For the Olympic opening, there was reportedly a huge fireworks display. And among other amazing things, the fireworks created the image of a series of footsteps in the sky.

Or did it? Seems that the people in the stadium watched most of this on video, and it seems that the video was faked.

You know what I find scandalous?

It took planners almost a year to create the 55-second sequence which appeared to be fireworks of more than two dozen footprints in the sky, said Gao Xiaolong, head of the visual effects team for the ceremony, in the Daily Telegraph story.

A year? Fireworks are among the easiest thing there is to create in CG. Hell, the solitaire game included in Vista includes a fireworks display when you win.

Ah, you say, but it's harder to create a CG fireworks display that fools everyone.

Yeah, I say, but it didn't fool everyone.

Anyway, what I like best about this story is the reason why the Olympic committee did it: they were afraid that Beijing smog would make a real fireworks display look terrible.

UPDATE: According to this, there were real fireworks in that shape, but what was displayed on the video screen in the stadium and was broadcast to the world was the CG.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste in Weird World at 09:05 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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