L.A. Shoot Day One

Today I spent the day shooting video of the continued construction of the dome panels for the upper stage of the Ares I rocket. Here is a diagram of what they were working on...







It's the curved pieces that make up the upper dome of the liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen tanks.

Today they were prepping the pie-shaped pieces of metal by laser etching certain patterns on a thin protective green coating that was previously put on the piece...it acts as a mask..sort of like taping a car before painting it. Except instead of painting it, they are going to use caustic chemicals to eat away the exposed metal to help save weight on the final piece.



Today it was almost 90 degrees here in L.A., I may have to go buy a bathing suit and either go swimming in the hotel pool, the Pacific Ocean or both!