Celestial Size Chart

There are several videos circulating showing a comparison of the largest stars. I like these kind of things, and I wanted to try one myself. Probably because I also watched "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan as a kid. Actually my first Youtube upload. Hope you like it...

This is a crisp and clear star size chart to help me understand my place in the universe. ​

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Leaving Earth: Timelapse of Moving Away from Earth

The Mercury-bound MESSENGER spacecraft captured several stunning images of Earth during a gravity assist swingby of its home planet on Aug. 2, 2005. Several hundred images, taken with the wide-angle camera in MESSENGER's Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS), were sequenced into a movie documenting the view from MESSENGER as it departed Earth.

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From NASA: 

Explanation: What it would look like to leave planet Earth? Such an event was recorded visually in great detail by the MESSENGER spacecraft as it swung back past the Earth, eight years ago, on its way in toward the planet Mercury. Earth can be seen rotating in this time-lapse video, as it recedes into the distance. The sunlit half of Earth is so bright that background stars are not visible. The robotic MESSENGER spacecraft is now in orbit around Mercury and has recently concluded the first complete map of the surface. On occasion, MESSENGER has continued to peer back at its home world. MESSENGER is one of the few things created on the Earth that has left and will never return -- at the end of its mission MESSENGER will be crashed into Mercury's surface. 

Why We Point Our Most Expensive Cameras Out: The Beauty of Space Photography

Space presents a fantastic mystery to human life. Unfathomably large, with characteristics that defy our experience and understanding, the stars have perplexed and amazed humanity for our entire recorded history, and likely before. In the present, astrophysicists and astronomers are aggressively studying the universe in an attempt to solve critical scientific and philosophical questions.

Astrophysicist Dr. Emily Rice, Hubble Image Processor Zolt Levay and Astronomer David W. Hogg were brought together in this video by PBS to talk on why it's so beautiful and how it's so important to take photos of space.

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5 - Our Planets

Song : The crew cuts · Sh-boom

Lovely animation by Pablo Maximiliano of our planets.

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5 - The Earth - Overview Effect

On the 40th anniversary of the famous ‘Blue Marble’ photograph taken of Earth from space, Planetary Collective presents a short film documenting astronauts’ life-changing stories of seeing the Earth from the outside – a perspective-altering experience often described as the Overview Effect. The Overview Effect, first described by author Frank White in 1987, is an experience that transforms astronauts’ perspective of the planet and mankind’s place upon it. Common features of the experience are a feeling of awe for the planet, a profound understanding of the interconnection of all life, and a renewed sense of responsibility for taking care of the environment. ‘Overview’ is a short film that explores this phenomenon through interviews with five astronauts who have experienced the Overview Effect. The film also features insights from commentators and thinkers on the wider implications and importance of this understanding for society, and our relationship to the environment. CAST • EDGAR MITCHELL – Apollo 14 astronaut and founder of the Institute of Noetic Sciences • RON GARAN – ISS astronaut and founder of humanitarian organization Fragile Oasis • NICOLE STOTT – Shuttle and ISS astronaut and member of Fragile Oasis • JEFF HOFFMAN – Shuttle astronaut and senior lecturer at MIT • SHANE KIMBROUGH – Shuttle/ISS astronaut and Lieutenant Colonel in the US Army • FRANK WHITE – space theorist and author of the book ‘The Overview Effect’ • DAVID LOY- philosopher and author • DAVID BEAVER – philosopher and co-founder of The Overview Institute ———- CREW Produced by: GUY REID, STEVE KENNEDY, CHRISTOPHER FERSTAD Director: GUY REID Editor: STEVE KENNEDY Director of Photography: CHRISTOPHER FERSTAD Original Score: HUMAN SUITS Dubbing Mixer: PATCH MORRISON ———- TECHNICAL INFORMATION Filmed with Canon 5D Mk ii. Additional footage from NASA / ESA archives Duration: 19 minutes ———- Planetary Collective: http://www.planetarycollective.com/ Overview Microsite: http://www.overviewthemovie.com/ Human Suits (original score): http://www.humansuits.com/ For more information: The Overview Institute: http://www.overviewinstitute.org/ Fragile Oasis: http://www.fragileoasis.org/

The original Blue Marble photo (to the right) is 40 years old now. I find it and this video extremely moving and oddly comforting.

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1 - Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot in Animation

A visual response to Carl Sagan's famed 'Pale Blue Dot' monologue, where he muses on our planet's appearance in a photograph taken by the Voyager 1 space probe. The most distant photograph ever taken of Earth. A personal project designed and created in After effects with extensive sound work created in addition to the music from Cosmos and spoken word from Sagan. Have wanted to bring visuals to something by Sagan for some time and finished this after working on it periodically over the last 3 months. (Edit: Now with added grammar!) Thanks for taking the time to view. twitter.com/thisisorder www.facebook.com/thisisORDER www.thisisorder.com

"From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it’s different. Consider again that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives."

A remarkable animation by studio ORDER. 

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3 - Timelapse of the Australian Solar Eclipse

I was fortunate to view the eclipse from "The Granite' in far north Queensland this November. Inspired by Joe Cali's short but spectacular footage of the 2008 event (https://vimeo.com/51646602), I sought a high vantage point to capture the sweep of the shadow. Clear views north and east proved difficult to find, so I had to hike an 850m peak the night before and sleep on a rock ledge. The clip includes 3 timelapses at various focal lengths. The first used a constant exposure, while the latter 2 tracked the light in the final 2 minutes either side of C2/C3, using bulb scripting. Eclipse Orchestrator software managed the light curve, while the cameras were triggered by a custom microcontroller built by Thomas Bethel. Many thanks to Fred Bruenjes and Thomas Bethel. You can find out more about my eclipse experience here: https://www.facebook.com/ColinLeggPhotography

Australia had a solar eclipse last month. Photographer Colin Legg made this outstanding timelapse of it.

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3 - The Known Universe

WPAHP on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/wpahp Recommendation: View with headphones or high quality speakers in 1080p. A combination of: ~ The American Museum of Natural History - The Known Universe ~ Hans Zimmer - Time (We Plants Are Happy Plants Remix) From the American Museum of Natural History: The Known Universe takes viewers from the Himalayas through our atmosphere and the inky black of space to the afterglow of the Big Bang.

From the American Museum of Natural History:

"The Known Universe takes viewers from the Himalayas through our atmosphere and the inky black of space to the afterglow of the Big Bang. Every star, planet, and quasar seen in the film is possible because of the world's most complete four-dimensional map of the universe, the Digital Universe Atlas that is maintained and updated by astrophysicists at the American Museum of Natural History. The new film, created by the Museum, is part of an exhibition, Visions of the Cosmos: From the Milky Ocean to an Evolving Universe, at the Rubin Museum of Art in Manhattan through May 2010. "

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