So I got this email today…
It’s just a couple of college kids making a movie and they need a car blown up. There were some emails exchanged and then we ended up chatting online for hours (until just a few minutes ago). Ry and I, being nerds, wanted to encourage reality based stuff. Such as no fireballs unless there really is excess fuel in the explosion. And the sound arrives significantly AFTER the explosion occurs (at 700 yards, boomershoot range, it’s about 2 seconds). Only if the camera is right in the middle of the explosion would it happen at the same time. They probably aren’t going to go for it. They want Hollywood reality, not physical reality.
From: Gideon Oakes
Sent: Wednesday, January 26, 2005 10:17 AM
To: joeh@boomershoot.org
Subject: Filming at Boomershot 2005Hi Joe,My name is Gideon Oakes. My buddy and I are students down here at BYU-Idaho, and we’re putting together a feature-length action movie called “The Moment.” In the film, there is a scene in which a car is supposed to blow up. I’ve visited your website and looked at everything, especially Project Fireball, with my eyes wide open. That kind of a fireball is exactly what we want. We’re not looking to demolish the car, but we want to have a spectacular fireball blow through the windows and up into the air.I’ve been trying to figure out how we could do this on our own, but the prospect of experimenting on blowing a car up (with no prior pyrotechnical knowledge) is somewhat of a frightening thing to me. So that’s why I started looking for people who already knew how to do this kind of thing. When I came upon your site, I was first thrilled to see someone doing what you do. You guys are definitely my kind of people. I’m from South Dakota, where we too take our 2nd Amendment rights very seriously. Then when I saw that you did this all in Idaho, I nearly fell out of my chair. Of all 50 states, you’re in the same state as us.So, I guess what I would like to know is, what would it take for you guys to put a titanium powder firebomb in a gutted out car and blast it at Boomershoot 05? We don’t know how far our movie is going to go, but we know that having this kind of special effect would definitely help its prospects out. Not to mention, it would be a heck of a lot of fun to do. 🙂Please let me know if you’re interested, so we can begin working on coordinating this project.Thanks,Gideon OakesBRP Digital MediaFrom: Joe Huffman
Sent: Wednesday, January 26, 2005 10:40 AM
To: Gideon Oakes
Cc: Ry Jones
Subject: Re: Filming at Boomershot 2005Rather than doing it at Boomershoot 2005 when my crew and I are very, very busy I would recommend some other time. Some weekend with a couple weeks notice would be probably work for us. Some of the issues I see are:
Do you have a car? If it wasn’t scrap before, it will be afterwards.
Cleanup. Unless you film it where you can just leave it the car and any pieces that fall off will have to be cleaned up.
Cost. If you can travel to us we can be had very cheaply–perhaps free if you give us credit in your movie. If we have to travel there then we would expect some compensation.
If we travel there do you have a place where this sort of activity will not upset the neighbors? Houses may shake a couple miles away. You might be able to mitigate this by inviting them to watch…
We will detonate it with rifle fire. If we travel to you we will need a safe place to shoot a high powered rifle.
Equipment risk. Depending on how close your camera(s) must be there is some risk of them getting hit by something. We can discuss this in more detail to give you some idea but if you decide to put them inside of the radius we give you (probably about 200 yards) then you take the liability.
Looking forward to hearing more about your project.
Oh, one more thing… we don’t do ‘bombs’ or ‘firebombs’. We do “reactive targets”–some of which happen to create fireballs. Talking about ‘bombs’ will get you turned over to the ATF, the FBI, and/or various intelligence agencies.
-joe-
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http://www.boomershoot.org
http://www.modernballistics.com