Learn a dance from YouTube; How do I mirror the moves?

I’m the best man at a wedding in the distant future. I’ve been tasked with learning a pretty complex Michael Jackson dance (Smooth Criminal, from The Michael Jackson Experience game on Wii).

The dance may be complex but the question is simple. What is the best way to learn a dance from the site when the participants are facing you, the viewer, on the computer screen and I’m attempting to practice dance at home?

A suggestion of “imagine your right hand is your left hand” doesn’t help much. Anything else would!

Cripes, sirestorm! What were you tasked with as an encore, flaming sword swallowing??

Seriously though, props for giving such a daunting task the good ol’ college try.

Question: Is this going to be choreographed with several /many other people, as most of MJ’s dance sequences were? I’d have to guess yes, since it’s such a big part of the overall presentation.

Makes a big difference in how you approach your practicing, IMO.

The groom’s demands have changed and do not require swords just yet. We (me and the other groomsmen) learned a routine that we practiced without shame for a total of 8 hours.

He then decided to change the routine to one song that did not include any of the original material. One iconic, very difficult to choreograph song.

Mr. Groom will be the center of the routine while 4 of us groomsmen will accompany his dance moves with our own choreographed moves.

I think I phrased my question poorly. How, as someone who doesn’t dance often, do I re-wire my brain to learn the dance when all dancers in the video are facing me?

Psychological or technological or just logical answers are appreciated.

Imagine the dancer on the screen is yourself in a mirror and mirror the moves. Don’t try to figure out his left-my right, just pretend you are looking in a mirror. Learn a short bit at the beginning and practice that until you are comfortable with it. Then learn the next short bit. Then practice from the top. Learn the next bit, practice from the top. Repeat.

So when he does the dance and moves to the right, everyone else will be moving to the left, since he will be doing the mirror of the guys on the screen.

Mirror the video.

A low-tech solution would be to put a mirror in front of the TV, then stand next to the TV and watch yourself and the TV in the mirror.

This is what I do. Or rather, I practice at night when it’s dark out by turning on all the lights in my living room and using the reflection in my front window, across from the TV. Luckily, I’m on the third floor, so probably don’t scare the neighbors too much. :smiley:

You should find out what everyone else is doing first.

My daughter wanted to learn a Miley Cyrus dance, and I made her learn it the right way around. Everyone else used the video like a mirror. On the day, my daughter is going one way, and everyone else is going the other. You don’t want this to happen to you; it’s apparently very traumatic.

If I’m not missing anything, why don’t you all just pretend the video is a mirror and don’t try to reverse anything. Make sure you discuss this amongst yourselves first, of course, and practice together sometimes. IIRC it isn’t like a partner dance where it really matters if you’re actually using the left foot or the right foot…

Exactly, if everyone’s learning from the same video, just follow the screen and you’ll all do the same thing without brain aerobics. No one watching you on the day is going to notice any difference!