I’m not that surprised you found it difficult to use swing and tilt simultaneously. It is not that straight forward. Tilt and swing each reduce depth of field but they are not independent either. They combine to give you a new shape of the depth of field. Suppose you have a receding subject like a flat road, and a wall along one side of the road. One might assume you can just figure out a tilt for the road and then swing for the wall. Doesn’t work that way.
One thing that can be worth doing to practice with movements when you aren’t out photographing, is to set up little scenarios on a table. You can use things like newspaper, pencils, anything. Light it so it is easy to see what is in/out of focus on the ground glass, and just try things. Near/far planes, vertical objects in foreground, background etc.
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