T'ai Chi Fundamentals

I purchased this DVD based on its reviews in the hope that my wife will find it inspiring. I could not have made a worse choice. The "tai chi" in DVD is based on a form derived from Yang's long form, but it is wrong in most fundamental aspects: body posture, foot work, breathing, etc.The DVD has an introductory qigong section. These qigong exercises are too fast and superficial to be real qigong and too slow and without vigor to be good aerobic exercises. The instructor is significantly leaning her upper body when shifting the weight from a leg to another, which can cause back injury to people involved in this kind of "qigong". One characteristic of real qigong is that it is safe and beneficial to both strong and frail people and the "qigong" in this DVD does not posses this characteristic. One funny aspect is that the instructor states that movement in Tai chi is rooted in the legs. There is a lot of wobbling going on for a body rooted in stationary legs.The Tai Chi section is even worse than the qigong one. The instructor's concept of relaxed upper body is weird. For her relaxed spine means purposefully arched spine, dropped arms are hanging arms and so on. She tries to assume a low stance, but her step stances are too short, which makes her incorrectly (and unsafely) lean when shifting the weight from a leg to the other. This is also the reason why consistently and incorrectly the projections on her knees fall outside the area covered by her soles. Most of the time she seems to have the weight about equally distributed on both feet which is also wrong.In summary, the "Tai Chi" on this DVD is extremely poor. People can get a sample of it on youtube. Unfortunately, I made the wrong assumption that because youtube does not return anything featuring Tricia Yu when searched using keywords "Tai Chi", there is no Tricia Yu footage on youtube. A more thorough search would have saved me $17.99 plus shipping and handling costs.

I first learned the basics of this form many years ago at Naropa Institute, but I was not successful in finding teachers in my area. So I studied other Tai Chi Forms.This version has now allowed me to pick up the fundamentals of the Cheng Man Cheng form. It is the best form for energy circulation. This Fundamental Form is very short but it includes most of the major moves of the original form. Tricia is a very good teacher. She does not expect a student to actually learn the form from the video alone, but I had no trouble in re-learning the form that I had not practiced in many years.

As a newcomer to Tai Chi I found this video extremely helpful. Ticia Yu illustrates the movements both facing you, which some criticize but is important for being able to view the hand movements accurately, as well as with her back to you. It is simple to review with the guided practice section at the end even if one has only a small portion of time. The format of the DVD is sensible and easy to follow. My only criticism is that Ms. Yu is extremely flexible and one must not attempt to imitate her rather too large foot movements as a beginner. I would highly recommend this video.

Good for beginners. Poses viewable from multiple angles & good instructions so you could easily practice. Nice music.

This is a good entry level DVD for a few basic Tai-chi movemnts, but not an actual complete Tai-chi form.I did find it useful for working with a group of mild mentally and physically challenged individuals. That is not to suggest that this would be the only people who would benifit form it.It also introduces many of the core concepts of Tai-chi in a very basic and easily understandable way. Some of the demonstrations could use a bit more narration to reinforce the correct focus and performance of the movements. Espically when the actual fundamentals form itself is demonstrated.

This DVD offers the beginner a way to understand the principles that are essential to Tai Chi practice whithout being overwhelmed. Simple practice sessions with this DVD allow the practitioner to make measurable progress in their own Tai Chi. The demonstrations with the mirrors make this by far the easiest DVD to follow that I have tried. The simple instructions in posture and breathing are enough to make this eries worth it. Consider the companion book as weill since it has some extra warm up exercises that are fun and challenging.

This is the Tai Chi program I am taking classes for. This video is very helpful in my at home practice.

see above

Groups the basic patterns and fundamentals so can master a certain stage before proceeding to next, all at your own pace. I recommend to view the entire DVD before starting anything, so you have a better understanding of where you're headed, and what this practice is all about.

This video production has some merit. For instance, the music throughout is relaxing. The posture and movement review from front and back, presented in a park-like setting is pleasant as well as very clear in demonstrating the various movements. The mirror exercises given are less helpful than they might have been. I would have preferred--as in the DVD's review section--to watch the movements from the front and then separately from the back along with the instructional commentary. But my biggest criticism of this DVD is its overall poor organization. Perhaps I'm too critical, being new to Tai Chi and not being able to anticipate how one posture moves into the next--the transitions--so was looking for a higher level of sequential and logical presentations. The DVD seems somewhat incomplete as a few positions were not presented in the instructional section of the DVD (the mirror work) but were reviewed as if they had been. Confusing to a newbie such as I. The routine demonstrated by the author and instructor also seemed too short (only had a half dozen movements, albeit repeated for the left and right sides, doubling the actual number of positions/movements) and did not seem to be comprehensive or well-rounded in the choices of positions/movements demonstrated. But remember, I'm new to this, so take this with a grain of salt. Intersperced throughout the DVD was some "philosophical" material which was too short, superficial and out of context to be helpful to one new to this discipline.

This a very basic introduction to Tai Chi. The exercises are simple and easy to follow, though it may take some time to master the sequencing of the exercises.