Da Vinci Absolute Genius with Dick and Dom

-This is Absolute Genius.

-So sit down buckle up and get ready for takeoff.

Each show will introduce you to a different genius -

an amazing person who had a genius idea which shaped the world.

And they will inspire us to come up with our own genius idea

at the end of each show.

-But will it be any good?

-Will it be any good?!

-It'll be...

-BOTH:

-Absolute genius!

On today's show we introduce you

to a visionary genius and bring one of his inventions to life.

It's going to be big, it's going to be bold

and it's going to be a blast!

Three. Two. One. Liftoff!

-Today, we introduce a man that had one...

-not two...

but hundreds of genius ideas

that were hundreds of years ahead of their time.

Like a futuristic flying machine.

Boots that enabled you to walk on water.

But you and I know him better as a painter.

But not any old painter.

He painted one of the most famous pictures the world has ever seen.

The Mona Lisa.

Come on over here and, please, meet Leonardo Da Vinci.

Ciao, Dick and Dom!

Yeah, inspired by his genius ides

we're going to be creating our own genius idea later on in the show

when we bring one of his inventions to life.

But first, let's find out a little bit more about the man himself.

Leonardo Da Vinci was born in 1452 near the town of Vinci in Italy.

His name actually means Leonardo of Vinci!

Back then there was no TV and no internet,

in fact, the world was lit by candles.

There were books, but Da Vinci didn't have time for books,

the real world was his classroom and nature was his inspiration.

This was a time before even cars were invented, but Da Vinci wanted to fly.

Yeah he was obsessed with the idea of man flying,

so he would watch other things that could fly and try and work out how.

He drew birds cos he wanted to find out how their wings worked.

Then he used what he learned to design a flying machine.

-Demonstrate.

-OK. I'll go and grab me bits.

MUSIC: "Vision On Gallery Theme"

SIGHS

Right, that's it! Show me. Now!

-Whaa!

-That's brilliant! Legs are a bit far apart.

-I haven't finished!

It doesn't matter. Did you know that

Da Vinci had a reputation for not finishing stuff?

You'd better listen to five more of our weird Da Vinci facts.

The Genius Top 5!

5! Da Vinci never went to school.

So no school dinners, no school uniform and no homework.

Shame really, he would have been great in art.

4! Da Vinci often wrote backwards using mirror writing.

Some think that it was a code so nobody could pinch his ideas.

I just think he liked looking at himself in the mirror!

Ooh, hello, gorgeous!

3! Da Vinci was a vegetarian. Apparently, he loved animals so much,

he used to buy caged birds just to set them free.

2! Da Vinci invented the pizza after accidentally

sitting on his cheese and tomato sandwich!

Only Joking! I've just made that one up!

And at 1! Da Vinci was a musical genius!

Not only did he invent some musical instruments,

he also played them, loads of them!

Yes, he certainly had the X Factor!

Congratulations, you're through to the next era.

# La la la-la la-la... #

It's fair to say that Da Vinci was pretty good at art.

He was particularly good at painting people

and this didn't come about by chance.

He studied the human body

better than anyone else had done before him.

Which is why we're here.

Before we bring one of his inventions to life,

let's tell you one more thing

that will show you how committed he was to his cause. This one's full on.

Now we all know that underneath the skin is a complex bit of kit,

arteries, veins, muscle, bones, organs, all sorts.

Like the gory pictures in biology books of human bodies' insides.

-Like this one.

-THUNDER

But how did Da Vinci know what was under the skin?

Back in Da Vinci's time, surgeons were allowed access to

the bodies of dead criminals for medical research.

Artists and students joined in, so Da Vinci must have spent many nights

cutting bodies up and drawing them.

It goes without saying, don't try this at home.

Can we turn the spooky music off, please?

Thank you. It was so scary, Derek's dropped his guts.

So we've learned that Da Vinci was awesome at drawing and painting,

but he also fancied himself as a bit of an inventor.

He came up with groundbreaking ideas,

like a suit to walk on the bottom of the ocean,

to a machine that would let you fly like a bird in the sky.

And how do we know all this?

Because Leonardo left behind

thousands of pages of notes in his secretive journals.

Da Vinci's genius idea was to invent stuff

that was centuries ahead of its time.

His secret journals were packed full off incredible designs,

there were flying machines, a parachute,

a robotic knight and even a tank.

Check me out! I'll blow you up from the 16th century!

Which genius idea will we bring to life at the end of today's show?

There's tons in here to choose from.

If only Fran was here, our resident scientist, to help.

This is Fran. She just loves experimenting...

Aaargh!

..to help explain the ideas of our geniuses.

And she's sure to pop up just when you really need her.

Hello. So which one's your favourite idea so far?

Instantly, I think the robotic knight.

-It does look quite awesome.

-I don't understand.

That'd need power and there was no electricity in those days.

It worked a bit differently. This picture doesn't quite show it.

Come with me and I'll explain.

So we know that Leonardo was obsessed with machines,

but also with the human body and what was under the skin.

So he combined his love of human bodies with his love of machines

and made a robotic knight.

-Ah!

-And how did it work?

-The way it worked was, if we look here,

you can see that just by pulling different bits of string,

you can make parts of the body move like a machine.

-Is this a Leonardo or a Fran?

-This is a Fran.

-Nice. OK.

But Leonardo did it on the knight

and instead of string he had rope and a series of pulleys

and he could make the arms move and the robot sit and stand up.

The idea of a robotic knight is genius,

but I think our genius idea could be even bigger and better.

Come on, Fran.

Andy, you can go.

Stairs! Oh!

CLUNKING AND CLATTERING

It was time to aim a bit higher.

-I like the look of the parachute.

-It looks good.

-It's OK.

What's so amazing about a parachute?

In Leonardo's time, more that 500 years ago,

no-one had even flown before. There were no planes, no helicopters,

so everything is amazing about this idea.

-How would he know that would work?

-He didn't. He had no idea.

But he was confident that it would work

because he based all do his theories on nature.

He would have watched leaves falling off a tree. And it's the same thing,

when an object's falling, it's falling through air.

And that air pushes up against the object and makes it fall slower.

With a parachute there's a massive area for the air to push against.

The air pushes against it a lot

and makes the parachute and the man fall much slower.

So to test Fran's theory, we headed off to a nearby tower.

Watch your head, Dick!

So you've made us walk up 205 steps to the top of this tower. What for?

Because we have here a small version of Leonardo's parachute.

It's the same shape as the plans?

Yeah. And we've also got a small version of a person

that's going to be thrown off

-with the parachute. And you ready for this?

-Yes.

-It's a Crash Test Dommie.

-There you go.

-Life-size.

-Shut up.

Look at the slaphead on him. Right,

so what are we hoping to achieve from this?

We're going to throw it off the tower

-and hopefully mini Dom will fall safely to the ground.

-Very good.

If this works then you and I are going to be replicating this

and supersize it and maybe jump out of a plane.

-I forgot about that bit.

-Let's give it a go.

-Countdown.

-ALL:

-Three. Two. One. Go!

-Go on, Dom! That way!

-So diddy Dom got off to a bad start.

And then things got even worse. Ouch!

-He's head-butted the tower.

-Just when it looked like it was all over,

the parachute filled with air and gave diddy me a nice soft landing.

-Not bad.

-That actually went quite well.

-Little Dom, how did you find it? Great!

-Fran?

I was impressed with it. The air caught it

and it was a gentle landing.

-But it did hit the tower.

-Yeah, it did.

The big question now is do we supersize it

and do a large scale version of that at the end the show?

I'm scared of heights. That was fine because there's walls,

but jumping out of a plane. I'm not jumping out of a plane.

To be honest, I don't really fancy ending up looking like that. So, no.

Back to the drawing board.

Our attempt at Da Vinci's parachute didn't go down too well,

but there was one invention that couldn't fail.

-What about if we go big with the tank?

-I do like this tank.

This was really revolutionary.

No-one had ever seen anything like it before.

-Looks like a tortoise.

-Well, Leonardo was inspired by nature

and it does look a bit like a tortoise shell.

-Have you got a model of it?

-I haven't.

But I do know somewhere you can go to find out all about tanks.

-Oh, really? He was from Italy. So, Florence? Rome?

-Milan?

-Dorset.

I love Dorset! Come on. Come on!

Dorset, with its stunning coastline and incredible cliffs

has been an inspiration to artists and writers for centuries.

Luckily for us, it also has a Tank Museum!

But not any old tank museum,

this place has got the biggest collection of tanks in the world!

-It was time to get inspired.

-It was time to get serious.

..98. 99.

MIMICS EXPLOSION

One. Two.

HE GIBBERS

Left on our own, we weren't getting anywhere with our research.

We needed a man with a beard who knew a lot about tanks.

Meet Tank Genius and museum curator David Willey.

What do we need to know if we're think about building a tank?

Tanks tend to be three main things.

They're about firepower, a gun, something to attack with.

They're about protection, so that's your armour plate or whatever

you put on your vehicle,

so you're protected inside. And it's about mobility,

how you get that vehicle to where you want to actually fight.

Would Da Vinci's designs have worked?

He's got the three principles.

Protection on the outside, he's got a cannon for firepower.

The only one that might be a bit of a doubt is the mobility,

because it's human power trying to manoeuvre a big vehicle along.

So that may be one of the issues you have to look at.

David had given us the theory,

but now it was time to see it in practice.

And where better to learn about firepower, protection and mobility

than on board a real life tank!

This is an M4 Sherman tank.

It weighs 32 tonnes, has a top speed of 24mph

and can take out an enemy tank at over 1,000 metres.

It's not something you'd mess with.

'The noise was a noisy noise!

'The Sherman was so loud, it made lots of noise!'

'It wasn't the smoothest of rides but it was definitely mobile.'

'Fist pump coming up!' Yeah! 'Yeah!!!'

'Yeah, I was having a good time, too.

'It was all good research for our Da Vinci tank.

'And after a few more laps in the Sherman,

'I was convinced that making a tank was the way forward!'

That was absolutely mind-blowing! And for me it's sealed the deal

that we are now going to make our version of Da Vinci's tank.

And I was really surprised as well that, being in a tank,

it was a nice steady, stable and quite a clean journey.

Look, no dirt on my hands. What do you reckon! Oi! Mate!

'Once Dick had swiped the muck off his chops,

'he soon came round to the idea of building a tank.'

Our Genius idea. To build a tank based on Da Vinci's designs.

Our challenge. To test its mobility,

its firepower and its protection

Our problem. We hadn't a clue

-where to start.

-Oh, dear!

We did know that was that Da Vinci's design was a wooden shell on wheels.

There were no engines then, so it was driven by men

-turning wheels by hand.

-Sounds like hard work!

He also wanted to fit cannons so it would have been seriously heavy!

To help us build our version of Da Vinci's tank,

we've enlisted a genius helper,

engineer extraordinaire Grant Cooper.

We're trying to stay as true as we can to Da Vinci's designs, Grant,

but we want to Dick and Dom-ify it a bit, make it more fun.

My main concern is that they're using

humans to turn those wheels by hand.

I think that'll cause us a few problems over rough terrain.

I suppose to do that kind of thing,

you need people with a lot of muscle.

So, what's your solution instead for hand-power wheels?

A much more efficient method is using normal off-the-shelf bicycles.

If we put a couple of those in,

-with you each riding those, that's the best way.

-OK.

We can't put cannons on for firepower,

so, have you got any ideas for that?

The whole principle of this

is to test that you can aim and shoot a target easily,

so I think if we go with paintball guns...

Yes! Never done paintballing.

I like your style. Great. So two boxes ticked.

The last one is the armoury

and the general shape of the outside design. What do you think?

That's one of the really good points about this original design.

We should just leave that alone.

So with the designs taking shape, we wasted no time getting to work.

First up, rolling around on the floor like pigs.

Our first task was to get wood to fit around the steel structure

that Grant and his trusty helper had assembled.

We're not really used to hard work,

so with the tank taking shape, we had a little break.

But not for long. We needed to get the bikes.

Right. Right. Right!

Although our budget didn't stretch to caterpillar tracks,

by fixing our bikes to each other,

we were confident our tank would be mobile.

There was no doubt in our minds that our tank would be a huge success.

But it has to be said that not every invention turns out quite so well.

It's time for The Not So Genius Idea!

Imagine a tank that looks like an old-fashioned Penny Farthing!

Imagine no more, because in 1915 the Russians built it!

It's the Tsar Tank!

It was massive! Nearly twice the size of a double-decker bus

and designed to crush anything in its path.

It turned out to be possibly the worst tank ever!

It was so heavy that during early tests

the wheels got bogged down in a muddy hole and it couldn't get out.

And it remained there rusting in a field for the rest of the war,

never quite making it to the battlefield!

So there you have it, the not-so-genius Tsar Tank!

So that's how not to do it,

but how had we got on with our Dick and Dom Da Vinci tank?

Well, the moment had arrived.

-Screws had been tightened.

-Tyres had been pumped.

And we were finally ready to show the world our...

Da Vinci tank!

Argh!

Argh! CRUNCH!

Hold on!

-No! We're going backwards!

-Brakes!

After a while, we got the hang of it

and so we took to the road for a cruise.

-Oi-oi!

-BOTH GROAN

-Argh! It's not easy, is it?

-No!

Watch out! Coming through!

Look! We're flying without wings!

-It was all going so well.

-Until...

BOTH SCREAM

CRUNCH!

-Right.

-Oh, dear.

The one thing we need working a bit better is the brakes.

-Yeah. And the steering. We've got to work out how to steer.

-Yeah.

Apart from that. It's a success.

-It's all good.

-It's amazing.

-Brilliant.

The next step is to get the paint cannons and put it into battle.

But first, let's remove it from this hedge.

Actually, how do we get out?

So the time had come to test our version of Da Vinci's tank.

We'd be testing its mobility, its firepower and its protection.

We felt pretty confident. We felt the spirit of Da Vinci

was running through our veins. We felt that...

Get on with it, lads!

Right, our first task is mobility.

We're going to try and get Da Vinci's tank around this track.

This isn't any old track this is like a battlefield.

-The ground is lumpy...and bumpy.

-Yeah.

And it's also raining, so it'll be muddy as well.

It'll be harder than the car park.

-'Things started off surprisingly well.'

-That's it.

-Shall we stop now?

Here we go. We've got to try and get round

the whole course without any problems.

'It was harder on this surface,

'but it was surely easier

'than turning the wheels by hand like in Da Vinci's plans.

'It has to be said that the tank's suspension

'could have been a little bit better.'

The seat's not comfortable either!

-Oh, man! This is really hard. Here we go. Ditch!

-Urgh!

-Oh, no!

-Stuck!

-We're stuck.

-Wedged right in.

-Wedged.

-'So this tank needed pedal power.

'But where's Sir Bradley of Wiggins when you need him?'

BOTH GROAN

'To make matters worse, we were about to encounter

'a highly technical, very complex mechanical failure!'

Chain's come off! Chain's come off! DOM LAUGHS

-Chain's come off.

-On the battlefield you can't call in a mechanic.

-No.

Whoever's in the tank has to fix it.

Imagine there's a big man with an axe coming towards us.

'With the chain back on, the challenge continued.'

-The one thing that's a problem...

-BOTH:

-Ohh!

BOTH LAUGH

-Oh, dear!

-We're literally...

-I think it's actually stuck.

I don't know what we can do now,

cos the chain won't stay on and my bike's totally stuck.

-So I think that's the end of the test.

-Your side's not looking good.

Yeah, I think mobility... potentially a fail.

Unfortunately, we hadn't managed

to improve Da Vinci's designs when it came to mobility.

Yeah. Sorry, Leo.

-I think we move on to the next one.

-Yeah.

-Yeah?

-We've got to get this out of here first.

Any proper man around that can help us?

One of the most important things about a tank is firepower.

On Da Vinci's tank design, he had cannons, we have paintball guns!

What do you think Da Vinci would have made of these?

-I think he would have called them bad boys.

-Yeah.

-That's what I think.

-Yeah.

-Paint goes in there, paint comes out here.

-Defo.

DOM WHISTLES

-Immense power.

-Yeah

'Our challenge was to hit each target

'three times in under 60 seconds.

'Simple enough? Well, maybe not.

'The guns were fixed tight

'and aiming at the different targets was going to be tricky.

'Dom was in charge of rotating the tank

'so that I could aim at the correct target.'

Three. Two. One. Go! Go on! Go on!

Right a bit. Down.

-You got 'em?

-No!

-Come on!

-Come on!

-Got one! Two!

Three! Next gun!

Stay there. Got it!

Done! Next! Back a bit. Right! Right, right, right!

Right!

Right! Right! We're nearly there! Come on! Yes!

-Stop!

-Come on!

-Yeah!

It's gone right through it.

-Bull's-eye as well!

-Ouch!

-I'm very impressed.

-Yes.

It was teamwork. We had to keep moving the tank around

-to get to the right position.

-Yeah.

The thing it had its problems

in that the holes where the guns are, are a bit too narrow,

so you couldn't actually manoeuvre them round very well.

But as a team you get it sorted out.

Da Vinci would be quite pleased with that. A good job.

-Right out the other side!

-Yeah.

-So things were looking up.

-Protection's the only thing left.

Yeah. We'll get in there. You go in first, I'll join you in a minute.

Go in there.

Right...

tomatoes.

-Are you in?

-Yep.

Argh! What's that?! Dom!

-We're under fire!

-One last one. Ready?

-Ow!

-You all right in there?

HE GROANS Is it finished?

-Yeah, run out of tomatoes.

-You what?

-Run out of tomatoes.

-Get!

-Oi!

We know what you're thinking,

even Granny's mobility scooter could withstand some manky tomatoes.

We were about to have a nasty surprise though,

or at least, our tank's armour was.

(What's that noise?)

LOW JANGLING AND RUMBLING

Ready?

ALL HOLLER

-Come on, lads!

-Ah, stop!

-Who are you?!

-We're his Grace the Duke of York's retinue.

-Don't be so silly. What's your real name?

-Oh, Dave.

If a medieval army had seen this tank in Da Vinci's day,

what would they have thought of it?

-They'd have been scared to death and run for the hills, I expect.

-Oh.

So, what would you do with weapons like that to this?

If we were brave enough, we'd smash it to bits.

Right, off you go then. Wait!

-We've got to get out. Silly men.

-Silly men!

What are they like! They look ridiculous.

DOM LAUGHS

-Right, lads, give it all you're got!

-Charge!

-Right, stop! Leave it alone!

-Silly men!

-What have you done?!

-Carried out orders, sir.

You've absolutely mashed it!

-That's the whole front gone. Good job we weren't inside.

-Yeah.

I think if this was in the middle of one of your wars,

people inside it wouldn't last long.

Right, back to your castle. See you later, lads.

Come on, lads.

So Dave and his merry men had smashed up our tank then left us

to explain the mess to Grant.

But they weren't finished yet!

Arrows were something that Da Vinci's tank

would certainly have had to fend off in his day,

so it would be interesting to see how it fared.

Although the odd one stuck, most bounced off,

which is down to Da Vinci's designs. The sloping armour really worked!

Being close to the tank and smashing it to bits,

it didn't withstand that,

-but people would never have got that close to the tank.

-No. Exactly.

-I think it's done a pretty good job.

-Hmm. Good armour.

It was. The tank had withstood the tomatoes and the arrows,

not the close assault, but two out on three ain't bad.

So in our books, that's a pass!

That's the end of our tank experience

and I think Da Vinci's tank fared pretty well.

The front got smashed in at the end

but the point was to find out what an amazing inventor he was.

And we also found out that he was a great artist, scientist and engineer.

So, Da Vinci, we can most definitely say, you were an absolute genius.

Grazie, Dick and Dom!

Saddle up. Time to get back to London.

-Yep.

-Hey.

I wonder how this tank would fare against a modern-day tank?

-Doesn't matter, we're never going to find out.

-No.

BUZZING

BEEPING

-Argh!

-Quick! Pedal!

-I can't! The chain's come off again!

Argh!

CRUNCH! Argh!

HE COUGHS

Bogeys!

-It went right through me! Don't wobble it.

-I'm not doing anything!

Just stand still, then!

Oi! Oi!

GIGGLES

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd