Nathan Gray is happy to announce that he will be teaching fight choreography for stage and screen with highlanders Adrian Paul at the Sword experience in August 2018.
This will be the second sword experience in Ireland and the second year that Nathan and Gray School of Arms have been employed to teach at the event.
What is the sword experience?
The sword experience is an event focused on giving fans of the hit tv show highlander the opportunity to train with Adrian Paul himself.
The events itself is held on the grounds of historical monuments with last year’s event taking place at Trim castle with participants fighting in and around the castle.
This year’s event will be taking place in Cahir Castle. With each participant getting to learn the tricks of the trade and will be taught how to fight on camera by learning fight choreography first hand from Adrian and Nathan. Not only will participants get to learn how to fight on camera within the historical Cahir castle, they will also be filmed and sent the edited video after the event.
The event is open for registration now.
Nathan Gray and Adrian Paul, demonstrating at Trim Castle
Fight choreography for stage and screen
Fighting on stage and screen is very different from fighting in real fights, as such the training is different from that of martial arts. At Gray School of Arms, we teach both martial arts and stage/screen fighting.
The differences
There are a lot of differences between fighting for stage and screen and martial arts, to many to list but here are two basic examples.
Fighting for stage and screen has a level of dramatics that would see you most likely lose in a real fight, if implemented. For instance cutting with a weapon is done with large movements and excessive amounts of motion, were in an actual fight you require you movements to be a lot tighter. It all boils down to giving the advance and viewer’s a show.
Martial arts on the other hand is about survival as such you want to limit the amount of movement and flashy techniques used. You want to get the job done in as quick and efficient a manner as possible. This in turn is not particularly fun or entertaining to watch outside of the martial arts community.
It is recommended to have experience in both martial arts and stage/screen fighting, but to look at each as their own thing. This can be a difficult balance to achieve however events such as the sword experience or schools like Gray School of Arms will give you what you need to succeed in both aspects.
