August 2009 Archives

9/11: Science and Conspiracy
Premieres Monday August 31 at 9P et/pt
Director's Diary During the Filming of the Show

DEMOLITION PREP

Director Robert Erickson documents the demolition of a dormitory on a college campus to compare the process with what conspiracy theorists claim took place in the twin towers and caused them to fall.

WEDNESDAY 11/19/08

I arrived in Thibidoux, Louisiana just after 1PM this afternoon. The Demolition team had not been clear about exactly where on the Nicholls State University campus this old dormitory was located. I called the foreman and he told me to look for the tallest building in the area. I finally found the nine-story brick structure behind the football field. They gave me a hard hat and set me loose. I fired up the HD camera and rolled tape. The place was abuzz with acetylene torches and sparks flying as they cut the steel beams. About a dozen workers. Lots of noise, jack hammers and big equip. Thinking about the World Trade Center towers I considered how difficult it would be to do this work without someone noticing.

The building is nine stories high. An old dormitory. They have knocked through the cinderblocks and are torching the beams, actually cutting a large "V" to weaken them. They will finish the major prep on Thursday and load the explosives on Friday.

Jim Redyke, from Dykon Demolition, tells me that the beams they are cutting here in Louisiana are puny compared to the WTC beams. WTC beams are ten times larger. Some effort spent on weakening the heavily cemented staircase/elevator shaft.

THURSDAY 11/20/08

It is cold again this morning but will warm up through the day. Redyke was fairly helpful today. I ventured onto the upper floors to see their destructive efforts there. Cinderblock columns smashed to reveal the steel girder beneath. I captured--more destruction, more torches, and a safety meeting. In the early afternoon Redyke put together the explosives, inserting fuses into the copper shape charges and dynamite sticks.

The University is planning quite a celebration for the implosion. They've invited crowds, put the blast off till 11AM, they are selling raffle tickets to see who pushes the button, and the Jazz band is coming to play a New Orleans style funeral dirge just before the explosion.

Find out what happens in the rest of the director's diary >>

And don't forget to tune in on Monday August 31 9P et/pt for the premiere of 9/11: Science and Conspiracy.

Locked Up Abroad: Jamaica
Premieres Wednesday August 12 at 10P et/pt
Producer's Diary During the Filming of the Show

Tuesday May 26th
It's the first day of the Jamaican shoot and we've scheduled a scene at Hellshire beach as our first sequences for the day. It was supposed to be an easy start for the crew but it doesn't turn out that way. Even though we arrive there little after 7am, the heat is intense and we know it will only get worse. Within seconds the factor 70 sun tan lotion is out and is being liberally applied by all.

Despite the heat, the location is brilliant and truly representative of Jamaica (or at least a part of it). It's a famous spot for canoodling couples, Rastafarian beach stoners and fisherman; here you'll always find loved up couples walking by the shore hand in hand, gnarly fishermen working the nets in distant waters and smell the powerful scent of ganja.

After the beach, we head off to the Hilton hotel to shoot the scenes of the girls arriving in Jamaica. It ends up being chaos. Filming in a 'live' location always makes the footage more believable - you get that edgy documentary feeling - but it can be a royal pain the backside dealing with the needs of the production and the location you are filming in. Paying customers aren't always happy to have a film crew in their way! Overall, a tougher day than imagined but very productive.

Earlier last week we did a caption contest on Facebook & Twitter related to Alone in the Wild.

Many of you participated via Facebook and Twitter. The winners and the best of the captions are below for your entertainment.

WINNERS:

TerronJ: I would assume my refrigerator is running, I'm actually no where near it. Who is this?

AbeFroman21: Can you deliver a pizza @ 6° 50' S 39° 18' E ?

Mark Lucas: "Hi, Luke? Hey, I just got captured by a Stormtrooper and he wants all the Ewoks to come out with their hands up."

Jason Ogden: "Yes, you heard me correctly. I impaled myself on my tripod, and no, I did not get the shot."

Check out what more of you had to say by clicking below, and be sure to check out messages and videos from Edward at the Alone In The Wild show page.

1. 1. Over 150 identical twins, in the U.S. are married to identical twins.  Genetically, their children are brother and sister, but legally their children are cousins.  

1. 2. Multiple births are the most common in African-American cultures, they are least common in Asian cultures.
2. 3. The nation with the highest number of multiple births is Nigeria.
3. 4. Twins births have risen 62% since 1980.  It is thought this is mostly due to interventional reproductive assistance such as IVF and older age women having children.
4. 5. 22% of twins are left-handed.  In the non-twin population, it is just under 10%.
   

Nat Geo Games is busy launching a whole slew of cool new games - recently including Herod's Tomb, Plan-It-Green, a number of Iphone puzzle games and a bunch more. They've launched a games platform with other great casual games on their new site. Here's the avatar I created, which looks vaguely like me if you shave 10 years off my age, buy me all new clothes, remove my glasses, square off my chin and otherwise de-nerd me - hair is the same color, however.

Filming Locked Up Abroad: Sierra Leone
By Hannah Lewis, Associate Producer

The story we are filming took place in Sierra Leone and it was a difficult process deciding which country we were going to film in. Sierra Leone was not an option due to instability and a lack of infrastructure. Looking at the map for the tenth time, most other African countries were also ruled out for the same reasons. There were not many options: we narrowed it down to South Africa, Uganda and Kenya, all of which had issues with weather: South Africa is going into winter and Uganda and Kenya into rainy season. As Renny, (our Director) aptly put it: 'it's a question of choosing which battle to fight'.

After much deliberation we decided on Kenya as it offered a very good visual match for Sierra Leone and does have equipment we need such as lighting. Also there are a lot of Kenyan peacekeepers in the story so it makes sense for casting.

Monday May 4th, 2009
Awake in Nairobi on our first morning to local news message on mobile phone: '12 dead in grisly road mishap on way to Nairobi'. Renny and I meet Jenny Pont, our production partner from Pontact Productions in Nairobi, but Andrew, our location manager is late. He is on the road to Nairobi. I'm worrying about him being involved in the grisly mishap just as he pulls in to the car park in a spectacular old land rover laden down with military props. Things are looking good.

After a meeting about locations Andrew sets off for the 10 hour drive to Malindi on the Kenyan coast whilst we go to a production meeting with the rest of the crew.
We go over the script scene by scene and address any questions that come up.

Tuesday 5th May
We go to equipment companies to look at grip equipment and lighting that will stretch our budget. One thing we have to factor in is that we are filming a long way from Nairobi so everything we need will for the whole shoot will have to come overland in trucks.

Wednesday 6th May
We catch a morning flight to Malindi and by chance are seated on the right hand side of the plane so we see snow-covered Kilimanjaro rising up from the flat red earth below. Seeing the terrain below and the incredible sight of Kilimanjaro reminds us what a privilege it is to be able to go to such amazing places as part of our job.

On arrival in Malindi we are met by a wall of heat and Andrew, our location manager who had arrived safely despite the notoriously treacherous Nairobi to Mombasa road, well known for car-jackings and accidents.

It looks wonderfully tropical and a lot like our Sierra Leone reference pictures, as Andrew had told us it would.

READ FULL DIARY >>