(How to make your own fake moon videos - or how to undo the fake studio videos)

Stop. Don’t say it. I know the moon landings were real, but I am just trying to have fun.

Some claim that the Apollo moon landings were faked in a studio. One way to make fake films would be to film astronauts and then slow the film down so it looks like they are on the moon. If this were the case, I could speed the videos back up to “normal” speed and see what they look like. After that, I will take normal videos and slow them down to make them look like they are on the moon.
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Tags: kinematics, gravity, video, fake, units

Can you believe it? Have you seen this video?


Are you thinking what I am thinking? WOW. How could these people not follow my rules for cool internet video. Once again, here they are:

1. Keep the camera stationary. This way I don’t have to keep moving the origin in the movie.
2. Don’t Zoom. Same reason, this video followed that rule.
3. Include a clear and obvious calibration object. A meter stick would work, or even a Kobe Bryant (I can look up his height). Maybe it could be a Ford F-150 that has a known length. Something!
4. Include the mass and height of all people involved.
5. Use high quality video.
6. Don’t talk about fight club - oh wait, wrong list.

Despite failure to follow all these rules, I have managed to analyze this video. Really when I saw it, I said “wow” - was that real? It looked real, but who would get shot up that high? (it is on break.com, so fake is a possibility).
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Tags: kinematics, video, energy

I am always looking for videos to analyze. Here is a site with many high speed videos. The clips seems to be in low resolution and in Windows Media Format, but still looks like there are some good ones.

High Speed Videos (Dr. David Alciatore at Colorado State University)

Tags: video

So, here is a video (from break.com - so you know it is likely fake).

Extreme Catapulting - Watch more free videos
If for some reason, you can not view this video, here is the plot.
1) Guy wears parachute and brings a portable thing like a see-saw.
2) Guy approaches large crane dropping a large mass repeatedly (I assume to flatten a dirt road)
3) Guy sneaks up an puts the see-saw under the area that the mass drops on and then stands on the other end of the see-saw.
4) Mass drops, guy shoots up and parachutes down. Read More...

Tags: forces, video, fake, energy

Ok, I this just came up and I had to write something about it (even though I have tons of other things to do). Here is a video of a guy jumping 35 feet into a pool of water only 1 foot deep.

How does this work? Read More...

Tags: acceleration, video, gravity, energy

I am really not sure why I started to look at this, but here is a video of the famous “jump salute” from Apollo 16 astronaut John Young.

It seems there is some discussion about this video in terms of fake or not fake moon landings. I don’t want to get involved in that whole mess, so I will just see if I can measure the gravitational field on the moon. Read More...

Tags: video, acceleration, gravity

I am currently teaching an introductory astronomy course for non-science majors. I thought this might be an opportunity to turn this into something useful. Why not just put my lectures online? Well, instead of actual lectures, I created presentations with voice overs. Read More...

Tags: astronomy, video

Ok, I am trying to be quick with this, since it is current. Here is an awesome video of Kobe Bryant jumping over a pool with snakes in it (I found this on digg):


It looks so crazy, I wanted to do a quick analysis to see if this is feasible (well, I know it is not feasible for me). Let me just pull out one of my favorite tools - Tracker Video Analysis. Read More...

Tags: fake, kinematics, video

In case you never saw it, here is the part of the episode where the Mythbusters explode a water heater.

I started to analyze this previously, but it wasn't complete. Now I will finish what I started.

If you are curious, here are the "answers":
Time of flight = 11.8 seconds.
Max height = 167 meters = 548 feet
Speed on impact (ground) = 34 m/s = 76 mph (compared to 234 mph initially). Read More...

Tags: mythbusters, kinematics, video, air resistance

I was recently re-watching a MythBusters episode and I found something I had wanted to explore previously (but accidentally deleted the episode). Here is a short clip from the "shooting fish in a barrel" episode:


Did you see what I found interesting? That big barrel of water left the floor from being hit by a bullet - here is a quick analysis Read More...

Tags: video, energy

I have posted an "online presentation" about weightlessness and gravity. This has taken some time to put together since I had to build some stuff (vomit comet for toys). Anyway, hopefully, you will find this helpful and useful.

Weightlessness and Gravity
Apparent Weight
Building a Vomit Comet Read More...

Tags: video, gravity

Some time ago, I posted an analysis of the Ford F-150 commercial where the truck is shown to stop a landing C-123 Airplane. Apparently, this was quite popular and I received some useful and interesting feedback. From this, I have a few updates. Read More...

Tags: video, kinematics, forces, momentum

Clearly, I find some joy in analyzing these Ford commercials. In the latest release, a F150 is spun around in a homemade centrifuge. Yes, this is an awesome opportunity to discuss physics, but is that Ford's intent? Ford is clearly trying to get a message out with this. The following screen shot shows the real message:

See that at the bottom? Closed centrifuge. Do not attempt. Damn you Ford! Why must you ruin my fun? Why do you think I have a centrifuge (an open centrifuge, btw)? Well, I guess all that is left is for me to analyze this commercial. (you can see the whole behind the scenes here - http://www.fordvehicles.com/f150behindthescenes/) Read More...

Tags: video, circular motion, forces, momentum

Ford, why are you the way you are? Do you actually have people look at your commercials? Or do you just assume that you can say and show whatever you want and I will buy a truck? I am sorry, I shouldn't say that. I do enjoy analyzing your commercials - so, please continue.
Ford's latest F150 commercial shows a big thing dropping from a helicopter to the bed of an F150. The claim is that Ford is awesome. 30,000 lbs awesome. Let's check this out.
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Tags: video, modeling, momentum, forces, kinematics