【Art Series 01】viewpoints of Dance – “Foundation, Originality, Dynamics, Execution, Battle”

Last Updated on 2024-07-25

“O.U.R. Judge-Scoring System” is one of the methods used to judge the “winner” in the Breaking competition.

O.U.R. will use 5 scoring categories — “Foundation, Originality, Dynamics, Execution, and Battle”.

Although these five categories cannot cover all the elements of “appreciation of dance”. ( Appreciation of dance is very subjective, just like everyone has a different opinion on art. )

However, this system still provides five objective elements, so that “participating dancers, judges, and audience” can have a reference standard and consensus. 

This article will introduce how to use “O.U.R.’s 5 scoring categories” to get a preliminary understanding of dance-culture.

In addition, some “extra insights” that Blues-Feng has learned from these 5 categories will also be introduced. (It will be applicable to “other fields” outside of dance.)

1. O.U.R. Judge-Scoring System

O.U.R. ( Objective & Unified & Real-time Judge System ) can be traced back to the first use in the R16 International Dance Competition in 2010. (designed by bboy Dyzee)

The original intention of O.U.R. is: to provide 5 specific scoring categories, so that the judges have an “Objective , Unified, and Real-time” scoring system.

Next, I will use my insights on dance to subdivide the “5 categories” into some “branch concepts”.

# 1.1. Foundation

When dancers perform dance, they will use the “foundation” as the root of everything.

Without a good foundation, it will be like a fragile tree, it may be broken by a strong wind at any time.

" Steady "

A dancer with a good “solid foundation” will show a steady and uncluttered pace in the dance.

On the contrary, if the solidity is not enough, his steps will be messy and floating.

" Musicality "

Literally, it is easy to understand, that is, the dancer’s “mastery of the music”, “whether the beat is accurate”, and whether the “music emotion” is fully presented.

The classification of this branch-concept is quite interesting. If you have never been in touch with O.U.R. Judge-Scoring System, you may not think that Musicality is classified as “Foundation”.

But Musicality can be said to be the root of dance, so it is reasonable to classify it as “Foundation”.

Musicality is so important that it even qualifies to be singled out as the 6th scoring category!

" Calmness "

Based on a good and strong “Foundation”, it will bring a calm and unhurried attitude that can grasp the next action at any time.

On the contrary, if you can’t clearly grasp the next action, you will have a flustered action.

# 1.2. Originality

The “Originality” is a very high-level category; it requires strong personal ideas and unconstrained imagination. 

In many cases, it is necessary to match the solidity of the Foundation to achieve “Originality”.

For general audiences, “Originality” may be a more difficult category to fully appreciate. (The reason will be explained later)

" the Only One "

That’s right, there are movements, skills, and dance steps that no one has done before. Just the need to “create something out of nothing” is a very high threshold for everyone.

And for those judges who have traveled all over the world and seen countless dancers, “the Only One” will immediately catch their attention.

Therefore, “the Only One” is an extremely difficult, but very powerful weapon.

" Personal Style "

In the culture of Breaking, this branch-concept is sometimes called Style-moves.

The branch-concept “Personal Style” is more about satisfying the dancers’ ultimate pursuit and persistence in “personal characteristics” than satisfying the taste of the judges .

However, if you can fully present your “Personal Style”, it can also become a powerful weapon to attract the judge’s attention.

" Foundation-extension "

When dancers are in the beginner stage of learning dance, they usually start with some “most basic movements”.

The “Foundation-extension” is based on these basic movements to carry out more advanced extensions, changes, and innovations.

However, the branch-concept “Foundation-extension” is difficult for audiences to find out.

The reason is very simple. People who have never learned it will naturally be unable to distinguish which are “the most basic movements” that every dancer knows.

Therefore, it is also impossible to distinguish which movements are “extended, changed, and innovative ones.”

I would like to remind that although “Originality” is very important, it does not mean that “Foundation” should be underestimated.

Because a dancer with a real soul can even use “solid and powerful” basic movements to defeat all opponents.

Moreover, it may even make you feel that those are not basic movements at all.

# 1.3. Dynamics

This is probably the most familiar category for the audience among all the movements of the Breaking.

Those are “difficult skills” that spin continuously on the floor or in the air.

However, “Dynamics” will not only be presented in “difficult skills”, but also on the “vision”.

" Difficulty of Skill "

Rotating movements such as Windmill, Air-flare, and Flare are called Power-moves in the culture of bboying.

The difficulty of these skills is very high-level, and in terms of visual presentation, they usually naturally present an explosive visual experience.

" Visual Presentation "

In addition to the Power-moves, another good way to show explosive power is to use “Visual Presentation”.

At this time, the difficulty may be far less than that of the Power-moves; but these dancers will have a “significant speed-fluctuations” in the steps or movements. (Any dance style can be used)

For example: instant acceleration, instant stop, etc., which will make the vision of these movements extremely powerful, and then achieve an explosive viewing experience.

# 1.4. Execution

To date, culture of dance has developed a very diverse element in the presentation of movements.

However, it does not mean that the more movements are packed, or the more difficult the movements are, the better the performance will be.

The category “Execution” will focus on whether the dancer presents perfect movements.

When performing movements, does it present the “vision” you really want to express?

Is the rhythm, melody, emotion of the music properly incorporated when performing the movements?

Therefore, in addition to being used by judges for scoring, “Execution” is also very suitable for dancers to check “completion of movements”.

" Flow "

Even with the use of difficult skills, is the presentation of the vision smooth enough? Can everyone really feel the “art of the vision” ?

Or maybe you created an original movement, but the vision haven’t been perfected yet, and it’s still choppy?

These examples are likely to be the factors that destroy the branch-concept “Flow”.

" Precision "

Now, let’s assume that a dancer is able to perform extremely complex steps.

But because of its high level of complexity, when the tempo of the music is too fast, his dance steps will gradually lose track of the tempo; and the vision does not seem to be in sync with the music.

A situation like this is an example of “insufficient Precision” in the movements.

Seeing this, maybe you are already thinking: “Execution – Precision” is used to an example that can’t keep up with the tempo. Shouldn’t this be classified as “Foundation- Musicality” ?

Here, Blues-Feng will briefly mention a point of view: In fact, the 5 categories classified by O.U.R. are not completely independent.

On the contrary, because of the “rich diversity” of many dance movements, these 5 categories are often intertwined and affect each other. 

This diversity is what makes art wonderful and interesting, as long as you understand it in the right way.

# 1.5. Battle

If the aforementioned 4 categories of “Foundation, Originality, Dynamics, and Execution” are regarded as the presentation of the dancer’s “personal skills and movements”.

Then “Battle” will be the presentation of the dancer’s “interaction with the live environment”. 

Whether it is an opponent, judges, audience, MC, or DJ, as long as it is a participant on the live environment, it is possible to become an “interaction object”.

" Invisible Aura "

Dancers who are able to master the atmosphere appropriately…

they don’t even need to use any difficult movements, can cause the atmosphere of the scene to be emotionally high, and directly affect the judges’ scoring.

" Response "

In dance culture, there is another important element — “Response”.

“Response” may occur in: responding to the opponent’s actions, responding to the atmosphere of the scene, and responding to the emotion of the music.

As long as it is handled properly, “Response” can also make people feel that the dancer has mastered the atmosphere of the moment.

2. Extending to Other Fields

# 2.1. Application of “Foundation, Originality”

Among the aforementioned 5 categories of O.U.R. , Blues-Feng particularly likes the two categories of “Foundation & Originality”.

Whenever I develop some “challenging” learning projects, I really like to use “Foundation” as the starting point for learning and “Originality” as the long-term goal.

For example, among the goals I set in “Learning Electric Guitar”, “Foundation & Originality” is also used by me as a “key goal”.

Because from the experience of dancing, I deeply understand that a solid “Foundation & Originality” will bring powerful energy and charm.

# 2.2. Obstacles in “Foundation”

However, in the early stages of learning, the “Foundation” are usually the most difficult, boring, and difficult to stick to. (This is also the reason why many people want to find the shortcuts of quick success.)

Even so, we still have to learn to overcome the Foundation and even learn to love the difficulty of the Foundation.

Although in a short period of time, you will not be able to see the effect; but for a long time “basic accumulation” will gradually emerge “solid results”.

# 2.3. Obstacles in “Originality”

The difficulty of “originality” is that you must have a deep understanding of this field and develop the ability of Unique Insights and Innovation.

These are easy to understand on paper, but when you actually want to implement them, they are extremely difficult and require a lot of effort.

# 2.4. Personal Style

As mentioned earlier, I like to plan like this for learning new things: “Foundation” as the starting point for learning, and “Originality” as the long-term goal.

Usually, if the “Foundation & Originality” are maturely developed, they will gradually lead to your unique personal style.

Regarding the “Personal Style” part, I would like to introduce more in the future【Art Series】.

3. Deep Thinking

In fact, the purpose of this article is not to praise O.U.R. Judge-Scoring System.

After all, the too “standardized” scoring method can easily cause contestants to make specialized preparations for the 5 categories.

In this way, it is very likely that the deeper and more abstract “artistic level” in the dance will be discarded by the contestants.

However, from the perspective of “understanding dance”, O.U.R. still provides a set of more objective and systematic views.

This can help people who are not familiar with dance to get acquainted with this culture, which I appreciate very much!

For me, inspired by these 5 categories of view, I can understand the application of “extending to other fields”.

This kind of thinking logic provides me with some unique insights, which I think is very valuable~

4. CONCLUSION

This article, through the introduction of the O.U.R. Judge-Scoring System, brings out 5 viewpoints that can give people a preliminary understanding of dance.

The 5 viewpoints are “Foundation, Originality, Dynamics, Execution, Battle”.

Although these five viewpoints come from “dance culture”, after understanding these viewpoints, I also shared the application of “extending to other fields” in the article.

Among them, the “personal style” point of view extended from “Foundation & Originality“ will be introduced more in future articles.

Before the end of the article, let Blues-Feng take you to quickly review the key points of this time!

“5 Categories of Dance” and their respective “Branch Concepts” :