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of Borneo has plummeted by half,
almost 150,000. | 0:00:00 | 0:00:01 | |
Now it's time for Click. | 0:00:01 | 0:00:08 | |
This week, dancing with the stars,
laughing with the stars and... | 0:00:08 | 0:00:17 | |
Skinny-dipping in the Himalayas! | 0:00:17 | 0:00:22 | |
Choose Wi-Fi, choose Snapchat,
choose a pre- ordered backyard with | 0:00:43 | 0:00:49 | |
arm and milk, juice likes, choose
follows, choose pizza delivered by a | 0:00:49 | 0:00:55 | |
drone, is quite bright, swipe left,
follow, follow, follow. We are | 0:00:55 | 0:01:02 | |
constantly being bombarded with
updates, twigs and information. We | 0:01:02 | 0:01:06 | |
are glued to our phones, addicted to
digital status and even smashing up | 0:01:06 | 0:01:10 | |
our gadgets, obliterating them to
pieces in a violent quest to rid | 0:01:10 | 0:01:14 | |
ourselves of this virtual
assistants. How self-imposed | 0:01:14 | 0:01:18 | |
restraints. Well, it's time to get
away from all that, just for if you | 0:01:18 | 0:01:25 | |
minutes. This week, Justin Rowlatt
travelled thousands of miles to a | 0:01:25 | 0:01:31 | |
village in the Himalayas which is
getting electricity for the first | 0:01:31 | 0:01:34 | |
time by enhancing the power of the
sun. | 0:01:34 | 0:01:40 | |
I've joined the team hiking up the
frozen Zanskar River. We've got an | 0:01:40 | 0:01:48 | |
eight day 140 kilometre trek ahead
of us. Our destination, a village | 0:01:48 | 0:01:56 | |
which has around 50 people, for
houses huddled together, under | 0:01:56 | 0:02:01 | |
granite cliffs. For hundreds of
years the only light of the dark was | 0:02:01 | 0:02:15 | |
the thin flicker from oil lamps.
Tanzin struggles to cook in the dim | 0:02:15 | 0:02:25 | |
light. TRANSLATION: These
traditional lights are not portable | 0:02:25 | 0:02:32 | |
and they don't cover enough area for
the children to read. It also causes | 0:02:32 | 0:02:37 | |
pollution. If we had solar power it
would be much better for us. The | 0:02:37 | 0:02:44 | |
next morning and the team gets to
work. This is the satellite dish and | 0:02:44 | 0:02:52 | |
take a look at this. It has taken
quite a beating along the way. It | 0:02:52 | 0:02:57 | |
will be interesting to see if this
works. This is a street light. 20 | 0:02:57 | 0:03:03 | |
watts. A complete grid? Because you
get wild animals in the summer and | 0:03:03 | 0:03:08 | |
winter. This is a charge controller.
Tying the grid together is over 550 | 0:03:08 | 0:03:15 | |
metres of wiring, but there's a
problem. The wire is very thick and | 0:03:15 | 0:03:23 | |
it is frozen. It's so cold. It's
about minus 15. Yes, we need to warm | 0:03:23 | 0:03:30 | |
this for about half an hour so that
it can be usable. His team is hard | 0:03:30 | 0:03:37 | |
at it, threading cables through the
tightest nooks and crannies. Each | 0:03:37 | 0:03:42 | |
home is topped off with a shimmering
solar panel. | 0:03:42 | 0:03:48 | |
This is a solar panel and the
capacity of the solar panel is 260 | 0:03:52 | 0:03:57 | |
watts. This panel is a
polycrystalline panel. At any | 0:03:57 | 0:04:02 | |
coverage it can charge the batteries
very well. So even when it is | 0:04:02 | 0:04:06 | |
freezing, as it is now, it will
still generate electricity? The | 0:04:06 | 0:04:09 | |
beauty of this is even at low
temperatures it gives a better | 0:04:09 | 0:04:14 | |
current. So it gets better? It gets
better. It is like a high altitude | 0:04:14 | 0:04:19 | |
desert, so it gets Sunbury-on-Thames
50 days in a year? Yes any one day | 0:04:19 | 0:04:25 | |
it gets nine hours of sunlight. In
winter it get six hours and proper | 0:04:25 | 0:04:30 | |
sunlight. Generating as much power
as possible is only the half of it. | 0:04:30 | 0:04:35 | |
The other issue is making sure no
power is wasted. What's more, the | 0:04:35 | 0:04:41 | |
solar panels don't just passively
drip DC into a battery, this system | 0:04:41 | 0:04:46 | |
has a brain. Remote motion sensors
ensure what's generated laughs. The | 0:04:46 | 0:04:52 | |
idea is you don't have to remember
to turn the lights off, as soon as | 0:04:52 | 0:04:56 | |
you leave the room the lights go
off. The sunsets... And it is almost | 0:04:56 | 0:05:03 | |
ready to go. The new solar micro
grid is a big deal for the | 0:05:03 | 0:05:11 | |
villagers. There is an elaborate
ceremony. The local Buddhist monk | 0:05:11 | 0:05:19 | |
says a prayer for the system. And
then it's time to throw the switch! | 0:05:19 | 0:05:25 | |
The hope is the new grid can ensure
the future of the village. | 0:05:31 | 0:05:35 | |
That added satellite dish does work
of the role and so... Does the | 0:05:55 | 0:06:00 | |
motion sensor. | 0:06:00 | 0:06:04 | |
A local Himalayan expedition has
installed over 250 micro grid is in | 0:06:13 | 0:06:18 | |
outlying areas of Ladakh. -- the
Global Himalayan Expedition. After | 0:06:18 | 0:06:25 | |
Hanamur we visited one specifically
designed to light up the minds of | 0:06:25 | 0:06:29 | |
schoolchildren. It is at the
government higher secondary school. | 0:06:29 | 0:06:39 | |
Hallow, kids! They've got an
innovative computer system and what | 0:06:45 | 0:06:51 | |
I'm going to do is test it by asking
you a fuse simple questions. So I'm | 0:06:51 | 0:06:56 | |
going to write them on the board and
then you fire up the computers and | 0:06:56 | 0:07:01 | |
we will get to work. OK, Sir! Here
we go. | 0:07:01 | 0:07:06 | |
That's right. Get to work! It might
look like they are online, but they | 0:07:11 | 0:07:21 | |
are actually scouring through an
off-line internet. So even without a | 0:07:21 | 0:07:23 | |
data connection, these children will
learn the sort of research skills | 0:07:23 | 0:07:28 | |
essential for finding out
information in a connected world and | 0:07:28 | 0:07:33 | |
of course it all runs of solar
power. There's half a terabyte of | 0:07:33 | 0:07:37 | |
memory on here and installed on here
is all of Wikipedia, Ted talks, all | 0:07:37 | 0:07:41 | |
sites of encyclopaedias and works,
works that the kids can use in order | 0:07:41 | 0:07:46 | |
to research all sorts of subjects.
At the heart of the system. But this | 0:07:46 | 0:07:51 | |
is the key to keeping it lower
power. This is a UK developed | 0:07:51 | 0:07:55 | |
computer system. Incredibly
low-energy, drives the keyboard and | 0:07:55 | 0:07:59 | |
the mouse. This is the computer they
use. What it means is they can have | 0:07:59 | 0:08:05 | |
up to ten of these bright LED
screens all running on 24 bolts, so | 0:08:05 | 0:08:09 | |
very, very efficient -- vaults. Time
is up! We need answers. I'm going to | 0:08:09 | 0:08:18 | |
pick on you. He was the last king of
the Empire. What do you think of | 0:08:18 | 0:08:25 | |
this system? How does it work? It
works very well. I get many | 0:08:25 | 0:08:30 | |
knowledge from it. It's very useful
and easy to operate. I think it's | 0:08:30 | 0:08:39 | |
perfect for students of mountain
areas. Solar micro grid is a great | 0:08:39 | 0:08:46 | |
fit for Ladakh, where steepling
geography has scattered communities | 0:08:46 | 0:08:49 | |
and made them difficult to reach
with powerlines. 1.2 million people | 0:08:49 | 0:08:56 | |
globally live without electricity
and for many of them solar is a | 0:08:56 | 0:09:00 | |
perfect solution too because we've
seen it can be rolled out almost | 0:09:00 | 0:09:05 | |
anywhere under the sun. It feeds the
demand for electricity without | 0:09:05 | 0:09:11 | |
eating up the planet. | 0:09:11 | 0:09:14 | |
But there is a rather unfortunate
tradition at the end of the track. | 0:09:19 | 0:09:24 | |
That's right. A deep -- dip. | 0:09:29 | 0:09:36 | |
Welcome to the week Intech. It was
the week that the UK government | 0:09:50 | 0:09:55 | |
unveiled an artificial intelligence
tool for blocking extremist content | 0:09:55 | 0:09:58 | |
online. And it's not just airspace
that are going to be occupying in | 0:09:58 | 0:10:04 | |
any future, researchers at a
university in North Carolina have | 0:10:04 | 0:10:07 | |
developed a drone that can fly
through the air and propel itself | 0:10:07 | 0:10:10 | |
underwater. Plus the Winter Olympics
website was frozen by a cyber attack | 0:10:10 | 0:10:14 | |
during the Opening Ceremony. And a
robot got to compete in its own | 0:10:14 | 0:10:19 | |
Olympics. 18 downhill skiing droids
went on to the slopes, competing for | 0:10:19 | 0:10:25 | |
a $10,000 prize. Boston Dynamics is
at it again with a demo guaranteed | 0:10:25 | 0:10:32 | |
to freak most people out. It's Robo
dog can now open doors. That's one | 0:10:32 | 0:10:37 | |
less obstacle in the fight world
domination. And a pig farm in China | 0:10:37 | 0:10:44 | |
is using AI to bring home the bacon.
The AI measures animal health and | 0:10:44 | 0:10:51 | |
behaviour, which the developers
Alibaba hope will improve farming | 0:10:51 | 0:10:54 | |
efficiency. And finally a coin might
be preventing us from making contact | 0:10:54 | 0:10:58 | |
with aliens. Researchers complained
this week that the price of key | 0:10:58 | 0:11:05 | |
computer chips have been driven
through the roof by demand from | 0:11:05 | 0:11:08 | |
crypto currency miners, with no
price drop on site we will all just | 0:11:08 | 0:11:12 | |
have to watch this space. | 0:11:12 | 0:11:15 | |
Fashionably late, Apple has decided
it wants a slice of the home speaker | 0:11:19 | 0:11:23 | |
market, finally releasing its home
pod, sometime after the first ones | 0:11:23 | 0:11:31 | |
hit the shelves. They've gone for
the same cylindrical shape as Google | 0:11:31 | 0:11:35 | |
and Amazon but it looks more like a
premium high-end speaker that either | 0:11:35 | 0:11:39 | |
of -- than either of those systems.
The amount of audio work Apple have | 0:11:39 | 0:11:45 | |
done on this device means its key
selling point is as a speaker. It is | 0:11:45 | 0:11:49 | |
impressive, with a full rich upper
facing woofer and seven tweeters, | 0:11:49 | 0:11:53 | |
each with its own amplifier, meaning
it can push sounds in different | 0:11:53 | 0:11:57 | |
directions. So it sounds exactly the
same wherever you are in the room, | 0:11:57 | 0:12:02 | |
but what it doesn't do is give you
the opportunity to change the levels | 0:12:02 | 0:12:05 | |
in any way. If I wanted to push the
base up right now there is no way of | 0:12:05 | 0:12:10 | |
me doing that. And even in a space
this big, the sound really carries. | 0:12:10 | 0:12:15 | |
What is interesting though is even
at 100% volume I can't even hear | 0:12:15 | 0:12:23 | |
myself think and it can still hear
my voice. Siri, pause. Just like | 0:12:23 | 0:12:29 | |
that. Where is Apple is going to
sound quality, Amazon seems to be | 0:12:29 | 0:12:33 | |
focusing on different features.
Their Echo Spot is all about the | 0:12:33 | 0:12:40 | |
screen. It now has the ability to
make video calls, as well as doing | 0:12:40 | 0:12:45 | |
the usual like play music, Kelly the
weather and even boil your kettle if | 0:12:45 | 0:12:49 | |
you've got a smart home setup. But
really it comes into its own as a | 0:12:49 | 0:12:55 | |
very nice alarm clock. It's not just
a function that makes this home | 0:12:55 | 0:13:00 | |
assistance different, but price is
another factor. While we Echo Spot | 0:13:00 | 0:13:06 | |
costs £119, the home pod will set
you back £319. The home pod ties chi | 0:13:06 | 0:13:16 | |
Wintune Apple, so instead of being
able to access any music streaming | 0:13:16 | 0:13:21 | |
service by voice activation for
example you can only use Apple music | 0:13:21 | 0:13:24 | |
in this way. If you wanted the 70
million Spotify subscribers would | 0:13:24 | 0:13:28 | |
have to go into your phone and use
Air Pay as a workaround, essentially | 0:13:28 | 0:13:33 | |
turning this speaker into a... Well,
speaker. And as people have been | 0:13:33 | 0:13:38 | |
discovering one that might leave a
nasty white park on wooden tops. | 0:13:38 | 0:13:42 | |
Apple's response? Choose a different
surface, or get a cloth and some | 0:13:42 | 0:13:47 | |
elbow grease.
Over the next few weeks we are going | 0:13:47 | 0:13:52 | |
to be talking to some of the gods of
the visual affects world. Last week | 0:13:52 | 0:13:56 | |
we went behind the scenes of Blade
Runner and this week it is the turn | 0:13:56 | 0:14:01 | |
of the Guardians of the Galaxy
volume two and we started by talking | 0:14:01 | 0:14:06 | |
about it is truly bonkers opening
sequence. | 0:14:06 | 0:14:18 | |
The beginning of the sequence
features a title sequence with | 0:14:18 | 0:14:22 | |
dancing in the foreground. And it
doesn't cut. It is on Groot the | 0:14:22 | 0:14:30 | |
whole time. He has to hold their
viewers with his crazy little | 0:14:30 | 0:14:34 | |
dancer, while what happens in the
background never stops. We have | 0:14:34 | 0:14:37 | |
something like or thousand frames of
continuous action. -- 4000 frames. | 0:14:37 | 0:14:46 | |
We were faced with the fact that the
environment was completely | 0:14:46 | 0:14:50 | |
spectacular and had to be created
entirely digitally. | 0:14:50 | 0:14:53 | |
spectacular and had to be created
entirely digitally. Everything that | 0:14:53 | 0:14:53 | |
we were inserting had to be
reflected and that is multiple times | 0:14:53 | 0:15:01 | |
the computation to compute the light
on them and also their reflection. | 0:15:01 | 0:15:07 | |
Everything ended up being done two
or three times, because of the | 0:15:07 | 0:15:13 | |
surface of the world they were
standing on. We were delighted to | 0:15:13 | 0:15:16 | |
have the opportunity to take on
Rocket at the raccoon. The first | 0:15:16 | 0:15:25 | |
aid, the muscle systems, all of
these things had updated in the | 0:15:25 | 0:15:29 | |
three years between the first
Guardians and this one. We wanted to | 0:15:29 | 0:15:34 | |
bring all about into Rocket, which
meant rebuilding him from the ground | 0:15:34 | 0:15:38 | |
up. And yet making sure that he was
absolutely recognisable as the same | 0:15:38 | 0:15:43 | |
character from the first movie.
Space being very open, it is very | 0:15:43 | 0:15:50 | |
hard to tell how fast things are
moving. James Cameron is very keen | 0:15:50 | 0:15:56 | |
on selling the speed of the action.
So we conceived of these sort of | 0:15:56 | 0:16:01 | |
wasps and waves of plasma energy
that lived in and around this planet | 0:16:01 | 0:16:12 | |
is so we could sell how fast the
camera and the spaceships were | 0:16:12 | 0:16:16 | |
moving -- wafts. There is a scene in
the middle of the movie where Rocket | 0:16:16 | 0:16:22 | |
and Yonder are in prison, but when
they break out they are on-board | 0:16:22 | 0:16:28 | |
this enormous, very big spaceship.
Which of course didn't exist. We had | 0:16:28 | 0:16:33 | |
big shots of Yondu walking through
these hallways and docking bays with | 0:16:33 | 0:16:45 | |
all of the ravages of the crew of
the spaceship being shot out with | 0:16:45 | 0:16:49 | |
his arrow. Ultimately, the arrow
which Yondu is firing works its way | 0:16:49 | 0:16:55 | |
all the way around the spaceship. We
had to design the interior of the | 0:16:55 | 0:16:58 | |
spaceship to give a satisfying
journey for this arrow to take. It | 0:16:58 | 0:17:06 | |
looks like a Busby Berkeley movie,
with crazy camera angles. Every | 0:17:06 | 0:17:13 | |
movie that we get involved in we
want to be pushing the envelope, | 0:17:13 | 0:17:18 | |
putting something new, with
expectation that we will get there. | 0:17:18 | 0:17:34 | |
Old film stock is a treasure trove
of historical information. In the | 0:17:34 | 0:17:39 | |
case of old BBC programmes it can be
a race against time to find any | 0:17:39 | 0:17:43 | |
remaining copy and digitise it or
risk losing it forever. But when | 0:17:43 | 0:17:49 | |
producer Charles Norton was given an
old Morecambe and Wise episode there | 0:17:49 | 0:17:53 | |
was a problem. After this that both
the BBC in the British Film | 0:17:53 | 0:17:58 | |
Institute have a look at the film
and essentially judged it to be | 0:17:58 | 0:18:07 | |
unable to be recovered. They were,
effectively it was going to be | 0:18:07 | 0:18:12 | |
thrown out. The pictures inside that
film, they are still there, they | 0:18:12 | 0:18:15 | |
still printed on the plastic, but
they are all locked inside this | 0:18:15 | 0:18:19 | |
permanently fused block of immobile
gunk, which, sooner or later, we'll | 0:18:19 | 0:18:26 | |
just rot away to soup. So Charles
brought the film to Queen Mary | 0:18:26 | 0:18:33 | |
University's dental department to
use that x-ray machine to see | 0:18:33 | 0:18:37 | |
through the love of decaying film to
be precious pictures within. But now | 0:18:37 | 0:18:42 | |
they had another problem. The film
was too big to be X-Raid. The only | 0:18:42 | 0:18:45 | |
thing you could do would be to cut
the film into little pieces and scan | 0:18:45 | 0:18:51 | |
Monfils at a time I didn't expect
him to say yes to cutting up the | 0:18:51 | 0:18:57 | |
film, but given the alternative was
watching this just rapidly | 0:18:57 | 0:19:01 | |
disintegrate, he said let's do it.
We were using an infrared laser, it | 0:19:01 | 0:19:08 | |
generated a lot of heat,
occasionally there were flames. At | 0:19:08 | 0:19:11 | |
the best we had a little bit of
damage at the age of the frames, at | 0:19:11 | 0:19:15 | |
worst we lost whole frames. Frame
took 5000 images of each chunk as it | 0:19:15 | 0:19:22 | |
rotated through 360 degrees to make
a 3-D model. At that point they | 0:19:22 | 0:19:27 | |
started to see what was on the film
for the first time. When you first | 0:19:27 | 0:19:31 | |
start seeing those pictures of Eric
Morcombe in one of his stereotypical | 0:19:31 | 0:19:36 | |
poses, you can't help but smile and
think, yes, this has to be done. | 0:19:36 | 0:19:46 | |
Once the scans were finished, they
had loads of data, but they also had | 0:19:46 | 0:19:52 | |
a new problem. The next really
difficult part was finding a way of | 0:19:52 | 0:19:58 | |
digitally flattening out this warped
object and digitally prising apart | 0:19:58 | 0:20:04 | |
all of the individual filmmakers
within it. -- film layers. We | 0:20:04 | 0:20:11 | |
originally have the manual software
where I would physically go through | 0:20:11 | 0:20:14 | |
each individual block and spend five
or ten minutes flattening out one | 0:20:14 | 0:20:19 | |
layer after the other, but that was
over several thousand frames, quite | 0:20:19 | 0:20:26 | |
labour-intensive. At this point
Charles took the problem to a data | 0:20:26 | 0:20:30 | |
scientist. What a human would do is
try to see where the image was | 0:20:30 | 0:20:38 | |
within the cross-section, the
problem here is that a computer | 0:20:38 | 0:20:42 | |
algorithm cannot quite do that. What
the algorithm does is it follows, | 0:20:42 | 0:20:48 | |
predominantly, the layers of
plastic, so not the images, but the | 0:20:48 | 0:20:52 | |
plastic. So once we have the layer
of plastic, we can move to the edge | 0:20:52 | 0:20:58 | |
of that layer and read off the
image. That process was repeated on | 0:20:58 | 0:21:05 | |
all of the film, making short work
of a task that would take a human | 0:21:05 | 0:21:10 | |
thousands of hours of work. Now
Charles is beginning the next phase, | 0:21:10 | 0:21:17 | |
turning the sky pictures back into
video. That is the next problem. But | 0:21:17 | 0:21:22 | |
now he has managed to put together a
taster of what is on that film. And | 0:21:22 | 0:21:27 | |
beautifully as well. Not a word out
of sync. I'm not mainly now. It is | 0:21:27 | 0:21:32 | |
me. You realise, of course, that the
tape has stopped. How does he do it? | 0:21:32 | 0:21:46 | |
That is an impressive sight. That is
the king's library, assembled by | 0:21:46 | 0:21:51 | |
King George III in the second half
of the 18th century. Four floors | 0:21:51 | 0:21:55 | |
below my feet here at the British
Library lie its vast basins, which | 0:21:55 | 0:22:00 | |
as you can imagine also contain a
lot of books. But did you know they | 0:22:00 | 0:22:04 | |
also contain 6.5 million sound
recordings which are now being | 0:22:04 | 0:22:09 | |
digitised? -- vast basement. The
British Library is the National | 0:22:09 | 0:22:15 | |
Sound archive, with sound recordings
spanning the last 130 years. These | 0:22:15 | 0:22:22 | |
are stored on all sorts of physical
formats, from delicate wax cylinders | 0:22:22 | 0:22:27 | |
to brass discs, two short lived
formats like minidisks, remember | 0:22:27 | 0:22:32 | |
that? There is a big push to
digitise them and make them | 0:22:32 | 0:22:36 | |
available online. Each of the 40
different types of storage format | 0:22:36 | 0:22:41 | |
has unique challenges, they all need
their own playback devices, and some | 0:22:41 | 0:22:46 | |
need a little TLC to coax the best
quality sound from them. Something | 0:22:46 | 0:22:50 | |
reasonably robust like a vinyl this,
we have an ultrasonic bath to be | 0:22:50 | 0:22:56 | |
able to shake that debris out of its
hiding place, we also have the more | 0:22:56 | 0:23:00 | |
traditional type of record cleaning
machines, the brush and vacuum | 0:23:00 | 0:23:05 | |
arrangements, that can produce some
quite startling results when you | 0:23:05 | 0:23:10 | |
start to clean off otherwise
invisible gunk. The team also have a | 0:23:10 | 0:23:16 | |
workshop to keep their collection of
machines in tiptop condition, so | 0:23:16 | 0:23:20 | |
staff can work on as many concurrent
transfers as possible and chip away | 0:23:20 | 0:23:24 | |
at the millions of recordings. If
you are faced with a tape for a disk | 0:23:24 | 0:23:30 | |
in a really parlous state and you
take it off a shelf, it may be | 0:23:30 | 0:23:34 | |
mouldy, it may need treatment, some
sort of repair, that doing that | 0:23:34 | 0:23:38 | |
process, that active process of
conserving and repairing that media | 0:23:38 | 0:23:44 | |
such that it can be replayed, even
just once, is hugely rewarding. | 0:23:44 | 0:23:48 | |
Certainly challenging. But with only
2% of their collection digitise and | 0:23:48 | 0:23:56 | |
only 15 years until some recordings
become unsalvageable, it is a race | 0:23:56 | 0:24:01 | |
against time to save as many as
possible -- digitised. It reminds me | 0:24:01 | 0:24:05 | |
that I have a box full of minidisks
in the loft, to bring them in. That | 0:24:05 | 0:24:09 | |
is it for this week from the British
Library. Don't forget we live on | 0:24:09 | 0:24:13 | |
Facebook and on Twitter at BBC
click. Then he very much a watching. | 0:24:13 | 0:24:17 | |
We will see you soon. -- for
watching. | 0:24:17 | 0:24:25 |