Re-imagining a legend
Jun 25, 2009 20:55:14 GMT
Post by brotherbanzai on Jun 25, 2009 20:55:14 GMT
...well, at least to me it's a legend ;D. I thought this might be of general interest to some forum members, so here we go.
The two swords made by the late Jody Samson for the movie Conan were what really got me interested in swords as things of beauty and as works of fine craftsmanship as a kid. Some will dismiss them as being pure fantasy, and that they are. I can understand those who are interested only in swords which are based on historical examples. There is certainly merit in the idea of preserving history and not adding to the misconception that the public at large has about what real swords were like. There are also historically plausible swords, those that could have existed but aren't based on specific surviving examples. Fantasy swords are not historical or even historically plausible, they belong in the same realm as dragons and wizards. But then, I don't have any desire to go back in time and slog through a blood soaked battle field hacking apart my fellow human beings over a dispute about who gets to govern what piece of land in a world without toothpaste or toilet paper. But a fantasy world where you could fight off monsters and rescue the princess, that's a trip I wouldn't mind taking!
That being said, a fantasy sword that couldn't possibly be wielded might look nice hanging on the wall, but doesn't inspire me the same way as one which I could 'theoretically' dice up a dragon with.
This sword will be a collaboration between myself and Brendan of Fable Blades. We began the project by discussing the blade design and batting ideas back and forth. While this sword would never be something you would want to carry off to war and fight with all day long, I wanted to mitigate the fantasy aspect of the handling as much as possible to make it behave as much like an actual sword as we could. The sword from the movie has no profile or distal taper. A sword without profile or distal taper is really just a sharpened steel bar more than a sword. The reason why this is so have to do with how a sword handles. This was unknown to me for many years until I started studying German long sword and began to realize what really makes a sword a sword. I'm going to go off on a tangent here for a minute...
A sword without taper will be tip heavy. You can adjust the point of balance by sliding the pommel farther back on the tang or making the pommel heavier. But where the POB is isn't all there is to how a sword handles. The idea with profile and/or distal taper is to concentrate more of the blades weight closer to the hand. Two swords with identical weights and points of balance can handle completely differently. To more easily visualize this we can imagine an extreme example where the sword is a steel rod with adjustable weights (I read this and saw a similar graphic in an article I read on the web but don't remember where, if anyone knows the article I'm talking about please post a link) as pictured below.
'Sword' A and 'sword' B have identical weights and points of balance. Imagine holding each one at the grip area and maneuvering it around, swinging, cutting, recovering, guarding and whatnot. 'Sword' A has it's weights pushed further out to the ends so it will be harder to initiate a swing and harder to stop the swing. It will also be harder to adjust the swing once it gets going. 'Sword' B has it's weights closer to where the hand grips it so even though the weight and POB are the same, it will handle more like a sword ought to by being faster and more maneuverable.
For this reason we designed a bit of profile and distal taper into the blade. The profile taper is slight so as not to stray too far from the look it's supposed to have. Once we had agreed upon a shape for the blade and the tang, it was time to start sculpting. First is the clay draft of one side of the pommel. It is sculpted around and aluminum blank which matches the planed tang end for the sword. This will allow the finished pommel to fit nicely on the finished tang. I made a number of changes from what the movie sword looks like, but the overall idea is the same.
The blade blank pictured up top was made by me but current plans are for Brendan to be making one for me and one for himself as well. I would have been happy to just let him make all the blades but I wanted one with the more prominent little 'ears' like the sword from the second movie and the steel available where Brendan is, is just a tad too narrow.
The two swords made by the late Jody Samson for the movie Conan were what really got me interested in swords as things of beauty and as works of fine craftsmanship as a kid. Some will dismiss them as being pure fantasy, and that they are. I can understand those who are interested only in swords which are based on historical examples. There is certainly merit in the idea of preserving history and not adding to the misconception that the public at large has about what real swords were like. There are also historically plausible swords, those that could have existed but aren't based on specific surviving examples. Fantasy swords are not historical or even historically plausible, they belong in the same realm as dragons and wizards. But then, I don't have any desire to go back in time and slog through a blood soaked battle field hacking apart my fellow human beings over a dispute about who gets to govern what piece of land in a world without toothpaste or toilet paper. But a fantasy world where you could fight off monsters and rescue the princess, that's a trip I wouldn't mind taking!
That being said, a fantasy sword that couldn't possibly be wielded might look nice hanging on the wall, but doesn't inspire me the same way as one which I could 'theoretically' dice up a dragon with.
This sword will be a collaboration between myself and Brendan of Fable Blades. We began the project by discussing the blade design and batting ideas back and forth. While this sword would never be something you would want to carry off to war and fight with all day long, I wanted to mitigate the fantasy aspect of the handling as much as possible to make it behave as much like an actual sword as we could. The sword from the movie has no profile or distal taper. A sword without profile or distal taper is really just a sharpened steel bar more than a sword. The reason why this is so have to do with how a sword handles. This was unknown to me for many years until I started studying German long sword and began to realize what really makes a sword a sword. I'm going to go off on a tangent here for a minute...
A sword without taper will be tip heavy. You can adjust the point of balance by sliding the pommel farther back on the tang or making the pommel heavier. But where the POB is isn't all there is to how a sword handles. The idea with profile and/or distal taper is to concentrate more of the blades weight closer to the hand. Two swords with identical weights and points of balance can handle completely differently. To more easily visualize this we can imagine an extreme example where the sword is a steel rod with adjustable weights (I read this and saw a similar graphic in an article I read on the web but don't remember where, if anyone knows the article I'm talking about please post a link) as pictured below.
'Sword' A and 'sword' B have identical weights and points of balance. Imagine holding each one at the grip area and maneuvering it around, swinging, cutting, recovering, guarding and whatnot. 'Sword' A has it's weights pushed further out to the ends so it will be harder to initiate a swing and harder to stop the swing. It will also be harder to adjust the swing once it gets going. 'Sword' B has it's weights closer to where the hand grips it so even though the weight and POB are the same, it will handle more like a sword ought to by being faster and more maneuverable.
For this reason we designed a bit of profile and distal taper into the blade. The profile taper is slight so as not to stray too far from the look it's supposed to have. Once we had agreed upon a shape for the blade and the tang, it was time to start sculpting. First is the clay draft of one side of the pommel. It is sculpted around and aluminum blank which matches the planed tang end for the sword. This will allow the finished pommel to fit nicely on the finished tang. I made a number of changes from what the movie sword looks like, but the overall idea is the same.
The blade blank pictured up top was made by me but current plans are for Brendan to be making one for me and one for himself as well. I would have been happy to just let him make all the blades but I wanted one with the more prominent little 'ears' like the sword from the second movie and the steel available where Brendan is, is just a tad too narrow.
More to come...
That's a good point about the different sword types. Though for a chopping sword I would think that you'd want the POB farther forward than on the straight sword and so would move the blade weight closer to the tip but wouldn't slide the pommel weight further back. I should probably clarify a bit too. What I wanted to show in the little graphic was that a sword which is meant to cut, thrust, and guard should be more along the lines of "B" and shouldn't be constructed so as to accidentally become a chopper like "A". I realized that I hadn't explicitly mentioned that and don't want to come off sounding like a chopping sword isn't a valid type of sword. 
Anyway I thought it might be interesting to show some of the stages things go through to get to a finished piece.
