Katakomben to film the event. Look out for an article in Kaskade magazine too…

More Lhupo: Lhupo’s channel on youtube

[/Ninja]

We used to have a “suggest a link” page – Put if fell off the site in one of the updates last year, – So we’ve put it back (under manipulation links). Meantime some people have e-mailed us links, thank you. We’re having a tidy up and posting a few:
* 4 person interactive poi spinning… – link from Splinter on .org thanks.
* Porte à Porte – combines Cigar boxes with digital Manipulation – Thanks to Pich for the Link.
* Nata Galkina. Foot Juggling. Antipoden. Антипод – thanks to Marco Paoletti for the link.
* Nata Galkina (Feet-Füße-Ноги) Unusual love story. – Also sent by Marco.
Mr. Boul Juggling – Some contact, some Baffoonery in a big ball.

You could be forgiven for not knowing that the Ministry just had one of its biggest, and most successful events, a week long workshop in the Katakomb, Berlin. as there has been no write up on here. Some news leaking out on .org. Hopefully if we drop a few hints, Ed will post a longer write up about it.

I (Ryan Mellors) edited most of this series in the passenger seat while Dawn drove the car; admiring the scenery in between stops at Tim Hortons (where we would recharge on caffeine and latop power) and late-night diners. We drove 2000 miles through a slowly changing landscape, our car loaded with balls of all sizes, hoops, tetrahedrons, bendy sticks, half-spheres, blocks and a video camera. Our objective: build the community, find others like us and explore what this ‘contact juggling’ thing is all about. Shoot lots of video and get to Montreal without running out of money.

Thanks to all who came to the workshops and to all the supportive musicians who offered music for the project. Today marks the official release of the series; 9 short videos documenting the journey. Click below for the videos (RT: 38min,) descriptions and prop contents, as well as a download link in 720×480 .wmv.

(more…)