Old video games shape the future.

January 3, 2012 8:46 AM

Controlled Quantum Levitation on a Wipe'Out Track.

From the video description:

Here is a short footage [sic] on our recent work on quantum levitation. We were inspired by the game Wipe'out to do our work. With this new technology, we hope to revolutionize the world of motor transport; Maybe in a near future we could assist to a real Wipe'out race.

posted by Burhanistan (93 comments total)

WELCOME, TO THE WORLD OF TOMORROW!
posted by hot_monster at 8:52 AM on January 3

What is keeping the cars "on" the road when they slowly ease around the corner?

Also, what letter is omitted from "wipeout" in order to come up with the abbreviated "wipe'out"?

Also also, do pixelated nametags mean they know they are going to get in trouble over this?
posted by DU at 8:55 AM on January 3

a: quantum. b: - c: yes/no
posted by rebent at 8:56 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

What is keeping the cars "on" the road when they slowly ease around the corner?

Quantum locking, I believe; they aren't just kept up by magnetic repulsion, they are actually locked in the magnetic field.
posted by Philosopher Dirtbike at 8:57 AM on January 3

So--tractor beam?
posted by MrMoonPie at 8:58 AM on January 3

Quantum Levitation Blue?
posted by slater at 8:59 AM on January 3

science is magic
posted by khappucino at 8:59 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

Does this look like bad CGI to anyone else? Bad as in blatantly fake.
posted by Brodiggitty at 9:02 AM on January 3 [9 favorites]

I have no reason not to believe this but, for some reason, those vapour trails look CG.
posted by run"monty at 9:02 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

or maybe it's the internet that is just magic
posted by khappucino at 9:03 AM on January 3

It's crazy to me that things like Quantum Locking are not discussed constantly in public forums.
posted by 3FLryan at 9:04 AM on January 3 [4 favorites]

Well, not crazy. I guess the world has to get on with all its other concerns. Maybe I should be a scientist.
posted by 3FLryan at 9:07 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

I agree it looks kinda fake.
posted by orme at 9:07 AM on January 3

brodiggity - it's not.
posted by rebent at 9:08 AM on January 3

The Wipeout video looks so fake that I immediately dismissed the whole thing. But if you click on the "quantum levitation" link it takes you to another video that more fully explains the effect. The video lists the Superconductor group at Tel Aviv University, which has its own site with pictures showing early research.
posted by chrominance at 9:08 AM on January 3

Does this look like bad CGI to anyone else? Bad as in blatantly fake.

Sorry, bro. Your instincts are leading you astray. This is totally real. Quantum locking is an actual thing.

The "fake-looking" vapor trails in the video would be coming off the supercooled element in the car.
posted by pts at 9:08 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

Awesome! Added to the toys I'd buy/build myself if I were rich and care free.
posted by meinvt at 9:10 AM on January 3

OK - After seeing 3FLryan's link I can see this is indeed real. It still doesn't look real in the JIST video. I've fallen victim to Clarke's third law.
posted by Brodiggitty at 9:14 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

Hm. While quantum locking is real, I wasn't aware liquid nitrogen came in tiny soda charger canisters. Is that a common thing?
posted by chairface at 9:23 AM on January 3 [2 favorites]

What, no power ups?
posted by The Bellman at 9:28 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

I have a weird feeling about this. A new YouTube account, comments turned off, no faces...? I want to believe, but I think this is CGI.
posted by joinks at 9:31 AM on January 3

Well since they spent as much money printing out the Wipeout logo and constructing a Wipeout style track as they did on any actual technological developments, and since the smoke looks fake, and since there is no JIST but only a JAIST, and since quantum locking being real has absolutely nothing to do with anything, I have to conclude this is viral advertising.
posted by fartron at 9:32 AM on January 3 [2 favorites]

Is this not similar to Dilatant Compound 3179 in that it's an amazing pure-science solution looking for a problem?

The obvious application would be a train, but building a safe, enclosed high-speed magnetic corridor represents enormous labour and materials compared to the time-tested simplicity and already high efficiency of steel rails (where most of the energy loss is in start/stop inertia anyways). I just don't see sufficient advantage here.

Another application might be magnetic bearings, potentially useful in situations where corrosion is a factor, or replacing mechanical bearings is cost prohibitive. However, you don't need superconductors to achieve that, they are already possible with ordinary magnets.

The quantum locking looks like it might be most useful for moving an object in a controlled fashion in zero gravity, but I still can't think of a situation where that can't be more cheaply handled by other means.

Ideas?
posted by CynicalKnight at 9:37 AM on January 3

Brodiggitty: I've fallen victim to Clarke's third law.

So, it appears that we need to revise the third law to "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from CGI"
posted by Bovine Love at 9:38 AM on January 3 [14 favorites]

Wait, where'd they get little Matchbox-type WipEout vehicle models? I can't locate them anywhere, and I'd totally buy them if I could.
posted by schoolgirl report at 9:39 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

I love Japan.
posted by empath at 9:40 AM on January 3

chairface: I wasn't aware liquid nitrogen came in tiny soda charger canisters. Is that a common thing?

That gives me pause as well. AFAIK, they come in N20 and CO2. Never heard of liquid nitrogen.
posted by Bovine Love at 9:41 AM on January 3

Wait, where'd they get little Matchbox-type WipEout vehicle models?

They built them out of superconductors.
posted by empath at 9:41 AM on January 3

That gives me pause as well. AFAIK, they come in N20 and CO2. Never heard of liquid nitrogen

You can order Liquid Nitrogen in small amounts for cooking, etc..
posted by empath at 9:43 AM on January 3

But not in the ISI-style chargers they are using.
posted by Bovine Love at 9:46 AM on January 3

In Japan, you can get little spaceships made out of superconductors in the vending machines outside the corner convenience store.
posted by Burhanistan at 9:46 AM on January 3 [13 favorites]

Does this look like bad CGI to anyone else? Bad as in blatantly fake.

I maintain that if aliens ever visit, our brains will reject them as bad CGI. Anything outside of our visual experience seems unreal to us, I guess.
posted by gregoryg at 9:54 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

I have no reason not to believe this but, for some reason, those vapour trails look CG.

Indeed. Watch the yellow vehicle's trail as it goes around the loop. Real vapor could not pass through the wall like that.

It's CGI.
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 9:55 AM on January 3 [11 favorites]

The science, of course, is real (and requires supercooled materials, not just something filled with 5 seconds of LN2). It's just this particular application that is fake.
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 9:56 AM on January 3

Man.

Looking at this again...

The vapor DOES look kind of fakey. And that Wipeout logo is goddamn everywhere in the video.

The plausibility of this notwithstanding, I am suddenly wondering if we ARE being had.

Also there's I'm not getting any really solid hits for "Japan Institute of Science and Technology." Also this is the only video that account has posted.

Also the Japanese for Liquid Nitrogen Tank wouldn't be 窒素の液体タンク. It would be more like 液体窒素タンク.

Fucking over-clever ad agencies.
posted by pts at 9:59 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

Fucking over-clever ad agencies.

I went to look at their other videos and was surprised to find nothing else there. Just another little red flag. Bummer.
posted by gregoryg at 10:01 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

I maintain that if aliens ever visit, our brains will reject them as bad CGI

If the aliens ever visit, they will use our consciousnesses as resources for their own CGI.
posted by digitalprimate at 10:01 AM on January 3

>:( I am going to be SO ANGRY if this is a fake!
posted by rebent at 10:01 AM on January 3

Well, hmmm. There is a new version of Wipeout coming for a new Playstation handheld. If this is viral for that I will....feel vaguely disappointed for a moment about it. Carry on.
posted by Burhanistan at 10:02 AM on January 3

Is there any theoretical limit to how far away from the magnet you can quantum-lock something?
posted by LogicalDash at 10:03 AM on January 3

I find the propulsion problematic.
posted by Bovine Love at 10:17 AM on January 3

Let me know when somebody does quantum popping-and-locking.
posted by Mister Moofoo at 10:21 AM on January 3 [4 favorites]

Bovine Love: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from Industrial Light and Magic"
posted by Brodiggitty at 10:24 AM on January 3 [4 favorites]

1) That "LN2" tank is in no way an LN2 tank. If it's actually a dewar, the actual volume would be minuscule, and the outside connection would rapidly boil it off. Note, also, the complete lack of frost.

2) Aformentioned vapor through track.

3) Propulsion. I see a bunch of permanent magnets, what's changing the field to make the cars move forward? The cars clearly decelerate and accelerate, which is not what I'd expect to see in quantum locking. Where's that force coming from?

4) JIST? No, the institution in Japan in JAIST. Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. There's also JST, the Japan Science and Technology Agency, and AIST, the National Advanced Institute of Science and Technology.

But no JIST.

Fake.
posted by eriko at 10:28 AM on January 3 [4 favorites]

By the time I saw number 37 race, ten years of dancing with death had taken its toll on his nerves... and his mind.
posted by Slap*Happy at 10:34 AM on January 3

As this is pretty solidly fake and most likely a viral for wipeout, I'm a flaggin'.
posted by chairface at 10:36 AM on January 3

Let me know when somebody does quantum popping-and-locking.

Tunneling should count as popping.
posted by Jpfed at 10:36 AM on January 3

Reddit thinks this is fake. I've come back to it several times. I'm sticking by my first CGI comment and I'm guessing it's for an upcoming video game.
posted by Brodiggitty at 10:38 AM on January 3

I have no idea if this is fake or not. On the other hand, almost every genuine "techno marvel" video I have seen in the last decade has had authoritative arguments for why it is "obviously" fake in whatever associated comments thread goes with it. Random internet commentators wildly overestimate their ability to detect CGI.
posted by yoink at 10:41 AM on January 3 [2 favorites]

yoink: I didn't leave a comment about the 3D mouse that makes the vehicle change lanes at the beginning (did they wire up , or about the rather elaborate track (made out of magnets?), or about the vehicles swapping lanes towards the end of the video, or about the fact that the vapor is following the exact path as the vehicles with no regard for inertia, or about the lack of any supercooling whatsoever in the video because I figured that there must have been some sort of explanation.

But vapor passing through walls is a bit much.
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 11:05 AM on January 3

Look at the picture in picture of them setting the car on the track. No vapour until it is "placed." This doesn't match up with the uncontested videos. If something is supercooled, it will give off vapour, magnets or no.
posted by Brodiggitty at 11:10 AM on January 3

I'm pretty sure this could actually be done, including the controlled propulsion - but something about the lighting and vapor trails is triggering my CGI-detectors.

How would you do it? Well, quantum locking levitation is a real thing. Combine that with some non-superconducting magnets and some electromagnetic coils and some Hall effect sensors and you can sense and propel the little passive vehicles with the track itself.

But there's a couple of key points (beyond the non-existent JIST agency) that make it seem (at least partially) faked to me.

It doesn't appear to be enough LN2 being used. Normally you have to soak and saturate the superconductor to make sure the core temp of the superconductor has dropped below it's superconducting threshold. (See the "quantum locking levitation" video I linked above.) Getting that core temp well below the threshold is essential for the Meissner effect to happen - which is the first part of "quantum locking levitation" being claimed.

And the effect of quantum locking doesn't seem to be being displayed anyway - just the standard Meissner effect. You can make a twisted track lined out of rare earth magnets and the Meissner effect will effectively keep it locked to the direction of the flux lines of the magnets. If the quantum locking effect was being used the toy craft shouldn't actually rotate or tilt and bounce around the way they are, but they will bounce around and rotate freely.

(Well at least as far as I've understood quantum locking and seen it demonstrated. That's the really astounding part about quantum locking. It's a thin film superconductor that's being penetrated by lines of magnetic flux through what I believe is either quantum tunneling and/or imperfections in the thin film superconductor allowing magnetic fields to pass through and lock the superconductor in place relative to the flux of the magnet.)

But, yeah, parts of it look CGI. The vapor trails are much too uniform. They ignore gravity. And physical objects.

My vote is for a mix of a real Meissner effect demonstration and CGI. The Meissner effect is really easy to do if you happen to have some LN2 and a superconductor. Kids do it in high school these days. Superconductor samples and working materials are now relatively cheap.

I also vote for not deleting or flagging this post because even if it is a viral - it's good practice to test one's credulity. Also, they totally don't need to virally market a new Wipeout game. All they have to do is make it not suck and release it and a gazillion nerds will open their wallets. That game is a classic.
posted by loquacious at 11:15 AM on January 3 [3 favorites]

Edit: If the quantum locking effect was being used the toy craft shouldn't actually rotate or tilt and bounce around the way they are, but they will bounce around and rotate freely when under the influence of the simple Meissner effect.
posted by loquacious at 11:17 AM on January 3

It's bemusing that this is a fake not because it depicts the impossible, but because it depicts the mundane. That's quantum mechanics, in a nutshell, actually.
posted by gilrain at 11:18 AM on January 3

This one, however, looks real.
posted by sutt at 11:24 AM on January 3 [3 favorites]

This just hit Kottke and Waxy.org, too. I really dislike days spent with the oily pleasure/discomfort of knowing that something everyone else is happily abuzz about is an outright fraud. happens a lot, these days. Each time the oil becomes less pleasant and my discomfiting.
posted by gilrain at 11:25 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

And this is also real, I believe. HOLY CRAP.
posted by sutt at 11:29 AM on January 3 [3 favorites]

D'oh, sorry. Loquacious already linked to the second of my links above.
posted by sutt at 11:36 AM on January 3

I'm leaning towards fake, too..
posted by empath at 11:38 AM on January 3

loquacious: ... I'm pretty sure this could actually be done, including the controlled propulsion ...

Oh sure, it could be done but .. it would require a great deal of drivers below the track, all carefully controlled individually. Note how abruptly the cars start and stop. Now look at how freely other videos show the 'vehicle'. To get that start and stop so clean, you would require many many control points. The circuity/mechanisms simply aren't there. Now one could have a bunch of tiny coils/whatever on a daisy chain/bus mechanism individually addressed and powered, but to fit it into that track would require major R&D costs, fab, etc all to just make it disappear for aesthetics. I think it is an extremely thin chance that the shown propulsion could be real.
posted by Bovine Love at 11:38 AM on January 3

I think we had a post on quantum locking a few months ago: http://www.metafilter.com/108482/Quantum-Levitation
That one at any rate was real, no idea about this one.
posted by physicsmatt at 11:40 AM on January 3

JIST? Yeah I read a paper they collaborated on with folks from the Harvard Institute for New Technology, published in the University of Novel Research Extended Applications Laboratory journal. Spring 2011 I think.
posted by damo at 11:58 AM on January 3 [5 favorites]

Boy, the people who thought this was real are going to be amazed when they watch this card trick.
posted by EmGeeJay at 12:25 PM on January 3

EmGeeJay: Boy, the people who thought this was real are going to be amazed when they watch this card trick.

We thought it was real at first because the very real phenomenon it's mimicking is, if anything, more astounding than the fake.
posted by gilrain at 12:51 PM on January 3

While it might be fake, there's absolutely no reason that you couldn't do this with today's technology.

I don't see why you'd need to "carefully" control the drivers - you need a bunch of electromagnets and a fairly low-frequency A/C source. The trick is that the drivers to the electromagnets would need to be out of phase fairly precisely but it really doesn't seem to be that hard to do, because this is being done at such low frequencies - you could do it with a regular computer and some fairly precise digital to analog convertors, which I'm sure you'd literally have lying around if you were one of a number of types of experimental scientists.

As for the lane switching, I assume that that's a "glitch that works" because the two tracks are close together and it'd be easy for one car to get bumped into another lane. This wouldn't necessarily bump the other car into your previous lane, but some of the time it would and :-D you only show the video where it works in the YouTube clip.

Without going over it carefully, I'd tend to discount the CGI theory only because, well, what they're actually achieving isn't that gosh wow - it'd be almost as much work to fake it as it would be to simply do the real thing. But you can't underestimate advertising types and I wasn't watching it for fakes...
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 12:55 PM on January 3

It would have to be careful, but I'll concede that careful is easy now-a-days. However, the larger number (a bunch falls short) of electromagnets is not, nor is the wiring to control them. As I said, you could cut down on the wiring by using individually addressable magnets, but now you've created a pretty big fabrication PITA all for making it look like the track is just simple track. It does not add up at all. Again, it is possible, but very very improbable in this context. If it was being mass-produced for sale at a high price to a audience who appreciated such things, well then, that might be different.
posted by Bovine Love at 1:02 PM on January 3

> Boy, the people who thought this was real are going to be amazed when they watch this card trick.

Bah, that's a real waste of CGI.

I've seen actual tricks more amazing than this, and I'm thinking you could in fact achieve basically that effect with today's magic technology and no CGI. It wouldn't really be a trick that you could do practically in Times Square - you'd have problems with wind, problems with people wandering through places they shouldn't wander through, but you could have a card-man walk around and hand you the chosen card, without you or any other obvious support being "over" the man, and you could film it and get an effect quite close to that in the video.

I like this better.
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 1:04 PM on January 3

OK, I watched it again, and I guess it's a fake. The track is just too neat, and the cars move too smoothly (if there were individual magnets, you would think you could visually detect where they were).

Pity!
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 1:10 PM on January 3

Heh, I just received an "anonymous tip":

Quantum levitation/locking is a wonderful and real thing, but the lame logo copy attempt in the Wipe-out video makes this video extremely suspect. Below, logo from a JAIST publication, and the JIST logo from the video.
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 1:38 PM on January 3

Yeah, the vapour looks very CGI-ish and the movement at the start looks too crisp and controlled. The biggest red flag for me, though, is that the researchers apparently can't spell "research" (first paragraph of the intro slide) but can consistently capitalise and punctuate "Wipe'out". I'm automatically suspicious when someone is more familiar with a trademark than they are with their own job description.
posted by ZsigE at 1:38 PM on January 3 [1 favorite]

Logo comparison here.
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 1:47 PM on January 3

The LN₂ cartridge and the quick cooling of the car was a dead giveaway. I came in here to find out what the joke was, but you guys thought it was real...
posted by DarkForest at 1:51 PM on January 3

Yes, yes. It appears to be fakey fake total fakeout and probably viral for the Playstation Vita (already on the market in Japan). If this offends anyone's sensibilities then I suppose that will be my cross to bear, but I won't be asking the mods for deletion.

Still, it's neat, eh? Kids will be playing with these things soon enough, provided they still like real toys.
posted by Burhanistan at 1:53 PM on January 3

It's Pierre Belmondo's birthday in a couple of weeks, but he's only turning eight so I knew this couldn't be real yet.

I thought it was a nifty viral, though I agree it's a shame they didn't use the money to find some researchers who do this sort of thing for real. I bet there are plenty of them who'd love to set up a track with some professionally made props. I'm holding out hope that this will inspire someone to do it anyway though.
posted by lucidium at 3:00 PM on January 3

The biggest red flag for me, though, is that the researchers apparently can't spell "research"

Not surprising to me at all. I've seen tons of typos in stuff like YouTube videos where they knew just enough English to add titles.
posted by smackfu at 3:03 PM on January 3

But not normally those supposedly uploaded by a group of people with multiple post-grad degrees, I'll warrant. I can see what they were aiming for, but it was way overdone fakey bad English.
posted by howfar at 3:41 PM on January 3

Still, it's neat, eh? Kids will be playing with these things soon enough, provided they still like real toys.

Man, we could almost have this toy right now, but as far as I know they don't sell LN2 in disposable bulbs like that. It may be liquid under pressure in a CO2 or N20 styled bulb, but requires chilling to be a liquid at 1 atmosphere, which is why it's sold and distributed in bulk in insulated vacuum flasks that are designed to be able to vent the rapidly expanding gaseous nitrogen, since it's going to be expanding constantly that unless you can keep chilling it.

I'm not sure if this one has been linked yet, but here's a video of a Moebius-strip shaped track where it happily rolls through 360 degrees of track angle while locked to pitch and yaw perpindicular to the track.

One of the things that seems to be missing from most of the videos that demonstrate this is how to actually set it up. Here's a basic overview. And another.

As I recall but can't seem to find the video for is that to properly set up flux trapping in the super conductor. And, crap, wikipedia doesn't even have an article for magnetic flux trapping yet.

Anyway, point being is two points about why I thought this was fake - and it's less about being fake and more talking about the very real and interesting science that they're emulating.

One - to levitate something superconducting at a specific height on the magnetic you must "set" the altitude of the superconducting object. There superconductor somehow remembers the flux lines it was trapped in - and if I'm recalling correctly it will remember this even if it goes warm, as long as it's not re-exposed to new (stronger?) magnetic fields. So you can re-chill your superconductor (or model vehicle) and stick it right back on the track and it clicks back into place at the previous height.

So, as you can see from the other videos of real demonstrations this altitude is very, very uniform. The Meissner effect and the related flux trapping is very strong relative to the low weights of the magnet because large (potential?) currents induced in the super conductor by the impinging magnetic field, which produces the opposing force that levitates the superconductor.

There's too much vertical bounce and movement in the vehicles in Wipeout video to match the Meissner effect.

Two - Quantum locking/pinning is also real - as in this video linked multiple times above - but it's apparently not being demonstrated in the Wipeout video. It's a different (and really utterly freaky) thing in addition to the Meissner effect and levitation.


More info about quantum locking/pinning seems to be available as a talk or lecture here.

(Come to think of it, it's like the Wipeout video was scientifically engineered to peg the uncanny valley and compel nerds to talk about it. +1.)
posted by loquacious at 3:48 PM on January 3 [2 favorites]

I WANT MY HOVERCAR!!!
I WANT MY HOVERCAR!!!
I WANT MY HOVERCAR!!!
I WANT MY HOVERCAR!!!
I WANT MY HOVERCAR!!!
I WANT MY HOVERCAR!!!
posted by sexyrobot at 3:54 PM on January 3

Wow. So it obviously isn't CGI. Neat.
posted by koeselitz at 3:56 PM on January 3

To me, it looks like somebody's Vancouver Film School compositing reel. Most of them make a point of putting CGI into hand held shots like this. The vapor trails don't seem to be interacting with the walls of the track and it seems to me like they missed a couple of spots where the vapour should be obscured by the walls of the track. Also there are spots where the the vehicles follow a line very precisely and other spots where they don't.
posted by bonobothegreat at 4:01 PM on January 3

(I hate to say it, but reading all the "THIS IS TOTALLY CGI!!!" comments here is now... more than a little amusing, to say the least.)
posted by koeselitz at 4:01 PM on January 3

koeselitz: (I hate to say it, but reading all the "THIS IS TOTALLY CGI!!!" comments here is now... more than a little amusing, to say the least.)

What makes you think it's real? It seems like we have ample evidence that it's fake. Did you misread loquacious, maybe?
posted by gilrain at 4:10 PM on January 3

How does "it kinda looks like there's some mist where it shouldn't be!" count as "ample evidence?"
posted by koeselitz at 4:18 PM on January 3

Ah, Bovine Love's comment goes beyond that. Hrm.
posted by koeselitz at 4:18 PM on January 3

I'm arguing it could be a mix of real and CGI. Blah blah blah a few pixels in my time. There are also many other things just wrong about the video if you're going to demonstrate the Meissner effect as a toy.

Also, the 3D mouse is probably a dead giveway for "3D CGI artist."
posted by loquacious at 4:23 PM on January 3

Aside from the obviously-faked parts, and the use of the apostrophe that nobody actually uses in referring to the game, liquid nitrogen in a container that size would be one of two things:

1. A bomb (assuming no safety pressure release)
2. Empty by the time you went to use it (assuming a safety valve).
posted by Dr.Enormous at 5:28 PM on January 3

Yeah, totally fake: everyone knows the name of the game is wipE'out". Sheesh. Some people.
posted by zsazsa at 8:05 PM on January 3 [1 favorite]

If nothing else had convinced me that this was a viral ad, the "wipeout quantum" logo displayed in the last few seconds of the video would have been enough.

Ah, Psygnosis... what have you become?
posted by A Thousand Baited Hooks at 2:35 AM on January 4

> I maintain that if aliens ever visit, our brains will reject them as bad CGI.

I maintain that the aliens are already among us, disguised as bad CGI.
posted by Tom-B at 5:54 AM on January 4

I could tell by the pixels.
posted by etherist at 6:49 AM on January 4

I think if it was CGI, they'd've made the speed a tad bit more impressive.
posted by spacediver at 8:19 AM on January 4

If it's cheaper, faster, and more reliable to fake an effect with CGI than to build it as a practical effect, a marketing agency is going to have to have an awfully good reason to build it practical.

Building an actual quantum-locking track with racing controls would be a lot cooler as an achievement but there is zero guarantee that it would work well or come out looking as good at first blush.

So being inspired by some real tech but then electing to fake it up for a commercial shoot instead of doing a practical implementation is a totally coherent move. As an explanation that makes more sense than doing a practical implementation and also adding some not-great CGI to try and salvage subpar results, but who knows I guess.

I think if it was CGI, they'd've made the speed a tad bit more impressive.

But that is, and I cannot believe I am saying this with a straight face, exactly what they would want you to think.
posted by cortex at 10:52 PM on January 4

I wanted to say that, but couldn't say it with a straight face. Bravo!
posted by Bovine Love at 7:04 AM on January 5