Behind the Scenes
This type of background painting is typically painted on glass, to allow exposure of film for compositing images in special effects.
What is Matte painting?
Earth's moon's official name, from Latin, is this.
What is Luna?
King Arthur's legendary sword.
What is Excalibur?
This engine component mechanically controls the opening and closing of valves in combustion engines.
What is the camshaft?
This type of wing configuration, which offers double the lift, was the only type possible with early low-powered engines.
What is a bi-plane / Bi-wing?
These actors do dangerous activities that endanger their lives, and are typically filmed so their faces cannot be seen.
What are stuntmen?
This planet has the most moons in the solar system.
What is Jupiter?
Jedi and Sith fight using these laser swords.
What are lightsabers?
Fuel injection largely made this engine component obsolete, though they are still used in 2-stroke engines.
What is the carburetor?
The average American consumes 90 of these annually and Americans as a whole consume 1.25 billion on Superbowl Sunday.
What are chicken wings?
When filming miniatures, this common condiment is frequently used to represent flowing water, as water does not scale.
What is salt?
It is the largest natural satellite in the solar system.
What is Ganymede?
The very first machine gun was named this, after its inventor.
What is the Maxim Gun?
This engine component mechanically controls the amount of air being sucked into the engine, and thus, engine speed.
What is the throttle?
This type of wing configuration offers the most area, and thus, lift.
What is a delta wing?
This phrase refers to actors making up dialog on the fly. A famous example is Han Solo's "I know" from Empire Strikes Back.
What is ad-libbing?
This planet's moons are both irregularly shaped satellites, thought to be captured asteroids.
What is Mars?
According to Shakespeare, a sword is weaker than this.
What is the pen?
CID is the abbreviation for this unit of engine capacity.
What is Cubic Inches of Displacement?
This creature, in the family Saturniidae, has the largest wings of any insect. It gets its name from an ancient hero, famous for his labours.
What is the Hercules Moth?
In the days before digital film, these devices were used to mechanically link projectors together to print images from one film strip to another.
What is an optical printer?
This moon of Saturn is larger, but less dense, than the planet Mercury.
What is Titan?
Bilbo's (later Frodo's) enchanted short sword that glows blue when Orcs are near.
What is Sting?
DOHC is the abbreviation for this type of engine configuration.
What is dual overhead cam?
This type of small wing is typically found on the front of the aircraft and is actually used for control, not lift.
What is a canard?