Today we are celebrating School of Scratch Student Magnus who recently completed the 100 days of scratching challenge.
Huge congrats Magnus! Super inspiring stuff, well done for sticking with the process and for the progress you have made!
You can request to follow his private account here: https://www.instagram.com/mrwesome/ to see all 100 day videos.
Here is a clip of Magnus from his new IG account, practicing his crabs on a portable for a School of Scratch Challenge:
Magnus joins Erick as the second student to have completed the 100 Days of Scratching project.
It’s something I undertook myself (see here) and have been encouraging my students to do the same – as a way to get in the habit of daily practice, documenting progress and connecting with others.
I asked Magnus some questions to help you if you are thinking of doing the project (please reach out to me if you are planning to do so, so we can follow your progress).
Interview
Can you give us some background on your interest in music and scratching?
I’m just addicted to music in general. I listen to all kinds of music all day. I started DJ after seeing some random dude throwing an after party in Chicago having DJ gear at home. I never even thought that you could just start DJing at home before that, LOL. So I got in to DJing and got a midi controller and some crappy CDJs and watched a bunch of people doing mixes on Youtube. The dopest ones were always those with scratching. So I got myself one real turntable and started to learn by watching a bunch more of Youtube, LOL. And I just enjoy it a bunch, it’s fun as hell!
What made you decide to undertake the 100 day challenge?
I saw a some posts about it from Emma Short-E and the School of Scratch. I had just been having a bit of a low motivation period and wasn’t really hitting the decks. I thought I would help me get back up on the horse by showing up and recording a video for 100 days, and it did!
What was your approach?
Like I said, I basically did the challenge to get back in the game so my goal was to show up and scratch! I didn’t make any specifics about what to do I just had the goal to hit the decks! I posted my videos to Instagram so there’s a max limit of one minute to post. Some days I just hit it to record the 1 min video, but still I was there scratching for 1 minute instead of 0.
What is your recording and posting workflow like?
I mostly used my GoPro to record the videos (gotta love fish-eye!!). Then I transferred the video to my phone and cut out whatever part I felt good about posting and posted it to Instagram. I wanted to record the sound separately for better sound quality but with the app I used on the phone I didn’t find a good way to sync up the audio file and the video so I ended up just using the GoPro sound. I guess it works, but you’ve gotta turn the volume up all the way to hear it good on Instagram.
What are your top tools / apps / software / equipment to capture and edit?
I have an Android phone and a GoPro. For the most part I made the edits with an app called Video Editor, works decently, nothing fancy.
What did you learn?
Ohhh boooyyy did I learn. I don’t have a list of things I learned but overall I feel my flow has gotten better and also connecting different scratches better. If I were to pick one thing I’d say I won over my nemesis, the crab scratch, which I now consider part of my techniques. I have learnt it and now I’m working on mastering it!
What were some of the highlights for you?
The feeling of getting into the flow, getting my motivation to scratch back.
What helped you on your way?
Getting motivational messages from Emma Short-E! ?
What didn’t work?
I didn’t do the challenge as a consecutive 100 days. This was partly due to taking some trips, but also from plain old laziness.
What was the most challenging part and how did you deal with that?
Motivation was why I undertook the challenge in the first place so it is also what I struggled with, especially in the beginning of the challenge. Just taking the challenge itself is what helped me show up and get my scratch on. Portable scratching is really taking over now but during the challenge I didn’t have a portable turntable so I went travelling a couple of times and during those times I didn’t have any way to scratch. But now I got myself a Numark PT01 scratch and I can bring it with me and stay funky anywhere I go!
What are your top tips for anyone who wants to undertake this challenge?
Just do it! Hitting the 100 days is great and doing the challenge keeps you dedicated to what you want to achieve! My approach was pretty informal, I didn’t make any schedule of what to practice or anything so doesn’t have to be a big barrier to hitting the challenge. Don’t make too big of a deal of it just try to do your thing for 100 days and you’ll see that you both improve and feel more motivated to continue to up your scratch game!
If you were to do this challenge again, what, if anything would you do differently?
This challenge is great. I could see myself doing it again. I could also see myself using a 100 day challenge for anything I want to improve, not just scratching. If I would do it again with scratching I think I would make like a weekly schedule or something like that a more focused way to evolve my skills. Mostly because I feel that’s what I want to work on now, since I already have the motivation now!
You are a School of Scratch student. What has your school experience been like? What do you love about it? What is your advice for anyone considering joining the school?
Hell yeah, SoS rules! I had just been starting to learn how to scratch for a little while when Emma Short-E started the School of Scratch. I actually watched a bunch of Emma’s tutorials on Youtube before she started the SoS so through following her is how I got to know about her starting the SoS. I thought she did great break downs and tutorials so I thought I’d give it a try. The tutorials/classes in the SoS are great and I’ve used them to learn different scratches and combos, etc. What I didn’t expect was the community that comes with joining the SoS, a bunch of dope scratch people who you can virtually hang out and scratch with or share ideas or whatever. There aren’t really many people who scratch where I live so the online community is great!
What is next for you?
Keep being dope!
Got myself a Numark Pt01 Scratch so now I’m going to #scratcheverywhere!
Where can we find you online? send as many links to you as you want. your chance to shine
Catch me scratching on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/a_wsum
Anything else you want to add?
The Supa Scratch Crew rocks! ?
That’s a wrap!
Thanks Magnus! Looking forward to seeing your continued posts and progress! Thank you for your continued contribution School of Scratch! See you in class!
If you are curious about the 100 day project you can find out more here – and if you would like to do the project with one on one support from me (limited places available), you can send me a message to find out what that looks like and how it can help you.
If you are curious about the School you can check it out here and sign up below to get 2 free lessons to get you started.
Happy Scratching! 😀
– Emma Short-E