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Irish_Tom

Irish_Tom

Irish_Tom

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Joined
18 Oct 2002
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Lo all,

I'm doing a project for my Graphic Design degree in which I have to solve a problem graphically.

I've decided to update the visual system for learning how to play the guitar and I'm looking for the opinions of a wide range of guitarists, from veteran's to just-beginners, for my research.

I would be very grateful if you could take a minute to read my proposal and give me some feedback;

Let me know if, firstly you think it's necessary, and secondly any issues you have with what I'm suggesting. If you also have any suggestions of things I should include based on your own experiences of learning the guitar that would be fantastic!

One of the problems I found when I started to learn was that scale and chord charts are boring and sometimes quite hard to decipher.

These are the issues I've currently highlighted:

Orientation of the neck when looking at a chord sheet or scale chart:
There's no obvious way of telling which way the chart corresponds to the neck of the guitar.

My solution
Use varying thickness of line on the scale sheet to show exactly which string is being referred to.

Where on the neck to start from:
In my experience it's not always pointed out which fret you should start a certain scale from or how high on the neck a chord is positioned.

My solution
Use colour codes to split the neck up into sections that correspond with the modes of the scales.

Which finger should be used for which note:
My guitar teacher was always telling me off for using the wrong fingering, especially with scales. It was usually because the sheets he gave me didn't specify and by the next lesson I'd forgotten what he'd told me and fallen into my own bad habits.

My solution
Use 'channels' that correspond to the correct finger. (This will be made clearer in a second).

Here is an existing example of E pentatonic over the first 12frets:

scale.jpg


Here is an even more confusing example of E pentatonic:

tab.jpg


Here is my sheet:

pentatonic-scale.jpg




Now I believe that these sheets should be used as an aid to learning the guitar with a teacher, but I think my system will make learning that bit more interesting while you're not in a lesson.

I also intent to adapt this system to screen based media as well as print (web and TV).

If you read through all of that, thank you very much! If you could spend just one more minute providing me with some feedback I really would appreciate it.

Cheers


Panzer
 
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I'm a guitar teacher myself, and personally I find your example a lot more confusing than the original picture :p But that's probably bias as I've obviously been looking at these kinds of charts for a long time.

In my opinion, my students don't have much difficultly with reading a combination of your example and the first picture posted, in that you write out each scale position on a different 'box' on the neck, so you'll have 5 seperate boxes if you happen to be doing pentatonic, 7 for diatonic etc, then a final box showing all of the shapes linking together.

The most confusing part of this seems to be where each scale joins onto another scale, since you obviously have 1 or 2 notes (depending on how many notes per string your scale consists of) being the first and/or second note of the next scale position. So you're idea of using a different colour for those notes which feature in more than one position is a good idea.

One thing I don't encourage though is strict fingering, being that there are times where you should (or it is advised) to follow a fingering pattern (I usually describe it as a finger per fret) so for example you'd play your regular minor pentatonic shape with each first note on each string being played by your first finger, you don't move out of position, however there are times when actually using this scale in a context of actual 'playing' that you may want to move out of this shape, particularly if you're being the highest note on your B string in that position, you would use your 4th finger if you were following the scale fingerings, but as anyone who plays guitar knows it's not common to bend with your 4th finger, depending on the player, so I personally allow room for flexability with scale fingerings.

Your idea of being able to practise scales/chords whilst away from your guitar sounds very interesting :) I'd be very much into hearing more about that.
 
Thanks for the very speedy response!

I have to admit that I expected experienced players to favour the existing methods, especially as I probably haven't explained mine very clearly. It is interesting to get the opinion of a teacher as well as a player, so thanks for that :)

I think I will have to specify the fingering channels for the very beginners, where some discipline is needed to avoid picking up bad habits and 'lazy fingers' :p Because I agree that it's not always practical in real world playing.

I've just been discussing it with my house mate (another Graphic Design student and guitar player) and the point he made is that the overlapping blocks of colour at the bottom of the page need to be made clearer. I'm thinking of stepping the blocks from low to high, to not only show the change in pitch, but make the overlapping colour clearer.

Panzer
 
Yeah the colour blocks are kinda what threw me off.

An idea might be to use the same colour idea, but put blocks around each corresponding fingering on the guitar neck, I mean blocks with just the coloured lining, they should be opaque in the centre.

It seems to be a bit of a double edged sword doing diagrams like this because there are so many things you need/want to add to the diagrams to make them easier to understand, but in the end risk them looking too busy.
 
Panzerbjorn said:
Orientation of the neck when looking at a chord sheet or scale chart:
There's no obvious way of telling which way the chart corresponds to the neck of the guitar.

My solution
Use varying thickness of line on the scale sheet to show exactly which string is being referred to.
Click to expand...

That is about the most effective way imo. That way you can see how you would look down of the guitar, and not say front on. This would help new players because in relation to them playing, it gives the correct orientation as the look down. I find the hardest issue is applying these scales/modes to the neck of a guitar, as it seems very different when you actually start playing it.

Panzerbjorn said:
Where on the neck to start from:
In my experience it's not always pointed out which fret you should start a certain scale from or how high on the neck a chord is positioned.

My solution
Use colour codes to split the neck up into sections that correspond with the modes of the scales.
Click to expand...

Good idea, apart from you would need to set out some universal colours that can easily identified (i.e light blue may be associated with the first position of the minor pentatonic). However, these colours may vary in Keys and this may get confusing.

Panzerbjorn said:
Which finger should be used for which note:
My guitar teacher was always telling me off for using the wrong fingering, especially with scales. It was usually because the sheets he gave me didn't specify and by the next lesson I'd forgotten what he'd told me and fallen into my own bad habits.

My solution
Use 'channels' that correspond to the correct finger. (This will be made clearer in a second).
Click to expand...

This is a good idea, but not everyone plays the same. I understand the thoery behind this, but it may also get confusing depending on how you write these out. I'd be interested to see these 'channels' that you are talking about as it may look more simple that what i imagine to it. ;)

Panzerbjorn said:
Here is my sheet:

pentatonic-scale.jpg
Click to expand...

That certainly looks a whole lot clearer. I know all of the five positions, but the hardest point is linking them together. It took me a good six months before i recognised the patterns fully, and by splitting it up like you have, it makes it easy to see how one links into another. The one disadvantage of this for me is that there is no root note in place. I find that once i know where the root note is, it makes it a whole lot easier to resolve my phrases, especially when combining the major and minor pentatonic as of course the fingering patterns change.
 
i think it's very clear, the different colours help the aesthetics a lot.

I think at a practical level however, the notes of the scale should be shown, not just where to put your finger. It's quite important to learn the notes of the scales and not just "where to put yo fingas biatch". It wouldn't hurt to put a small white letter on each dot
 
Thanks for the feedback guys!

I shall look into including root notes and the notes of the scale as well. Although as Andelusion said, there is so much information that could be included, where do you draw the line for simplicities sake.

In just the first few posts you've highlighted some issues that I hadn't thought about so thanks again for that. The project is running for the next 6 weeks so please keep adding to this thread :)

I'll keep updating it with new bits and pieces as I develop the idea as well.

Cheers

Panzer
 
Personally, I like it. It's much easier on the eyes and like dmpoole suggested - the line thickness is a brilliant idea.

The one thing I don't like however is the vertical arrangement of the different positions. It appears to make the frets line up when personally I feel that if you made each position vertical, but in a stairwell manner it would be easier to understand.

Try:

-1
---2
-----3
-------4
---------5
Click to expand...

Rather than:

--1--
--2--
--3--
--4--
--5--
Click to expand...
 
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One thing I would do to hone in on how the scales fit in with eachother would be to show the scale on the whole neck, carry on with the colouring system, and where the notes overlap split the dots in half...

kinda like...

err...

How do I describe it..



----()------()----------()------------()--
()------()----------()------------()------
()------()----------()------------()------
----()------()----------()------------()--
()------()----------()------------()------
 
Not very well, clearly.

Where the notes overlap across the two positions split the blob into the appropriate colours up so its easy to identify where the overlap is.

I'm not keen on the colour blocks underneath, that just seems to confuse the issue - if you did it like I'm (BADLY!) trying to explain then I think it might be clearer.
 
I like it, I like the colours idea, the string thickness and also the fingering channels are brilliant...

only 2 things to change though:

1) Add on the note name at each fingering position (or an option for this somewhere)

2) Change the fingering channel for the very first picture (red one).... I don't know why at all you would play all those notes with your pinky??? It should be played with the 3rd fret using ring and 2nd fret using middle ... OR .... 3rd frets using middle and 2nd fret using index finger...

Good work though, and a great idea... coming from an advanced/expert gutiarist here.
 
Thanks again for the feedback.

I'm going to use the stepped look as Nix suggested and Docaroo you're quite right, the first mode should certainly start with the index finger rather than use the little finger so I'll adjust that :o

Alex I see what your suggesting and it might well work a lot easier than a blended colour, I shall put this into practice and see how it works as well :)

As for the note name of each position, I think it might just work. I'm going to draw up a new draft either today or tomorrow so I'll post it up and see what you think.

Panzer
 
Just thought I would share with you the latest update. I believe this has all of the alterations mentioned. The only problem I can find with it is that when I add the notes of the scale, it's quite hard to read on the yellow background of the 2nd mode.

Might have to re-colour the positions or add the notes in black (but then it's hard to read on the dark blue of the 3rd mode :o)


pentatonic-scale2.jpg


Just thought I would mention that I had to scale down the image to fit in with the 800px maximum image size for the forums. It's actually easier to read in full A4 scale ;)

*edit* Just noticed that the coloured bars at the very bottom don't align with the positions on the fretboard so I'll adjust that also.

Cheers again for any more feedback.

Panzer
 
I like the changes apart from adding all of the notes of the scale. This is really only because i don't think you should make them note dependant because it changes depending on what key you are in. :)
 
I definately think you should double the Eminor pent an octave higher as a hell of a lot of people will be using it up the octave rather than in the open position imo.
 
Panzerbjorn said:
Might have to re-colour the positions or add the notes in black (but then it's hard to read on the dark blue of the 3rd mode :o)
Click to expand...

imo, make the note name black on light colours and white on dark colours :)

OzZie said:
I like the changes apart from adding all of the notes of the scale. This is really only because i don't think you should make them note dependant because it changes depending on what key you are in. :)
Click to expand...

I agree, which is why I said you should make adding the note names optional... infact you could be REALLY clever and make it so that when you pick a key for the scale, the note names are added in dependent on that key..... so the patterns can be set until you pick a key and then you can choose to see the note names too :)

looks good though!
 
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