script

a video by David Navis

Why Leaves Change Color

Video Script

Video Script - Why Leaves Change Color
Video	Audio

Scene opens with Dr. Dave coming out of a pile of leaves. Closes in for a close up. Opens up to wide-angle shot.	D: Hi Class Dr. Dave here once again with this weeks science. Have you ever seen leaves change color? Have you ever seen leaves change colors on the trees? Have you ever wonder why leaves change color? Look around – it’s happening here.
Cut to Title, “Why Leaves Change Color”
Pan and zoom from leaves to Doc talking	D: Native American’s also wondered how the leaves changed color. They developed a belief that is called a myth. According to this myth, hunters in the Heavens killed the Great Bear in Autumn and its blood dripped over Earth's forests coloring some of the leaves red. As the hunters cooked the meat, fat dripped from the Heavens and colored some of the leaves yellow. Dr. Dave then goes on to point out that there is a more modern myth still around today. It seems that most folks assume old Jack Frost is responsible for changes in leaf color, but, that’s not so. Many leaves begin to turn before we have any frosts.
Cut to thermometer	D: points out that the temperature, although cold compared to Riyadh, is not below freezing. Rather, the change in coloring is the result of chemical processes that take place in the tree as the seasons change.
Close up of leaf	D: during the Spring and Summer, a food-making process takes place in the leaf in cells containing the pigment chlorophyll. Pigment is described as being a color. This pigment gives the leaf its green color.
Camera back on Doc who is all green, background is green	D: The chlorophyll absorbs energy from sunlight and uses it in transforming carbon dioxide and water to carbohydrates, such as sugars and starch.
Doc takes off layers of different colors	D: Everything is green. All summer long the chlorophyll produces food for the tree. In the fall, the chlorophyll stops producing, the color starts changing.
Flash close up of leave changing color highlighting the loss of circulation in the leaf	D: You can see here and actual leaf. As the cool air and shorter days of sunlight occur, the leaf begins to go asleep. The food the leaf produces isn’t as much and the ends of the leaf begin to lose their energy.
Back to Doc:	D: It’s kind of like your arms or legs going to sleep. Have you ever had that happen to you? Well, have you? You just can’t use them anymore! They’re kind of like wet noodles!
Doc holding banana	D: Here’s another way to look at it. See this green banana? When it’s picked off the tree the color is green. As it gets older, it changes color. And you know what color that is? Come on Mrs. Self, tell us what color is a banana? (pause) That’s right it’s yellow. That’s because the chlorophyll stops producing food … just like a leaf!
Cut to Doc standing under a naked tree Close up of leaf and stem	D: Whoa – look at this tree! It’s naked! It looks like it’s already asleep. But how did it loose all it’s leaves? Well, once the sunlight decreases in the fall, the separation layer forms at the base of the leaf stem. This causes it to become really weak.
Wind and rain begin to fall on Doc	D: Once the rain starts to fall and the wind start to blow, their weight and pressure cause the leaf to fall off the trees. Oh no!
Doc is back - normal - Review lesson	D: Oh hi again - I hope you enjoyed leaving about the leaves that fall in the fall. Get it? Fall in the fall? Oh never mind. The leaves change their color because they don't produce anymore food called chlorophyll. Once that happen, the leaves turn from green to another color. Shortly ater that the leaves begin to fall off and the tree begins to go to sleep.