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The
Amazing Water Slide: How it was done
Last week we
shared a video clip of a man in a neoprene wetsuit sliding down a
water slide, hitting a ramp, and then flying 115 feet through the air
to land safely in a small children's pool. Just like many video
segments from the web and Hollywood movies this was completely faked.
Last year we shared one from Japan, that showed a man strapping
multiple bottle rockets to his back and then being launched
(supposedly) out over the water (Japanese Game Show). You
might remember the clip of a supposedly amateur video of a group
camping out in the desert and their truck is amazingly hit by a
meteor (Toyota Truck commercial). These types of video clips provide
"real" science educators with great opportunities to discuss the
realities of physics concepts with students (and some teachers) who
may perceive these types of events as real.
This time, German engineer Bruno Kammerl,
created the human projectile video clip
that accumulated more than 1.4 million views worldwide. As luck would
have it, I was in Europe when this hit the internet and other news media,
and thought this was another "CoolStuff" opportunity. Those
that are internet savvy can tell you, that this clip sparked science
discussions all over the world. Was it real or was it fake? That was the
question that brought science educators once again to the fore front.
This video
was a carefully crafted viral ad for Microsoft's Office Project 2007
in Germany. Kammerl had come up with a special type of neoprene
material called "Softslide" and he described it as "almost
frictionless" on his website. He then came upon a sponsor who
financially helped
him achieve his goal of the longest and most exciting waterslide in
the world. The creation and testing of this slide in the German Alps
lead to the production of the video. Of course it's all fake; the
result of careful editing and creative video production.
From Janko
Roettgers Blog 8-11-2009:
Kammerl’s
web site was registered in May by an employee of the German
subsidiary of marketing giant MRM Worldwide. Chatter about this
connection popped up online only a few days after the waterslide
video started to become popular, and MRM Worldwide quickly decided
to lift the curtain. Microsoft’s logo was added to Kammerl’s
Megawoosh.com web site late last week, and MRM Germany CEO Alexander
Ewig finally fessed up to his company’s involvement in a press
release emailed to us today, saying: “We developed Megaswoosh as a
viral campaign for Microsoft Germany.”
“This revelation was supposed to come a little later,” I was told by
Maik Koenigs, whose Hamburg-based viral marketing agency Elbkind was
hired by MRM to seed the video onto more than 60 sites. However,
bloggers were too quick to make the connection, so there had to be a
change of plans. “Viral communication is a dynamic process,” he
explained, adding that the outcome was still beyond everyone’s
expectations. The campaign was just meant to be for a German
audience, but has gotten Twitter, blog and mainstream media
responses from all over the world.
So how was
the video really done? As some bloggers guessed, it’s a case of
creative compositing, meaning that the clip we get to see is based
on multiple elements that were combined together to create a final
video. A stuntman slides down the slide, secured by a rope. Then
there’s a body flying through the air, which is animated. And
finally, the big splash. “He actually jumped from a wooden ramp into
the pool,” explained Koenigs. Of course, you don’t get to see any of
this in the final clip, thanks to careful editing that makes it look
like a single take.
Here’s a short, unedited clip that shows how the stuntman filling in
for Kammerl is sliding down part of the slide for a first segment of
the final video:
So yes, it
was fake. As is so much of the world students are exposed to these
days. However, they are entertaining, fun and sometimes baffling. But
what a great opportunity for discussion. When something like this
comes along, questions, theories and hypothesis's begin to flow.
Engage,
Explain and Expand...
Dave
Barnes
CoolStuff Editor
Arbor Scientific
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