Video Project Proposal
Word count: 802
Video Title: A quick rundown of Formula 1
Theme/Concept: Educational video about Formula 1
Genre: Nonfiction
Synopsis: Formula 1 cars were famous for their loud engines and their distinctive noise (sound of old Formula 1 cars passing). The most recent iteration of Formula 1 cars is not as loud (sound of new Formula 1 cars passing), but more efficient and more powerful. This is because their new engines are hybrid. This is a strange concept because when you think of hybrid you think of the Prius, but Tesla has recently shown how electric cars can be incredibly fast. Hybrid performance cars combine the power of a gasoline engine and the power of an electric engine to create a more efficient and more powerful car. To start, a normal gasoline engine runs by using small explosions to move pistons up and down. This up and down motion is translated into circular motion which drives the wheels. This is what the RPM/1000 display measures next to your speed in a car. Hybrid cars didn't come from Formula 1, but things like our brakes, traction control, and anti-lock braking system (ABS) all came from or were perfected in motorsports. Unlike our road cars Formula 1 cars are meant to be driven incredibly fast with speeds reaching up to 230mph and the ability to accelerate from a dead stop to 60mph in 2.1 seconds. Like riding a bicycle the faster a Formula 1 car goes the easier it is to control. This sounds backwards for a car but engineers found ways to manipulate air to their advantage. Things like spoilers on your average roadcar may not do much but Formula 1 cars have 2 wings, one in the front and one in the back. Most people think that spoilers are pointless or make your car slower and they're mostly right. Your average roadcar doesn't go fast enough for them to be useful, but at high speeds they push air up and gives the car more grip. This sacrifices top speed for the ability to turn faster which is preferred in races. There are a lot of pieces that work together to mold the air exactly how the engineers want it to improve the car's lap times by fractions of a second. This may not seem like much but there can be up to 80 or so laps per race. If we look at the front wing we'll notice the strange shapes it makes. If all the engineers wanted was down force then why are there so many gaps? Well it turns out that the giant open wheels of the car are not very aerodynamic and create a lot of unwanted air slowing the car down. The front wing instead manipulates the unwanted air away from the car while keeping the clean air close to the body. The engineers are literally air bending with these wings. On top of manipulating the air for grip, the tires themselves are essential for grip. These tires are massive and only work well at high temperatures. Before putting the tires on the cars they need to be kept heated to ensure the tire can grip to the road and perform well. To make sure the entire surface of the tire makes contact with the ground Formula 1 cars have their front wheels tilted so around corners the tires flatten for more grip. This is different than road cars that have their wheels tilted which is mostly for show.
Video Style: Gifs visualizing how each piece of a Formula 1 car works and freezing on important parts. Still images to focus on important aspects. Video will be similar to other educational videos, possibly use a whiteboard and other drawings.
Breakdown of possible scenes: Introductory gif of Formula 1 cars on a track explaining why Formula 1 is important to us and how their complexity can be simplified. Zoom in still images of the major parts of a Formula 1 car, starting with the engine. There should be a gif of a single piston going through its cycle and the similarities and differences between our engine and theirs. One scene will be going through the basic aerodynamic parts and why cars have spoilers and what they do. There will be images of brakes and how Formula 1 technology reached our cars and what future technologies may trickle down, with images of these items.
Target Audience: Anyone or curious people
Length of video: 7 minutes or so
Objectives: To educate people about the cars around them, where the technology came from and where it's going.
Setting: On a whiteboard, images of Formula 1 cars on the track, etc.
Images:
Formula 1 car
Piston in Engine
Front wing
y250 vortex created by front wings
Formula 1 car camber
Stanced road car
Dear Sam,
ReplyDeleteI'm still not sure about this topic. I like that you've chosen something that interests you and that you have knowledge about, but there has to be a way to give this some other spin. What's the most interesting thing about Formula 1 cars? The reason I ask is that it will be hard to find a general audience for this focus, and hard to find a specialized audience. For the general audience, I believe you may find that most people do not have an interest in the engine capabilities of a Formula 1 car. A specialized audience who may share an interest would probably have an understanding of the basics that you've described above. So, one way to approach this is to figure out what it is that you personally find appealing about Formula 1 cars--what is your relationship to this type of car? Why not something else? Your job as a writer is to figure out why you've developed a fascination with this car and then help us to understand how that illuminates something about the human experience. That is a tall order--but I believe you have the intelligence to do this. Cars generally are symbols of something else, a desire for power, or the desire to run away, or the need for a thrill--so, will you spend some time writing about what draws you to these vehicles so that you can get closer to the heart of this subject and from there, closer to a shared understanding with a more general audience?