Derek Meddings and 21st Century Visions

As my burgeoning website is concerned with Dereks
model UFO and the effects lighting etc used during the making of the series,I have placed a pre-order for a copy
of 21st Century Visions with Amazon (this means that they will send me a copy in whatever condition, if they come across one)

As a copy of this book maybe difficult to get hold of, could anyone provide a transcript of what Derek has to say about making and filming/lighting the Alien craft in UFO.
I realise that there is a problem here with copyright,however my intention is to buy the book if I can get hold of it. And I,m not asking for a transcript of the whole book.

The intention of my website is to try and reveal all the secrets about the model .How it was built,filmed and the methods used to light it.I,m also going to provide instructions on how anyone can build their own 2in
version,a minature copy of the original.

Thanks in advance to anyone who can assist.

My intention is to do more work on the site at the end of July when I won,t be working.Until then if anyone wants to look at the youthful site,you can find it at.

http://geocities.com/elder7uk/


Mark UK



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

--- In Mark Davies wrote:
>
> As a copy of this book maybe difficult to get hold of,
> could anyone provide a transcript of what Derek has to
> say about making and filming/lighting the Alien craft in UFO.

Mark,

I own this book (a fantastic one!) so I think I can fulfill your
wishes :-) For I've got no scanner I had to type it from the book.

Here what Derek has to say about the Alien craft in UFO:

----------->

The saucers themselves were another example of a design that looked
great on paper but proved a nightmare to film. The effect we wanted
them to create was a blur of spinning light, which looked dramatic
and mysterious, but also seemed believable. I'd already had some
experience of filming flying saucers when we made FIREBALL XL5, and
one of the worst problems we faced was to create a realistic spinning
effect. This could only really be achieved with an electric motor. In
the past I'd tried attaching the flying saucers to a spinning
serial mount, which was suspended out of shot, but this usually
resulted in a very shaky effect. The solution we came up with for UFO
was much more ingenious and far more effective.

This time the motor was built into the body of the vehicle, which was
made up of a series of metallic vanes attached to a transparent dome.
The vanes could be spun beneath the dome, which was attached to a
flying rig by wires, resulting in a vehicle which looked as if it was
spinning. To add to the effect, reflective panels were attached to
each vane, which created the blurred light effect we wanted when the
vehicle was in motion. The final result looked fantastic on screen,
but there was one drawback to the design. The saucer had to be
carefully weighted so that it would spin evenly, but if it was
tilted, it would stop rotating, which meant that we couldn't
create shots of the vehicle banking in flight. The result, however,
was a craft that seemed to defy the laws of gravity, which added to
its mysterious presence.

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Hope that helps and was also of interest for the other members!

Best wishes
Christian