RPD's Simplified Elementary Notation

RPD's Simplified Elementary Notation is the successor to the experimental Hexbinmos' Elementary Notation created by Fel2Fram and Hexbinmos from FPSB. RPD, an SPSC member and pen spinning researcher, had developed it since reading the original elementary notation between 2012-2013.

Like in Hexbinmos' work, it defines a series of elementary tricks and a grammar for describing all tricks and combinations in pen spinning.

Tricks

The count of tricks in RPD's system is reduced down to 5 compared to Hexbinmos' 6 elementary tricks, with "Stall half-release" being omitted in favor of reusing Fingerswitch combined with a fingerless slot. The characters used to reference them have also been changed from the original Greek letters to those from the Latin alphabet.

a Fingerswitch

A spinless change of slots, the fingers and hand move but the pen remains stationary.

b Tipped Charge

A tipped charge-like motion. The rotation about the slot is clockwise for the normal and counter-clockwise for the reverse.

c Wiped Charge

A wiper-like motion, that can be performed in the center of the pen as well as at the ends.

d Roll

Rolling the pen along its long axis, without changing a slot.

e Slide

A sliding motion to move the pen more towards the inside or outside of a slot, without changing the slot.

Grammar

The notation system borrows its grammar from formal notation. Tricks are connected in a linear sequence to begin with, with slots notated after the name of the trick. For instance:

a T1-T2 > a t2-12

Note the ">" borrowed from Hexbinmos' notation, equivalent to "->" in formal notation.

Simultaneous tricks and rotations can also be applied:

b+c 0.25 23 > a+b rev+c 0.25 23-13

With the tricks occurring simultaneously notated with "+" before the slots. Note how the rotation section immediately after refers to both tricks at once. This is because a notated trick block covers an identical time period for all simultaneous tricks, with a minimum timing difference between tricks of 0.25 rotations. Note also the postfix "rev" referring to a trick being performed in reverse.

Fingerless slots are notated with "*", either on its own for a true aerial or with fingers to indicate a fingerless trick is being performed while in contact with them:

(PD) c 0.5 1234*

Examples

RPD provided several example notated tricks in his book using the system.

Pass

Pass 12-23 = a+b 0.25 12-13.2>23

Charge

charge = b+c 0.25 > b rev+c 0.25 > b rev+c rev 0.25 > b+c rev 0.25
charge rev = b rev+c 0.25 > b+c 0.25 > b+c rev 0.25 > b rev+c rev 0.25

Note that the minimum a charge can be split down into is four separate parts, as the direction of one of the constituent charge motions changes every quarter turn.

Sonic

sonic = b+c 0.25 23 > a+b rev+c 0.25 23-13 > a+b rev+c rev 0.25 13-12 > b+c rev 0.25 12
sonic rev = b rev+c 0.25 23 > a+b+c 0.25 23-13 > a+b+c rev 0.25 13-12 > b rev+c rev 0.25 12

Like the charge, except now adding the fingerswitches also.

Around

IA 12-12 = a+b rev 12-1*>12
TA T1-T1 = a+b rev+c rev T1-T*>T1
backaround 12-12 = (PD) Fl a+b+c 12-1*>12
Bust = (PD) Fl a+b rev+c rev 12-1*>12
Inverse bust = Fl a+b rev+c 12-1*>12

A variety of examples, with tricks such as inverse bust being highlighted as noteworthy by RPD as the notation can reveal differences between the tricks.

Spin

palmspin = (PU) c rev P*

Here the amount of continuous wiped charge can be omitted as it may vary between varying lengths of palmspin.