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The Weather -- The Movie

The cloud mass hurtles in from the Tasman and forms a vicious whirlpool, thrashing at New Zealand. Then it quietens down and scuds off to the east, leaving the country in peace until the next bank appears.

It's a film made from infra-red scanner pictures, taken once an hour from the Japanese GMS satellite in geostationary orbit over Papua New Guinea.

"It's a first for this part of the world," says Victoria University meteorologist Dr Jim McGregor, who prepared the film. "The complexity of the weather systems is fascinating. It's a tremendous exercise in interpretation, even for experienced meteorologists -- different people see different things in it."

Some weather forecasters have said, on seeing the film, that if they had known New Zealand's weather patterns were so complicated they might never have entered the profession.

McGregor and his colleagues are now working on producing videos through computer processing of the satellite data, which is simpler and quicker than shooting film. They plan to use video discs, which will allow the speed and direction of sequences to be controlled through a computer keyboard.