CGI....

[bakana]

From Season One of Babylon 5:

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR> This weekend, I was at the Space Frontier Foundation to receive an award for Babylon 5 for Best Vision of the Future, part of which was its recognition of our *deliberate efforts* to get things right. Zero-G maneuvering, civilian use of space, a working O'Neill station, on and on, all the stuff you think happens by "coincidence."
And which has not generally HAPPENED on TV before.
In attendence were the Delta Clipper team of engineers, astronaut Pete Conrad, leading researchers with NASA, JPL, McDonnell-Douglas, you name it.

And one of the people there, who had been with SDI and the Space Program for 12 years, currently a top-level NASA consultant, pulled me aside and said that after seeing the line about the gravity not letting the body get very far . . . he said he sat down to do the math required to come up with the actual MASS of B5, starting with the 2.5 million tons of actual structure, plus likely vegetation, quarters, occupants, ships docked inside ... and when you add it all up, it came to about the same mass as a fairly small moon ... and IT WOULD BE ENOUGH TO KEEP THE BODY FROM -- AS STATED IN THE SCRIPT -- GETTING VERY FAR.

The body would drift from the station a bit, get pulled back, hit the hull, bounce, drift a bit, and be pulled back.
Or go into a slow elliptical orbit. (He mentioned that in the history of the Apollo program, little bits of debris that would flake off the outside of the ship would remain in proximity to the ship, just on the basis of ITS mass and gravity, and it's not very big.)

A couple of other high-level engineers backed him up, and said that it was quite reasonable.
JMS
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

The Informal connections with NASA & JPL started quite early. These people kept in touch and answered questions whenever somone at Babylonian Productions needed an answer.

The CGI crew worked very hard from Day One to keep the Physics as accurate as possible, given the limitations of TV.

Same with the Markab Plague. They consulted several Experts to get the biology as correct as current theories allow. Including the Center For Disease Control.

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Yes, I like cats too.
Shall we exchange Recipes?

[This message has been edited by bakana (edited August 30, 2001).]

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR>...little bits of debris that would flake off the outside of the ship would remain in proximity to the ship, just on the basis of ITS mass and gravity, and it's not very big.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

This sounds like something that JMS misremembered from that conversation. Paint flakes and the like would continue to remain in proximity to a spacecraft (as did the debris cloud produced by the explosion aboard Apollo 13) but this has very little to do with any gravitational effect. (Science not Zahthras's strong suit.

)

Such objects keep up with the spacecraft because they are traveling at the same speed and in the same direction as the ship. Since the Apollos mostly coasted to the moon, instead of accelerating the whole way, Newton's laws tell us that an object that comes loose from the ship will continue moving in the same direction and at the same speed until some force acts on it.

The only reason something you toss out your car window when you're coasting on a highway at 60 MPH doesn't just float alongside your car is that wind resistance and gravity take over. In the absence of those two things, as in space, objects that are attached to the ship have the same velocity as the ship, and don't loose it when they detach. If you hit the accelerator (or the astronauts light up the engine) you'd pull out ahead of the tossed object, but it would continue moving along at 60 MPH while you pulled away at 70 until it hit another object.

This is also why shuttle atronauts don't go flying out towards the tail of the ship when they step out into the cargo bay. They're moving at the same speed the ship is, even when detached from it. Gravity isn't a factor in any of this.

So, on balance, it is probably a good thing that JMS had some science advisors on tap, because his grasp of some of this stuff is a little shaky.

Regards,

Joe

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Joseph DeMartino
Sigh Corps
Pat Tallman Division
joseph-demartino@att.net

 

[Hesperous]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR> <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
Personally, Bluestar is better than "Snub Nosed Whitestar" which is the only Canonical name for the ship (and even then, the name was never mentioned on the show, its from Tim Earls website
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR> <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I think that the alliance would stick to something like "Alliance Runabout", and it may get a nickname, (Snub Nose, bluestar, duckbill). This is how our military is, we describe the plane, and nickname. "F4-Phantom", "F15- Eagle", "A10-Warthog", (F being Fighter, A = Attack)

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[Chris Springob]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by bakana:
The Informal connections with NASA & JPL started quite early. These people kept in touch and answered questions whenever somone at Babylonian Productions needed an answer.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

OK. But that's not the same as vetting every script, which is what they did with
Crusade. The more realistic look of space seen in Crusade that I explained in an earlier post is the sort of thing that I'm guessing occurred as a result of the closer interaction with JPL (though I don't know for certain).


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[bakana]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR>The more realistic look of space seen in Crusade that I explained in an earlier post is the sort of thing that I'm guessing occurred as a result of the closer interaction with JPL (though I don't know for certain). <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>


Chris, the whole point of the quote I posted was that, as early as the First Season, Babylon 5 was getting noticed by the Experts at JPL & NASA because of the care they were taking to get the Science right whenever possible.

Babylonian productions had kept this in mind from the very first. It was mentioned numerous times in JMS posts on GEnie when the show was originally filmed. Getting the Science right was always a consideration.

Judging by your comments, the major place you noticed it in Crusade was in the Backgrounds.

Remember that it was more Noticeable because Crusade Had more space backgrounds to Notice.



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Yes, I like cats too.
Shall we exchange Recipes?

 

[Chris Springob]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR> Chris, the whole point of the quote I posted was that, as early as the First Season, Babylon 5 was getting noticed by the Experts at JPL & NASA because of the care they were taking to get the Science right whenever possible.

Babylonian productions had kept this in mind from the very first. It was mentioned numerous times in JMS posts on GEnie when the show was originally filmed.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Let me recap this discussion so far because I'm starting to get confused about what it is that we actually disagree on.

I said that JPL was used as a consultant on Crusade. You then said "Actually both NASA & JPL were both involved unoficially long before that press person got wind of it." It sounds like you're saying that JPL's involvement with Crusade wasn't much different from its involvement with Babylon 5, and that the only reason the press release came in 1998 and not 1993 was because that was when "that press person got wind of it".

I then said that JPL's involvement with Crusade was in fact quite different from its involvement with B5. On Crusade, they vetted every script and tried to make sure that the show's alien worlds were consistent with the latest planetary science. I'm not aware of any similar arrangement on B5. I'm sure there were technical consultants on B5, but were they people at JPL? While JMS may have asked people at JPL about certain things during B5's run (and I'm actually unaware of any specific examples of this), that's not the same level of involvement that exists when they're paid consultants.

What you seem to be arguing is that the science on B5 was realistic, and that it was noticed by people at NASA. But neither of those points really has anything to do with what I was saying. All I was saying was that JPL was involved with the development of Crusade in a way that they weren't with B5. Nothing more.

This is not the same as saying that the science on B5 was bad. The science on B5 was generally pretty good. But the fact of the matter is that on a show that's set in a stationary location and largely about galactic politics, you don't need a technical advisor on every episode. On a show that involves visiting a new planet just about every week, you do. So the fact that Crusade went the extra mile in recruiting well-qualified scientific experts as consultants is largely a function of the nature of the show, and does not represent a failing on the part of B5.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR>Getting the Science right was always a consideration. Judging by your comments, the major place you noticed it in Crusade was in the Backgrounds.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Right on the first point, wrong on the second. I did notice that B5 had mostly sound science from the beginning. I was just using the space shots in Crusade as an example of the benefit of having JPL as a paid consultant.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR> Remember that it was more Noticeable because Crusade Had more space backgrounds to Notice.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Babylon 5 space shots = nebulae that take up a substantial fraction of the sky in just about every star system, and no galactic plane

Crusade space shots = no nebulae and the galactic plane is there

This isn't just a matter of me not noticing it in one case. They really do look quite different. And I don't fault B5 at all for leaving out the galactic plane, seeing as how no previous SF TV show had ever shown it (to my knowledge), and it doesn't affect the story one iota (unlike many of the science errors on the Star Trek shows). My point was simply that Crusade should be commended for being the only ones to get this right. Complimenting one show should not be read as a veiled attack on the other show.


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