Experiment - Ballroom judges

[HoosierIUSB]

I've been thinking the last few months about an experiment.

We see a lot of the same judges and competitors at WCS competitions. Here's the experiment: After a competition is done, let some skilled ballroom judges review a J&J or Strictly comp on video and compare it to the judging done at the competition.

Some of the adjustments that would need to be made:

1) Videotaping from the WCS judges angles - this would require a hand held camera (e.g. "Steady Cam") that would replicate as much as possible what judges on the floor see.

2) Only let the ballroom judges view the tapes once - no multiple viewings or rewinding allowed.

3) Judge on only those criteria that ballroom judges actually judge on - musicality might be out, but I'm not sure.

4) Even if the ballroom judges picked different finalists than the WCS judges, they would have to judge the finals from a "clean slate" - that is, judge whoever the WCS judges put in the finals.

The reason? I can only hypothesize here (and I know I'm going to get slammed for these, but I realize I'm full game), but I think that some of the current (and past) WCS judges probably have opinions already formulated about certain dancers based on things like past competitions, whether they have taught privates for them (seems like a conflict of interest, but that's another thread), personal like/dislike, age/height/weight discrimination, etc. Before I get knocked down for saying those things, I do believe that most of the judges do "call it like they see it" and try to be as fair as possible. However, the vast majority of ballroom judges will not know the WCS dancers (hopefully) and therefore would supposedly be free of most of the above-mentioned prejudices.

I know that there will be some people that say such an experiment would be impossible because the dances are different. Well, maybe so. But I would think that a ballroom (particularly Latin) judge would do a pretty good job of assessing technique, partnership, etc.

What do I think would happen? I think you would see some agreement in judging placement between WCS and some discrepancies. It would be interesting to compare some of the large comps (Boogie, Phoenix, etc.) as well as the small comps, as well as a number of comps over time to see if there would be any trends in areas of disagreement (technique, partnership, etc.).

What does everybody think? Arjay and other judges in particular. Thanks in advance.

[SoundInMotionDJ]

The reason? I can only hypothesize here (and I know I'm going to get slammed for these, but I realize I'm full game), but I think that some of the current (and past) WCS judges probably have opinions already formulated about certain dancers based on things like past competitions, whether they have taught privates for them (seems like a conflict of interest, but that's another thread), personal like/dislike, age/height/weight discrimination, etc.

I think if you find out a little more about how ballroom competitions are judged, you will be quite happy with the current system used for swing events.

As an addition (or perhaps aside) to your question, consider this:

Do you think the results for any particular contest would be different if the judges were placed in a separate room and all watched the same monitor and had the same vantage point for each couple?

Do you think the results for pre-lims would be different if every couple was given a 30 second spotlight performance? (The theory being that the judges can only watch you for a few moments at a time, and this way all the judges would see the same part of your dance.)

--Stan Graves

[Jerry Wang]

Hmmmm. The way I'm understanding what you are proposing is in order to see if this experiment would result in an more unbias judging of comps because you feel that from what you've seen in the community that there seems to be a tendancy of judges to play favorites because they know the dancers. I don't disagree with the situation being that it does happen however what you asking is quantifying the thoughts, emotions and reasoning behind a dance judge'. And I say a dance judge since it doesn't matter if its a ballroom, latin, country or swing judge. They are all human, each with a unique blend of personalities and experiences that direct their judging. Sure there are guidelines to what to judge for but in the end no matter how unbias and objective they can be or not, they still judge base on their likes and dislikes.

Sure, if a judge is familiar with a dancer, it seems favored however, its a double edge sword since it may get you past the prelims but the same judge may judge you even harsher at the next round or next time since they know where you are in your dancing and expect more of you. In the end, the only way, unbias and objective judging can be done is if you introduce "robots" to view the judging but then you only be able to judge based upon timing, technique and probably teamwork. It would be interesting to see if you can teach robot judges to judge musicality or somehow be emotionally moved by the competitor's dance.:)

PS - (sorry ranting here ) i hope its not your intention, but you're insinuation that having a ballroom or latin judge because of their ability regarding understanding technique, connection, etc sounds to me that you don't think WCS judges do that which i think is an insult and bit disrespectful. If you ask around or even talk to the WCS judges, you'll find that many come from other dance disciplines including ballroom and latin as well as having competed professionally and served as judges in those dances. (ranting ends)

[WestieTash]

PS - (sorry ranting here ) i hope its not your intention, but you're insinuation that having a ballroom or latin judge because of their ability regarding understanding technique, connection, etc sounds to me that you don't think WCS judges do that which i think is an insult and bit disrespectful. If you ask around or even talk to the WCS judges, you'll find that many come from other dance disciplines including ballroom and latin as well as having competed professionally and served as judges in those dances. (ranting ends)

Plus, have you seen the way ballroom couples do WCS??? As a Novice competitor, I've been told to show solid, sophisticated basics if I want to get noticed. One of the ways to do that is with a solid anchor. Have ever seen a ballroom dancer do an anchor? I came from the ballroom world and I haven't. For guys, stepping down the slot is something I hear teachers harping on A LOT. That's another thing ballroom dancers tend to not always do.

Frankly, I'm mostly happy with how judging is done. Do I always agree? Heck no! Are there certain judges who make me want to withdraw from a comp if I see them holding a clipboard? YES! But what system is perfect?

[whipkitten]

I understand the point of the experiment, but I think that ballroom judges (or any other style of judge) may be able to see that one couple is sharper or more entertaining, but I can't say that they would really be able to judge technique or style. Case in point, Grand Nationals. The Shag judges and the WCS judges are given completely different crtieria to look for. They are similar in philosophy, but they are different concepts. I think it would be incredibly difficult for a WCS judge to judge Shag and vice versa.

Really I think that the system is generally pretty fair. IMO, a lot of the inconsistencies come more from a judge's background rather than personal preference, at least in the better judges that I have seen. I think it is up to the Chief Judge to address what he/she expects out of the judges to look for and enforce the rules that have been put in place.

I'm not saying that I completely agree with the way comps are judged, but as long as this dance stays a subjective dance, i don't know how else you would judge it.

Oh and I completely agree with Jerry in that it can be good AND bad when a judge knows you. Sure, at least you know you will get seen in a big prelim group, BUT i know of TWO judges who have admitted that they judge me more harshly because they *do* know me.

[SoundInMotionDJ]

BUT i know of TWO judges who have admitted that they judge me more harshly because they *do* know me.

From the judges I have spoken with over the years, this is fairly common. Most teachers are harder on their own students. I suspect a lot of reasons for this, among them is to help remove the appearance of favoritism.

--Stan Graves

[HoosierIUSB]

Jerry Wang wrote:

"PS - (sorry ranting here ) i hope its not your intention, but you're insinuation that having a ballroom or latin judge because of their ability regarding understanding technique, connection, etc sounds to me that you don't think WCS judges do that which i think is an insult and bit disrespectful."

No - that is not true - you misunderstood the point. My point - and maybe I did not make it clear - was consistency in judging, NOT the lack of ability to judge. And I did not mean to pit Ballroom judges vs. WCS judges - I could have used Lindy judges, Figure Skating judges, Tractor-Pull judges, whatever.

Perhaps the biggest inspiration for this came from the thread Lindo started re: lack of standardization, which Mario added to:

(Lindo) - " . . . I recently attended a judges meeting at a NASDE event and the head judge expressed that they do not hold someone accountable if they do not do an anchor. ".

(Mario) " . . . The TRUTH is that placements very tremendously based on the judging panel. . . . The worst thing about WCS? Its lack of standardization. It allows for very differing points of view to not only be present, but also flourish. The result is our dance becomes more and more polluted with extraneous rubbish that has little to do with our dance . . .

And I also think Alina made a great comment, too: " . . . The problem I see with judges enforcing some sort of "rules" re doing an anchor is that a competitor VERY rarely gets personal feedback on why they didn't make the callback or why they didn't place from those who judged them at a comp. I just don't see that as being part of the WCS culture (as opposed to the ballroom culture where I as a competitor can go up to a judge after the competition and get a list of things that either offended them about my partner and I or things they liked about our dancing). Competition dancing is really not taken seriously to the point where the judges can act as enforcers of technique because the competitor wouldn't know what aspect of his/her technique are being held against them and thus would be unable to fix that aspect . . ."

As Alina pointed out, I believe that a judge should be able to explain his/her ranking. I don't care about all the excuses like "there were so many dancers, I don't remember", etc. As a judge - YOU rated the dancer, and therefore, you should be able to explain that rating. It's not up to me to explain how it should be done - the bottom line is that competitors deserve that explanation, IMHO, just as they do in other types of judging - ballroom, figure skating, etc. Many WCS competitors I have talked to want this kind of feedback, but it's unavailable. I feel that WCS events need to change this and that part of the responsibility of judges for WCS events would be to document why they placed somebody where they did and be able to inform a competitor of these reasons. I'm not the only one who feels this way. I know there is subjectivity, but too much subjectivity can severely detract from the credibility of a competition - why have it at all if there is no standardization and it's completely subjective? To be fair, some event organizers like Bill Cameron have tried to incorporate some type of feedback from judges in their events, but it would be nice to see this type of effort at more events.

A case in point is the Grand Nationals, which someone mentioned. I've been to for the last 7-8 years, and I've seen something in the Pro Strictly which really bothers me. Usually, there are about 20 - 30 couples enter, with a prelim and a final. Most of the couples are in one of three groups 1) Two "Pros" dancing together, 2) Two "All-Stars" dancing together, or 3) A "Pro" and an "All-Star" dancing together. Virtually every year - and much more so recently - the couples who make finals are virtually always the ones in which at least one partner has won a Classic or Showcase at one or more major events (that's who I'm designating as "Pro"). As far as two All-Stars - no matter how well they dance together - they won't make finals. The problem I've seen is that a few Pro-Pro or Pro/All-Star couples dance poorly and a few All-Star/All-Star couples dance much better, but the All-Star/All-Star couples never make finals. It's almost as if some of the Pros could fall flat on their face and they would still make finals. Two All-Stars can have the most superbly connected and executed dance but never make finals simply because of what they have not achieved. Sorry, but at the last Grand Nationals this trend was so blatant it made me sick.

To those who are happy with the system of judging - Great - I'm glad you are. I'm not, for some of the above reasons.

[whipkitten]

As Alina pointed out, I believe that a judge should be able to explain his/her ranking. I don't care about all the excuses like "there were so many dancers, I don't remember", etc. As a judge - YOU rated the dancer, and therefore, you should be able to explain that rating. It's not up to me to explain how it should be done - the bottom line is that competitors deserve that explanation, IMHO, just as they do in other types of judging - ballroom, figure skating, etc. Many WCS competitors I have talked to want this kind of feedback, but it's unavailable. I feel that WCS events need to change this and that part of the responsibility of judges for WCS events would be to document why they placed somebody where they did and be able to inform a competitor of these reasons. I'm not the only one who feels this way. I know there is subjectivity, but too much subjectivity can severely detract from the credibility of a competition - why have it at all if there is no standardization and it's completely subjective? To be fair, some event organizers like Bill Cameron have tried to incorporate some type of feedback from judges in their events, but it would be nice to see this type of effort at more events.


I completely agree. I'm sad to hear that others have not had the same experience as I have. Whenever I have gotten up the guts to go ask a judge why they rated me a certain way, I have always gotten a response. It may not be right away if they are busy at that moment in time, but the judges I know keep their notes at least for a little while and are happy to chat with you about it.

My husband recently became chief judge at an event in Houston. He believes that feedback is an important aspect of competing and stayed after awards for awhile to allow people to come and ask him questions if they had any. A few took him up on the offer. Then he posted on our local forums that he would continue to answer questions via email and more people took him up on that offer. While at first I thought it was going to be just a bunch of people yelling at him because they didn't like their scores, most people were sincere and truly wanted to find out how they can do better.

I thought this was a great idea. Maybe more judges would be willing to do this?

[westcoastjunkie]

a [WCS] competitor VERY rarely gets personal feedback on why they didn't make the callback or why they didn't place from those who judged them at a comp. I just don't see that as being part of the WCS culture (as opposed to the ballroom culture where I as a competitor can go up to a judge after the competition and get a list of things that either offended them about my partner and I or things they liked about our dancing).

Just curious, as I've never ventured into competitive ballroom dancing...

Do ALL competitors get feedback or only the finalists/semi-finalists?

[Arjay]

Very interesting thread...

Well I figure the best way to approach this topic is by giving examples....
As far as breaking down my theory....wouldn't do much good, everyone is mentioning lots of good points that I would for the most part agree with...everyone is...

The best way to run this experiment by the way would to have two sets of judging panels present at the comp. One set independent from the other. One set of all WCS judges and the other all consisting of only ballroom/latin dancers.

The same relative placement formula to decipher winners. Remember every experiment requires all constants and one variable...in this case the panel.
They would have to be present(video would not be a constant)


Anyway to my examples:

From both ends of the judging clipboard.
I was once asked to judge a hustle competition. With no other true hustle qualified judgesI was asked to judge. What I could judge on was was what my preferences are for partnership dynamics... Granted, this perhaps isn't the best example merely because i have training in other dances.(again one variable, the example used was a "ballroom dancer with no wcs experience") I have experience in most partner dances.

But to compare and see how my judging paired up with the other hustle dancers was rather enlightening for both myself and those I judged...

I can't really say what i felt was conclusive in what we're discussing but maybe that's the point....everyone has their preferences. I'd even say that I don't judge like a typical WCS judge or teach like a typical WCS teacher. heck i'll even say i don't dance like a typical WCS dancer.

The other example on the other end of the judging clipboard is my experience on SYTYCD... You think Melissa and I would have been also ideal candidates for the show considering our experience. But again, based on what these non-partner dance judges they almost didn't' know how to deal with us. they judged us on their knowledge of what they expected and their ideals and their preferences...and it obviously did not include us!!!

[lrsd]

Arjay,

Great concept and its great you are bringing this up. However I have to disagree with regard to having someone from the ballroom community judge this dance, unless they are part of our community. The reason is that ballroom dances and WCS are different in how they are taught and danced. WCS is a street/bar dance, where ballroom(for lack of a better description) is more of a trained dance. I would actually rather see the judging go back to where it started. I think it would be interesting to have the room judge the event...no judges everyone votes for the couple that danced the best dance and entertained the crowd the most. How were people like Franky, Dawn and norma judged? In lieu of the focus of an event be classic or showcase some how create a way that a JNJ or a SS is the focus. Create a new point structre that encourages pro's to compete with am more often...this should also enfluence the dance and spawn more interest in new comers.

(Mario) " . . . The TRUTH is that placements very tremendously based on the judging panel. . . . The worst thing about WCS? Its lack of standardization. It allows for very differing points of view to not only be present, but also flourish. The result is our dance becomes more and more polluted with extraneous rubbish that has little to do with our dance . . .

Judge based on swing, I have purchased US Open tapes for about the past 12 years and have older tapes of previous years and each year I end up playing judge. "great dance, but no anchor" "she is back leading and her leader cant keep up" "they are not communicating, they are trying to impress the judges but missing the point of the 3 t's" "no swing content" "are they doing a hustle or WCS?"

Art

[Alina]

Just curious, as I've never ventured into competitive ballroom dancing...

Do ALL competitors get feedback or only the finalists/semi-finalists?

Anyone who wants feedback and asks for it, usually gets it. Sure, there are times that a judge may not remember details about your dancing, especially if you were cut after a large opening round but usually you can get feedback if you want it. A lot of couples want it and try to get it and judges are usually happy to give it.

Some of the best pointers I ever got came from a judge who judged me in a comp which I was then able to take to my regular coach and explore further and get a LOT out of.

Before I comment on the experiment itself, let me just put this out there: YES, absolutely musicality is VERY important in ballroom and a major criteria being judged, just not to the extent it is in WCS because the more stringent structure of ballroom makes it practically impossible for it to be as musically oriented as WCS is.

I will say, re the proposed experiment, that a ballroom judge judging a WCS competition will look for a lot of the same things a WCS judge would but would also look for different things as well. When I look at WCS competitions (and I've judged lower-level ballroom competitions before) to me what stands out a lot in WCS is lack of, how do I put it, "polish" and "performance" in many WCS competitors. Granted, being a street dance, WCS is more introverted than ballroom, where performance, audience interaction and partner interaction is very important. But besides the lack of performing ability I see in lower ranks, I've seen pros dancing in a competition where they are looking down at the floor while dancing and to me that's a major turn off performance-wise (because you ARE performing every time your get out on a competition floor). If you are not going to look at your partner while you're dancing with them or at the audience who is cheering for you, then what's the point - dance in your own living room by yourself and be done with it:) However, a good ballroom judge will also look at many of the same things a WCS judge would - musicality, technique, connection, lead and follow, etc. It's not that different! A ballroom judge would also place Jordan and Tat first almost every time because they have the total package.

But if you are going to have judges unfamiliar with the personalities out there on the floor judging purely on the dancing and the performance, you might get a different result at least some of the time because they would be unfamiliar with the politics. However, politics are also HUGE in ballroom and no dance world is immune to them. It is very hard to place ahead of a couple that has been beating you for years even if you did happen to have danced better than them once or twice; you move up when couples retire and quit, usually. There are new couples that shoot up and vault over established veterans but usually those are VERY estbalished amateurs turning pro who are better than most pros anyway. It's much easier for couples to constantly switch places in the WCS world IMO so in that sense I think the WCS judging is more fair.

[whipdancer]

A ballroom judge would also place Jordan and Tat first almost every time because they have the total package.

Just curious, how do the judges view pushing the boundaries? Skating on the edge of what is or isn't in that given style of dance. Perhaps mixing a little hip-hop in with your foxtrot.

[Alina]

Just curious, how do the judges view pushing the boundaries? Skating on the edge of what is or isn't in that given style of dance. Perhaps mixing a little hip-hop in with your foxtrot.

Umm, putting hip hop into your foxtrot on a competition floor, at least in international standard is basically not only impossible, it would be ridiculous. It would totally take away from the character of the dance, besdies foxtrot music not being at all hip-hop-py... Maybe you just gave it as an example but in that instance, I think the judges would probably not look at that couple again and would wonder what sort of controlled substances they swallowed before competition...:confused:

All kidding aside, though, there has been a decent amount of innovation in ballroom lately in the showcase competition although we're not talking crazy innovation here. Mostly it has to do with choice of music and its interpretation (not dancing to plain vanilla, Sinatra-type foxtrot, but something more interesting like an Andrea Bocelli operatic piece or something new-age-y or something more rock-n-roll). There is a bit more innovation in the latin/rhythm categories. CHeck out some youtube videos of America's Ballroom Challenge from PBS for examples, like this:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=-jBi6yR-PAs
and this:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=dXTs7ceGnGg
and this:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=zuAyTHlSYR0&feature=related
and this:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=RQv8FSi37NA&feature=related
and this:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=L59pW_uUIkw&feature=related
and this:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=iElnSHnoE30 (very weird!)

[Dima]

http://youtube.com/watch?v=zuAyTHlSYR0&feature=related
The Bird Dance Exhibition was performed at Liberty in 2005 (i think). I remember Grace mentioning that Kyle's jaw dropped when he was watching it.
On a different note. I wish the commentators would STFU and just let people watch.

[Alina]

The Bird Dance Exhibition was performed at Liberty in 2005 (i think). I remember Grace mentioning that Kyle's jaw dropped when he was watching it.
On a different note. I wish the commentators would STFU and just let people watch.

When I saw it live or the first time at Ohio Star Ball (the competition that was taped for America's Ballroom Challenge), my jaw dropped too and I've seen that couple dance many times before, with the same reaction. Their show routines are stunning and Yulia is the best latin dancer in the world right now, period. She is dancing with another partner now and I just saw their show two weeks ago in Boston. While it was also incredible, something about her and Max (her SO in real life) was just really special when it came to shows. Their choreography was brilliant!

[whipdancer]

I think the most impressive thing about those performances - is that no matter what theatrics they added, they held true to the style of dance they were doing. There was no question what the dance was once they started the dance.