The Physics of Starship Battles UPGRADED AND REMASTERED: Lasers and Kinetic Energy

This movie, 3 years ago, turned into my most downloaded physics educational film. It kind of took a life of its own and flew off into my most popular. It almost made itself, flying off my laptop in only 3 weeks and truth be told, I've been trying to capture that success ever since. This is the one from which everything else is measured.
And now, uploaded in high quality, and the sound finally works ;)
These older ones have been bugging me for a while. Ever since I finally figured out how to solve the sound problem, I knew I'd have to go back and fix the old stuff if I ever wanted piece of mind (I'm a perfectionist). Once I get a few more uploaded, I do have an idea for the next movie floating around ;)
However, not all of these can be fixed. My first two Physics movies were filmed ENTIRELY on analog, meaning there's no way to upgrade the quality without totally starting over. It wouldnt be a matter of rerendering as with these ones, there's no quality to rerender. The math movies might have been saved if not for the soundtrack. The dubious echo effect is unfixable without totally erasing the whole thing. We make our choices and we have to live with them forever. It pushes us on to the NEXT project, with the drive to do it right.
My last few movies have been entirely digital. ;)
And speaking of digital, thank god for Netflix streaming. Star Trek, Babylon 5, Battlestar Galactica, all there at seconds notice. Delicious ;)

Category:

Education

Tags:

• laser
• physics
• kinetic
• velocity
• star
• trek
• battlestar
• buck
• rogers
• science
• ladies

[Virgil0211]

I had a thought about the lasers and how the high-powered ones wouldn't be visible. It might be stretching a bit, but I recently saw a documentary about the first machine guns and automatic weapons. They decided to add in 'tracer' rounds that would light up in order to help the soldier line up their shots more effectively. One might retcon this into various sci-fi settings, saying that two lasers are being fired (the damaging invisible one plus the lower-energy 'tracer' one.). That work? :-P

[SpreadingtheMuse]

@Virgil0211 Sure it'd work. No different than using a red laser for a sniper rifle. Work just fine

[Crusnik2000]

Spreadingthemuse, What's the possibility of developing Deflector shields? Is it possible or are we better off sticking with heavy armor plating?

[SpreadingtheMuse]

@Crusnik2000 I (kinda) address shields in the movie that'll be uploaded in a day or so. I mention them insofar as they're one of the things we havent the foggiest idea how to do yet. So for now we're stuck with heavy armor ;(

[Crusnik2000]

Spreadingthemuse what is your Favorate Scifi Series?

[SpreadingtheMuse]

@Crusnik2000 I'm a finicky sucker. It usually rests with watchever I'm watching at the moment. I've got Dr Who on DVD now, so I guess thats it. But I wish Battlestar 78 had gotten 2 seasons. I wish Firefly had gotten 1. B5 got me hot and bothered in the day, but I have two Trek uniforms hanging in my closet.

I just got done making a Harry Dresden outfit (if you read modern fantasy), so make sense of that.

[SpreadingtheMuse]

@RickMojave The E=hf is on a photon to photon basis. If you hook up bigger batteries to one of them to give it an unfair power advantage then you screw up everything. By and large, I'd go with whatever had the higher power. But the destruction depends. Lower frequency cant penetrate skin (like infrared), whereas high frequency can (Xray). Burn some skin or slice thru? You be the judge.

[RickMojave]

Is it more destructive to shoot a brighter laser of many lower-frequency photons or a dimmer laser of less higher-frequency photons (both composed of the same amount of energy)? In other words, is quantity or quality more destructive?

[SpreadingtheMuse]

@YouthFreedomFighters Ill give it a whirl of course ;) Always like watching laser movies

[YouthFreedomFighters]

@SpreadingtheMuse I see, well I made a video called "SciFi Laser Weapons" where I inquire about that a bit, and the video is also a tribute to you and your videos.