werner@aecom.yu.edu (Craig Werner) (12/25/89)
I'm sure this bothered other people at the time -- if they
noticed it.
Remember that great series of commercials about a month back. The
helicar on the napkin, run down the steps, scanned in, CADed, all sorts
of color graphics, a report to the board of directors, then an animated
helicar flying off into the distance.
A few things bothered me about that commercial.
Minor gripes:
1. The MacIIx, scanner, laserwriter, software, and CD ROM used in
that commercial cost over $20,000.
2. From the TV commercial, you think the animation is occurring
in real time. The fine print in the print ad admits it is just playing
off of a CD ROM. I was really dissapointed.
Major gripe:
3. That helicar has no stabilizer. There's no way it could fly.
And there's certainly no way it could execute that graceful turn into the
sunset. In other words, it's a terrible idea. A great visual
presentation, but all style and no substance. But I suppose that
marketing types (nor Macintosh users ?) are not supposed to know anything
about aerodynamics. It ends with the sloga "the best way to make a great idea
fly." The idea may fly, but that helicar never will.
--
Craig Werner (future MD/PhD, 4.5 years down, 2.5 to go)
werner@aecom.YU.EDU -- Albert Einstein College of Medicine
(1935-14E Eastchester Rd., Bronx NY 10461, 212-931-2517)
"Results would only confuse people."roy@phri.nyu.edu (Roy Smith) (12/26/89)
In <2692@aecom.yu.edu> werner@aecom.yu.edu (Craig Werner) writes: > 3. That helicar has no stabilizer. There's no way it could fly. What if the body of the helicar was asymetric in such a way that the downwash was deflected off to one side, providing the counter-torque required to keep the vehicle from just spinning under its blades? Maybe it's just not obvious in the animation that it's done that way. Maybe there is a reaction jet on one side of the body? -- Roy Smith, Public Health Research Institute 455 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016 roy@alanine.phri.nyu.edu -OR- {att,philabs,cmcl2,rutgers,hombre}!phri!roy "My karma ran over my dogma"
kaufman@Neon.Stanford.EDU (Marc T. Kaufman) (12/26/89)
In article <2692@aecom.yu.edu> werner@aecom.yu.edu (Craig Werner) writes:
-Major gripe:
- 3. That helicar has no stabilizer. There's no way it could fly.
-And there's certainly no way it could execute that graceful turn into the
-sunset. In other words, it's a terrible idea. A great visual
-presentation, but all style and no substance. But I suppose that
-marketing types (nor Macintosh users ?) are not supposed to know anything
-about aerodynamics. It ends with the sloga "the best way to make a great idea
-fly." The idea may fly, but that helicar never will.
I suppose you are not aware of the Hughes NOTAR (NO TAil Rotor) concept, which
is being applied to the Hughes 500 series helicopter, among others.
Marc Kaufman (kaufman@Neon.stanford.edu)uzun@pnet01.cts.com (Roger Uzun) (12/27/89)
The apple helicar anim displayed in the ad is an insult to the display
capabilities of the machine. I have done 256 color animation of
arbitrary raster images over arbitrary backgrounds on the Mac II
series before. There is no need for a "canned" animation of this
low quality to be used as an example of this machines capabilities.
The background was stark white. Given a 256 color screen, from
a palette of 16 million colors, at 640X480 pixels, one can get
VERY detailed objects, and still save about 64 colors on thescreen
for color cycling animation effects. That ad was pathetic.
-Roger Uzun
UUCP: {hplabs!hp-sdd ucsd nosc}!crash!pnet01!uzun
ARPA: crash!pnet01!uzun@nosc.mil
INET: uzun@pnet01.cts.comfiddler%concertina@Sun.COM (Steve Hix) (12/27/89)
In article <1989Dec26.021519.16887@Neon.Stanford.EDU>, kaufman@Neon.Stanford.EDU (Marc T. Kaufman) writes: > In article <2692@aecom.yu.edu> werner@aecom.yu.edu (Craig Werner) writes: > -Major gripe: > - 3. That helicar has no stabilizer. There's no way it could fly. > -And there's certainly no way it could execute that graceful turn into the > -sunset. In other words, it's a terrible idea. A great visual > -presentation, but all style and no substance. But I suppose that > -marketing types (nor Macintosh users ?) are not supposed to know anything > -about aerodynamics. It ends with the sloga "the best way to make a great idea > -fly." The idea may fly, but that helicar never will. > > I suppose you are not aware of the Hughes NOTAR (NO TAil Rotor) concept, which > is being applied to the Hughes 500 series helicopter, among others. NOTAR might be hard to implement with no tail boom, at least it would be operating with a smaller lever arm. Go for an even earlier method of dealing with rotor torque: drive the blades by venting bleed air through the rotors at their tips. Almost have to use a turbine engine to make it work well, though. Some Mac users (even some marketing types) do know a bit about aerodynamics... or even aviation history. ------------ "...Then anyone who leaves behind him a written manual, and likewise anyone who receives it, in the belief that such writing will be clear and certain, must be exceedingly simple-minded..." Plato, _Phaedrus_ 275d