{"id":1062,"date":"2015-05-04T13:12:48","date_gmt":"2015-05-04T18:12:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/?p=1062"},"modified":"2015-05-04T13:13:57","modified_gmt":"2015-05-04T18:13:57","slug":"writing-realistic-fight-scenes-advice-from-a-martial-artist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/2015\/05\/writing-realistic-fight-scenes-advice-from-a-martial-artist\/","title":{"rendered":"Writing Realistic Fight Scenes: Advice From A Martial Artist"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/krieg.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-1200\" src=\"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/krieg.jpg\" alt=\"krieg\" width=\"1000\" height=\"695\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/krieg.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/krieg-300x209.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px\" \/><\/a>If you&#8217;re looking to add realism to a fight sequence, talk to someone who&#8217;s been in a few fights.<\/p>\n<p>Hey- that&#8217;s me!<\/p>\n<p>Okay, quick disclaimer: I don&#8217;t <em>like<\/em> fighting. I&#8217;m not <em>good<\/em> at it. But it&#8217;s something I&#8217;ve had to practice in my martial arts career, for good reason. For one thing, I know I won&#8217;t get totally wailed on in a real fight (because I&#8217;ve been in a real fight, and I wasn&#8217;t wailed on). For another, it teaches you the most important lesson: the desire to avoid fights altogether.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m the last person to tell you that I&#8217;m some kind of super badass. My modest credentials are as follows:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Second-degree brown belt in Kenpo, Jun Fan, Muay Thai, and Eskrima.<\/li>\n<li>About five years&#8217; experience with freestyle sparring, grappling, and kickboxing.<\/li>\n<li>About the same amount of time playing with Kali sticks, machete, and bo staff. A wee bit of experience with sai and German longsword.<\/li>\n<li>Experience with squaring off against all different kinds of people. Men and women, anywhere from my height\/weight (5&#8217;5&#8243; \/ 115 lbs) to a foot taller and two hundred pounds heavier.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>That&#8217;s enough for me to tell you the following about what a fight is like:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Real fights are short.<\/strong><br \/>\nThink- really think- about two people running at each other with razor-sharp weapons and the intent to kill. Do you believe they&#8217;d actually spend twenty minutes tirelessly exchanging blows in a beautiful, deadly ballet?<\/p>\n<p><em>Hell no.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Want to know what a real sword-fight looks like? You can find plenty of examples on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/results?search_query=swordfighting&amp;aq=f&amp;oq=\" target=\"_blank\">YouTube<\/a>, but here&#8217;s the gist: two opponents will either charge right up to each other, or square up and test each other out until someone sees an opening. Once they close, they may exchange a few blows before (a) one or both go down with lethal wounds, or (b) one or both lose their weapons and switch to a grapple\/melee.<\/p>\n<p>A fist-fight typically doesn&#8217;t last long, either. Action movie heroes can shake off 37 punches and keep going, but you and I can potentially be <em>killed<\/em> by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cracked.com\/blog\/5-things-nobody-tells-you-about-getting-punched-in-face\/\" target=\"_blank\">ONE lucky shot<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>If a fight <em>does<\/em> run long, you&#8217;ll find yourself expending a lot of effort to whack the other person and dodge their hits. <em>It wears you out.<\/em> You&#8217;ll have trouble holding your arms up. You&#8217;ll gasp for air. You&#8217;ll get sloppy with form and defense- and that&#8217;s often when you or your opponent will make a terrible mistake.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Real fights are ugly.<\/strong><br \/>\nA real fight is about survival, not about showing off fancy choreographed moves. With stakes and emotions running high, all one&#8217;s discipline and training may go right out the window- assuming one had any to begin with. Sometimes your single emotion is <span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><strong>DIE<\/strong><\/span>. Sometimes it&#8217;s <small>Please, deity of choice, let this end.<\/small><\/p>\n<p>In a real fight, everything&#8217;s fair game. Hair-pulling, fingernail-raking, nut-shots- whatever gets the job done fastest.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Keeping your guard up is super important.<\/strong><br \/>\nEspecially if you&#8217;re a tiny little wisp like me. It&#8217;s way too easy for a bigger opponent to bop a smaller one in the head- <em>if<\/em> you leave your guard down. When you put up your dukes, they shouldn&#8217;t hover at chin or chest level. At least one fist should be held high to block head-shots (I tend to keep my lead fist above the crown of my head, and my rear fist around ear-height). When using a weapon, it should also be poised to protect your head as often as possible.<\/p>\n<p>Again, it gets <em>hard<\/em> to do this as a fight drags on, and the muscles in your arms complain about holding your fists\/weapons up that high. It&#8217;s something you have to train yourself not to be lax about.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Even if you &#8220;win,&#8221; you&#8217;ll probably get hurt.<\/strong><br \/>\nThrowing punches hurts your knuckles- if you throw them properly. Hold your hand wrong, or hit with the wrong part of your hand, and you <em>will<\/em> break something. It&#8217;s also stupidly easy to break fingers in a sword-fight. A deflected blade can bounce onto your fingers, or someone might punish you for forgetting to tuck your thumbs in. After all, what&#8217;s the easiest way to disarm your opponent? <em>Smack the shit out of their hands.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Head injuries are very common and insidious as well. Movies and books tend to make light of them. The truth is, if someone falls unconscious for <em>any<\/em> length of time after a head injury, they&#8217;ve sustained a serious concussion and may have issues later with memory, vomiting, and a slew of other things. Head gear should be worn whenever possible, and head injuries checked out by a doctor after the fact.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The best way to win is not to fight at all.<\/strong><br \/>\nSomeone who <em>talks<\/em> a lot of shit probably hasn&#8217;t <em>seen<\/em> much of it. Most people with actual fighting experience won&#8217;t want to pad that resume- they&#8217;ll <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>run<\/strong><\/span> if given the chance.<\/p>\n<p>My karate school always advocated fighting as one&#8217;s last resort. As the saying goes, &#8220;What&#8217;s the best block? A city block!&#8221; (As in, a city block&#8217;s distance between you and your opponent.)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Hopefully this helps! If you have any questions or comments, let me know!<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><!-- Place this tag in your head or just before your close body tag. --><br \/>\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/apis.google.com\/js\/plusone.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><!-- Place this tag where you want the widget to render. --><\/p>\n<div class=\"g-post\" data-href=\"https:\/\/plus.google.com\/+EllisMorning\/posts\/4rB9bxHxhft\"><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you&#8217;re looking to add realism to a fight sequence, talk to someone who&#8217;s been in a few fights. Hey- that&#8217;s me! Okay, quick disclaimer: I don&#8217;t like fighting. I&#8217;m not good at it. But it&#8217;s something I&#8217;ve had to practice in my martial arts career, for good reason. For one thing, I know I won&#8217;t get totally wailed on in a real fight (because I&#8217;ve been in a real fight, and I wasn&#8217;t wailed on). For another, it teaches&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"><a class=\"btn btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/2015\/05\/writing-realistic-fight-scenes-advice-from-a-martial-artist\/\"> Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1062","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-advice","category-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1062","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1062"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1062\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1210,"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1062\/revisions\/1210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ellismorning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}