Excellent Choreography

For my fanfilm, age of the sith, I was wondering if people could give me suggestions for excellent choreography and for cool moves. Just for the last scene of the movie. I will give some background info:
The environment is a mix of ep2 and ep1. It takes place in a sith temple like in a cave, but there are platforms in the air like in ep1. A character comes in, kills someone, and kills someone else.

thanks,
aaron

 

What do you mean - "suggestions for choreography?"


Do you mean examples of other FanFilms you can see to get ideas?

Do you mean original suggestions for choreography?



Can you be a bit more specific?

 

both are fine. when i made the post i had the second one in mind but the first choice wouldn't be half bad either....

 

Check the FAQ. There's some stuff in there that should give you some insight on fighting. This one guy (forget his name) wrote out a tutorial with some basic moves and such and even made movies demonstrating them.

Take the time to practise. Get with a friend who's into this stuff and make up some fights. You might want to get some protective equipment so you don't accidentally kill yourselves or something. Also remember, when fighting you're trying to hit the other guy, not the wooden dowel rod sticking out of a maglight with holes drilled into it he's holding.

 

You also will want to check out the "Behind the Scenes" featurette from Broken Allegiance on fight choreopgraphy.
This is an excellent look at the development of "lightsaber fighting" with actors who had no previous experience.

 

thanks for the info, and for a lot of the saber fights it will probably be very slow stuff and in editing time i will speed it up with premiere but that brings up a problem: the dialogue and other movie content will be way too fast

 

And your fight will look awefully fake. Don't speed it up, practice until the speed you want looks natural.

 

No No No ... this is not the way to go.
It will be WAY to obvious that you sped up the action.

Better to practice ... practice ... practice your choreography so that you can perform it at regular speeds.
You'ld be surprised how well some creative shot angles and editing can liven up an otherwise dismal duel.

 

i know, there has been tons of choreography practicing, we just aren't fast...

 

Then, sorry, but you won't have that "Excellent Choreography"

 

AWB were you born in 1989?

 

1. i'll try and get faster and faster and faster and faster and so forth


2. yes, i was born in 1989, why??

 

so, what fanfilms have the best choreography in them?? the only ones i've seen are duel, duality, and the dark redemption. duel was good, duality was amazing, and dark redemption was decent

 

i feel old all these numbers are getting so high now!

 

AWB:
My suggestion to you is to methodically download many of the films on the TFN list. Some I would ricommend are:
* The New World
* Knightquest
* Broken Allegiance
* Seeds of Darkness
* Legacy of the Jedi


There are others, but start with these.
Study the choreography .... then sit down and think up your own.

Practice ... have fun. You WILL be a Jedi ... I promise.

 

changing the subject here, about background music for the movie, i can't find the jedi theme (song that plays when qui-gon and obi-wan fight droids in beginning of tpm, on the sail barge in rotj, when luke is trapped in teh beginning of esb and he escapes from the monster, etc.) except for the return of the jedi one. does anybody have a different version of that song that isn't technp or anything like that???

 

Another great thing to remember is, like was earlier mentioned - your trying to hit the person, not make contact with the other persons weapon. And dont always make contact, number one, if your so close together that your clashing sabers every swing, then either your choreography looks very fake (and staged because you cant possibly block things at point blank (obviously)) or its going to feel extremely awkward trying to block swings that are that close. This seems a bit unclear, Im sure, but you may be able to see where I'm coming from.

Another thing is, if your not making contact, use ducks, spins, rolls, and for god's sake, RUN. Its much more impressive when the choreography takes place while running rather than standing still. But, dont try to too get fancy. TPM was fast and great, but it was way too fancy. Darth Maul did a lot of useless moves. However, Ray Park knew what he was doing. My favorite part of the TPM duel is right after DM smahes the door controlls and they move into the catwalk room. DM throws Quigon out of the way and moves to hit Obi with the same blade. Just remember to put Reality before Fancy, and like TAC said, practice. Good Luck - Jordan

 

this is still about choreography but with a lightsaber against blaster scene i just have sounds for blasters no lighting at all. so does anyone have any tips for me on blaster-saber combat choreography??

thanks,
aaron

 

watch AOTC as much as you can

the Obi-Wan/Jango fight in the rain has the best blaster/lightsaber fight i've seen.... only thing is, in most cases the lightsaber wielding warrior will pummel the blaster equipped guy.

 

Looks like someone needs some coreography lessons. Luckily you are doing a fanfilm that only requires lightsabers. That means you can pick up any stick that is the right size and not have to worry about balancing and weight of the real weapon...phew.

Ok what you are doing is called Stage Combat. Stage combat is PRETENDING to fight to please an audience. It is a series of pre-planned moves that the actors know. No surprises or anything. Keep in mind that contrary to belief, you are NOT trying to hit one another, you have to make it look like you are (thats where the acting comes in).

Now that we know what stage combat is, lets go over some simple manuvers.

1.The first is a simple overhead swing perpindicular to the ground at your opponents head (like you are trying to slice him in half). This move is parried by holding your sword parallel to the ground well above the head.

2.The second is a slice parallel to the ground at your opponent right shoulder. To parry this move bring sword to right and hold perpendicular to the ground.

3.same as #2 except change RIGHT for LEFT

4.This a thrust cut at opponents leg. aim for leg slicing down a a 45 degree angle. Parry this by bringing sword down and blocking at a 45 degree angle to ground

5. This is a thrust at opponents torso. Parry by swinging and knocking sword out of way or to add variety spin. This move can be divided into 3 moves. Jab at head, torso or groin/legs.

NOTE:All parries should be carried out as crisp and clean as attack and make a nice perpindicular X every time blades meet. A parry is not so much a swing to block an attack, but more of a still posistioning of sword to meet the attack.


Now just go out and practice A LOT. Practice makes perfect. You will not get it going fast the first few attempts.

For some Ideas, just watch any medieval movie. here are some suggestions
Braveheart
Robin Hood Prince of Thieves
Starwars Episode 1 (look at the duel of the fates)
umm...out of anymore ideas

 

Another thing, dont try to attack, ahem, PRETEND to attack your opponet with a lightsaber all the time. Use the enviroment. Throw sand, slam people into walls, jump off of things, break things, make it as unique as possible. A series of 'thrusts and parries' is only good for so long. Like someone also said above is change camera angles a lot. and panning during duels - bad. Track or stay static. Photography is crucial, I believe there is a nice article int he FAQ that ... tumblemonster, I think wrote? Correct me if I'm wrong. But its a great article, an essential one for any choreographer/stage combatant.

 

Doing a blaster/saber fight might actually be a bit more difficult. You have to plan out all the attacks on both sides of course. The real trick will be to keep the actors in sync since they won't be playing directly off of each other.

A good way to do it would be to break it all down into steps. This also goes for saber to saber. Keeping a beat, like you're dancing. Count out the moves. 1-2-3-4 1-2-3-4, and so on. Check out some of the earlier Jackie Chan movies. In the early seventies the Hong Kong movie fights were not as smooth. They would contact and then sort of stop for a moment. You could easily see how it was all broken down into steps and how they kept rythem. In fact if you just listened to the punching sound effects you'd have a beat you could carry a song to (well, that maybe an exaggeration )

Of course that's why it's called choreography