REM@MIT-MC@sri-unix (11/28/82)
From: Robert Elton Maas <REM at MIT-MC> I object to the restriction that a use for a space station must be scientific or technical. I'd like to see it used as a setting for movies that have real zero-gee special effects (in addition to all the scientific and manufacturing stuff I want done there). Why are they making that (in my opinion) arbitrary restriction on use?
ignatz (12/02/82)
Sorry to hit the net with this, but it's the old uucp->ARPA bugaboo... Go to space to shoot null-g special effects? Come on! They do very well now, and for a fraction of the cost moving a film crew and actors up there would cost, even with the shuttle. Not to mention the hazards of working in a low-pressure environment with untrained personnel...
REM@MIT-MC@sri-unix (12/04/82)
From: Robert Elton Maas <REM at MIT-MC>
Date: 1 Dec 82 16:38:08-PST (Wed)
From: npois!houxm!ihnp4!ihuxx!ignatz at Ucb-C70
Go to space to shoot null-g special effects? Come on! They do
very well now,
All the special effects I've seen have ranged from incorrect to
grossly idiotic. Things like smoke from explosions billowing and
rising on the Moon or in orbit are idiotic. The best effect I saw was
in Silent Running where the fireball grew and faded without rising,
and where pieces of the exploded spacecraft passed by the camera along
straightline trajectories in full perspective. But the fireball did
seem to be self-contained as if pressing against ambient gas pressure
even though this was supposed to be in deep space out near Saturn.
Please tell me where you've seen truly correct special effects which
look like the LEM takeoff (bits of material flying up and back down
along near-parabolic trajectories) or the equivalent in an inertial
frame (bits flying along near-linear trajectories), with smoke
particles and fireball plasma and gas doing likewise (not billowing or
contained in any way) because of very very very small ambient gas
pressure. Or how about a movie about people in spacecraft that don't
have artificial gravity, where they glob their "glass" of water instead
of drinking it in the usual way, where every so often something loose
drifts by the camera and they have to nonchalantly snatch it out of
the air and stow it somewhere, where bulkheads DON'T fall loose from
the ceiling and crush somebody against the floor. Let's have a
realistic movie about the first manned trip to Mars, which definitely
WON'T have artificial gravity on the spacecraft! You ever see one like that?