Behind the Scenes
- Return of More Than Meets the Eye
- More Monsters, Motion, and Mechanics!
- Mysterious Makeup and Preposterous Props! - II
- Higher-Tech Reality
- More Monsters, Motion, and Mechanics!
A Square Image
Computer technology has developed to enable us to make smaller and more detailed images. The more squares per inch in your graph paper, the better the quality of your image. Today's computers transmit images allowing for thousands of squares per inch. This can make something that's really two-dimensional appear three-dimensional. A computer-animated character requires this great density of information to look real.
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Going Up?
Electricity will flow only if there is a complete path, or circuit. As you touch the small connecting wire to the two nails, it acts like a switch, making a complete circuit. The light shines. For movie effects, the nailboard creates a way to rapidly complete electrical circuits, just by swiping a material that conducts electricity across the pairs of nails. That's how filmmakers create an "elevator" that doesn't really exist. Besides elevator lights, nailboards can be used to create a fast series of explosions or other pyrotechnics and special effects.
More Middle School Activities
- Return of More Than Meets the Eye
- More Monsters, Motion, and Mechanics!
- Mysterious Makeup and Preposterous Props! - II
- Higher-Tech Reality
- More Monsters, Motion, and Mechanics!
Out of the Blue
When you see color, you sense light being reflected from an object to your eyes. Since plastic folders aren't all alike, you'll find that some combination of red or yellow folders will create a filter to block blue/green light from getting to your eyes. This causes the blue screen to disappear, leaving the actor ready to be added to any scene - like E.T. and Elliott who "fly" out of the neighborhood. A green "blue screen" is used for scenes where the actor is wearing blue so he or she won't disappear, too.
More Middle School Activities
- Return of More Than Meets the Eye
- More Monsters, Motion, and Mechanics!
- Mysterious Makeup and Preposterous Props! - II
- Higher-Tech Reality
- More Monsters, Motion, and Mechanics!
Give Me a Hand
Computers have a lot to offer! Instead of a photocopy, with a laser scanner, you can scan all sides of a real object and make a three-dimensional picture on the computer. To make a gloved hand look real, there is a technique called texture mapping that adds intricate details to the surface of an object. Models like your skeleton can be connected to computers so that the motions you make can be duplicated and altered. The computer can even combine all three of the activities you did into one realistic moving image. Many movies use a combination of these techniques. For different scenes of the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park, for example, the filmmakers used electronically controlled life-size models, latex body parts, and computer animation-just like you used different versions of your hand for different scenes
More Middle School Activities
- Return of More Than Meets the Eye
- More Monsters, Motion, and Mechanics!
- Mysterious Makeup and Preposterous Props! - II
- Higher-Tech Reality
- More Monsters, Motion, and Mechanics!