Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!news.media.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!usa-post Newsgroups: usa-today.tech From: usa-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: usa-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: tech Thu, Jul 30 1992 Date: Thu, 30 Jul 92 04:32:02 EDT Message-ID: 07-30 0000 DECISIONLINE: Technology USA TODAY Update July 30, 1992 Source: USA TODAY:Gannett National Information Network SPACE STATION STAYS ALIVE: The House Wednesday voted down an effort to kill space station Freedom but moved toward cutting $525 million from the project. Lawmakers voted 237-181 against the attempt to cancel the station, which is expected to cost $40 billion to build. The House was ready to provide $1.7 billion for work on the project, instead of the $2.2 billion President Bush wants for next year. ATLANTIS COUNTDOWN TO CONTINUE: NASA's countdown to launch of shuttle Atlantis was expected to be back on track Thursday after workers spent Wednesday making sure electrical lines inside the cargo bay were properly connected. Liftoff remains on schedule for 9:56 a.m. ET Friday. The launch window extends to 12:26 p.m. Air Force meteorologists are predicting a 95% chance weather will be good enough for the launch. LOOSE CABLES ARE FOUND: Kennedy Space Center workers closed the doors to the Atlantis' cargo bay at 5 p.m. Wednesday, about 12 hours late due to concerns about electrical lines that are part of an Italian satellite experiment. Technicians noticed that two cables were not properly fastened. A loose cable could have resulted in the failure of the $376 million Tethered Satellite System in space, officials said. OLYMPIC ADS USE COMPUTER STUNTS: Unlike Olympic athletes, Olympic ads don't have to do all their own stunts. Kodak fills a stadium with computer-generated people in one ad. Special-effects company R:Greenberg Associates - which also put a 1945 film clip of Gene Kelly into a Diet Coke spot featuring Paula Abdul - did the work. A Miller Lite uses morphing - "Terminator 2"-style metamorphosis - to change dancers' costumes. (For more, see special Effects package below.) GE APOLOGIZES TO CONGRESS: The head of General Electric Wednesday apologized to Congress for a $40 million defense-procurement scandal involving jet engine sales and diversion of funds to Israel. "GE regrets what happened and accepts the liability," said GE Chairman John Welch, whose firm last week pleaded guilty to fraud and agreed to pay $69 million in penalties. He testified before a House panel Wednesday. MAGLEV FUNDING IS RESTORED: A Senate appropriations panel Wednesday approved a spending bill that restores funding for an experimental magnetically levitated "super train." The legislation provides $45 million for fiscal 1993 that would begin an ambitious six-year competition to build an American "maglev" train that could haul passengers and freight at speeds approaching 300 miles per hour. LTV GAINS $83.9 MILLION DEAL: The Army Wednesday awarded LTV Corp.'s missiles division an $83.9 million contract to incorporate one of its interceptor designs into the Patriot air defense system. The contract will stretch LTV's Extended-Range Interceptor (ERINT) program through 1994. LTV will develop prototype hardware that would adapt the ERINT to the Patriot launch system, the company said. IBM TO SELL COMPUTER PARTS: IBM said Wednesday it has stepped up its drive to sell computer chips and other computer parts by authorizing a Japanese company to act as a distributor in that country. Kuroda Electric Co. Ltd. of Japan will distribute memory chips, circuit boards and other computer parts under the agreement, said IBM spokesman Jon Iwata. The parts are made by IBM in Japan, he said. BELL ATLANTIC TO OPEN NEW UNIT: Bell Atlantic Corp. plans to unveil a new consulting division next month, trade publication Network World reports. The division, to be located in Frazer, Pa., will include a $1 million testing lab to provide local- and wide-area network integration products and services. The unit will start with 70 employees. It will provide hardware, software, design and installation for data networks. SPECIAL PACKAGE ON EFFECTS: KODAK USES 200 PEOPLE IN AD: In a Kodak ad running during the Olympics, spectators in a stadium hold up cards to form photographs of athletes. Kodak filmed about 200 people with cards in a stadium in Buenos Aires, shot a crowded soccer game in the same stadium, then used computer graphic imaging to re-create the card-flipping with different photographs. MORPHING DONE WHILE MOVING: A Miller Lite ad uses morphing. It has been popular since it turned Michael Jackson into a panther in his "Black and White." Miller used it last year to turn a jukebox into Rod Stewart in a Genuine Draft ad. But this ad transforms moving, not stationary, figures. As a couple dance, their costumes change via computer mixing of the pixels, or dots, that make up each image. MORPHING IS TAKEN TO NEXT STEP: The new technology keeps morphing one step ahead of jaded viewers, says Tom Kennedy, executive producer at Industrial Light and Magic, which created the effect. Previous ads "have morphed in the simplest of conditions," he says. "This upped the ante, with people in recognizable surroundings, whom we continue to recognize as they change." (End of package.) Technology Editor: Ed Kelleher. (1-919-855-3491) Making copies of USA TODAY Update (Copyright, 1992) for further distribution violates federal law. This article is copyright 1992 Gannett News Service. 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