Newton’s Third Law of Motion

Hi,

I have now started developing the next video in the series of Professor Mac explains Newton’s Laws of Motion.  Many viewers of my videos on YouTube, and readers of this website, have requested an explanation of the third law and that is what I am now preparing.

For this production I will be posting regularly about my progress. The posts will give an insight into how I produce the videos, including details of the process of writing, voice recording, modelling and animation.

My video on Newton’s second law of motion was released during the summer of 2011.  It has received a steady stream of viewers on YouTube.  In January 2012 I was excited by the release of the iBooks Author software by Apple which enabled the development of amazingly interactive ebooks for the iPad.  This book format is ideal for presenting the Professor Mac videos and content.  I therefore started production of the first Professor Mac ebook and published this in June 2012. I quickly realised that there was also a large audience who didn’t have access to the iPad so I then developed an EPUB version of the book for use on the iPhone and iPod touch.  This was also published in June 2012.

The development of a video for YouTube and the development of a video for an ebook is technically the same process, but the flow and structure of the video needs to be planned differently for the best results.  I have therefore decided to develop my video on Newton’s third law primarily as an ebook.  Some of the content will be made available on YouTube but most of the video will only be available in the ebook.

So what is my process of developing a video rich ebook? I start with a great deal of research, including watching lots of videos of great lecturers at work and reading material on the web and in text books.  I then sit down and decide what I want to present and the best way to deliver it through video.  This then leads to the writing of the script for the video. What may be surprising is that, before the animation starts, the audio has to be recorded and only then may the animation start.  This is because the animation is made to the voice recordings.  This requires the script to be developed and complete before animation starts.

In parallel to the script development I also start some test modelling to establish how I will achieve the more technically challenging aspects of the production.  I use a program called Blender for the modelling and animation of my videos.  It is an amazing open source program which is free to use.  It is developed and supported by a very active community which provides tutorials, models and materials for use by the community.  The program has everything required to produce high quality animations.

The video of the third law will explore how we use the law to launch a rocket. This requires the development of a model of a rocket and the simulation of smoke and fire as the rocket launches.  I am in the process of developing the rocket and I will post updates as I make progress.

For the moment the script is close to being finished and then the voice recording and animation can start …….

Mac