Thumb picks: love 'em, hate 'em? What's your favourite?

[sandysue]

Hey, Shel, I saw this on another forum, and immediately thought of this thread. The maker of the meme said I could share it, so here you go:

[michelew]

Haha! Yes, I may have to adopt that attitude. Fake it til you make it. or... Fake it til you become it.

Good one Doug.

M

[thereshopeyet]

Vanessa

I know what you mean about the thumbpick having a strangle hold on your thumb.
For me, I put that down to unfamiliarity and presumed it would become a little more comfortable with time.
I subjected mine to a little heat under the grill (momentarily) and opened it up a little.
Anyway, I pulled it out the drawer only last night to have another go with it, it's been
a few years since I tried it. :ohmy: I'll persevere longer this time. :S
You are awesome at everything guitar ...... thumb pick too :dry: , I'm sure.

Michelle
I know this is about thumb picks but......

I don't have natural nails and just play with the flesh of my finger tips but I don't think that helps the tone
I tried acrylic nails on my right hand. :dry: It's a really hard material and I think would wear well.
Shaping them I found tricky, I've looked at a lot of instruction videos on the internet.
From what I understand it's working out a balance between nail contact and flesh and shaping with a slight slope to give a fuller tone.

The main jist I took from all is that it's individual and one has to experiment to find something that works for them.

Also I thought it might be possible to use my pick if I chose, but with the acrylic on the index finger, I found when strumming my index finger nail was brushing the strings too when holding the pick ! :S :ohmy:

Neil's holding a pick tip camera angles aren't too clear for the index finger position when strumming.

I place the pick at the bend of my index finger first joint and thumb on top.
My index finger points at an angle towards the pick point, if I fold it back I find the wrist movement restricted, which I think is how Neil does it. Not sure.

In seeking to maximise options available to develop best tone, my conclusion was that to have the acrylic for fingerpicking, I'd need to spend a good bit of time experimenting - relearning the little I know to make all options work.

Then there's the invisible pick with acrylic nails :ohmy: more experimenting !
:blink: :S invisible pick looks natural and fun but I have never quite got the knack of it and with the acrylic seems very noisy.

The type of finger contact on a string ( amount of pressure) for the right hand is different than that of the left, so are the callouses the same?

Tommy Emmanuel in a lot of his internet interviews explains he has callouses on the end of his right hand fingers as he doesn't have nails as such. It would be great to see them to get a better understanding of what he means. Then again he plays 24/7 so they must be just like left hand callouses, I'd say I have tough skin on my right hand unlike callouses on my left hand. It's a pity he doesn't show his callouses to help understand the extremity of his, to get tone compared with a pick, they must be major :dry: hard.

In summary, I thought I may be able to work out a best of all options to maximise tone but I'm thinking that may not be the case and just stick to no nails (fleshy with tough skin in the hope of developing stone hard callouses ) and flatpick as that's what I know, but it leaves me feeling I'm missing out on something, it would be nice to be able to understand how to use all options.

Back to guitarrrggghhh Nirvana :dry: :ohmy:

Dermot

[michelew]

Dermot, I find it's good to hear what other people are doing. As you say, it's all experimentation and Woking out what works for you under different circumstances. Over time, things change too.

I never thought I'd ever become friends and 'play nice' with thumb picks, but while they're not my preferred way of playing, they are useful and I am finding it much better than it was even as little as a year ago.

So just keep playing and those finger callouses will develop in time.

Thanks for adding to this thread.

M

[thereshopeyet]

Neil

I owe you an apology.

I Wrote:

Neil's holding a pick tip camera angles aren't too clear for the index finger position when strumming.

:S Sorry.

I'm not sure what Holding a Pick Video Tip I was looking at, but the one here is quite clear.

For some reason my first finger has a tendency to pop out no matter how I try.
Have you any suggestions how I might correct this from happening.
:S :ohmy:

Dermot

Click Image To Enlarge:


I've removed the colourr so you don't see the pink nail varnish :dry: :ohmy: :silly: :laugh: :laugh:



http://www.totallyguitars.com/howto/1/3 ... ing-a-pick

[michelew]

WOW! This thread is over a year old. I've definitely been on the hunt for the perfect thumb pick for a loooong time, and complaining about them for even longer. Well yesterday I went to my favourite guitar specialist store and finally found a bunch of picks that people were recommending in this thread that I hadn't been able to source previously.

Bear - I purchased a set of Zookies - medium - 10, 20 and 30. They feel good.

BigBear wrote:

Shel- you don't have the good ones! The best I've found is a Zookie by Jim Dunlop. The reason they are best is because the tip is at an angle to your thumb meaning your attack is square to the string. I use 20 degree.

Here's a link:



Bear

But the surprise winner at the moment is the Fred Kelly Speed Thumb Pick. I'm trying to play something that's really fast. It looks strange, but Damn! if this pick doesn't make a really good difference. Thanks for the recommendation Wiley.

[sbutler]

And the Fred Kelly speed thumb pick,, can be trimmed pretty easily as well!

[wiley]

[michelew]

Hey Scott - yes they can, they can be very easily modified to the right length. Of course working out what the right length is is part of the challenge. Does that mean you're using them now? How are they working for you?

Wiley - I have a differently shaped ProPik which has been quite good, it's shown in this thread somewhere. I didn't see the speed verse. But I'll look out for it next time I'm in the store.



Though I find the down side of the metals ones is that I'm getting a metal buzzing sound when the back of my thumb hits other strings. I presume that will go with more practice as I become more precise.

Thanks for adding to this guys.

Shel

[tombo1230]

H Michelle,
I've been trying to find a good and comfortable thumb pick for a couple of years now.
I have some of those speed picks but don't like the sound of them. I find they are clicky and plastic sounding and I can't vary the tone dynamically. Maybe that is just me though.

I recently found for me anyway, the perfect pick, 'Slick pick,' large size, medium guage and made of delrin they do them in plastic also.
With the delrin ones I can vary the loudness and they don't sound plastic or clicky. Very comfortable. I read somewhere you should try a pick for two weeks, as this is how long
it can take to get used to them, but this was great right away! I also found a great finger pick from the
same online shop. it works very well. http://www.eaglemusicshop.com/prod/guit ... ks-set.htm

Tom N.