Nick's post last week has inspired me to post some video from our practice here in California. I've updated my blog with some video of a rapier lesson that I gave yesterday that covered the actions in plate 7 along with some of my commentary. I'd appreciate any feedback, thoughts, or criticism.

Here's the link:
http://www.thecoblog.net/?p=171

Thanks,
David

My word, there is a flowering of good 17th century fencing instructional videos on the web! This is very very good for the Art, and I really hope it will help many a lonesome practitioner. My only problem with the phenomenon is that it seems it's all about Capo Ferro

As for your video, I like the format. It looks like the recording of a traditional fencing lesson. It is a bit less eloquent and straightforward than Nick's video style, but the captions help. Well, while with Nick a complete beginner could understand and copy everything going on, in your case you have to know what it is being talked about. After reading the plate and your post, though, it was rather easy following your breakdown of the action. You should add a link to your blog for the wandering youtuber!

Since I am not that good a fencer, I'll need your help to understand the "clever fencer" response. Have I got it right?

When C disengages, he doesn't seek to gain D's sword on the other line (and attack). He stands with his weight kept back and when D lunges, he parries the attack on the outside line (with either edge), completing the cavazione. He then wounds either with a cut or a thrust.

Excellent, I am glad to be an inspiration

The technique is looking really good, but I have a few comments. Firstly, your form, evidently you know good form as you are correcting your partner, but then not using it yourself, I can understand this, such as the comment I just made about my own video in the other thread, but it is distracting for me. So that is really a comment on the teaching style as opposed to your technique, which is really good.

Other than that, a few comments about the production of the video which might help. I keep making tweeks to improve my videos and I think there are some easy ways to improve videos very easily. Firstly, the camera mount, hand held footage detracts from the footage, as it is difficult to concentrate on what is going on with the motion of the camera. Panning is fine, but I would recommend a tripod, nothing expensive, just a simple one. This was actually contrary to my background, as I have a history of movie directing and producing, where shoulder mount is almost always prefered to tripod, but instructional and fiction work is very different. So I shoot sparring footage handheld, as the cameraman can stay fluid with the action, but tripod with instructional, as to make the focus of attention the sword practice.

Then, widescreen is awesome for fencing footage, as it naturally suits two opponents facing eachother. The camera I use shoots natively in widescreen, which is great, but even if you do not have such a camera, most video editing software will allow you to crop it to widescreen, which if you look at your footage, would get rid of a lot of the unnecessary background. If you are interested, I use this camera:
http://www.panasonic.co.uk/html/en_GB/Products/HDC-SD9/Overview/476211/index.html - fantastic peice of equipment, and outstanding for the money.

Lastly, sound, it would be great to better here what you are saying and crop out some of the background noise. To do this I use a basic Olympus dictaphone (a USB model), with a standard Olympus tie clip mic, all cheap and readily available kit, synching the audio to the video is very quick and easy in your video editing software. The audio in my clips isn't perfect yet, I have one problem left to resolve, I need manual audio levels, as the automatic levels increase te volume in order to pick up background noise when I am not talking. That is the last thing to sort out, but I find this really helps from an audience perspective.

Anyway, thats it, as I said, great technqiue, I just posted up a plate 7 lesson myself funnily enough, thanks for posting!

Hi Francesco, thank you for your kind words and your feedback. Also, thanks for reminding me to post back to my blog! I had intended to do that, but I made the youtube videos before I wrote the blog article and forgot to go back and update the video descriptions.



By the time we get to this action, we've got a number of things going on. Here's what's going on by the time you get to the last action. First, C was attacking by doing a disengagement in the tempo of D's attempt to gain the weapon and advance to measure. D figured this out, so he started lunging as soon as he saw what C was doing. Now C starts to get pretty clever and realizes that he can defeat D by using a feint. So, when D gains on the inside line and advances, C disengages, extending his arm and leaning his upper body forward a little, simulating an attack by disengagement. At this point, D thinks he sees what he's looking for so he makes his response (an attack to the outside high line), but because C hasn't really committed to the attack though, it's pretty easy for him to bend his arm and make the parry.
The plate says that you can parry with the true or false edge and riposte with a thrust or a cut. I've interpreted this to mean that if I parry with the true edge I should riposte with the thrust and with the false edge the cut, though I'd be interested in hearing someone's opinion who can read the actual Italian. This interpretation seems to make sense to me though - I don't like riposting with a thrust after a false edge parry because then I either have to rotate my hand or attack without the proper opposition. Using a cut after the true edge parry isn't so bad but I still have to either turn my hand so that I can cut with the true edge or try to do a false edge cut. On the other hand, the false edge parry with a cut to the head is extremely fast and very effective.

well, let's start saying that Capo Ferro is not the best writer there is. Reading the Italian text we could say that your interpretation might be the best.
He does say "He may parry with the false edge OR with the true edge. And then he could throw a dritto to the face OR an imbroccata." Then we could say that the false edge and the cut go together, and the true edge goes with the imbroccata... It stands to reason, but the writer himself wrote it down in a very ambiguous way.

Hi Nick,
Since I am teaching in the video (rather than demonstrating the technique) I adopt a teaching stance rather than a fencing stance. For one, this is much less tiring than a normal stance so I can teach for longer without getting tired (I gave about a 45 minute rapier lesson just before this one) The stance also makes it easier for me to control timing and distance, ensuring that the student will have the best chance of executing the technique correctly. It also allows me to keep my left hand free which I can use both as a visual queue for when the student should attack (in action 1) or make small adjustments after they make their hit. (Maestro Gaugler describes the teaching stance in Science of Fencing)

Also, thanks for the advice on the video - I actually used a fairly cheap digital camera (Sony DSC-H10) so it's not really designed for this sort of thing. I friend just loaned me a better camera which I'll probably use if I post anymore videos..

That certainly is open to interpretation. The way I choose to do it is basically however I see practical, which seems to be what you have done. When I parry with the false edge in this technique I always riposte with a cut, because of what you are saying, its simply not easy or safe to thrust from here, and in fact an imbroccata can lead to your hilt getting tangled up with their blade as a few of my students found out when trying to do it. However, when I parry with the true edge, I am happy to thrust or cut. The reason for the cut here is based off one of the windings that we do in longsword, where from a zorn on the inside, we twist in to an oberhau cutting from the left, it is exactly the same idea in reverse, and works well.

On the stance, yes I can appreciate that, especially if you were giving the lesson to a student, no problem, and I do know what you mean, I frequently do something similiar.

In terms of the camera, although the higher quality the camera the better, it is less of a problem than you may think, even a cheapy camera can produce good results by tweaking a few elements of the production.

If we take a queue from the Bolognese, then delivering an Imbroccata after parrying with the Falso is definitely in the repertoire. Additionally, we can look at Marcelli, who parries all thrusts to his outside with his false edge and generally ripostes with a thrust (with the hand in seconda). However, I am familiar with the problem of tangling your opponent's sword in your quillons 9as in, I've done it on many occasions), and certainly can see riposting with a Mandritto instead.

The riposte with a thrust after a false-edge parry is just one of those tricky actions where you have to decide whether it is better to deliver a potentially much more devastating thrust or a safer cut.

As an aside, we see this same problem when, after parrying to the inside on the true-edge the riposte as made as a fianconata (as described in Bondi' di Mazo).

Steve

Yes that is a good point Steven, it is definitely possible, however, I find the double time nature of the defence makes it very difficult to strike the thrust before the opponent has recovered, so I tend to either strike a cut, or pass, which reduces the problem of the quillons being tangled and ensures you strike the opponent if he recovers quickly.