Discovery_Da Vinci Unlocking The Genius
Transcript
00:00The term genius is thrown around far too easily these days, but Leonardo da Vinci, well, here's
00:25a guy who totally fits the profile, whether you know him as an artist, a scientist, or
00:29an inventor.
00:30Hi there.
00:31I'm Kevin Brosh, here at Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry, and behind me are
00:35more than 60 da Vinci inventions, based on original sketches that date back more than
00:40500 years.
00:44Many of those ancient sketches can be traced all the way back to Florence, Italy.
00:49The sketches are just the beginning of the story.
00:51Over the next hour, we'll examine how da Vinci has managed to captivate us for so many
00:55generations.
00:56But first, back to the museum models.
00:59We found a family of artisans right here in Florence that's dedicated its life to recreating
01:04history.
01:07That's all the Nicolai father and sons team does, make models for museums and exhibits
01:12all over the world.
01:14These guys have the market cornered on fabricating 500-year-old machines.
01:23We must remain faithful to Leonardo's drawings.
01:27Because all of the pieces are exhibited in museums, even a small deviation would attract
01:32criticism.
01:37We literally refer back to the original drawings of Leonardo.
01:41We import some of the drawings into the computer to determine more accurately the distance
01:46and the proportions.
01:48After that, we begin building a small prototype.
01:50It's reduced scale.
01:52And that's just to see if all the technical functions are operational.
01:56We then come up with a larger model of varying sizes, either to scale or larger.
02:05This is the first prototype of a glider.
02:08It's a fixed-wing glider.
02:10The wings don't bend.
02:11Actually, they bend slightly as to be able to guide like a giant eagle or any other big
02:16bird.
02:19Leonardo came up with this model after first experimenting or studying the ideal machine
02:23which would be propelled by sheer human force.
02:26And after seeing that muscle power wasn't enough, he conceived of the idea of flying
02:30by gliding.
02:36When da Vinci wasn't dreaming of flying, he was creating military machines.
02:40As much as he detested war, he recognized the opportunity it presented for inventors.
02:45He also recognized the need for secrecy.
02:51We noticed it when analyzing the first design for a machine we were building.
02:56There seemed to be errors.
02:58And we realized that this was especially apparent with the military machines.
03:03It seems he wanted to, I don't know, perhaps hide some particular detail or secret which
03:08could be copied simply by looking closely at the drawings.
03:12A blatant and obvious example is the armored car.
03:16And this was noticed by other people.
03:18There was flawed in the gear system which was used for the motion of the car.
03:25The exactness and attention to detail in the Nicolai family's work is impressive.
03:30But it's important to understand that they started out with a pretty good roadmap.
03:34What we are looking at is an original Leonardo da Vinci drawing.
03:38It's about 500 years old.
03:40And it tells the story of a stage set he designed for the play Orpheus.
03:46This stage set was revolutionary in its time.
03:49The Renaissance audience would not have seen any of the special effects that an audience
03:54today knows.
03:55And during this performance, there was a mountain, this area would have been a large mountain
03:59which would have opened up to reveal the inside of a cave.
04:03And then at one point in the performance, you can see a little bit here, an actor would
04:08have just popped up in the middle of the stage and it would have really appeared like magic.
04:12This drawing was probably carried by Leonardo.
04:15He would have, it's a very large piece of paper for its time.
04:18He probably folded it up, kept it in his pocket, pulled it out when he had a new thought.
04:22And hence, that's why there's so many different kinds of drawing on it.
04:28Back in their workshop on the outskirts of Florence, the Nicolai brothers and their dad
04:32prepare for the next museum exhibit.
04:35They hope those who see their work will get almost as much satisfaction as they've got
04:39in crafting them.
04:41Yes, you see the public enjoying the models and it's satisfying.
04:50One feels joy inside and seeing my father and my brothers, it makes one's smile grow
04:56from ear to ear.
05:03Check this place out.
05:05Look at this.
05:06This is the original Funhaus.
05:07Woo!
05:08Actually, I'm lying.
05:09It's a da Vinci experiment on perspective.
05:12I don't quite get it.
05:13I just think it's really cool.
05:15Tell you, they do not build them like Leonardo anymore.
05:18Thankfully, our world is full of people who embody his spirit.
05:22Our next story, you could say, is about a guy who mirrors da Vinci.
05:26Get it?
05:27The mirrors?
05:28Dean Kamen's his name.
05:32Talk about making an entrance.
05:36It's not how most of us arrive home.
05:40But the guy piloting this helicopter isn't like most of us, so getting around in one
05:44of his two helicopters is just routine.
05:48Meet Dean Kamen.
05:49His love of flying machines is just one of the many parallels between him and Leonardo
05:54da Vinci.
05:59Kamen has over 300 patents to his name and a long list of inventions to his credit.
06:07This is arguably his most well-known work.
06:10The Segway is a two-wheeled ride that grew out of an earlier invention.
06:14If you lean forward, you move forward.
06:19If you lean back, you move back.
06:23There was so much hype around the release of the Segway that it was being touted as
06:27important an invention as the internet.
06:30But the Segway still hasn't found its stride.
06:33Like da Vinci's armored tank or self-propelled car, it may take many years before the Segway's
06:39potential is fully realized.
06:42I wish I could tell you that I knew what inspires us.
06:45I can assure you if you opened up my calendar, it wouldn't say, 11 o'clock, have brilliant
06:49idea.
06:50You don't schedule inspiration.
06:52You can't count on, aha, I see it.
06:57In the late 90s, Kamen's company worked hard to perfect something called iBot, a self-balancing
07:03motorized wheelchair that can take its users to places other wheelchairs simply can't.
07:10I'll roll forward until the wheels come to the stairs, and since they know I'm on stairs,
07:16they'll just literally walk down the stairs, one stair after the other.
07:24All this from a college dropout.
07:27Much like Leonardo da Vinci, who was self-taught, it's hard to pin Dean Kamen down.
07:32His expertise spans the spectrum from medicine to transportation, but he's too modest for
07:37those comparisons.
07:40You'd have to be very arrogant to assume that you are carrying on the spirit of da Vinci.
07:47You'd have to be arrogant to think you are carrying his water bucket.
07:52But his laid back style conceals a serious mind that is constantly looking for ways to
07:57tackle some of the world's biggest challenges.
08:01I look at most of my projects and it's not a line.
08:04The activity looks like a bowl of spaghetti.
08:07You look at the little gem that comes out the end sometimes and you're very happy.
08:12One of those gems is a small generator hidden in the basement of his home.
08:18A box this size can make about 3,000 watts, 3 kilowatts, which is plenty of power for
08:24a typical American household.
08:28In the same way da Vinci improved on inventions of his day, Kamen has found a way to make
08:33the centuries old Stirling engine more efficient.
08:36By burning just about anything, even cow manure, it may be the spark that literally lights
08:41up the developing world.
08:431,400 degrees F. When it gets to 800, you're going to hear the motor kick in, ready?
08:50It just turned on.
08:52And as it turned on...
08:53Power is produced by keeping one end of the engine hot and the other end cold.
08:58It was field tested in Bangladesh.
09:01We have two villages over there that for 24 weeks, every home in the village had light,
09:07communication, a computer, and there were a couple of small refrigerators.
09:12And the only fuel they used for 24 weeks was cow dung.
09:16Ultimately, Kamen sees a day when the generator will be used to power a water purification
09:22system that his company has also developed.
09:27Surprisingly, Dean Kamen doesn't kick back on weekends in front of the TV.
09:32He believes that the entertainment and sports aimed at young people are having a negative
09:37influence on them.
09:40And the lure of so many apparently exciting opportunities, mostly from the world of Hollywood
09:47and entertainment or the world of sports, seems to dominate their consciousness.
09:53And so he's fighting fire with fire.
09:56Using the sports model, throwing in some elements from the entertainment world, and mixing it
10:01all up into this.
10:06A robotics competition.
10:07It's called For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology, or FIRST.
10:14Our culture has managed to always present sports and entertainment as exciting, bigger
10:19than life things, and always present science and technology as a difficult, abstract idea
10:25reserved only for that few.
10:28And now these kids are seeing, I can do this.
10:36These events are infused with loud music and a competitive spirit.
10:40Make it fun.
10:41Make it exciting.
10:42Give awards.
10:43Bring the bands.
10:44Bring the cheerleaders.
10:45But put some content in between all of that.
10:49From education to developing ways to power people's lives and provide clean drinking
10:54water to those who don't have it.
10:56For Kamen, these are the biggest challenges of the future.
10:59We ought to be able to make sure that everybody on this planet can drink clean water.
11:05And if we get rid of Cryptosporidia and Girardia and Cholera and Diarrhea, you will have gotten
11:11rid of a huge fraction of all the sickness and misery on this planet today.
11:18Through Kamen's work, major strides are being made towards solving these problems.
11:22If the answers aren't found in his lifetime, well, he's making sure that the next generation
11:27is ready to take up the challenge.
11:34When we come back, Da Vinci has designs on war.
11:39He made trebuchets and a catapult which resembles a crossbow.
11:44And so we tried to take the heart out of that and put it into the catapult.
11:58Long before modern firearms, there was Da Vinci's stone thrower.
12:01Through a complex series of gears, springs, levers and cranks, a stone or rock could be
12:06heaved a great distance, depending on the amount of flexibility in the wooden arm.
12:12It was widely known that Leonardo Da Vinci was a pacifist at heart, but designing military
12:17weaponry was definitely a pretty good way to pay the bills.
12:21Check this thing out.
12:22It may seem a little primitive, but it's actually the perfect fighting tool.
12:26This is Da Vinci's catapult.
12:28How do you design one of these things?
12:29How do you build one of these things?
12:30And what are the problems you encounter while building one?
12:33Well, we decided to find out.
12:35Fire!
12:36Oh, nice!
12:37Why are these people wheeling a medieval-style catapult into the alleyway of this modern
12:47Chicago neighborhood?
12:50Why even build a catapult in the 21st century?
12:53Well, when a big museum wants you to be part of a show honoring the creative genius of
12:58Leonardo Da Vinci, you jump.
13:00Or in this case, you throw.
13:03The farther, the better.
13:04We're looking at about 20, 25 feet.
13:06It needs to be above your head so that people can't catch it.
13:09It's a teeter-totter, with one end of the teeter-totter being very short and the other
13:13end being very long.
13:15You put a lot of weight on the short end, and it causes the long end to fly up in the
13:19air very fast.
13:23Matt's catapult is based on a number of Da Vinci drawings.
13:26Although Leonardo didn't invent this weapon, he did spend a great deal of time trying to
13:31improve the tools of war.
13:33This is a giant crossbow Da Vinci mapped out sometime around 1485.
13:38His late 15th century design for a wheeled tank, powered by humans or horses, was hundreds
13:44of years ahead of its time.
13:46Around the same period, Da Vinci also envisioned multi-barreled cannons, which were to be used
13:51much like today's machine gun.
13:54Even though Leonardo is said to have thought of war as beastly madness, he played up his
13:59skill as a military engineer and downplayed his work as an artist in order to land a job
14:04with the Duke of Milan.
14:07He really hated it in humane terms, but this was big scale employment.
14:13So if you're an engineer, war was one of the major outlets.
14:22Back inside Matt's Chicago studio, this menacing catapult takes shape with the help of some
14:27modern tools.
14:28To lock the thing in place and give it the look and the actual reality of what they might
14:34have used, we then pound dowling through it as if we were pinning it.
14:39Purists will say that Matt's really building a trebuchet, which is a more advanced version
14:44of the catapult.
14:46These devastating weapons were still highly regarded in Da Vinci's time, even though gunpowder
14:51weapons were already common.
14:54Their primary objective, to launch projectiles, everything from boulders and flames to disease
14:59infested animals over castle walls.
15:03Da Vinci most likely improved the trebuchet by attaching a ratchet-like device to its
15:07throwing arm.
15:09This allowed the arm to lock into place, making it less likely to fire unexpectedly.
15:16What he looks for when he's designing things like the catapult and giant crossbow, he's
15:20looking at traditional weaponry and always thinking of ways how can he get heavier loads
15:26thrown greater distance.
15:28The next challenge for Matt Binns, giving store-bought wood the look and feel of something
15:33from Da Vinci's day.
15:36You would gouge the wood to get it to the shape you want, but it would leave marks in
15:41the wood.
15:42So we can replicate that partly with the plane, the power plane, but also an axe kind of comes
15:47in handy to give it that hand-hewn look.
15:53And you can bet Da Vinci didn't have one of these to work with.
15:58It's called a plasma cutter.
16:00Inside the business end of this is a small pellet of hafnium, which is the element number
16:0772, slightly radioactive I think.
16:11This handy little tool uses pressurized gas, which is heated to about 16,000 degrees Celsius
16:17to easily burn through the metal pieces that will adorn the catapult.
16:22While the form takes shape, function is just as important, so it's back out to the alleyway.
16:28And we'll test this out with a Nerf ball first, get a number of distances, maybe we'll change
16:32the weight.
16:33If you want to catch, I'll pitch.
16:39The first shot isn't bad, but Matt wants some more distance.
16:42Try to go with another 10 pounds.
16:46Adding weight to the bucket will bring the arm down faster, hopefully giving the ball
16:50that added distance.
16:52But there's a snag in the plan.
16:54Did it hit something?
16:57I don't know, I think maybe the bucket hit something.
17:03There's a mark here where I think the bucket's been hitting on this.
17:07As it's rubbing, we're going to move the weights onto this side of the bucket so the
17:10bucket tips the other way.
17:13This time the ball travels a few feet farther.
17:15We've got to gust the wind, the wind's coming back.
17:17I think Da Vinci would have been interested, amused, and pretty proud.
17:24Matt's catapult has passed its initial tests, but what will happen when the heat is on?
17:32We thought we ought to get a little more medieval and we don't have any rotting cows or corpses,
17:36so we thought maybe a little fire to set fire to the thatched roofs inside.
17:41At the end of the day, Matt and the crew get into the spirit of Da Vinci's time, adding
17:45some fuel to the fun.
17:47Okay, and that's quite hot, and fire!
17:51Now we don't recommend trying this at home.
17:57It's really interesting to note that when you take a good close-up look at Da Vinci's
18:00handwriting, it appears that everything is backwards.
18:04There's no shortage of theories as to why Da Vinci practiced this so-called mirror writing.
18:09Some people thought he was writing in secret code to prevent others from stealing his ideas.
18:13Some thought he was just trying to make it difficult for the readers.
18:15But perhaps the easiest reason or explanation why he did this was that Da Vinci was left-handed.
18:21When you're writing with your left hand from left to right, it forces your hand to drag
18:25through the fresh ink, thereby smudging it.
18:27Change your style.
18:28Write with your left hand, but go from right to left.
18:31You remove the smudging, but everything you're putting down on the paper is backwards.
18:39Still ahead on Da Vinci Unlocking the Genius, art masterpieces show up in the strangest
18:44places.
18:45And the blood makes a very nice ink.
18:47It's just the right consistency to flow and to write and draw with.
19:00Leonardo Da Vinci was consumed by two things in life, curiosity and the art of investigation.
19:06Where most artists of his era were only interested in the external human form, Leonardo's interests
19:11went deeper.
19:12He was never satisfied until he knew the anatomy of his subjects inside and out.
19:17His attention to detail was astonishing.
19:19He even introduced cross-sections as teaching tools.
19:22He may be best known for his artwork and inventions, but he was a lifesaver.
19:26He still is, even today.
19:28Just ask Dr. Francis Wells.
19:30I'm a heart surgeon, that's what I spend most of my time doing.
19:36Francis Wells is not your average cardiac surgeon.
19:38In fact, he doesn't even like to use the title doctor.
19:42But Dr. Wells is the go-to heart specialist in the United Kingdom.
19:47He's performed countless transplants, but his specialty is heart valve reconstruction.
19:53He uses a radical technique that was inspired by an unlikely source.
19:57That's right.
19:58Leonardo Da Vinci.
19:59There was a very, very good exhibition of Leonardo Da Vinci's drawings, anatomical drawings,
20:06at the Royal Academy in Piccadilly.
20:08It just blew me away as to how beautiful the drawings were.
20:13It was the beauty of the drawings that caught Francis Wells' eye.
20:16It was something else that brought him back for a closer look.
20:19You could see in the drawings he was trying to work out the physiology and the function.
20:25And it was that combination of function to form that really, really got me interested.
20:31Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man might be the most famous anatomical drawing in history.
20:36And while Da Vinci's hands-on examination of the body's inner workings may be lesser
20:40known, they're by no means less relevant.
20:44Even though it was strongly frowned upon, Da Vinci claims to have dissected more than
20:4830 corpses during his lifetime.
20:51It was a daunting task when you consider refrigeration was still hundreds of years
20:56away.
20:57Da Vinci would have had to endure hours, if not days, of horrendous stench to satisfy
21:02his curiosity.
21:03What he was doing is drawing them and analyzing them at the same time.
21:08If he drew the lungs, he would look at the branching of the bronchial tubes, the air
21:13tubes in the lungs.
21:14He couldn't just say, I will draw them.
21:16He said, how do they work?
21:18How do they branch?
21:20How do they pass air?
21:22While artistic, Da Vinci's anatomical drawings were not always accurate.
21:26But when it comes to the heart, well, Leonardo still amazes the experts.
21:31This drawing shows very well what I'm talking about, both in the detail and the accuracy
21:34of his drawings.
21:36This is probably an ox heart and this is the aorta.
21:39And these are the bronchial arteries, paired arteries arising from the back of the aorta,
21:44which are specifically to provide blood to the airways themselves.
21:49The drawing's also very important from the point of view of these three drawings to the
21:53side here, which actually show the cartilage in the airway.
21:57Now this is very important to hold the airway open when the animal's breathing.
22:02And he's the first to describe this and draw it.
22:05Through his own analysis of Leonardo's paperwork, Dr. Wells began to challenge and eventually
22:10change the way he repaired valves in the operating room.
22:13I was looking at the mitral valve and it seemed to me that the explanation that we had for
22:19one of the leaflets, which was flailing backwards, causing the leak, didn't fit with what I saw.
22:25When it works properly, the mitral valve works like a set of doors, preventing blood from
22:30flowing in the wrong direction, back into the heart.
22:33Doctors have always repaired so-called floppy valves by narrowing their diameter.
22:38It's effective, but often severely restricts a patient's activity level after surgery.
22:43So after studying da Vinci's 500-year-old sketches, Wells decided there was room for improvement.
22:50So I then changed the way I repaired the valve using this kind of thought process, analytical
22:55thought process that Leonardo had used, and using ideas that he had thought about in terms
23:01of the heart as a pressurized chamber.
23:04The conclusion he reached was that it was best not to alter the diameter of the valve
23:08while repairing it.
23:09The technique has proven to be quite successful.
23:12It also gets patients up on their feet faster.
23:15And now Wells, like da Vinci, is using art to spread his science.
23:20I find if I'm trying to communicate an idea, the easiest and quickest way is to draw it.
23:25Now this is where art and science truly come together.
23:29Much like da Vinci, Dr. Wells is comfortable expressing his thoughts through sketches,
23:34even when a pen and paper aren't available.
23:36We had a visiting student at the top of the table, and so I asked, as I commonly do, for
23:41a swab or a white sheet of paper, in this case a swab.
23:45And it was at that moment that Francis Wells began tinkering with what would become a unique
23:50habit.
23:52You can see here, I'm using a pair of forceps with what is actually a sterile piece of paper
23:57taken from wrapping around an instrument.
24:00We had a cleft all the way back, and we had a huge poster leaf of perps and another cleft,
24:09and we had another poster leaf of perps with a ruptured cord.
24:13So this drawing was done during an operation.
24:15You can see the heart in the background.
24:17Here is a piece of sterile paper, and these are just ordinary surgical forceps dipped
24:21in blood, which work just like a quill pen.
24:28Blood makes a very nice ink.
24:30It's just the right consistency to flow and to write and draw with.
24:35Effective teaching tool?
24:37Possibly.
24:37But one thing is for sure.
24:39Francis Wells' blood drawings kicked up a storm of controversy, something he shrugs
24:44off.
24:45It's a very, very small amount.
24:47It doesn't do anybody any harm, and at the end of the procedure, of course, the swab
24:51or paper is burnt along with the rest of the disposables after the operation.
24:57For Wells, da Vinci has had a huge influence on his life.
25:01He's passionate about his profession, where even in life and death situations, there's
25:05room for art.
25:07I think for Leonardo da Vinci, one of the most attractive things for me is his powers
25:13of observation, is the way he thinks.
25:15You can always have a rest and look at his wonderful paintings that he has, which are
25:21just a joy to look at.
25:22But I think for me, the thing that keeps drawing me back to him is his insight into life and
25:29nature.
25:33With a triangle of cloth measuring 12 arms by 12 arms, da Vinci's parachute, the first
25:38ever, had to provide strong enough air resistance to avoid catastrophic injury.
25:43This design was actually tested in the year 2000, and it worked.
25:58About an hour's drive north of Florence, nestled in the Tuscan countryside, you'll
26:02find the Leonardo da Vinci Museum.
26:06The museum is housed inside da Vinci Castle, a suitably dramatic home for the works of
26:11a genius.
26:13The number of models has grown over the years to become one of the biggest and most original
26:19collections of this kind.
26:24Everywhere you look, there's evidence of Leonardo's incredible ingenuity.
26:28It's hard to believe that, for example, he invented a life preserver and scuba gear almost
26:33five centuries ago.
26:37Leonardo's inventive genius is really the kind of thing that's pushing our technology
26:40today, pushing people to think outside the box, to observe their surroundings, to find
26:45new solutions to problems.
26:47One of the more interesting items on display is what appears to be a wooden bicycle.
26:52Now, did da Vinci actually invent the first bike?
26:55I'm sorry to say, for people who look at the bicycle, that's a forgery.
27:00There is absolutely no way that is by Leonardo, or is it a piece of Renaissance technology.
27:06It's illiterate in terms of Renaissance technology, and although it was greatly hailed at the
27:12time, I think most serious Leonardo scholars would now regard it as a forgery.
27:18So the bicycle, it's a piece of nonsense.
27:21It's generally agreed on that the drawing of the bike was done by a pupil of Leonardo.
27:26The drawing is sketched with lead pencil.
27:29Lead pencil wasn't even discovered until decades after Leonardo's death in 1519.
27:35Leonardo is, to use some nasty phrase, a one-off in that sense.
27:39I think you couldn't create another Leonardo da Vinci today.
27:44A short bike ride up the road from Vinci, you'll find the house where Leonardo was born.
27:49The building was restored in 1986, but the landscape and the view which Leonardo would
27:54have enjoyed has remained relatively unchanged to this day.
28:07Leonardo da Vinci spent hours observing and sketching horses.
28:11Not only was he impressed with their size, strength and speed, he saw a direct link between
28:16the sleek animal and humans.
28:19Da Vinci spent a great deal of his later years planning and designing to build a huge bronze
28:24horse statue for the Duke of Milan.
28:26Unfortunately, it was a project that was never completed.
28:33It's taken more than 500 years, but a company in Calgary, Alberta is finally realizing one
28:39of Leonardo da Vinci's most ambitious projects.
28:42Well, part of it at least.
28:52Studio Y has been commissioned to build the head of da Vinci's massive horse, a bronze
28:58statue that was intended to honor an Italian nobleman.
29:05They have all the latest technology at their disposal.
29:08Everything from laser scanners and computer software right down to the hairdos.
29:14Because it's Leonardo da Vinci, it's sort of an honor, I guess in some ways, that we
29:19are able to emulate his work.
29:22The people that we hire here, they're all artists and there's a lot of pride that goes
29:25into this type of project.
29:27So as projects go, I would say this is one of the most important ones we've ever done.
29:36David Nolan is the president of Studio Y, a company that specializes in large format
29:413D displays.
29:44Nolan's excited about this project, but he knows his employees will have their work cut
29:48out for them, building an eight feet long by eight feet tall horse head.
29:53He can only imagine what da Vinci must have gone through.
29:56It's amazing to me that given our current technology, we still find challenges in building
30:01projects of this size and this magnitude.
30:04It's really hard to imagine just how difficult it would be to do sculptures of this scale.
30:09Surprisingly, the biggest challenge comes from the smallest part of the project, making
30:14the clay model, which will be the basis for the finished piece.
30:19It's based on da Vinci's sketches.
30:22I'm given a concept drawing or design and it's my job at this stage to flesh it out
30:29in three dimension into a sculpture that can be interpreted.
30:41As this laser scanner passes over the horse, it gleans all the information it needs to
30:46turn this model into a computer file.
30:50The file can then be scaled up to the size needed for the project.
30:54The details are then passed to another computer that controls the router that will cut the
30:59pieces of the horse head.
31:01Does all this modern technology betray da Vinci's original vision?
31:04David Nolan doesn't think so.
31:06I think he'd be impressed with the technology side.
31:09I think being a visionary, someone like Leonardo would love it.
31:12The router can carve out a two feet thick piece of foam in just one pass.
31:26It's about 50% faster than cutting by hand.
31:29Studio Y is using styrofoam to model the horse head because it's light, durable and easy
31:34to cut.
31:37It's time for the pieces to be assembled.
31:41Contact cement is sprayed over the flat surfaces before they're brought together.
31:47Once in place, the process reverts back to a more traditional form of artistry.
31:52So we just started today and the whole horse will be carved in a week.
32:02Da Vinci spent 17 years working on the clay model for his great horse, but it was never
32:07built.
32:08Studio Y will finish its project in just three weeks.
32:13I'm just really proud to be part of something of this magnitude and this sort of quality.
32:19For David Nolan and his team, the hard part is over.
32:22Now the horse head is ready to go on display, giving 21st century audiences a chance to
32:27travel back in time and see a small part of what was da Vinci's big dream.
32:37Okay, so we know that da Vinci didn't create the bicycle, but check this out.
32:40Looks like my ten speed, the chain drive.
32:42We'll be back in a flash.
32:45Come on, let's take this for a ride.
32:50This may have been the idea that led to the first ever helicopter.
32:54Da Vinci called it the aerial screw.
32:57The linen sail was soaked in starch and when it was spun fast enough by a group of men,
33:02it would take flight.
33:03You know, it's one thing to create your own product or service, but it takes a completely
33:09different set of skills to get that product into manufacturing and then finally move it
33:13to market.
33:14Now, as good as Leonardo was, most of his greatest inventions only made it as far as
33:18a sketch pad.
33:19This one I like, though.
33:20Let me ask you, what if you could dream up your own idea and then create it yourself?
33:25Sort of your own little fabrication laboratory.
33:30When it comes to getting things made, we've all seen this before.
33:34Big companies with fast, expensive machines that churn out products for millions of potential
33:39customers.
33:40But what happens when you want to make a product for a much smaller market?
33:44We're talking a one person market.
33:47Well, that's known as personal fabrication.
33:53The point of personal fabrication isn't to buy what you can buy in Walmart, because you
33:57can buy in Walmart what's in Walmart.
33:59It's to buy what you can't buy in Walmart.
34:01It's things for a market of one person.
34:04Neil Gershenfeld is the director of the Center for Bits and Atoms at the Massachusetts Institute
34:09of Technology.
34:11He teaches students to create technology using the school's expensive machines.
34:16Get PY, and we come over here and we read it in.
34:20I was spending a lot of time teaching students to use them, and so that led with colleagues
34:24to starting a class called How to Make Almost Anything.
34:28And that wasn't meant to be provocative.
34:29That was just how to use these machines to do the research.
34:33To Gershenfeld's surprise, many of the people he ended up teaching weren't engineers, but
34:38artists and architects.
34:40I was swamped with hundreds of students begging to get in the class, saying, you're desperate,
34:46all my life I've been waiting for this, I'll do anything to take this class.
34:49Hi, I'm Kelly, and this is my screen body.
34:54The participants turned out some truly bizarre products, such as this personal scream saver.
35:00Yes, scream.
35:04It will save your yells and screams and play them back later.
35:12And this web browser for a parrot.
35:16Another made an alarm clock you wrestle with to prove that you're awake, and year after
35:20year after year the students showed up just doing these amazingly inventive things.
35:25So you remember we were talking about how we might make one of the flashlights where
35:29you shake it and the light comes on?
35:32The students made things they wanted, not things they needed.
35:36The popularity of the course got Gershenfeld and his colleagues thinking about how they
35:40could make this expensive technology available to the masses.
35:45The Fabrication Laboratory, or Fab Lab for short, is the solution.
35:50It's a collection of a bunch of tools that reflect what's best used.
35:54Not in theory, just in practice.
36:00At the heart of the Fab Lab are three pretty ordinary looking machines.
36:05First up, this laser cutter can be used to cut acrylic, wood or metal.
36:10Next there's a computer controlled cutter.
36:12It looks and sounds a lot like a printer, but it doesn't use ink.
36:16Instead it uses a knife to cut things like vinyl for making graphics or copper for making
36:21electronic parts.
36:23Finally, there's a high resolution milling machine, which is basically a very accurate
36:29drill, good for making circuit boards.
36:34Add some computer software, throw in the raw materials and you've got yourself your own
36:38production line.
36:40This is called GIC, Grace's Invention Kit, and it's made from a cardboard box.
36:45I was teaching my daughter Grace how to use a laser cutter in a Fab Lab.
36:50She was eight at the time.
36:52And she was bored by what I was teaching her, and so she had the idea that you could take
36:56the cardboard box and you could cut it in parts and make a construction kit.
37:00For roughly $35,000, anyone can purchase the basic ingredients for a Fab Lab.
37:06Gershenfeld knows it's not cheap, but predicts that the Fab Lab tools will eventually cost
37:11around $1,000.
37:13And the machines will one day be able to make copies of themselves.
37:17Bit by bit we're getting closer to using the tools, to make the tools, so that the labs
37:22are just continuously evolving into the end point of this evolution.
37:25I love the Fab Labs!
37:28Fab Labs can travel anywhere, and it's in the developing world where they may have their
37:32greatest impact.
37:34They've already been set up in Africa, India and Latin America.
37:38Here an eight-year-old girl in Ghana is learning to make a circuit board.
37:43Perhaps centuries from now, Neil Gershenfeld will be remembered for giving the gift of
37:47invention to millions.
37:51Asked whether he sees parallels between what's being done in these Fab Labs and what Da Vinci
37:55did, well, he has an unexpected answer.
37:58Much as I'm a fan of everything he's done, the one thing I don't like is the focus on
38:05Da Vinci as the great inventor.
38:07Because one of the lessons for me is just how finely distributed invention is.
38:15Imagine how much untapped creative power exists out there.
38:19Fab Labs could harness all of that energy, putting the world on the verge of a new renaissance.
38:29When Da Vinci, unlocking the genius, returns, an invention that has these two men on top
38:34of the world.
38:35If you drive in the car, it's like a little house.
38:38So we understand this as places where people live and we try to be inspired by that technology
38:46and take it into our designs.
38:57You know, many of Leonardo's inventions were designed to make day-to-day life a lot easier.
39:02Inventions like the life jacket, the arch bridge, and even the parachute are still in
39:05use today.
39:06But what about the most basic of human needs, shelter?
39:09Well, Da Vinci also inspired at least two inventors in Italy to push the edge of the
39:14design envelope, all in the name of survival.
39:19What do modern day Da Vinci's do on a lazy Sunday afternoon?
39:26Well, if you're Arturo Vittori and Andreas Vogler, you pitch a tent.
39:36But you can't buy one of these pup tents at your local sporting goods store.
39:41The ancient city of Bomarzo provides the dramatic backdrop for the desert seal tent.
39:46Seal for its shape and desert because it's specifically designed for extreme conditions.
39:52We found out that the desert has a very specific temperature development in the vertical direction
39:59where on the ground, the temperature by the sun radiation gets very high and hot and the
40:06further you're away from the ground, the cooler the air gets.
40:10We thought, well, to cool this water would be much too heavy, so why don't we use the
40:16air which is up there to cool the tent and that's the origin of the idea.
40:21It was their Da Vinci-like powers of observation that led our two architectural engineers to
40:26think like camels.
40:28Just two meters above the desert ground, the air can be as much as 20 degrees cooler.
40:34Maybe the camels were on to something.
40:36Basically, we have been looking at the desert and trying to understand what's happening
40:41there and why camels have such high noses and things like this and by observing what
40:48actually the desert is, we were able to come up with that concept.
40:54Leonardo Da Vinci for me is more, less an artist than a scientist actually because he
41:02used his drawings to observe nature.
41:05He was drawing how the water moves, how trees work and everything.
41:11The tent weighs less than six kilograms, so it's easily transported in a backpack.
41:17At the top of the inflatable support beams is a fan that draws in the cool air.
41:23At two meters, it's tall enough to stand up inside and it's long enough for even the tallest
41:28sleeper.
41:30The advantage of inflatable structures is not only that they're very light to transport,
41:36but they're on one hand rigid, as you see in the wind it's fairly stable, the tent,
41:40but they're also flexible.
41:41If you need maintenance, you can kind of bend them over.
41:45The silver material is a kind of heavy-duty industry material, textile, which is coated
41:51with aluminium to reflect the heat.
41:54Now here at the end bit, we have actually the same detail like on the very top and we
42:01use it also like the air intake to let the air out here, which is coming out through
42:08this flap, excess air.
42:10But the reason for this very special detail, this standoff, which is actually a thin aluminium
42:15plate covered with this material, is here on the bottom not only for technology reason,
42:21but also for ergonomic reason, because if somebody's lying in there, usually the feet
42:26of a person stick out and this accommodates actually this place for the feet.
42:33Inside the tent, we do need a little bit of technology.
42:35We have this solar battery charger and a battery pack and we need this charging unit basically
42:44to regulate the current, which comes from the solar cells to charge the battery and
42:48control the electricity we need for the fan.
42:52And we have a little hose coming out, which allows us to attach the pump here.
42:58And this fits neatly underneath the tent when we don't need it and we just can close the
43:04flap.
43:05Now, if you find the sealed tent a little too cozy, you may want to try and seek shelter
43:10under something called the kinetic pavilion.
43:13It's a new spin on the traditional gazebos you would see in a town square.
43:18Try to imagine it about ten times this size.
43:21Okay, we basically have four of these cantilevering arms here, which are here made out of wood
43:29and steel, which could also be in reality, but it could also be done out of carbon fibre
43:34and aluminium, like modern materials.
43:39The whole pavilion could slowly move and act and could be controlled by the environment
43:46or by computer or by the internet, or even by mobile phones of the people standing around
43:52it.
43:53So it's kind of, it could become a very democratic shape, let's say.
43:59This could be a kind of a modern version of an element which attracts people just by the
44:05movement and the beauty of it.
44:08The kinetic pavilion and the sealed tent are likely years away from hitting the markets.
44:13But like Da Vinci, Arturo and Andreas hope their ideas will be used as a starting point
44:19for future world-changing inventions.
44:22For us as architects, we would like to see that we can pick up from this development
44:28and make new developments, new designs, improve it and make it better.
44:35Well, there you have it.
44:37The spirit of the great Leonardo Da Vinci lives on and it shall live on so long as our
44:42modern day innovators and inventors continue to explore, examine and create.
44:47Thanks for watching.
44:49I'm Kevin Brosh.
45:35I'll see you next time.