For the Juniors: Tall buildings that won't fall

Shot of a modern building. The camera pans over to the neighbouring building under construction.

MARVIN: Hey, what's going on over there?

NARRATOR: It's another tall building going up. Why don't we take a closer look?

The camera zooms into the building under construction. This is followed by shots of several construction workers doing different jobs in the building.

NARRATOR: It takes lots of hard work to put a building up…

Two construction workers wearing hard hats have a discussion over some building plans.

MAN: Plumbing over here on the eastern side, that's basically complete.

NARRATOR: ..and lots of talking and planning.

MAN: Need to finalise the western side.

MAN 2: Where are we up to in the lighting?

MAN: Basically, all of Level 4 lighting is now complete.

NARRATOR: These men are checking that the work is being done the way the building plans say it should.

Shot of the building plans.

MAN 2: I think the power's alright. It's finished on this floor.

NARRATOR: The plans show how the building should be put together and where certain things go…

As the narrator speaks, lines and boxes on the building plan show where each of the items are supposed to be located.

NARRATOR: ..like doors… windows… bathrooms… and lifts.

Shot of a detailed model of the building.

NARRATOR: People sometimes make models of buildings to check they've got the design right and to show people who might be interested in buying parts of the building what it will look like.

Close-up shots of the various parts of the model building.

MARVIN: I can see the car park entrance. And look at all the balconies the apartments will have. And… and look! There's a swimming pool in there. Having a model makes it much easier to imagine what the finished building will look like.

Shot of the exterior of the building under construction, followed by a shot of construction workers pouring liquid concrete onto a section of a floor.

NARRATOR: One of the concrete floors is being poured today. The steel rods being buried under the concrete will give the floor more strength.

Shots of workers levelling the concrete.

NARRATOR: Everyone works fast to spread and smooth the concrete out before it becomes solid and hard.

Time-lapse footage shows the concrete being laid out over the entire surface.

Shot of the pillars in the interior of the building.

NARRATOR: This building is being held up by lots of really strong concrete columns. Like the floors, this concrete also has steel rods through it to make it even stronger.

Shot of the steel rods on the roof where the construction workers are pouring the concrete.

NARRATOR: You could see some of these rods sticking up from the floor before the concrete was poured.

Computer-generated model of the building, showing the ground beneath it.

NARRATOR: Another thing that makes this building strong is the foundations underneath it.

Concrete pillars are added to the ground below the building in the model.

NARRATOR: Putting part of a structure underground makes it more stable.

The screen splits to show a shot of a large tree in a park. Roots are drawn below the visible part of the tree to show the resemblance to the concrete pillars below the building.

NARRATOR: The ground helps to hold it up, just like the ground around the roots of a tree help to hold it up.

Concrete walls are added around the pillars in the model.

NARRATOR: These foundations are made of concrete. They're surrounded by reinforced concrete walls to stop water from the ground seeping into them and making them weak.