McTodd

I've been a lazy git and haven't got around to looking for Master Blasters, but I have uploaded 'The Gunpowder Plot - Exploding the Legend', where Richard Hammond recreates the titular Gunpowder Plot with surprising (and satisfying!) results...

http://www.stage6.co...ding-the-Legend

Wow! If you do have them, that would be wonderful. No pressure...

I'll have a look this weekend - watch this space!

I used to have Kaboom! on tape along with entire series of the BBC2 documentary series Master Blasters. I say used to because I loaned it to someone in 2001 and never got it back

Blimey, I may have that series on VHS! I say 'may' because I have hundreds of VHS tapes with stuff recorded off the telly over a 20-year period and I can remember very little of what I have... I am (sporadically!) transferring it all (well, the stuff that isn't available commercially at any rate) to DVD.

I shall have a search for Master Blasters, and if I have it I shall do the business and bung it up on Stage6. It'll be a week or so before I can report back.

it looks like a waterplume will remain a mystery...

In one of my books at home (I'm currently at work), there's a brief description of how they did the water plumes for the 1970 film 'Tora Tora Tora'. Because water is so hard to scale, they didn't actually make water plumes, but rather they used 'buckets' of gypsum (IIRC, I'll check later) floating just below the surface of the water (presumably with a thin watertight covering) and a charge under the gypsum, rather like the SFX 'mortars' used on land for shell explosions. The charge blew the gypsum up into the air which looks convincingly like a large water plume. The shot would have to cut away quickly, however, as the gypsum just remains suspended in the air far longer than water.

I suspect they used much the same technique in 'Sink the Bismarck'.

Portfire, glad you liked my wee pyro film! I'm devising better techniques (in theory, anyway) and will build more elaborate, realistic miniatures (of recognisable buildings, for example) for new experiments in the coming months.

Everyone in general - I have other docos that I think will be of interest (such as Richard Hammond's 'The Gunpowder Plot') which I will upload in the coming weeks, but I'll post here when they're online (it can be a frustrating business uploading to Stage6 - took me 3 attempts to get 'Kaboom!' on there, for instance!).