Tis the day to celebrate by blowing stuff up, as long as it's not yourself or your neighbor. Fourth of July, aka, Independence Day, should legally be allowed to change its name to Fireworks Day. The typical Fourth of July celebration goes something like this: start cooking out a sometime in the afternoon, consume beer or other alcoholic beverage for the majority of the day, and when it gets dark, blow the holy hell out of whatever fireworks you were able to procure. Sometimes, acquiring the fireworks, at least above and beyond what your local WalMart sells, sometimes requires a road trip, but it's definitely worth it.
Just as long as you don't blow yourself or anyone else up.
With that in mind, the lead video, which appeared at PopSci.com, demonstrates what happens when you add these wonderful items filled with gunpowder and colorful, sparkly powder to common household items, something of a natural occurrence on YouTube. The difference between PopSci's demonstration and the amateur home video someone uploaded of their uncle blowing up the television is immense, if, for nothing else, that wonderful film trick called slow motion.
From the post's description:
The Phantom line of ultra-high-speed video cameras have held PopSci's rapt attention even before the v12 model won our Best of What's New Award in 2008. So what better way to celebrate our nation's independence than aiming a Phantom v641 from New Jersey's Vision Research at all manner of explosives, resulting in high-definition footage of fireworks going off at a glorious 2,000 frames per second?
For me, there isn't one. Apologies if you wanted a killer fireworks display, but, we're here to please so try these:
While the Washington D.C. fireworks display is pretty cool, it would be much better if it was filmed in slow motion, just like PopSci's educational video.