Alien Adventure
''Alien Adventure'' is a science fiction/slapstick comedy 3D film in IMAX format released in 1999 by nWave Pictures, written and directed by Ben Stassen. The movie was rated G (or the local equivalent) in most countries. It was the first fully digital feature-length film produced for a large-screen format. Plot An extraterrestrial humanoid species, the Glegoliths, are wandering through space in search of a new world. Encountering an unknown planet (which turns out to be Earth), the Glegolith leader Cyrillus sends two "manned" probes to the surface to determine if it is suitable for colonisation. The scouts in the probes think they have arrived at a great city, but in fact they have arrived at a new amusement park that is not yet open to the public. They proceed to explore four amusement rides : * Arctic Adventure ( motion simulator ride in a freezing environment); * Magic Carpet (a ride in an Arabian Nights-themed dungeon); * Kid Coaster (a roller coaster set in a gigantic ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ben Stassen
Ben Stassen is a Belgian film director, producer, and screenwriter. Career Stassen founded nWave Pictures in 1994, producing CG ride films including ''Devil's Mine''. Starting in 1997, Stassen began focusing on large-format films, directing ''Thrill Ride: The Science of Fun'' and ''Alien Adventure''. In the late 1990s, Stassen directed a succession of 3-D large-format films, including ''Encounter in the Third Dimension'' and ''Haunted Castle (2001 film), Haunted Castle''. In 2005, Stassen produced and directed ''Wild Safari 3D'', the first 3-D wildlife film for the giant screen. Stassen's first feature-length animated film, Fly Me to the Moon (2008 film), ''Fly Me to the Moon'', was released in North America on 15 August 2008 on both regular-size and IMAX screens, exclusively in 3-D. According to nWave, ''Fly Me to the Moon'' was the first animated film to be designed, created, and released solely in 3-D. The film was originally announced for the spring or summer of 2007. It ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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3D Film
3D films are motion pictures made to give an illusion of three-dimensional solidity, usually with the help of special glasses worn by viewers. 3D films were prominently featured in the 1950s in American cinema and later experienced a worldwide resurgence in the 1980s and 1990s driven by IMAX high-end theaters and Disney-themed venues. 3D films became increasingly successful throughout the 2000s, peaking with the success of 3D presentations of ''Avatar'' in December 2009, after which 3D films again decreased in popularity. Certain directors have also taken more experimental approaches to 3D filmmaking, most notably celebrated auteur Jean-Luc Godard in his film '' Goodbye to Language''. History Before film The basic components of 3D film were introduced separately between 1833 and 1839. Stroboscopic animation was developed by Joseph Plateau in 1832 and published in 1833 in the form of a stroboscopic disc, which he later called the fantascope and became better known as the phén ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Belgium
Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to the south, and the North Sea to the west. Belgium covers an area of and has a population of more than 11.8 million; its population density of ranks List of countries and dependencies by population density, 22nd in the world and Area and population of European countries, sixth in Europe. The capital and Metropolitan areas in Belgium, largest metropolitan region is City of Brussels, Brussels; other major cities are Antwerp, Ghent, Charleroi, Liège, Bruges, Namur, and Leuven. Belgium is a parliamentary system, parliamentary constitutional monarchy with a complex Federation, federal system structured on regional and linguistic grounds. The country is divided into three highly autonomous Communities, regions and language areas o ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Walloon Language
Walloon (; natively ; ) is a Romance language that is spoken in much of Wallonia and, to a very small extent, in Brussels, Belgium; some villages near Givet, northern France; and a clutch of communities in northeastern Wisconsin, United States.Université du Wisconsin : collection de documents sur l'immigration wallonne au Wisconsin, enregistrements de témoignages oraux en anglais et wallon, 1976University of Wisconsin Digital Collection : Belgian-American Research Collection /ref> It belongs to the ''langues d'oïl'' dialect continuum, the most prominent member of which is French. The historical background of its formation was the territorial extension since 980 of the Principality of Liège to the south and west. Walloon is classified as "definitely endangered" by the UNESCO ''Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger''. Despite its rich literature, beginning anonymously in the 16th century and with well-known authors since 1756, the use of Walloon has decreased markedly ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Saints Cyril And Methodius
Cyril (; born Constantine, 826–869) and Methodius (; born Michael, 815–885) were brothers, Byzantine Christian theologians and missionaries. For their work evangelizing the Slavs, they are known as the "Apostles to the Slavs". They are credited with devising the Glagolitic alphabet, the first alphabet used to transcribe Old Church Slavonic. After their deaths, their pupils continued their missionary work among other Slavs. Both brothers are venerated in the Eastern Orthodox Church as saints with the title of " equal-to-apostles". In 1880, Pope Leo XIII introduced their feast into the calendar of the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church. In 1980, the first Slav pope, Pope John Paul II declared them co-patron saints of Europe, together with Benedict of Nursia. Apostolic letter of Pope John Paul II, 31 December 1980 Early career Early life The two brothers were born in Thessalonica, at that time in the Byzantine province of the same name (today in Greece) – Cyril in 827 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Glagolitic Alphabet
The Glagolitic script ( , , ''glagolitsa'') is the oldest known Slavic alphabet. It is generally agreed that it was created in the 9th century for the purpose of translating liturgical texts into Old Church Slavonic by Saints Cyril and Methodius, Saint Cyril, a monk from Thessaloniki, Thessalonica. He and his brother Saint Methodius of Thessaloniki, Saint Methodius were sent by the Byzantine Emperor Michael III in 863 to Great Moravia after an invitation from Rastislav of Moravia to spread Christianity there. After the deaths of Cyril and Methodius, their disciples were expelled and they moved to the First Bulgarian Empire instead. The Early Cyrillic alphabet, which developed gradually in the Preslav Literary School by Greek alphabet scribes who incorporated some Glagolitic letters, gradually replaced Glagolitic in that region. Glagolitic remained in use alongside Latin in the Kingdom of Croatia (925–1102), Kingdom of Croatia and alongside Cyrillic until the 14th century in th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Animatronic
An animatronic is a puppet controlled electronically to move in a fluent way. Animatronics are the modern adaptation of the automaton and are often used for the portrayal of characters in films, video games and in theme park attractions. Animatronics are a multidisciplinary field integrating puppetry, anatomy and mechatronics. Animatronic figures can be implemented with both computer and human control, including teleoperation. Motion actuators are often used to imitate muscle movements and create realistic motions. Figures are usually encased in body shells and flexible skins made of hard or soft plastic materials and finished with colors, hair, feathers and other components to make them more lifelike. Animatronics stem from a long tradition of mechanical automata powered by hydraulics, pneumatics and clockwork. Before the term "animatronics" became common, they were usually referred to as "robots". Since then, robots have become known as more practical programmable machines t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Book Of One Thousand And One Nights
''One Thousand and One Nights'' (, ), is a collection of History of the Middle East, Middle Eastern List of fairy tales, folktales compiled in the Arabic language during the Islamic Golden Age. It is often known in English as ''The Arabian Nights'', from the first English-language edition (), which rendered the title as ''The Arabian Nights' Entertainments''. The work was collected over many centuries by various authors, translators, and scholars across West Asia, Central Asia, South Asia, and North Africa. Some tales trace their roots back to ancient and medieval Arabic literature, Arabic, Persian literature, Persian, and Mesopotamian myths, Mesopotamian literature. Most tales, however, were originally folk stories from the Abbasid and Mamluk Sultanate, Mamluk eras, while others, especially the frame story, are probably drawn from the Middle Persian literature#"Pahlavi" literature, Pahlavi Persian work (, ), which in turn may be translations of Indian literature, older Indian ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Motion Simulator
A motion simulator or motion platform is a mechanism that creates the feelings of being in a real motion environment. In a simulator, the movement is synchronised with a visual display of the outside world (OTW) scene. Motion platforms can provide movement in all of the six degrees of freedom (DOF) that can be experienced by an object that is free to move, such as an aircraft or spacecraft:. These are the three rotational degrees of freedom (roll, pitch, yaw) and three translational or linear degrees of freedom (surge, heave, sway). Types Motion simulators can be classified according to whether the occupant is controlling the vehicle(such as in a Flight Simulator for training pilots), or whether the occupant is a passive rider, such as in a simulator ride or motion theater. *Examples of occupant-controlled motion simulators are flight simulators, driving simulators, and hydraulic arcade cabinets for racing games and other arcade video games. Other occupant-controlled vehicl ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Amusement Park
An amusement park is a park that features various attractions, such as rides and games, and events for entertainment purposes. A theme park is a type of amusement park that bases its structures and attractions around a central theme, often featuring multiple areas with different themes. Unlike temporary and mobile Travelling funfair, funfairs and traveling carnival, carnivals, amusement parks are stationary and built for long-lasting operation. They are more elaborate than Urban park, city parks and playgrounds, usually providing attractions that cater to a variety of age groups. While amusement parks often contain themed areas, theme parks place a heavier focus with more intricately designed themes that revolve around a particular subject or group of subjects. Amusement parks evolved from European fairs, pleasure gardens, and large Picnic, picnic areas, which were created for people's recreation. World's fairs and other types of international expositions also influenced the em ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Humanoid
A humanoid (; from English ''human'' and '' -oid'' "resembling") is a non-human entity with human form or characteristics. By the 20th century, the term came to describe fossils which were morphologically similar, but not identical, to those of the human skeleton. Although this usage was common in the sciences for much of the 20th century, it is now considered rare. More generally, the term can refer to anything with distinctly human characteristics or adaptations, such as possessing opposable anterior forelimb-appendages (i.e. thumbs), visible spectrum-binocular vision (i.e. having two eyes), or biomechanic plantigrade-bipedalism (i.e. the ability to walk on heels and metatarsals in an upright position). Humanoids may also include human-animal hybrids (where each cell has partly human and partly animal genetic contents). Science fiction media frequently present sentient extraterrestrial lifeforms as humanoid as a byproduct of convergent evolution. In theoretical converge ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Extraterrestrial Life
Extraterrestrial life, or alien life (colloquially, aliens), is life that originates from another world rather than on Earth. No extraterrestrial life has yet been scientifically conclusively detected. Such life might range from simple forms such as prokaryotes to Extraterrestrial intelligence, intelligent beings, possibly bringing forth civilizations that might be Kardashev scale, far more, or far less, advanced than humans. The Drake equation speculates about the existence of sapient life elsewhere in the universe. The science of extraterrestrial life is known as astrobiology. Speculation about the possibility of inhabited worlds beyond Earth dates back to antiquity. Early Christianity, Christian writers discussed the idea of a "plurality of worlds" as proposed by earlier thinkers such as Democritus; Augustine of Hippo, Augustine references Epicurus's idea of innumerable worlds "throughout the boundless immensity of space" in ''The City of God''. Pre-modern writers typicall ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |