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Post by malfunkshun on Feb 2, 2005 14:34:06 GMT
NO MALF IT IS NOT! For the last time your talking of a PRESSURE explosion not a KINETIC explosion. Your talking of compressed superheated steam not nitro glycerin, you may damage the structure slightly but it would NOT send hundreds of tons of iron and brick INTACT through the air a thousnad yards INTACT. I would ask you malf have you ever been to Big Ben? Its big and heavy but you get the impression that its also very fragile. The haed of Big Ben where the clock is located is made of thousands of little pieces, it is NOT one huge block of polystyrene. Sorry malf your efforts to explain and ultimately justify the Big Ben scene are highy comendable but will never work as the scene is in reality very very crap, its just not plausable and with no amount of tweeking will it ever work. god what a pessimist you are. if everybody had your attitude, nothing would ever get done because nobody would ever consider 'what if'. we would all just take one look at something new, say "its crap" and go back into our caves. i'm trying to cast a good light here, and you happen to disagree motile, but neither one of us really has any hard scientific evidence for our points of view, and both of us are convinced we are right. in reality, neither of us are right because unless a heat ray really hit big ben, we will never see what would really happen. oh... and all of your prejudice against my theory stems from your opinion that the scene is just, in your elaborate description... crap. what if the scene had looked really good, grada-A fantastic? i'll bet you would not be so biased against ideas on how certain aspects of the scene might actually work in reality. whats so bad about considering a possibility instead of slamming down your first onto the table and in effect saying 'its impossible'? well, whatever. you will just enjoy the movie less, its really your own loss in the end. i'm just trying to help here in my own measly little way
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Post by Ashe Raven on Feb 2, 2005 17:10:42 GMT
everyone's right
no one is wrong
Lets leave it at that ;D
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Post by I own a cylinder on Feb 2, 2005 20:19:57 GMT
o.k. then. It's British Engineering. Although i have noticed that one of the subtle things that could improve the scene is the clatter of the bells shifting in the tower. It's called Big Ben for a reason after all.
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Post by Ashe Raven on Feb 2, 2005 20:42:00 GMT
I'm almost tempted to use that scene in my documentry. I'l find some engineers to tell me exactly what would make the tower fly like that.
The maths should prove interesting
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Post by RustiSwordz on Feb 2, 2005 20:44:04 GMT
yes it is, no it isnt yes it is no it isnt yes it is no it isnt..... LOL like my siggy.... 'scuse sence of humour... ;D
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Post by flynnsixtysix on Feb 3, 2005 11:49:25 GMT
your going to FIND a case to fit the crime, ASHE ?
What madness is that ?
then convince yourself that THIS is what hines meant when some engineer comes up with some incredible billion to one scenario as to how Big Ben could have flown across the skies in one piece.
Your willing to go to that much effort and create such a concrete self-delusion
Man- that blows my mind.
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Post by Lensman on Feb 3, 2005 12:16:09 GMT
It's true that stone and concrete both have great compression strength (resist being crushed under heavy weight) but little tensile strength (don't resist bending; they break instead), so the analogy of boats or ships being tossed around and not disintegrating does not hold. Boats and ships are made of steel and/or wood, and have great tensile strength.
OTOH the top of the Big Ben tower has a sturdy interior cast-iron frame, which holds the clock, so that makes it much more believable that it could remain intact if tossed thru the air.
Now as for the force of explosion -- the question is not whether the explosion is from steam or dynamite or TNT or whatever. All these involve expanding gasses. If you think a high-pressure steam explosion isn't a "real" explosion, then you've never seen the result of a boiler explosion.
Actually, if the heat ray instantly imparts *enough* heat energy to the stonework -- and it *is* brick and stone, as a brief Internet search will show, not concrete -- then it could cause a plasma explosion; no steam need apply. (Modern anti-tank weapons use a "shaped charge" plasma explosion to penetrate tank armor.)
The pertinent question is: Could a sufficiently powerful explosion send the top of the tower flying thru the air? Looking at a building purposefully collapsed by demolition is pointless, because that is never a single large explosion, but rather a series of small explosions timed to cause the building to collapse in on itself. Could a plasma explosion send Big Ben flying thru the air? Heck I dunno, but I'm certainly willing to allow Hines the artistic license for showing it happening. After all, this is not a documentary -- it's a movie!
What bothers me about the depiction is not that the structure remains intact, but that it remains upright as it is catapulted thru the air. An explosion (plasma or otherwise) on one side of the tower, if it "blew off" the top, would send it tumbling in the opposite direction.
I think it's great that everyone here is concerned with treating the science fiction classic right, but ultimately it *is* fiction, not a historical re-enactment. As authors say: "Never let the facts stand in the way of a good story!"
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Post by I own a cylinder on Feb 3, 2005 12:39:49 GMT
I think it's great that everyone here is concerned with treating the science fiction classic right, but ultimately it *is* fiction, not a historical re-enactment. As authors say: "Never let the facts stand in the way of a good story!" I second that. Films are supposed to be the means of escaping the boardem of reality. Every one knows what would happen if an explosion occured with Big Ben that the thing would fall to bits. Its only a clock tower. But just having the thing scattered in bits is s**t. Its not meaningful. events in films have to have meaning, transcend what has gone before. If you want to see somthing just blown to bits...watch ID4. What happens in real life is boaring. What happens in the movies is uniqueness and exciting. And that's what Hines has tried to do. Copy the over top physics Hollywood uses to create excitment and something which has not really been seen before. Credit to the man.
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Post by Ashe Raven on Feb 3, 2005 12:42:22 GMT
your going to FIND a case to fit the crime, ASHE ? What madness is that ? then convince yourself that THIS is what hines meant when some engineer comes up with some incredible billion to one scenario as to how Big Ben could have flown across the skies in one piece. Your willing to go to that much effort and create such a concrete self-delusion Man- that blows my mind. Wow you do over react at sarcasm don't you ;D
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Post by themotile on Feb 3, 2005 12:57:15 GMT
Sometimes people miss the simple sound of laughter amidst the howling winds of frustration.
I think we have all been guilty of that one.
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Post by RustiSwordz on Feb 3, 2005 13:02:49 GMT
Tim Hinds uses the force to hold it up, after all he is the chosen one... ;D
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Post by Ashe Raven on Feb 3, 2005 13:09:23 GMT
I must confess, realistic or not, it's damn impressive. Damn scary and damn dramatic. ;D
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Post by RustiSwordz on Feb 3, 2005 13:17:13 GMT
No i expect Yoda to be in the forground saying,
'You do, or do not, there is no try...'
'That film director was our last hope'
'No Obi wan, there is another...'
LMAO
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Post by Ashe Raven on Feb 3, 2005 13:21:12 GMT
My point is, the dramtic is often exagerated for effect. If it's wrong, thats a good debate, but the effect it was meant to have on the audience is served well.
If I were to get really technical, all space battles would be silent. It would make star wars very boring don't you think?
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Post by McTodd on Feb 3, 2005 13:29:54 GMT
I second that. Films are supposed to be the means of escaping the boardem of reality. Every one knows what would happen if an explosion occured with Big Ben that the thing would fall to bits. Its only a clock tower. But just having the thing scattered in bits is s**t. Its not meaningful. events in films have to have meaning, transcend what has gone before. If you want to see somthing just blown to bits...watch ID4. What happens in real life is boaring. What happens in the movies is uniqueness and exciting. And that's what Hines has tried to do. Copy the over top physics Hollywood uses to create excitment and something which has not really been seen before. Credit to the man. But there's over the top, and there's over the top. That pre-vis of Big Ben flying through the air with the greatest of ease is just bobbins, whatever pseudo-physics flim-flam anyone devises, or artistic license you credit PP with. Bobbins is as bobbins does...
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Post by Ashe Raven on Feb 3, 2005 13:37:35 GMT
I've yet to see any epic that isn't, over the top over the top
sorry but thats a fact
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Post by themotile on Feb 3, 2005 13:42:39 GMT
My point is, the dramtic is often exagerated for effect. If it's wrong, thats a good debate, but the effect it was meant to have on the audience is served well. If I were to get really technical, all space battles would be silent. It would make star wars very boring don't you think? That would hold true if it was dramatic but it is not is it? Its hit with a comedy crayola squigle of doom and then the top of Big Ben 'detaches' and 'floats' off (not hurtles or rumbles but floats) to land some time later on a bridge made from lollypop sticks, sending up clouds of brown. just brown. Its dire, and to think that was a finished shot too!
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Post by I own a cylinder on Feb 3, 2005 13:43:40 GMT
BTW. Can some one check if im not going mad but as the camera tilts from the river up the tower...does a little man run away from it between the building behind and the building next to the tower, just prior to the heat ray hitting it? I'm sure there is but its a fleeting glimpse and difficult to tell.
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Post by themotile on Feb 3, 2005 13:45:37 GMT
I've yet to see any epic that isn't, over the top over the top sorry but thats a fact yes but you either say wow that was cool or you say wow that was crap, doesnt make over the top right if it looks crap does it. "because it a movie" doesnt make the Big Ben shot "ok" because its rubbish.
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Post by themotile on Feb 3, 2005 13:46:46 GMT
BTW. Can some one check if im not going mad but as the camera tilts from the river up the tower...does a little man run away from it between the building behind and the building next to the tower, just prior to the heat ray hitting it? I'm sure there is but its a fleeting glimpse and difficult to tell. I cant see anything dude, but its too low res to tell.
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