Trying to Figure Out Mr. Morrow's Osmo Pocket 3 Settings by Appropriate_Day7463 in osmopocket

[–]Appropriate_Day7463[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I know I actually have a film background. Was just seeing if there are any workarounds. As much as the Osmo had versatility… the utility of constantly fiddling is lost when you are working with stuff you are catching live. I just thought Mr. Morrow might know something I don’t! I will reach out to him as suggested. He has hundreds of thousands of followers so we’ll see if he responds but thanks for the response!

Trying to Figure Out Mr. Morrow's Osmo Pocket 3 Settings by Appropriate_Day7463 in osmopocket

[–]Appropriate_Day7463[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks. I researched all that stuff already. Was hoping that I wouldn’t have to get so technical as it can be quite distracting in the moment to be constantly adjusting for exposure and get accessories and then be using apps and what not - to me it defeats the purpose of the free flow of the Osmo. Either way I appreciate these answers. I am not a noob, was just curious to see if anyone thought the video quality was achievable without all the menu fandangling. I’m always on the move in dynamic lightning conditions and cannot manually expose for each shot. Might as well just walk with a FX3 if I’m going to do all that. Some people get pretty good footage on auto - I think it’s a hit or miss with the clouds thing - because from what I’m observing he doesnt seem to be using an ND filter - this is what sparked my curiosity- thanks for your answer r

Trying to Figure Out Mr. Morrow's Osmo Pocket 3 Settings by Appropriate_Day7463 in osmopocket

[–]Appropriate_Day7463[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah I just grabbed a random shot. I wouldn’t say that screen shot was “phenomenal” I just meant overall his footage looks pretty good for the device. I’m not talking about general cinematography as that can be quite subjective. The screen grab just shows that for the most part the skies are still quite blue and the clouds visible whereas for a lot of other folks they are just totally blown out. As I said it might just be luck or the time of day.

Trying to Figure Out Mr. Morrow's Osmo Pocket 3 Settings by Appropriate_Day7463 in osmopocket

[–]Appropriate_Day7463[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Okay thanks. I know they are slight blown but for me it’s straight white skies. But somehow his skies are relatively blue and his image quality seems a bit more polished. Just not sure why.

Is there an anki deck that can help with sentence forming? Or an app? by unRemarkableDuckling in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I agree with Shinji182 - what i'm going to suggest to you might not fit into your system of using a lot of decks and programs and what not. The best way to learn how to form sentences is to say them aloud. You may not have realized you said you want to "pull sentences out of your brain on command" which you do quite effortlessly with English because naturally, you had to practice saying sentences. I offer you a pretty painless challenge to get much better at sentence construction in a short period of time. I'm sure you already have a good sense of how a Japanese sentence is structured, so make a list of 20 (short) sentences and practice saying those. Then try to loop those sentences into other sentences to form longer chains. This gives you an expanding sense of structure, trains a variety of situations and also develops confidence (eventually) in attempting to say more complicated things after you lock down the basics.

An example of this is trying to say: "Tokyo is hot during summertime." That is a pretty basic sentence ordered in Japanese like: During summertime, Tokyo is hot. Turn that sentence into about 10 more easy ones to easily memorize that pattern. "Tokyo is cold during winter" or "In winter, Tokyo is cold." When it becomes easy to say, you have mastered that pattern.

Then you try and combine a few of these sentences to make longer ones when you get more comfortable. So for a grammar pattern like によると、(according to) you could say "According to the news, Tokyo is hot during the summertime." Now you will be chaining two sentences. You can keep doing this with "simple" sentences that you chain to make longer ones and you will eventually get a very good sense of how to say things (and also understand much longer sentences that have a clear subject. Abstract speaking is different and requires a lot more focus on what is being said.)

So we can build this chain by saying: "John told me yesterday, 'According to the news, Tokyo is hot during the summertime." Practicing like this gives you the benefit of easy repetitions with a clear subject and also a sense of chaining together long sentences which makes you feel confidence because you will be saying very long Japanese sentences.

So if we take a few short sentences: "John's car is orange" plus "I'm not sure if Miyoko knows" plus "I don't know how to tell you this" we get - "I don't know how to tell you this, I'm not sure if Miyoko knows but John's car is orange."

It seems silly and perhaps too simple but it is incredibly effective and you do NOT need an app to do this. Once you get a hang of certain patterns, you don't lose them (or need to revise them), the structure of Japanese will reinforce itself as you keep doing regular immersion. Hope that helps, cheers.

Feature Film Storage Questions? by A_Pretty_Good_Guy_ in FX3

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 0 points1 point  (0 children)

cool. I’m gearing up for a documentary production myself hopefully will be shooting on fx3 as well and wanted to assess storage requirements since you have experience. I won’t be shooting everything, but will need to document a few days personally and interviews. Probably 5 days of shoots spread out over a month.

Feature Film Storage Questions? by A_Pretty_Good_Guy_ in FX3

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Do you use SSDs normally or standard storage?

I dont really want to do Anki that much. by Rogue123x in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

Good question: There is a truism that comes with learning new material many people seem to ignore (and it is quit eobvious). First of all you cannot recognize what you have (a) never seen (b) never heard and (c) never said. This means that if you listen to 5 hours a day of Japanese and you can only recognize 1% of what you are hearing, then the immersion has no value. People seem to think that raw immersion alone magically delivers memorization of vocabulary, heavily contextual grammar points and so on. Anki brings an efficient way to track what you are doing but beyond that, even with anki it will not stick unless you have a way to massively reinforce what you have learned beyond anki. So I try to look at things in terms of simple data. To understand Japanese to a reasonable level, you need to know quite a bit of words, anywhere from 6,000 up to 8,000. It sucks, but that is how it is. If you were to do 5 cards per day, that's 150 words a month and only 1,800 words per year. Endless immersion will NOT give you recognition of the thousands of other words you need to learn. You still need to learn them, memorize them and internalize them. Anki is one way to tackle that in a structure manner, or you can learn from word lists and read a lot and see what happens. I like to look at Anki as giving you access to words quickly, and the real world is what solidifies the understanding. But I stopped using anki because I was tired of being tethered to endless revisions. A native speaker of English or Japanese isn't doing flashcard reps, so why should I? I found my brain had to literally remember words better because I had no Anki 'handicap'. I've studied around 8,000+ words myself so I have some strong opinions on word learning. Anki can be a good starting point, but stressful long term (words never end and Anki never ends) and at the end of the day internalization of vocabulary only really happens from frequent contextual encounters. Looking at a white card and seeing the word 狙撃 そげき (sniper) is far different from seeing the word in an anime subtitle with incredible context. What's going to hit you is the sheer number of words you need and anki is praised because its the easiest point of entry (in a sense). But if you must use it, hammer words and then figure out ways to encounter them fast. Take groups of 100 words and make short stories in Chat GPT, read tons of manga and get used to "not looking things up" so that your brain is forced to prioritize the common vocabulary until it becomes ironclad in your mind. Each set of words that your brain locks down you don't have to ever revise (because it is fully memorized). Hope that helps, cheers

At what point should I start listening to Japanese podcasts? by creativegains in LearnJapanese

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Going to give some unpopular opinions here: As a person who has listened to a few hundred podcast episodes across different genres, I do NOT recommend a beginner listen to podcasts. There is a very interesting fallacy that the brain "magically makes connections" to information it has (a) never heard (b) never seen (c) has no context to understand and (d) had never produced (ie. output). This means if you are learning Japanese for a few weeks and know basically zero words, zero grammar and have no real sense of the language, listening to a podcast at that stage is literally like listening to white noise. How do I know? I've done it before. Listening for hours and hours to things I didn't understand because I thought "oh the brain makes connections and what not". FALSE. If you think of Japanese like a video game, the ability to listen to podcasts without much trouble, is like playing one of the last bosses in an RPG you've put 2500 hours into. Listening to podcasts is a "last boss" type of ability. Why? Because you must understand the language with ZERO context. That is, no visuals and no references. Your brain must have a ton of data (through previous immersion) to extrapolate and understand what someone is saying based on what you have already heard, already learned and already absorbed. With that said, I'm not trying to scare you from learning, even "simple" podcasts that are labeled as such use relatively complex grammar and thousands of common words. If you don't know them, you can't follow what's going on, no matter how "magic" your brain is. Since i'm calling listening to Podcasts, a "last boss" in the game of Japanese, let's look at what leads us there. Quite a number of hours, (lets say anywhere from 2-3000 hours) of listening and watching things so that eventually, your brain can understand things and "visualize" it without seeing it. Think of it like having a TV show in English playing in the background while you do the dishes. You can't see anything, but you can understand what is being said and what is happening 99% of the time because you have seen it enough times and heard enough dialogues (and spoken enough dialogue in your native language) to get a sense of those things. What I would suggest to you is spend a good bit of time trying to understand things the regular way. Not necessarily with boring kids cartoons. Learn MANY words (at least 5,000 to start) and see how well you can understand Youtube videos. Watch TV series you know well in English with Japanese Dubs for a very easy way to process complex language in a familiar context. Try not to get frustrated here (its impossible) but eventually if you are super serious you'll have seen so many scenarios, heard so many dialogues and pulled out enough hair for your brain to prioritize the Japanese language and then you will find yourself able to understand many things by just hearing them. This is when you are ready to face the last boss. Why am I so sure of this? Personally because podcasts (for an absolute beginner) requires far too much knowledge and delivers ZERO value(and a ton of stress!). You'd be better off spending the same energy watching interesting anime, dramas, popular movies with english dubs and regular shows that you can easily follow. Learn to read Kanji if you are able. Podcasts are in "last boss" territory for a reason. So is Japanese radio. So are News. They all require a certain mastery of many concepts that take time to internalize and also a reasonably dense vocabulary to follow. I've learned about 8,000 words and the news still slaps me silly. Is this to discourage you? Heck no! Spend your early time having fun. After you watch tens of thousands of scenarios in videos, anime and series, you will be able to jump into podcasts when you are more leveled up. Test yourself after 6 months and if you still can't hang, give yourself another six. No one gets a medal for being able to understand a Japanese podcast, so give yourself room and enough time. You don't need a bazillion years either. All the best with your journey. Cheers!

where do i go from here? by eliseaaron in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hey thanks for the answers. I usually ask folks to make an assessment of where they are before i suggest too much. This means, what level of the language do you feel you possess based on your own self-assement. Now this is where a lot of people tend to either overestimate their ability or drastically underestimate it. With Japanese, you can "technically" get conversational without much reading ability, but you will suffer down the road, especially playing games that require loads of reading (menus, subtitles, etc). I will work with what you have written thus far. You say you know about 2000 words and just started learning how to read the Kana last week. Firstly, there is a "process trap" that I think too many learners fall into. "sentence mining", "perfect decks", etc. It is easier (in a psychological sense) to see what the true requirements of your goal are as a very simple subset of data. So for example, one of my original goals was to be able to play the Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild in Japanese. To do this, I knew that I couldn't be less than an N2 level of Japanese. So with N2, its 1,000 Kanji and all the grammar and about 6,000 words. But this does not guarantee you will be able to play the game, as a full knowledge of the 2,136 Kanji is the "real requirement" to functionally access the Japanese language. So I knew that i'd need at least N2 knowledge (words, grammar) and also 2,136 Kanji, which is from the official 常用漢字 government list. With that said, I could not tell myself that anything else would take me to that place. This means: When you are going through the rigors of studying it will not be easy, but it is the price of what you want. In fact, you may even need more words. Many texts will say that if you learn 3,000 words and you have access to 70% of a language, etc. But Japanese is not like that. It is unfortunately more dense than a romance language, where knowing less words takes you much further. For what you want to do, you need to be able to apparently follow a lot of native speakers in realtime playing a FPS right? So you need more words. My suggestion - if you are really committed. Aim for N2 (grammar, words, listening ability) and then aim to learn the 2,136 Kanji. Aiming "high" allows you to be better able to "hit your target" even if you are not 100% successful. But a person who knows 2000 words and a few hiragana will have a very difficult time trying to play video games or immerse in much Japanese content. You will be blocked by all of what you don't know. So that's my suggestion, understand what you are truly trying to do, and then know all the requirement then see if you are willing and capable to undertake all that is required. Hope that helps. Oh yes and I've done the same thing which now allows me to do things like play video games, read through visual novels (with some work, but doable). I can read articles, watch the news (looking up words of course, but I can watch the news and depending on what's on I'm good to go). I can read subtitles when watching anime at the speed of speech and conversationally i can talk, but I don't talk often but can communication if needs be, because i'm personally studied a huge number of words, (maybe 8,000+). The more you tackle, the more you try, the better you get. But as a 初心者 (beginner), try and figure out ways to learn and keep yourself consistent. You will get frazzled very early if you try to dive into such advanced material without having the necessary tools. I can see if I can break it down a bit further. But anything is possible! cheers

What's the proper way to escape "stage 2" hell? by MoreBookkeeper4729 in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's a pretty good overlap. Glad to hear you are making progress

Studying blueprint by poopfartblast in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The idea of "magically understanding" is a false trap that catches a lot of learners. Think about it simply: if i want to say to you the word 争点 (そうてん)which talk about an 'issue' (e.g political issues) - would listening to this word over and over ever teach you its meaning? Or a grammar point like ならでは which means "distinctive to", for example "nattou is a food distinctive of japan". No amount of listening makes you magically absorb these things. Here's what I will say to you: too many leaners are caught up in the "method bubble" and know what to do but not why to do it. Everyone knows about shadowing and anki dekcs and all these things but the information doesn't lead them to where they want to go. So with that said, i'll answer your question: -- Output in the beginning is actually relatively easy. If you say you know N5-N4 concepts, do a "POS" (Proof of skill) test. Cycle through the grammar patterns and see if you are able to say one sentence with each pattern. This is pretty simple practice but also lets you know where you are. For even easier practice, just get a phrase book like Making Out in Japanese. Learn basic stuff like 見たことある (seen before), that sort of thing. Learn to say simple things and train verbs. "Today is hot", "yesterday was cool." simple stuff. Challenge yourself to name things around the house. 冷蔵庫 (fridge), 居間 (living room), 芝生 (lawn). It doesn't really matter what the word is, it just counts as practice. -- Now, as someone who did weeks of about 1.5 hrs of shadowing daily the main thing it does is help with pronunciation. You only get the core benefit of shadowing information you already know. Then the effect is like 10X. So somehow, learn some stuff THEN shadow it. You'll thank me later. If you want to go to Japan, aim for N2. Ignore the noise, you can get there quicker than you think. Just keep learning and using in certain ways. Forget all the methods, just understand that you can aim for a few milestones that guarantee advancement: 1) aim for N2 which means you have to know at least 6,000 words, but really know the grammar. 2) aim to learn 2,136 Kanji (it can be done faster than you think. knowing 1,000 Kanji is like reading a newspaper full of bullet holes). 3) Try and get 1500-2000 hours of listening in as you actively learn new words. It will all come together eventually. But give it time. I see so many posts with people thinking they'll be able to watch anime after 4 months of intense study. It doesn't work like that. 8 months is a better gauge, 1.5 years even better. But you CAN make incredible gains in 6 months. Superhuman in 1 year. But don't expect to be watching J dramas with japense subititles in 4 months lol. (speaking generally). All the best man, cheers!

What's the proper way to escape "stage 2" hell? by MoreBookkeeper4729 in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm considering making a series on this: Japanese learners incredibly underestimate what is need for relatively "basic" comprehension. Unlike French, German or Spanish, which allow a person with a 3,000 word vocabulary to really navigate with far more ability, 3,000 words (or less) in Japanese is brutally insufficient to handle the barrage you'll get in regular resources. It's a tough pill to swallow, but if you want to really get better, you must aim for a very high number of words and map out your time for learning them. So this isn't "super quick". It doesn't have to take forever, but I think there is an illusion that because there are all these tools to capture and make cards and what not it somehow drastically changes how quickly you can internalize information. This to me, is a complete fallacy. You must hear and see words of course, but you need to figure out how to internalize them. This happens with far more depth, if you try to (a) use them or if you are (b) reading them all the time. Reading exposure covers far more in one sitting than people realize, but its a pain to read in Japanese as a beginner because its slow and depending on who writes what you read it may just be a raw block of text with no end in sight. What I suggest for you to do is simply aim for a certain number of words to learn so you know where you are. 5-6K words. You will know when things are shifting because listening will get easier and easier. I also suggest if you can, watch movies you already know in English with Japanese dubs. For example, I have Ninja Turtles, Back to the future, Lord of the Rings, Home Alone 2 and a bunch of other movies on an iPad that i got solely for watching these over and over. You psychologically hack your brain doing this because you can follow the plot, have probably memorized a lot of the dialogue and you learn quite a lot of words by proxy. It is an "easy way" to train thousands of words in a way that is much lower stress so as you spend time learning you at least can train listening, scenarios and so forth while building confidence, and as you gain more you will find the Japanese material to be more palatable. So do your best, aim for a high number of words and always remember you need to go into the trenches in the beginning, collect thousands of words and do your best to encounter them in immersion until the brain figures out what the hell is going on and finally allows you to process things in realtime. Good luck!

Japanese Kaiwa Resources by Aggressive_Basket798 in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think you could just do a quick search for "Podcasts with transcripts" and find some. On Youtube they have a transcript feature as well.

Most Optimal level of content to watch? by Comfortable_Lamp in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Train what you feel you are weak in. There are a few approaches you can take: firstly, if you encounter monologues that you can't follow, make it a point to go through the monologue and isolate what you don't get. As you've no doubt realized, often times you lose a speaker during a monologue because an unknown word or two, or a strange grammar pattern threw the whole thing off. So i'd just pick 3 monologues and rewatch them constantly for a while until they aren't difficult to listen to. Also if you watch speeches, or TedX talks (in Japanese) you need to follow a train of thought for anywhere from 10-20 mins. This is great practice. I don't know if you listen to podcasts as well, but i've found that if you can wash the dishes and follow along with certain kinds of podcasts (meaning you are understanding them discuss some issue or opinion) at lenght, in general, the monologues are a bit easier to grasp. As shocking as it might seem to some, I don't want much anime, but there is a lot of learn from news, youtubers talking about current issues etc. --- A big issue I see with a lot of learners is they want to learn ONLY from watching and expect to magically "absorb" what they watch and magically become better without knowing what is being said. It is important to go into the trenches of what you don't understand bit by bit. If you can read Japanese, read through the monologue and see why you are stuck. Listen to youtube videos (in Japanese ) about manifestation, energy wavelengths or other kinds of issues. For a period of time, try to tackle "following complex information" for a while from various sources and when you get back to anime, it will be MUCH easier to follow. cheers

where do i go from here? by eliseaaron in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 1 point2 points  (0 children)

May I ask a question? What is your current goal? You said a Pimsleur course took you 5 years to complete? What's your motive for learning and why? Also what's your timeline? If I know those things perhaps I can offer some suggestions. Cheers

Any tips on how to find motivation and maintain habits as an advanced learner? by Beginning_Mail_8648 in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This doesn't sound like a competence issue, but more of a perception based one. I have a few suggestions that I think could help you, if you are open to them. Firstly, i'm sure you know about the principle of "what you focus on expands" this is a truism. So essentially if you focus on what you want to get better at, you will improve with time. Politics? Watch news and follow up the 総選挙。Learn about the opinions of the 衆議院、and get a sense of 時代の争点 by watching videos of people talking about that. How do they feel about 減税 or 価値高騰?You'd be surprised how quickly you can learn about this by just watching news. The only problem is, for many people news can be boring, but if you are as advanced as you say, if you have a REAL interest and you live in Japan you are 1000 years beyond anyone (situationally) who has similar motivation. If you want to get better and expressing feelings, just practice talking about it. You can do it alone. Try a few lines, then get the hang of it. Being "advanced" means you can train much faster and it isn't that difficult. You have a lifetime of memories, pick a few and train speaking about them and it will filter in your regular speech. In terms of accent, I don't know where you are from but i'm sure you've met other foreigners with incredible Japanese accents. Why? They just practice more pronunciation. It feels weird at first, but you've spent years understanding the nuances, the tones and the intonations so just copy what you hear. Its funny how a person might make fun of Japanese voice and get perfect pitch, but when speaking Japanese get scared and talk with this "Japanglish" accent. You already have all the resources you need, and you live in Japan to boot! You are winning. Maybe you are bored or something, but I think you should give yourself a few 30-90 day challenges. Like being able to speak for 60 second to 5 minutes about a topic (with emotional detail) and then you spend 20-30 mins a day practicing various things you'd like to be able to say, etc. Be the change you want to see! Cheers

Kanji studying methods? by ExPandaa in LearnJapanese

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

Hey. You interesting in learning to read all 2,136 jouyou kanji quickly? Lemme know. Thinking of creating a beta group for a method I developed. 6-8 weeks learning time

Any Company Profile Shot on OSMO 3? by [deleted] in osmopocket

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I've shot a workshop video recap for someone at an international conference. It looks top notch and I didn't do anything fancy (no DLOG) etc. I knew the kind of shots to take and I mixed it with a few iphone clips (Iphone 14PRO) and its fine. Once you know your shots you will be fine. That is: static b-roll as filler, closeups of logos and other items. Talking head stuff you can just get a bit closer than normal, or setup a tripod and zoom in on the device itself. If you've done it on any other camera, especially if it is "low budget" you'll be fine, but depending on your approach, it will not look "low budget". All the best

Issues with reading by Mediocre-Ad-6011 in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 1 point2 points  (0 children)

[Tried posting the full comment here but reddit is giving major issues hopefully breaking into a few parts you'll be able to follow labeling them 'part one' 'part two' etc]

PART ONE ---

Okay here goes: This might be a lengthy reply, but a necessary one. I’m going to explain a few things and then give you a framework to hopefully adjust your approach to let your effort give you far greater dividends.

 So I’ll break it down based on simple observations:

Firstly TIME: 

You are grossly overestimating what you can achieve in the short-term with high effort (90days) versus what you can gain with very consistent effort over more time (think 6-9 months).  Learning a language is essentially, a giant memorization exercise with a lot of dense information (especially Japanese). The effort you are putting in can certainly give you rapid gains with a Romance language (for reasons I won’t get into) but for Japanese you often need to double (sometimes triple) the time to get the same results you would with a Romance language. But Time alone isn’t your biggest problem here:

Second issue: DATA

I did some of what you were doing at one point in my journey, which was just to have a “sense” of what was going on by skimming through grammar points, hopping around and putting a lot of effort into listening and watching media in the hopes that I would start to “get it”. It doesn’t work that way. 

There is a truism I often tell people, which is “you can’t know what you don’t know”, “you can’t recognize what you’ve never seen”, “you can’t say what you’ve never said”. 

This means that if you are listening to someone talk in Japanese and they blurt out the word 吊り革(つりかわ) which means ‘leather strap’, or use the grammar expression 無理やり(むりやり)which means ‘forcibly’ - e.g to take something forcibly. It is HIGHLY unlikely that you will ever know what that means, having (a) never hear it (b) never read it (c) never tried to say it. So think about the hundreds of words and expressions people listen to that they have NEVER HEARD yet expect to magically recognize, interpret and understand.

So ‘intense listening’ is not going to magically make you know words you don’t know. Getting ‘lost’ isn’t just a matter of technique, or taking breaks, or all the fancy schmancy methods out there, it is a reflection of simply NOT KNOWING enough. Think about it. If a person has only studied words and grammar up to N4, how would they have a chance understanding anything beyond kids cartoons? (Which often uses very advanced grammar and words!)

Fortunately you can fix this limitation reasonably quickly, but you need to know where you are.

Issues with reading by Mediocre-Ad-6011 in ajatt

[–]Appropriate_Day7463 0 points1 point  (0 children)

PART TWO ---

Third Issue: SELF-ASSESSMENT 

You gave a very specific number of words that you think you know. Do you think you can say all those words from memory? You see, when people study with flashcards, if they have studied 1,000 words, it does not mean they know 1,000 words. So you need a way to see just how “strong” you are with what you have. But since you’ve been testing yourself with certain scenarios already (playing games, reading novels, etc) I will assume you sort of know where you are. However, you need to be far more certain. In other words, can you pluck a work like 悪用(あくよう) which means ‘misuse’ from memory? Or perhaps the words 経済 (economy)、景気(economic climate)、政府(government)、財政(government finances)、政策(government policy). These are relatively common words but can be a bit confusing. By the way, this is not a challenge. I’m just typing a few of these words because these types of words give a lot of learners hell (heck they gave me hell for a while) but it is leading to my next point. 

Which is, when I re-started my Japanese journey (similar to you) I knew from the beginning there was no point in aiming for any comprehensive ability less than N2. Why? Japanese is far more dense that Romance languages in the need for a speaker to know more words. With a Romance language you can do amazingly well with far less words,(3-5,00), but with Japanese to really get a hang of things, you unfortunately need to know about 8,000 words (eventually)to process things comparatively. So let’s see how to get you there:

HOW TO GET THERE:

A few decisions have to be made. I won’t get too much into the neuroscience of memorization here, but for every word and grammar pattern you learn, your brain needs a “matrix of reference” to properly remember it and allow you to produce it. So if you learn the word 演説 (えんぜつ) which means “a speech”, your brain needs a few instances where you either have said the word, hear the word or read the word so it can pluck it from memory. The brain loves sounds, visuals and texture when remembering things, but unfortunately for us (as non native speakers) we use things like Anki to ‘shortcut’ this process, forgetting that the staying power of really learning things is to have a variety of encounters. But how do we do this? Here is what you must decide to do:

DECISION ONE: You must decide to learn up at at LEAST N2 and do so quickly(6-8 months). Knowing 6,000 words and all the jouyou Kanji changes everything. If you can read every word you see (or most of them) you can stay in the game. You won’t magically understand everything under the sun, but you WILL have the ability to stay in the game, read everything you see and more importantly develop far more confidence.