In a recent ITV documentary the claim was made that Libyan supplied heavy weapons were used to shoot down a British Army helicopter in Northern Ireland, showing actual footage from the attack.
The footage is from the computer game ArmA 2 as widely reported.
The IRA propaganda clip below would seem to be the same one
Of course, the wider story has some elements of truth but seriously, how can you look at those clips and not see they are a video game?
Even if you could argue that maybe they just thought the pixel effects were due to a shitty old camera, did the men parachuting out of the helicopter not eventually make someone go “hang on a second…”?
This is a real milestone, guys. Parachuting and the dodgy clouds of smoke aside, that footage looks reasonably convincing – doesn’t it? I mean, not as in “looks like NI” but “looks like live action footage” – and the sort of CGI you get on games is only going to improve. Convincing faking of full motion video is going to be the kind of thing that anyone can do at home, within five years. (Look up “machinima” for the roots of an entirely new sort of art.)
a – that might be very true (though it’s been said within the game industry every year since about 1993 that soon you won’t tell the difference between real actors / game characters …), but it is more a terrible reflection on the generally crappy journalism of itv. let’s face it, no one in the uk was particularly shocked by this cock-up. it’s lazy and show poor standards, but then most journalists can’t find their arse with either hand …
i guess what is more worrying, and perhaps this was your point, that soon enemy nations / forces could use such tools to fake atrocities committed by our forces (ie. afghanistan etc) to try and muster local support / world wide condemnation … in that case its just good old fashioned propaganda with a modern flava (apologies!).
I am too busy shooting space invaders to comment.
“Of course, the wider story has some elements of truth but seriously, how can you look at those clips and not see they are a video game?”
Because it is what you *want* so see…
Because you are less than 35 yrs old and think *every* event was filmed as it is these days…
Because you are a lazy journalist…
This was presumably the clip they should have used c/o Jason L over on tank-net.com
You have to admit that defence reporting is pretty woeful with reporters being able to say pretty much anything they like – anything with tracks is a tank, a ZPU-2 is a ‘heavy anti aircraft gun’ etc. It makes you wonder if they’d get away with showing football footage on the news from FIFA ’09 PC and constantly getting the names and roles of the players (and sometimes the side they’re playing for) wrong. My fave so far from the Libyan reporting was a woman CNN reporter pointing to an M151 and saying the rebels were resorting to using World War two vehicles “like this Willys Jeep”.
And another one – also looks like a DShk/M.
Omelette – at least journos can spell!
Even though they are dumb enough to think that game footage was a grainy 80s camcorder or something.
(Ducks for cover, then starts digging in …)