Tomorrow I’m planning to do a little filming on the streets of London – getting a few cut-aways…
Proposals
Spent today putting together a proposal document for the documentary. This is primarily so that Electric sky have something to talk about when discussing trying to get pre-sales for it. I’ll eventually have to put together a trailer – but I want to wait until I’ve got a little more footage.
They asked me to put together a synopsis, a list of interviewees and a budget. Writing synopses is always hard, but like any writing work - once you get a few key paragraphs in place, it tends to fall together. I put a few pics in (a couple of my 3d models and some shots from nasa) and the list of interviewees I’ve already put together.
I know the synopsis usually comes first in any film project – primarily because you can’t usually start work without it. however, I’ve got the camera and I’m going ahead anyway. Still, the synopsis is a good discipline – if you write it without knowing pretty well what you’re trying to do, it will become clear that there’s something wrong when you read it back. If your synopsis is waffly, then your project is probably not well enough focused.
Here’s mine:
Duration 50 mins
Going to Gliese is a 50 minute documentary exploring the possibilities of examining, visiting and eventually colonizing a planet orbiting another star.
It’s the story of how mankind’s first steps out into the universe might be made and it uses a mixture of interview, Nasa footage and computer animation to look at the technologies – both available and speculative – which might allow us to see more clearly, and eventually visit unimaginably distant worlds.
Every problem Earth has comes down to one thing. Too many people and not enough resources. But in April 2007, mankind caught a glimpse of a future in which those constraints no longer mattered.
In the constellation of Libra, astronomers discovered a planet orbiting a nearby star. Planets around other stars had been discovered before - What was different about this one was that it had the potential to be habitable. The planet Gliese 581 c is slightly larger than the Earth, but it is likely to be covered with oceans and continents just as the earth is.
For the first time in human history, we are able to detect earth sized planets orbiting other stars and as our ability to see these planets increases, so we can begin to discern more and more about the environments around our neighboring stars.
The distances to these stars are huge, but scientists are already developing methods of propulsion which have the potential to reduce journey times to our nearest neighbors to just a few decades.
At the same time, the groundwork is being laid for the kind of sustainable, sealed environments which will allow humans to make long interstellar journeys and set up bases on other worlds.
Some of the technologies we’ll explore are already here - like the ability to see distant planets. Others are tested and on the way to becoming a reality - like ships which “sail” on the solar winds. Others represent engineering challenges, but are based on established knowledge – like nuclear powered ships and artificial biospheres.
Still others explore more exotic scientific possibilities – such as the “terreforming” of other worlds into Earth like planets, and faster than light travel making use of loopholes in Einstein’s theories.
The possibility of colonizing other worlds sounds remote – but will you still think so when you’ve seen “Going To Gliese”?
The budget is a little tougher… I’m the only one working on the project, and I’m doing it pretty much for nothing. Calculating how much I should be paying people is a bit of a shot in the dark… if anyone out there has opinions on this budget, I’d love to hear them!
Proposals
Spent today putting together a proposal document for the documentary. This is primarily so that Electric sky have something to talk about when discussing trying to get pre-sales for it. I’ll eventually have to put together a trailer – but I want to wait until I’ve got a little more footage.
They asked me to put together a synopsis, a list of interviewees and a budget. Writing synopses is always hard, but like any writing work - once you get a few key paragraphs in place, it tends to fall together. I put a few pics in (a couple of my 3d models and some shots from nasa) and the list of interviewees I’ve already put together.
I know the synopsis usually comes first in any film project – primarily because you can’t usually start work without it. however, I’ve got the camera and I’m going ahead anyway. Still, the synopsis is a good discipline – if you write it without knowing pretty well what you’re trying to do, it will become clear that there’s something wrong when you read it back. If your synopsis is waffly, then your project is probably not well enough focused.
Here’s mine:
Duration 50 mins
Going to Gliese is a 50 minute documentary exploring the possibilities of examining, visiting and eventually colonizing a planet orbiting another star.
It’s the story of how mankind’s first steps out into the universe might be made and it uses a mixture of interview, Nasa footage and computer animation to look at the technologies – both available and speculative – which might allow us to see more clearly, and eventually visit unimaginably distant worlds.
Every problem Earth has comes down to one thing. Too many people and not enough resources. But in April 2007, mankind caught a glimpse of a future in which those constraints no longer mattered.
In the constellation of Libra, astronomers discovered a planet orbiting a nearby star. Planets around other stars had been discovered before - What was different about this one was that it had the potential to be habitable. The planet Gliese 581 c is slightly larger than the Earth, but it is likely to be covered with oceans and continents just as the earth is.
For the first time in human history, we are able to detect earth sized planets orbiting other stars and as our ability to see these planets increases, so we can begin to discern more and more about the environments around our neighboring stars.
The distances to these stars are huge, but scientists are already developing methods of propulsion which have the potential to reduce journey times to our nearest neighbors to just a few decades.
At the same time, the groundwork is being laid for the kind of sustainable, sealed environments which will allow humans to make long interstellar journeys and set up bases on other worlds.
Some of the technologies we’ll explore are already here - like the ability to see distant planets. Others are tested and on the way to becoming a reality - like ships which “sail” on the solar winds. Others represent engineering challenges, but are based on established knowledge – like nuclear powered ships and artificial biospheres.
Still others explore more exotic scientific possibilities – such as the “terreforming” of other worlds into Earth like planets, and faster than light travel making use of loopholes in Einstein’s theories.
The possibility of colonizing other worlds sounds remote – but will you still think so when you’ve seen “Going To Gliese”?
The budget is a little tougher… I’m the only one working on the project, and I’m doing it pretty much for nothing. Calculating how much I should be paying people is a bit of a shot in the dark… if anyone out there has opinions on this budget, I’d love to hear them!
Jelly and fingerprints
As a side note, I saw a great piece in this weekend’s Bad Science column in the Guardian. It said basically that all the talk about biometrics as the antidote to terrorism and fraud is so much tosh. Apparently you can fool a fingerprint detector 80% of the time using nothing more sophisticated than household jelly!
You can also create a useable fingerprint from a mark left on a wine glass for about £20.
People put so much store in technology without ever examining it – as long as enough long words are used people just switch off and accept what they’re being told.
I’d love to do a documentary where I (or some other geek) shows the viewer in “cookery programme” style how to fool fingerprint machines, break into others computers using wireless networks in starbucks, buy fake passports, get doctorates, or buy people’s credit card details from Russian fraudsters (another piece in this weekend’s guardian).
It’d be fun – but probably a little risky!
I could even do a piece on home bomb making…. Perhaps not.
No comments:
Post a Comment