Weopons Training for Lightsaber Choreographing Question

I know I must be running this into the ground, but I have been looking for something that can teach the fancy manuevers like Ray Park does in Episode 1. Finally I have something to look for, but does anyone know of a weopons class that can teach me basically the entire Darth Maul set up (flips, spins and twirls with a staff)? If so, what is the class called?

 

heres my advice,

the fighting in starwars is based off many kinds of fighting,
heres the ones i know and im pretty sure that the fighting in starwars is based off

id take some weapons training in ninjitsu

ninjitsu
kendo
taichi saber
fencing

 

weapons training isn't going to teach you to do the coreography like in the movies. that's showy stuff, not real sword fighting. my advice would be to try to take some fencing or something to learn some basic moves and movements and then just study a lot of what looks good on video. then play with it and make it look good.

 

A lot of the saber technique from the new Star Wars films was actually developed from some sort of blade weapon from the Philippines...the name escapes me, but a search of starwars.com should bring it up.

Incidentally, the Philippines are also the source for the hand-to-hand combat in The Hunted, and I think I caught somewhere that LOTR used it as an inspiration as well. Does anyone know if there are any US-based schools that teach fighting styles from the Philippines?

 

I believe JediDragon is right.

Stage Combat is what you want to get involed in. You will learn the proper angles, and fighting designed for movie flash.

Even after stage combat classes, watch alot of movies with combat (Both weapons and hand to hand). Study the things you like, and ask yourself; why you liked it. See if you can incorporate it into your choreaography. If not, remember it. Maybe you can use it later.

Don't forget unarmed combat can give you ideas for sword choreography, since a blade is just an extension of the arm anyway.

 

As I mentioned in your other thread on this exact same topic, you should try to get some gymnastic training. It takes a long time to learn those flips and spins, but once you've learned them, it takes no time at all to do them with a staff.

-tm

 

yeha just learn some basic sword moves [Kendo or sumthin] and spend the rest of your time getting flexable and start gymnastics

 

the phillipino arts would be Kali or Arnis probably? You can usually find these with schools that teach Jeet Kune Do (ol' danny was big into both if I remember right). Just look in the yellow pages for Kali or Arnis (I can never remember the difference in the 2, but they usually have to do with knife, stick, sword, and h2h).

 

park has years of martial arts under his belt, and is very experianced with swords and real weapons combat. takes years to learn that stuff. if you want to do flips, you could do a range of things. take figure skating, cause a few of his stuff is done in figure skating.

in term sof the actual work with the saber/s, its more or less a combination of fancy stupid unrealistic things and real weapons combat from many different types of martial arts.

 

The Filipino weapon art that everyone is referring to is Escrima, which employs multiple bladed weapons. The Escrima blade weapons are known for having curved hilts, which gives you a better grip with a single hand.

And the other hand, Kali is a no-crap fighting style that evolved from escrima, and a few other styles, and grew up in America. It employs heat-treated combat batons made from bamboo. Unlike other styles, such as Kendo, which use full body armor, the only armor used in Kali sparring (which is really their main form of training) is a helmet and gloves.

My advice for choreography training is imitate. Watch some of the good saber-fighting fanfilms here, and try to recreate the fights with a friend who has some patience and doesn't mind getting hurt too bad. Then, go out, rent half a dozen old Jackie Chan flicks (the dubbed ones of course), and watch them carefully. Start trying to imitate the choreography.

This will give you a foothold grasp on choreography. The next step is coming up with some original stuff. Your first couple of fights are going to look pretty basic and boring. But keep working at it, and you'll realize the longer you work at it, the more inspired you'll be for different sets of moves. And be sure to work on footwork! It's half the battle right there.

 

that's right, escrima is the other one I was trying think of. brain farted.

what info you got on arnis?

(sorry, don't mean to hijack)

 

Well, after a quick look at Google under "arnis martial art" you'll find this from the USADOJO.com site:

Arnis began in the Philippines over 1200 years ago. It was the fighting technique used against the Spaniards in the 1500's. Today Arnis is the main martial art in the Philippines and defiantly the most popular. Modern Arnis was developed and refined by Remy Presas. The word Arnis is taken from the term "Arnis de mano" or harness of the hand. Arnis (practiced in northern Philippines), Kali (practiced in the southern Philippines) and Escrima (practiced in central Philippines) are all essentially the same art.

Arnis practitioners utilize empty hand techniques and weapons such as sticks and knives. There are different forms of combat which use different types of weapons such as a long wooden sword and a short wooden dagger. There is a single stick and double stick Arnis which uses one or two 2 foot long stick(s) made of wood or cane.

Arnis is a serious form of self defense but it is often seen as a sport. It uses almost all hand techniques, striking and parrying and depends strongly on strategy. Students train with drills, sparring and in free style practice and the training is very physical and strenuous.

Arnis practitioners also develop mental, emotional and spiritual qualities.

I'll admit, I'd never even heard of arnis until now. Thank God for google!

EDIT: Here's something else I found. It seems that Arnis and Kali are actually one and the same. They're both Eskrima. They only difference is where you're from.

Eskrima (also known as Arnis and Kali) is a weapons based martial art which comes from the Philippines. It is the national sport of the Philippines,and has a very long history of combat effectiveness. Only recently has this art become more conspicuous in many countries and enjoyed the popularity of other more traditional Asian arts. Its difference from other martial arts is that the student is taught to train with weapons from the very start, rather than starting on empty hands training (like many martial arts do). This type of training builds manual dexterity in the practitioner and also trains faster conditioned responses to various attacks. Although it is weapons based, it also includes striking (kicking and punching), wrestling and grappling, and even groundfighting, as well as teaching practical defenses against most weapons. In the Philippines it is referred to as Arnis in the northern islands (Luzon), is known as Eskrima in the central islands (Visayas), and is known as Kali in the southern islands (Mindanao).

 

Sounds pretty interesting. I wonder if they offer any courses around where I live...

 

well, you learn something new every day

I knew they were all filipino, but didn't know they were all the same thing for the most part...

 

I lean towards a modified Pi Gua Quan style. Fluidity and grace with a stick. My director doesnt let me use cause no one can match up with it.

 

My article anticipating lightsaber influences for EP 2 has relevant info on different fighting styles. A New Style? Cutlural Influences on Jedi Style Sword Fighting

If you want to train in a sword art (and I don't mean hollywood stunt fighting), you train in a sword art, which takes hundreds of hours to even begin to get the real feel for the movement. Sword fighting is about subtlety, stage fighting is about showing off.

Once you can figure out the choreography, the actor has to act like he can make his limited knowledge look real enough for the general audience.

Depending on your goal, the method and manner in which you create choreography and then film it can be very different.

If you want authentic realism, you need years of practice, and not just intellectual debates about movement. Understanding the reality of combative arts requires training and experience, not study from a book. Get an experienced martial artist who likes SW to create it.

If you want an imitative style, natural ability, an observant eye, and practice will get you through. Watch whatever movies you like and try to imitate it. The draw back is that your choreography won't be as unique as those created by choreographers who draw on their own experience. The plus side is that talented people (despite, or even in spite of their lack of experience) will often successfully show their creativity.

A note about hurting yourself. All fighting art practitioners train to minimize accidents to the point that many never have them. Accidents happen when a person places him/herself in a potentially dangerous situation: you spare to roughly against someone you shouldn't, you try techniques too quickly, you push your body to its limits, or, more often, you push your body past your level of technical ability. Moreover, you learn more quickly from someone who already knows what he's doing than by experimenting and figuring everything out yourself (i.e. reinventing the wheel). If you practice and train carefully, and then comfortably speed up the movement, you shouldn't ever have to put yourself or your partner in a dangerous situation.

Think of it this way: I would never think that I had to bear accidentally shooting myself with a gun in learning to shoot one than I would have to bear accidentally cutting myself with a sword in learning how to use it.

Yeah everyone will say how Jackie Chan (and other stunt martial artists in movies) hurt themselves during filming; stunt men are paid to put themselves in that position and they know what they're doing or pay the price of injury. When accidents do happen in movies, stunt guys have consciously put themselves in situations mentioned two paragraphs up.

 

"you push your body past your level of technical ability"

In other words, bending things the wrong way.

 

I take a prop or toy saber and just do what feels right. For choreographing, I start a camera rolling and me and my opponent go through step by step what could happen. If it looks choppy put together, we refine it. But doing it slowly like this helps to prevent the fairly bad "4 up, 2 down, 3 up, 2 down, meet at guard" crap that we use in some points, acceftionately referred to as "banging sticks". In other words, no training, just slow choreographing within our own limits. Practice doesn't hurt either, as a pair or alone. Since it's warming up, I miht start going outside and just practicing with my saber for 20 minutes at a time. Edit: At night, of course, because of my fancy-shmancy EL blade

 

I'd have to agree with everyone else here. Imitation is the best way to go for staged fighting. I've had a lot of fun figuring out Ryan's spinny moves and I can do the lightsaber spin behind the back thing that guy from Art of the Saber does. That stuff is basically just baton twirling and is really easy with some practice but looks impressive.

Real combat training is good to have so you know what can realistically be done in a fight. Everyone here has suggested some type of martial art or another but you might see if you have a SCA chapter in your area (Society for Creative Anachronism). They're the guys you see in the homemade armor at the Renaissance fairs. Yeah they're dorky but you can learn European sword fighting, real and fake, from them.

If all else fails then just get a heavy stick to swing around in your backyard everyday for 20 minutes. At the least you want to be in shape for your mini-epic. It's actually good exercise which you'll need since swinging around a 3 pound prop will tire most people out a lot faster than you would think.

 

My two cents.......

One thing to remember is that a weapon is just an extention of the hand. It is a part of you. While you are twirling it around, you should know where it is at all times...Just like your arm. So if you know where it is, then you should know where it is going, and how to get it there.

But like said before by MANY other people, Movie fighting is just that. Movie fighting. 90 percent of what is in the movies wouldn't last 2 seconds on the street.

Escrima, arnis, and kali are GREAT arts. But they are real world arts. They won't teach ANY fancy flipping or jumping. If you want to learn that kind of stuff you can take something like Northern eagle claw kung-fu. But you will here many, many times, that the flipping and fancy kicks are ONLY for practice and show. Not practical use.

 

If I understand the original question correctly, you are trying to do something close to if not exactly like the Maul set up. You were watching a trained gymnast and martial artist in action there. Lucky for you he used very little in the way of martial arts. As was stated several times, best thing I've found is to look at what looks good on screen. Watch a fencing match. I believe you will be highly dissapointed. You could watch any number of Asian sword fighting matches and also be very dissapointed.

Real sword fights (with a foil or bokken) are over almost as quickly as they begin. I've never won or lost a match in more than a few swings. If you want to be accurate, you'll find the coreography to be pretty short. If you want it to look good, you'll find "real" sword fighting to be quite out of the question. It's just over too fast, no matter how good the competators are.

Take some Tae Kwon Do classes for the high kicks and stage combat for the fighting. I learned tumbling when I was like 10, so the only place I know of to learn it at an older age would be something like cheerleading. Have fun!

 

hello, SwordSaint here. o.k. here goes. I train in and teach modern arnis (a student of Bram Frank,creator of the Syderco. Gunting)I don't think you really want Arnis,Kali,escrima,etc. Theyr'e all about realistic technique not flashy moves. Ray Park trains in Wushu; A Chinese style that uses acrobatics heavily. NOW THE WARNING: I've been training in the martial arts for 19 years and still have SO MUCH TO LEARN! If you plan on being able to move like Ray Park then your'e gonna be starting down a LONG,LONG road. Just my two cents.
C-YA,
SwordSaint.