James Cameron's Illustrated Mars Reference Design 161
An anonymous reader writes "Terminator Director James Cameron commissioned renderings of the NASA Mars Reference Design [HTML, 4 PDFs]. The mission profile calls for a cargo ship sent ahead of a crew, a huge (Terminator-like?) rover, and inflatable habitats. It's not clear where Skynet and the T-800's hyper-alloy combat chassis fit in yet. Between now and then, the 5 Mars missions: 2005 Mars Reconnaisance Orbiter, 2007 Phoenix and Netlanders, 2009 Science Lab Rover, and 2011 Scout. Skynet comes in 2026."
Skynet and Mars (Score:5, Funny)
What part of Arnold going to Mars do you not understand?
I personally don't mind him going to Mars, just as long as This Terminator stays [arnold.ro] and becomes my personal bed buddy.
Of course, since I browse Slashdot, that's never going to happen. Thank you OSDN! You've ruined not only my life, but my odds of scoring with her.
Re:Skynet and Mars (Score:1)
Re:Skynet and Mars (Score:1)
Phoenix? (Score:3, Funny)
Also, wouldn't it get to Mars a whole lot faster than three years?
James Cameron explores the planets (Score:2, Funny)
Re:James Cameron explores the planets (Score:2, Informative)
Hohum..
Re:James Cameron explores the planets (Score:5, Informative)
Being somewhat of a luxury (Score:5, Funny)
What, Magrathea built Mars too?
Cheers,
Ian
Re:Being somewhat of a luxury (Score:2)
First mission in 2005? (Score:1)
Instead of setting a deadline to reach Mars, I say we go when we're good and ready.
Re:First mission in 2005? (Score:2)
Re:First mission in 2005? (Score:5, Informative)
1997: Pathfinder/Mars Global Surveyor
1999: Mars Climate Orbiter/Mars Polar Lander (both lost)
2001: Mars Oddessey/Mars 2001 Lander (Code name: Apex - cancelled after the 1999 failures)
2003: "Athena:" A lander that was planned back in the late 90's, then cancelled after the 1999 failures(much of Athena became incorporated into the current MERs). Spirit/Opporunity (also Japan and ESA took advantage of the opportune planetary alignment).
Also, before the 1999 failures, there was an amazingly complex Mars Sample Return mission in it's initial stages planned for 2008. Professor Squyres (Spirit/Opportunity leader) was also to have been involved in that. It was a sort of "Rube-Goldberg" trick that would have had a lander on the surface, scoop up some soil, put it in a rocket not much bigger than a model rocket, launch it into Mars orbit, rendezevous with an orbitting satellite, launch it back to earth and finally be snapped up by a helicopter as it paracheutted down over the American desert (this parachutte technique happens to be how StarDust's sample will be retrieved). That mission woulda been so cool though. Honestly, making it work sounds even cooler than the actual specimen we woulda gotten back!
Re:First mission in 2005? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:First mission in 2005? (Score:1)
How will the samples be contained when returned to Earth?
The landing site at the Utah Test and Training Range was chosen because the area is a vast, desolate and unoccupied salt flat controlled by the U.S. Air Force in conjunction with the U.S. Army. The landing footprint for the sample return capsule will be about 30 by 84 kilometers (18 by 52 miles), an ample space to allow for aerodynamic uncertainties and winds that might affect the direction the capsule travels in the atmosp
Re:First mission in 2005? (Score:2)
Can someone explain, or point to a good reference, on this helicopter retrieval method? It just doesn't seem to make any sense to me.
If the thing is falling fast, the
The technology is not the problem. Will is. (Score:5, Interesting)
- Very high-performance hydrogen-oxygen rocket motors, courtesy of the Space Shuttle program.
- Two different final descent and landing systems:
- In-situ propellant production has already been demonstrated using simulated Mars inputs.
- We've had most of the other necessary re-entry heat shield, space suit, rover and other technology since Apollo, and the rest (mostly space suits and bigger rovers) are either relatively straightforward or outgrowths of things like the Shuttle EVA suit.
The technology is ready for us. The problem is that we are fearful and refuse to take the idea seriously enough to put real effort into it. This is largely due to people (like the idiot BBC commentator this morning) who see Mars as a sideshow or even an immoral waste of resources. Their goals are served by pushing any real mission ever-further into the future, so that it never gets done. If you really DO want it done, you have to get to Mars before the political will to do it has been sapped by the obstructionists. This means that you cannot get to Mars in 20 years, you only have a hope of doing it if you do it in 10 or even 8.- Rocket-assisted, descended via the Surveyor (Luna) and Viking (Mars) landers.
- Airbag, descended from the Mars Pathfinder system.
(I note that Cameron's proposal is to use both, with the crew landing via rocket and cargo bouncing down inside inflated habs.)Re:The technology is not the problem. Will is. (Score:1, Insightful)
Which, quite frankly, is difficult to refute.
Just to play a devil's advocate: what business do we have throwing our limited resources to other planets when we have so many problems already down here?
I've never figured out an answer to that question without sounding like a cold-hearted bastard.
The answer (Score:5, Insightful)
- Throwing resources? What's a few tons of aluminum to the Earth? All the money stays right here.
- We are not throwing resources, we are exercising imagination and initiative. These are not limited resources, they are amplified by being used... and they are the same things needed to solve problems on earth.
- "When there is no vision, the people perish." Giving people a reason to look up from their petty squabbles to see a possible future on another world might solve some of those problems. Crime fell drastically during the first Moon landings, because most everyone was glued to the story unfolding on live television. We should try to do this again.
- Shouldn't we consider it a general religious imperative to learn what we can about where we came from and what else there is, starting with the history of other planets (including the life on them, if any)?
That's hardly an exhaustive list, and it won't convince anybody who doesn't want to be convinced. But something along those lines might persuade even the moralists that they don't have the high ground all to themselves.Re:The answer (Score:2)
Labour, clever people and energy are some of the limited resources that are consumed by such an endeavour. Consider if these could be used in a better way, such as to invent a way to de-pollute the atmosphere, replenish the ozone layer, or figure out how to stop people from starving to death.
Crime
Re:The answer (Score:4, Insightful)
This is a common argument, and I see three main problems with it.
1 - It assumes an exclusive-or choice between the two. I fail to see why this is the case. There are plenty of smart people in the world to go around.
2 - It assumes that people who are good at creating a space exploration program would be equally good at solving problems like starvation in poor countries. I also fail to see why this is the case. The skills and personal interests involved in those two projects are radically different.
3 - The kind of worldwide problem-solving that people who make this argument always cite (e.g. feeding everyone in the world) is the kind of pie-in-the-sky goal that can (IMO) never really be met. I think that it is important to try and better the living standards of people who are in truly terrible situations, but OTOH unless there is an incredible shift in the nature of governments and societies everywhere then it's a project that will never be completed.
The comparison that comes to mind for me is someone who says that they're going to put off having children until they have a US$1,000,000+ yearly salary, a huge house, four cars, and a personal jet. It's *possible* that it will happen, just unlikely.
Re:The answer (Score:3, Insightful)
Consider if these could be used in a better way, such as to invent a way to de-pollute the atmosphere, replenish the ozone layer, or figure out how to stop people from starving to death.
If there is one thing Science has shown us over the past 200 years, it is that more people working on a project does not necessarily get it done faster. Most of the scientific advances in that period were done by either single people, or very small groups of people. Throwing every clever person in the world at a proble
Re:The answer (Score:2)
I think you *really* believe what you say. It's just amazing how naive a Northamerican can manage to be!
Im British thankyou very much. I know what Im talking about.
Re:The answer (Score:2)
The possibilities are endless. People like you suffer from extreme case of short-sightedness.
Re:The answer (Score:3, Insightful)
I'll bite, too. :)
The main problem with the general argument in the GP is that we will not be able to solve all of our human problems before conquering the heavens. We'll be extinct before that happens. Many of the problems that exist down here have existed amongst humans for all of recorded history, and we have reason to believe they existed long before recorded history began. If we achieve a utopia where all of these problems are solved, then we won't need to go into space anymore.
That said:
You can
Spoken like a stereotypical college leftist (Score:2)
Re:The answer (Score:2)
Which is precisely why these missions could be funded by voluntary $10,000 contributions from right-minded individuals such as yourself, who alone understand that it doesn't really cost - it pays!
Re:The answer (Score:2)
Re:The answer (Score:2)
Many of the technologies developed in going to Mars will have direct impact on problems here on earth. It's not as if we can't work on problems here and getting to there (just in case we can't solve the problems here)...
Re:The technology is not the problem. Will is. (Score:5, Insightful)
I can answer that with a simple quote from Larry Niven: The dinosaurs went extinct because they didn't have a space program.
Its a silly quote but its very true. The probability of humanity being destroyed or anhillating itself will drop dramatically once we have a self-sustaining colony on an extraterrestial object. Its like insurance for humanity in a way.
Re:The technology is not the problem. Will is. (Score:1)
You know what's funny? (Score:2)
The people I tell Larry Niven's explanation of why we need a space program to (not in those words, but the same general idea) who aren't enthusiastic about space say more or less the same thing in response.
Their counter-argument goes something along the lines of, "well, why are we so great that we think we should be preserved? If we destroy ourselves or if an asteroid comes along and takes us out, why should we be so arrogant to think we should try and stop that?"
I get a LOT
Re:You know what's funny? (Score:2)
Will is not the problem. Cost is. (Score:4, Insightful)
And how do you get those Shuttle-derived engines back to earth after launch? Or do you just throw them away at X-million dollars a pop? That's gonna add up fast. Maybe you design and build a new Shuttle to haul stuff into orbit, so you can get your $100 million engines back. But whoops - it costs $10 billion to design and build a new Shuttle, and billions more to operate it.
As for landing on the Red Planet, we've had trouble with that ourselves recently (Mars Polar Lander), and we'd been doing it successfully since the mid-'70s. Designing and building a man-rated lander for Mars (one that cannot fail) could easily run up a billion in design costs. Then there are the cargo / habitat landers, which also cannot fail. Chuck in another billion. Plus a billion more to design and build the habitats, and another couple of billion to get them all to Mars. That's a LOT of mass to haul into earth orbit and then blast out to Mars.
In-situ propellant production may have been demonstrated in the lab here on earth, but we don't know yet if it would even work on Mars. Right now we're having trouble getting simple robot rovers to function correctly, at $400 million a pop. What you're proposing is that we drop a small chemical factory on Mars, along with an automated tractor and bulldozer to haul it icy rock for processing. It could easily cost $10 billion to design and build such a setup, plus a billion more to get it to Mars.
The heat shields would also have to be pretty heavy-duty, since unlike Apollo or the Shuttles, these Mars vehicles are going to be traveling at interplanetary velocities. Because we'll want to minimize the astronauts' exposure to lethal doses of interplanetary radiation, as well as the amount of food and water needed to sustain them (costs a fortune to haul that stuff into orbit), their spacecraft is going to have to be traveling fast, and their landers are going to have to rely on the Martian atmosphere to slow them down.
Their rovers would also need to be far more durable than the moonbuggy used by the Apollo astronauts, since most plans call for the astronauts to remain on Mars for weeks at least, if not a year or more. The Marsbuggy could itself cost in excess of a billion to design, and another billion to build.
And since these guys are going to be there longer, in the hard radiation environment of Mars, they're going to need spacesuits that are far more durable, far better shielded against radiation, and far less susceptible to damage (from abrasive or chemically-reactive dust in particular) than the Apollo or Shuttle-era suits. Again, you could be talking a billion or more just to design and develop such suits, and heaven knows how much to build them. And with all that radiation shielding they're likely to be heavy as heck, too. Add millions more just to transport them to Mars.
I haven't even touched on all the other tech needed to get the astronauts there and back again safely and quickly. Large, powerful nuclear reactors will be needed to supply them with electrical power and probably power their engines. I can't see doing this practically or reliably with chemical rockets
Re:Will is not the problem. Cost is. (Score:2)
The development costs for all the landers was in the engineering of the computers and programs to do what was required in advance of any specific knowledge. In other words, we were trying to build software to do something when we had incomplete information about the operating environment, resorting to simulation and over-engineering.
On a manned mission, we don't need that. We're sendin
You have some serious misconceptions going (Score:4, Insightful)
Let's see, 1 launch window every 2 years, 2 vehicles per launch window, 4 engines per vehicle = 4 engines per year. Manufacture of High Pressure Fuel Turbopumps: "Production rate > 1 unit / month since first flight in July 2001 (STS-104) [nasa.gov][1]. At the rate of 1 unit per month, you could have enough engines to fly a Shuttle every month and replace engines every 5 flights, send 4 vehicles to Mars every launch window instead of 2, and have about 3 brand-spanking new engines left over.
It would take one launch, carrying about 50 tons on a trans-Mars orbit. [marssociety.org][2] The Shuttle orbiter weighs about 100 tons fully loaded; its engines are around 10 tons, leaving 90 tons for vehicle, payload and trans-Mars injection fuel. The required delta-V to get from LEO to TMI is roughly 4.3 km/sec. [3] Vacuum-specific impulse of an SSME is 452 seconds [boeing.com] [4], or exhaust velocity of 4430 m/sec; the required TMI mass-ratio is 2.64 by the rocket equation. If you retained one SSME (modified to be restartable in flight) for the trans-Mars injection, you would need to start with ~53 tons * 2.64, or roughly 140 tons. This appears to be well within the capacity of a vehicle using 4 SSMEs and 3 SRBs to put into LEO.
Yes they can. You send them first, perhaps several of them, one launch window before you send people. If they don't land and work correctly, you hold the manned mission off for another launch window. If you send 3 and only 1 of them lands and works, you have one usable landing site; if 2 or 3 of them land and work, you have your choice of options. You can use the unused landers later, or for supply depots for long surveys.
You have some serious misconceptions about price tags here. The cost is almost entirely for research, development and engineering; manufacturing is a drop in the bucket. You could probably crank out rovers for a few million apiece now that we have the design.
A small chemical plant is much, much simpler than a rover. The biggest issue might be filtering dust to keep it out of the machinery, and you would have a lot of trouble claiming that we don't have any applicable experience with filters.
No, that's your proposal. I'm proposing Zubrin's scheme of carrying LH2 to the site and processing it into methane and LOX via the reactions
Note that the methane-production reaction is e
Re:You have some serious misconceptions going (Score:3, Insightful)
>On anything. Your post is so ignorant, you ought to
>do something really drastic to expiate your shame.
>I would suggest learning to study, and not posting
>on any subject that you have not studied.
Insulting people is ALWAYS a good way to show how smart you are.
>>None of the components you listed in your message do
>>us much good for a manned Mars exploration program.
>>Take the Shuttle engines you list as one component.
>>
Re:You have some serious misconceptions going (Score:2)
Stop insulting my intelligence with fallacious or ignorant objections and you won't have your nose rubbed in them. If you don't have complete confidence in your knowledge, qualify your statements appropriately.
Let's see, I recall saying this (and you quoted me):
1 launch window every 2 years, 2 vehicles per launch window, 4
Propulsion technology is the problem (Score:2)
Chemical rockets eject propellant at relatively low speed that gives rise to three crucial problems.
1. A mission will take at least one and a half years.
2.
Re:Propulsion technology is the problem (Score:3, Interesting)
That's not true. The key trick with these plans is that you send the return vehicle first, and let it land and produce the propellant for the return trip before you ever launch the human crew. If you lose the return vehicle as it lands on Mars, it's a setback for the program, but nobody dies.
Re:Propulsion technology is the problem (Score:2)
The question is, are you going to let the machines sit there on Mars for a year as your crew is trying to get there. Remember that the Martian environment is incredibly dusty, and that nothing from earth has spent more than 90 days up and running on Mars. Now, are you going to be able to monitor the machines well enough to be able to say that they'll still work when the crew gets there? Actually, monitoring isn't even a problem since once you've launched your crew, you can't recall them no matter
Re:Propulsion technology is the problem (Score:2)
>The unmanned portions will probably cost many
>billions of dollars on their own. If you loose
>them, not only will you have to wait two years
>to try again, but you've also lost 10 billion
>dollars.
That's correct. And it brings up another problem you'd have to plan for - what if you've built the manned portion of your program, have it gassed up and ready to go, and then find out your fuel factory on Mars just exploded? Is it going to be OK to
Re:Propulsion technology is the problem (Score:2)
Re:Propulsion technology is the problem (Score:2)
Not so. The Viking 1 lander was operational for over 6 years, while the Viking 2 lander lasted 3.5 years (see here [nasa.gov]). So, yes, I think we can manage a year or 18 months.
Read The Case for Mars [nw.net]. Zubrin has covered your objections there.
Re:Propulsion technology is the problem (Score:2)
Viking I used RTGs for power, though, and lasted for about 6 years. Viking II, which also used RTGs, lasted for 3.5 years.
Secondly, it doesn't take a year to get to Mars. In fact, it only takes about 6 months.
Thirdly, research and development costs are a big reason projects like the 2 Mars Exploration Rovers cost so much. If NASA decided that they wanted to re-
Re:Propulsion technology is the problem (Score:2)
What? BioSphere2 failed mainly due to inadequate planning and design. For example, the concrete used to build parts of the structure was absorbing oxygen. Using BioSphere2 as an example fo
Re:The technology is not the problem. Will is. (Score:2)
The real problem, of course, is money. Politicians aren't keen on spending billions on science projects that are perceived to be risky, and that will only come to results after their own term in office has ended. The politicians in my own country especially c
Good idea... (Score:5, Insightful)
Human pilot (Score:4, Interesting)
The short answer though is that long-range navigation would get the ship to around the right area of Mars, then a human pilot could help the ship land in a good nearby location, moon lander style. As Zubrin notes, there is nothing like having a trained pilot actually doing the landing. i don't think humans landing on Mars will be dropping down in giant Jackie Chan style human hamster balls!
Re:Human pilot (Score:2)
While his ideas about how such a mission could be accomplished are interesting, I was a bit disturbed by his motivation for the Mars missions - he thinks of the earth(and the U.S. in particular) as having become too government-controlled, and wants to set up a colony on Mars just to get away from it. In fact, he specifically says in the book that the Mars colony will eventually rebel and set itself up as a independent nation. Zubrin re
Red Mars (Score:2)
What I found impressive is the very practical nature of the research they are doing on these earth stations. They really are getting a lot of practocal experience and I found myself agreeing with all of the points at the end of the book summarizing what works and what does not with crews going to mars.
To tie back into my subject, probably a lo
Re:Good idea... (Score:3, Interesting)
It's also likely mars would get it's own gps satelites to spare the expence of the containers carrying more sophisticated navigation equipment.
We can expect the first expedition to mars to be full of married geologists and engineers willing to stay there decades if not most of the rest of their lives. With laborers comming in
Re:Good idea... (Score:4, Insightful)
Didn't Cameron do deep sea exploration, himself?
I usually don't side with the Hollywood types, but he seems to be a real risk-taker, and you've got to admire that.
More stuff, less fluff.
Re:Good idea... (Score:4, Interesting)
Yeah. Besides being one of the only (the only?*) director able to really shoot something on/underwater that didn't go way over on budget and ambition... he actually has the patent on those full-face helmets from The Abyss, and a few other things. His brother is a big engineer type as well.
* Peter Weir's Master and Commander didn't go over budget I don't think, and that was on the water, but I think it stands alone with Cameron's Titanic and Abyss as water-movie successes. He just asks for an astronomical buget up front and gets it out of the way. :)
Re:Good idea... (Score:2)
Both Titanic and The Abyss had ambition in spades.
Yes, the full-face helmets were patented.
James Cameron's brother designed the cameras used to shoot the actual Titanic wreckage for the movie.
Re:Good idea... (Score:2, Interesting)
Taking a cue from one of the most imaginative minds of the 20th century, Chuck Jones,I propose using a really, really big slingshot.
Einstein was an imaginitive man. It was his imagination that let jump right to true conlusions that no one else could see.
Richard Feynman was perhaps the most imaginative physicist ever. His notational systems alone are amazing.
However, both of th
Re:Good idea... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Good idea... (Score:2)
As for how, well unlike the moon Mars has an atmosphere which means an internal combustion engine or Fuel cell will work ( albeit with a different gas, Methane Fuel cell in this cas
Re:Good idea... (Score:2)
The Collier's Space Program, half a century later (Score:5, Informative)
Those pictures are famous, and there's even an animated Disney documentary from the period.
The "Collier's space program" was far more ambitious than what's been done to date, or even what Cameron had drawn. The Collier's program had a big rotating space station in Earth orbit, a Mars rocket under construction in orbit, and heavy industrial traffic to and from orbit. Cameron has much lower ambitions.
Good for Cameron, NASA, and us (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm 33, and I damn well better see a person on Mars in my lifetime! And a moon colony. And those flying cars are LONG overdue...
I'd love to be sitting in my little cabin on mars in my old age, doddering on about "In my day, we had to live in inflatable huts, and we had an oxygen ration. We were only allowed to breathe ten times a minute. You kids have it lucky!"
Re:Good for Cameron, NASA, and us (Score:2)
Yes he did.. (Score:2)
What's wrong with Cameron (Score:2)
It's like seeing shaq leaving the lakers at the top of his game to play for a charity league for good will.
Re:What's wrong with Cameron (Score:4, Informative)
I interviewed Cameron last year, and flat-out asked him why he hasn't made a film (as opposed to a documentary) since 1997. His answer was, "I'm having too much fun." Well, lucky bastard on the one hand, but on the other, all credit to him!
Still, looks like he's going ahead with Battle Angel now. And in 3D, to boot!
Re:What's wrong with Cameron (Score:2)
In other words, he has moved on to the highest plane of film making where he has to mix technology/screenplays and inform the audience, all at the same time. I vote for another something along the lines of the Bismark documentary before another Titanic. At least we didn't have to wait for the bloody Bismark to just frickin' sink already.
KFG
Been there already... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Been there already... (Score:2)
pdf file mirror...just in case nasa can be /.'ed (Score:1, Informative)
Table of Contents [comcast.net] Section 1 [comcast.net] Section 2 [comcast.net] Section 3 [comcast.net]
Gunnm? (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe he finally got his ass in gear and is really making that Gunnm (aka Battle Angel Alita) [yukito.com] movie he bought the rights to years ago - there's quite a few flashbacks to the main character's life on mars, especially in the sequel (or rather, the rewriting of the ending) called "Battle Angel Alita: Last Order" that's currently being released...
np: Ulrich Schnauss - Clear Day (A Strangely Isolated Place)
Re:Gunnm? (Score:2)
This is bad... (Score:2)
Oh well, we had a good run.
Talk about editors allowing MISLEADING LINKS (Score:2)
DUMBASSES! What about people who don't have a graphical browser? Clicking on that HTML link is just a waste of their time.
I know it's asking a lot expecting Journalistic Integrity on Slashdot, but EDITORS PLEASE don't link to a bazillion pages of bandwidth hogging useless for anything worthwhile FLASH and then call it HTML.
A normal HTML page would be nice (Score:5, Insightful)
Gees whatever happened to content oriented plain old HTML.
*shakes head*
I'll read the friggin thing when I have a couple of hours to wait for the pages to load.
PS: for anyone else having trouble: you have to click on those microscopic VCR style buttons at the top of the page to get the page transitions. Then go get a cup of coffee.
Re:A normal HTML page would be nice (Score:2)
I understand that "in a webpage" technically means that it's HTML , but for all in tents and purposes, zero content of the document is HTML.
It's all in this "must have some plugin" format guaranteed to piss people off when you claim it's a link to HTML.
Re:A normal HTML page would be nice (Score:2)
Just a note, this is the funniest thing I've ever read:
but for all in tents and purposes
Re:A normal HTML page would be nice (Score:2)
Dude, you are hilarious! You have a structural problem with the page?? I didn't even notice...
*shakes head*
That makes two of us...
Re:A normal HTML page would be nice (Score:2)
I started reading (thinking it was just HTML as advertised) and when I got to the bottom of the first page I clicked on the graphic down there (assuming it would take me to the next page). I still don't know what that graphic represents, but it doesn't do anything.
I finally looked up top, but with hard-coded font sizes on that frame and my 1600x1400 screen size the word "Brows" is almost microscopic, and its actually quite difficult to hit the page forward button without a
Re:A normal HTML page would be nice (Score:2)
News for Nreds, Stuff that Matters (Score:5, Insightful)
Stephen J. Hoffman, Editor
David L. Kaplan, Editor
Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center
Houston, Texas
July 1997
And this is NEWs how exactly?
Re:News for Nreds, Stuff that Matters (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:News for Nreds, Stuff that Matters (Score:3, Informative)
Design Reference Mission? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Design Reference Mission? (Score:2)
I think I speak for everyone when I say.... (Score:1)
Now PLEASE PLEASE! make us a great big shiny, blow-your-socks-OFF, good old-fashioned Hollywood blockbuster...!
You can even set it in space, or underwater if you'd like... just make it shiny.
That's all we're asking dude...
Peace
Inflatable habitat (Score:5, Insightful)
Winds not going to blow tent over (Score:3, Informative)
mars (Score:1)
Terminator? Sounds more like Aliens. (Score:2)
Re:Terminator? Sounds more like Aliens. (Score:2)
exploremarsnow.org (Score:3, Informative)
But apparently nobody cares because it wasn't commisioned by a well known director with a fetish for explosions.
just a lil' paranoia (Score:1)
James Cameron owns Mars Trilogy Rights (Score:3, Informative)
This probably means that at last the books are being adapted for the screen...
fake landing (Score:1)
And it gets around the budget deficit problem too.
Inflatable Inhabitants? (Score:2)
I think NASA would frown on bringing blow-up dolls on a major mission such as this. I mean, sure we're human and there are some idiosyncrasies that come along with that, but couldn't they hook up with each other and
oh. nevermind then.
Instead of making cute jokes.... (Score:3, Insightful)
"The thing I found about human mission architectures for going to Mars is that if you change one piece or one assumption, it has a ripple effect through the whole thing, and it looks different coming out the other end. You do things differently, your spacecraft are configured differently, your surface mission looks different, the time you spend on the planet looks different. So a certain set of fundamental assumptions had to be made and then we had to design everything for what it was going to look like."
Hmmmm (Score:2)
Fuzzy Math in a Mission to Mars? (Score:2)
Why a film director as opposed to... (Score:2)
Okay, this I don't get. James Cameron is a film director. This is basically the same thing as asking an artist to concieve a ship design. This, to me, is looking at the wrong solution to the problem.
The problem is not one of aesthetics or "believability" or even film-making. It is one of keeping people alive and for providing a living environment. What stresses a particular structure will need to tolerate, what safety limits, what shape this kind of structure will take on... those are engineering issues,
Re:Why a film director as opposed to... (Score:2)
Re:I'm confused. (Score:2)