Home Made Star Wars Movie Injury

SaleNowOn writes "Rather than use expensive cgi techniques to make the light sabres glow for their home movie. This couple instead used fluorescent tubes filled with petrol. Which they then set alight. If they don't survive they must be Future Darwin Award winners. It makes me proud to be British." And me embarassed to be a Star Wars geek.

Comments

Glow Sticks

[Rolyat69]

Why oh why didn't they just use Glow Sticks? Here is a nice article on how they work. Crack them, cut them open, and dump into some sort of clear plastic tubing and seal. From what I understand, Glow Sticks are nontoxic and come in nifty colors! I guess the force just isn't that strong with them. :)

Re:Glow Sticks

[hey!]

This works amazingly well.

I have a friend who is machinist who made a number of beautiful plastic broadswords that were designed to be filled with something like twenty glow stiks worth of juice. The effect was spectacular, even in moderate lighting. They were exquisitely beautiful creations with several different colored plastic, finely shaped, finished and furnished. His best one he took to an Boskone years ago, where Larry Niven, who was staggering drunk at the time, asked to see it. Naturally Niven waved it around and smashed it against an elevator door, putting an ugly chimp and spiderweb cracks in it. My friend was pissed -- it took forever to make one that nice.

Personally I would have got a Sharpie and had Niven autograph the sword for me. Something like this: "To Dave -- Sorry about the sword, but I was being a drunk asshole at the time. All the best, Larry"

Re:Glow Sticks

[Rei]

You need tight field lines to get coronal discharge - and if you use them, you'll probably see lightning coming from it in the dark. Tight field lines generally require fine wires. Also, the glow will be unicolor unless you outgas different gasses from your saber.

Not that I'd recommend using fluorescent light tubes filled with anything - that's a shatter risk. And while tritium isn't dangerous in most situations, that much tritium in a fragile container is asking for trouble - getting that much on your skin (where some may soak in) and in the air (which you'll breathe), you'll probably get a couple years to a couple decades of background radiation equivalent (based on the fact that drinking an entire tritium rifle sight is a two years dose).

Re:Glow Sticks

[AndroidCat]

"Tritium requires a $40,000 dollar license from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, with secure facilities and weekly medical exams because of its radioactivity. Don't even think about trying to get Tritium. It is dangerous and illegal." (And this from people doing home-built fusion reactors!)

Talk about doing it the hard way!

[BandwidthHog]

The bitch of it is that in my high school electronics class, when we covered Tesla Coils and Van de Graff Generators, our teacher showed us how to have a light saber fight by holding a flourescent tube in one hand and the center tap of a Tesla Coil in the other. Sure, you've gotta be careful not to break the thin glass tube, but at least the results aren't quite so nasty if you do. Probably looks more convincing as well.

And if you work it right, it also gives you the ability to do the ever popular Jedi trick of throwing someone across the room with the open palm of your hand.

High voltage beats high temperature any day of the week.

Flourescent Tubes

[bsd4me]

Flourescent tubes will also glow if you hold them while standing under high-tension power lines.

Re:Obsession with All Things "Star Wars"

[sickofthisshit]

"Star Wars" is a good sign for Western society....We support democracy.

Star Wars != support democracy, you dweeb. What, did you attend the George W. Bush school of political science? Where democracy = feel good, with no actual considerations for what defines a democratic society?

The whole point of the saga is that democratic institutions are weak, and we need princely heros (who have the blood of Anakin coursing through their veins) to protect us from despotism. Queen, Princess, Knight...those are the heroes. Who voted for Luke Skywalker? Who exercises civilian control over the Jedi?

The Star Wars story *might* correspond to a desire for a constitutional monarchy, respectful of basic human rights, but with a quasi-religious independent military. No democracy there, bub.

Re:Slightly more information

[swillden]

Let's make a list here: Fire, Gasoline, Flying glass

You forgot the best one: soap.

They mixed the gasoline with soap. The resulting mixture is a sticky, highly flammable sludge often called poor man's napalm. I'm guessing they did it so they could coat the insides of the tubes with a mixture that would stay in place while being swung around. Obviously, gasoline alone would tend to slosh and pour out.

But when the "saber" shattered, and the stuff splashed on them, it stuck to them, just like napalm does. Gasoline alone would have been much less dangerous since except where it soaked into clothes it would have mostly slid off the people and onto the ground. What little actually did stick would have burned away fairly quickly. This stuff, on the other hand, can stick to skin, hair and clothes in thick globs and continue burning for a very long time. Worse, it's very hard to smother effectively. If you drop to the ground to smother it, the lack of oxygen will stop combustion, but the mixture will probably retain enough heat to reignite as soon as you roll over. It also retains enough heat to continue burning you for quite a while if you wrap up in a blanket or something.

Very, very nasty stuff to be playing with. It's no surprise that these two may not survive.

Real napalm, by the way, is also a mixture of gasoline plus other stuff to stabilize it and slow the rate at which it burns.