posted February 14, 2005 05:38 PM               

Apollo 9 is now in, it came in late this afternoon. They will start shipping tomorrow.

Now, for MOL.

I have been considering for some time now creating a disc on the 1960's planned military space programs - but the centerpiece will be a fictional 30-minute product as if the programs (primarily MOL/Blue Gemini and Dyna-Soar) actually were carried through. In addition to this piece we would include the footage that does exist, such as some of the early Dyna-soar footage and MOL footage. We would also include a considerable slideshow on the programs.

This would be a bit different (an alternate history) in that the fictional part would be accurate, based upon the programs as they were planned, and would be accurate to physics (i.e. no "whooshes" in a vacuum.) The fictional piece would be created from CGI and real photography, with something of a storyline (already done) within which the "missions" take place. I have another draft of a disc like this dealing with a Direct Ascent mode voyage to the moon, using a NOVA vehicle (and another idea about the 1981 manned landing on Mars using NOVA and a nuclear upper stage that we all so proudly remember happening).

Would anyone else find something like this interesting (providing it is well done and isn't a hack job - which I wouldn't do) or am I just off on one of my strange production-idea tangents? (I have a million of 'em)

posted February 15, 2005 02:56 AM               

Maybe you could join forces?

posted February 15, 2005 08:09 AM               

I will probably group them by planet. Although in some cases I may group by spacecraft. Since I haven't fully researched them yet it is difficult to say for sure.

posted February 16, 2005 03:45 PM               

And Apollo 9 is, indeed, shipping. We're not done with all the pre-orders yet, but should be by the end of the week.

Liftoff is now complete and will be out around March 5, and I'm enjoying work on Apollo 12 at the present time. I should have a new preview up on line sometime tomorrow or Friday.

posted February 18, 2005 12:37 PM               

Mariner 4 + 6 + 7 + 9 reconnaissance of Mars.

Viking 1 & 2 Orbiters & Landers exploration of Mars.

Global Surveyor, Mars Odyssey and Mars Express photograph Mars from orbit.

Pathfinder-Sojourner and both Mars Exploration Rovers conduct intensive studies of Mars.

posted October 22, 2005 02:56 PM               

I'm finishing up Mercury this week, and have everything in on Apollo 14, plus have a surprise that will be released in a few weeks (having something to do with Apollo), and am trying to decide the exact order of things for next year.

We will most definitely get Skylab and Space Shuttle development out next year, and probably 2-4 others (in addition of Apollo 14 and Challenger, which are coming right up)...

Right now here's what I expect to come out and when:

THESE ARE ESTIMATES

Mercury (6 DVDs) - 11/15 (going to masters right now)

Surprise Apollo Release (1 or 2 DVDs) - December 1

Challenger (3 DVDs) - January 28, 2006

Apollo 14 (5 DVDs) - January 31, 2006

Plus:

Space Shuttle Development (3 DVDs) with ALT and STS 1-4

Skylab (6 or 7 DVDs)

The X-15 (3 DVDs)

ASTP (2 DVDs)

Plus 1 or 2 other projects. We could put Viking on line for one of these projects. Or the Atlas Liftoff set.

Mark

posted October 23, 2005 03:06 PM            

A big problem with doing anything on BG and MOL is that the published information on them is very scarce and also misleading. I have managed to obtain a huge number of MOL documents and also some Blue Gemini documents, but have not published anything on this myself (no time).

I think that there is a popular misunderstanding that "Blue Gemini" was the name of the MOL Gemini flights. But actually, BG was the first proposal for adapting Gemini to Air Force use. This was quickly abandoned in favor of building a dedicated space station, initially called MODS, then renamed MOL.

But as I explained in several articles in Spaceflight magazine a few years ago, there is a whole missing chapter in that story as well. The Air Force started out with the Man In Space Soonest (MISS) program, which was officially canceled when NASA was created and placed in charge of Mercury. But the Air Force continued a human spaceflight program in secrecy. Little documentation on this exists, but one of the MISS proposals was adapted for reconnaissance purposes because the Air Force hoped to take the camera out and put a man in at some point. They proposed chimp flights in 1960, leading eventually to a manned flight. But they got stomped down on this. By 1962 NASA was evaluating the "Mercury Mark II"--Gemini--and the Air Force was involved in the launch vehicle support for that. They proposed that they be allowed to fly some Air Force Gemini vehicles. They wanted to do this in stages, with joint NASA-Air Force crews for several missions, followed by all-Air Force crews for later missions. I believe they proposed about a dozen flights in all, presumably some of these would have taken the place of NASA's actual Gemini missions. Ultimately, the Air Force had to settle for having some experiments carried on Gemini, and they switched their interest to MODS, then MOL.

MOL was always in trouble. I found and then lost a great document from late 1964 from one MOL official to another complaining about the fact that the program had not progressed in the past year. They simply were unable to define what it was supposed to do.

Around 1965 or so, MOL transitioned from a "let's see if there are any military man in space missions" program to an operational reconnaissance satellite mission. It became highly classified at this time and the documentary record simply dries up. The government will not release any documents on this subject. I have it from good authority that the late MOL design was essentially like a Hubble space telescope with a Gemini stuck on the front, with the telescope pointed down. (Note that this is not what most of the unclassified illustrations of the spacecraft show.)

posted October 24, 2005 11:25 AM               

I have no idea how that will turn out. One the first places for me to start on this is videocosmos... but I have no idea how that will go, how deep that access goes, etc. I just haven't gotten into that part of it yet.... but intend to see in 2006.

posted October 24, 2005 07:29 PM               

It is hard to come by good quality footage of the Soviet space program. This is where Spacecraftfilm's ability to make available high-quality footage would come in hand.

Armando

posted October 25, 2005 05:19 AM               

I will be meeting the two Cosmonauts in a few days, so I can grill them about the archives in Russia, as they may have an insight.

Cheers,

posted November 07, 2005 08:34 PM               

You go ahead and make anything you want -- just right after you finish one on Apollo 1.
In regards to Soviet Space DVD's -- one covering the early launches and training of the first 20 cosmonauts would be great too! You know with guys like NELYUBOV !!

Thanks for creating these wonderful DVD's. My son gets a first hand look of what MY childhood excitement was like.

posted November 09, 2005 11:58 AM               

Yes, it is a bit different than our other material, but I ran across this stuff when I was at the archives, and they are really loaded with fascinating material, including explanations of things I'd never seen before, so I thought they were worthwhile to make available. They are black and white, but the quality on them given when they were created is really quite good.

I especially like the program on the guidance computer, which shows how the scopes slew from DSKY commands, shows how the hardware was created and how the DSKY operates. It was shot in the lab at MIT. The LM program was shot at Grumman and Tom Kelly gives the tour. There's just a lot of great stuff, and over five hours of it, so I thought it was worthwhile to make it available.

I kept it on two DVDs because I didn't know how many of these were actually going to be in good enough shape after I made the transfers, but they were all in good shape with the audio intact. As it turned out I was able to get them all (dealing with Apollo). I also included a film on the Apollo 4 mission (color) and the program on the Surveyor probes.