Homemade Spacecraft on Vimeo

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2. Homemade Spacecraft (textless version)

by Luke Geissbuhler

1 year ago

1. Homemade Spacecraft

by Luke Geissbuhler

1 year ago

Video from a weather balloon that rose into the upper stratosphere and recorded the blackness of space. Visit brooklynspaceprogram.org to support the team.

Credits

9,299 Likes

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Tags

mathieu hamel 1 year ago

great idea!
superdobby 1 year ago

Waouuw. Super génial.

Très belle vidéo. Trop fort.
:-)
Jordan Megahy 1 year ago

An interstellar idea!
Alex Beston 1 year ago

idea? he actually implemented it!
HDtimelapse.net 1 month ago

Great project!
worker_robot 1 year ago

This is amazing, nice job!!
Karthik Kumar Viswanathan 1 year ago

This is Amazing! How many baloons did you use?! :-)

It was a great idea to track it with instatracker: very ingenious!
J. C. 1 year ago

Brilliant. What camera did you use?
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

Glad you liked it. We used a Go Pro Hero HD. The most amazing little camera since the Bolex.
Sam Gardner 1 year ago

I'd send a link over to them, not every camera can go to space and back in one piece! You'd probably get some freebies haha
jacob galle 1 year ago

beautiful.
c speranza 1 year ago

Amazing
Andrea Biffi 1 year ago

Cool!
elias ressegatti 1 year ago

this is incredible. i want every kid to have dads like you.

btw. your last name sounds swiss...
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

Indeed it is. Thanks for the kind words.
IOCTL 1 year ago

Damn right!
George Shtefan 1 year ago

Right on!
Ana Trkulja 7 months ago

I agree with Elias! :0)
about the kids part :0)
Kalvin Khoo 4 months ago

Me too. I wish all the kids have a dad like you. Agree with Elias. :)

By the way, thanks Luke for the video and a inspiring idea of doing this experiment.
Aleksandar Kolundzija 1 year ago

Luke, this is truly amazing. Thanks for sharing.
7&7 Films 1 year ago

That is so cool.
john david 1 year ago

awesome little project!

I hope you'll keep working on new and improved versions :)
Polemico Pictures 1 year ago

That's awesome! Best science project ever. Max is a very lucky kid. and thanks for turning me on to the Go Pro. it rocks. -JonM
Sami Sänpäkkilä 1 year ago

Really inspiring!!!
eugen kelemen 1 year ago

exceptional. cheers guys!
Filip Hammarnäs 1 year ago

Incredible! I'm amazed!
Filip in Sweden :)
merlin pardo 1 year ago

:) Génial! Bravo les gars!
From Paris, France.
Mathias Willerup 1 year ago

Inspirational. Awesome.
Mathias
Denmark
Rowan Strang 1 year ago

This is AMAZING, gives me shivers!
Laurie 1 year ago

This is the most amazing thing I can ever recall seeing.
furory 1 year ago

That is brilliant - an inspiration to fathers and budding astronauts everywhere
simon ware 1 year ago

you need to start speaking to this guy

robertharrison.org/icarus/wordpress/
Daniel Hayek 1 year ago

I love the sound!
Downforce Media 1 year ago

This is one of the coolest things I have ever seen in my life! When I was a child in the 1970s my brother and I tried a similar experiment but we only attached a thermometer. It traveled about 100 miles from the site that we deployed it and was returned due to a similar note we placed in it. We thought that was so cool. Your experiment was perfect. My hat is off to you.
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

So what was the temperature?!
David Shin 1 year ago

This was absolutely ridiculous! Do you have a site where you listed the parts that you used and/or instructions on how you built this thing? I would love to give it a try myself if possible.

BTW ... I found out about this video via ESPN's SportsNation:
espn.go.com/video/clip?id=5623054&categoryid=2378529
Danny Roozen 1 year ago

Did you have to get any special permission to release the balloon to that altitude?

I don't know the rules concerning this but it's absolutely brilliant!!
svanes 1 year ago

i have a similar question, to which i have a second question to add (and it's not with the intent to be nosy or critical): were there any concerns that the spacecraft could pose a problem by crossing the flight path of airplanes?
David Shin 1 year ago

Some other guy carried out an almost identical project over in England and he said he had to contact FAA for permission and a license.

youtube.com/watch?v=0b0NyiB8APQ
About 1:55 into the clip.
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

Yes, I'm certainly not the first to do this. We're all just trying to improve on the design and have a successful recovery. You do need FAA approval and notification. The craft was built within FAA regulations for weather balloon payload which I highly recommend adhering to. We also made sure to launch out of city air space. Every commercial plane is required to have two engines in case it strikes a bird or such. Lastly, if you run the probability of striking a plane, you'll see that it is extremely, extremely low. There is no record of a weather balloon causing a plane to crash since they started keeping track in 1962, but you can't be too careful. Here's the FAA link.

ecfr.gpoaccess.gov/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=ecfr&sid=ea968eea871ed9ab2380f6d979eaa7a6&rgn=div5&view=text&node=14:2.0.1.3.15&idno=14
Rick Macomber 1 year ago

cool documentation... let's just hope that every vimeoean doesn't now decide to launch one of these balloons all on the same day!
Pedro Resende 9 months ago

Toshiba made it in 2009 but it is the fist time I see a regular person doing it: youtube.com/watch?v=k6PSbUl_68k
Ed Hawco 1 year ago

Wow, what a fun project! But I have two questions:

1) The opening titles begin with "In August 2010 we set out to send a camera to space" and end with "After eight months of research and testing..." But August 2010 was only ONE month ago. Theoretically, this film has jumped back in time by seven months!

2) Why did you choose a cloudy day? Wouldn't a sunny day have been better visually, as you could have seen the ground during the flight?

Oh one more thing... any plans for a sequel? :-)

e
d
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

You're right it's poor phrasing. We set out to "launch" in August 2010 after months of R&D.

We had no choice but to launch on that day. It was very stormy while we were upstate and we had a window that was calm with Northerly winds, so we took it. Funny though, I think the clouds might make one feel higher off of the earth than if you'd see the land masses. I was missing the geography myself though too. No complaints. I was interested in what's above the clouds anyway.
Abby 1 year ago

This is so cool!
Milk Products 1 year ago

Blast off!
yes.
yes.
yes.
Camilo Bejarano 1 year ago

awesome, what a great idea!
alex 1 year ago

Incredible!
Brad Miller 1 year ago

Did you have FAA approval?
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

see above reply
David 1 year ago

Brilliant! What size weather balloon did you use?
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

It was a balloon that was rated to burst at 19'. But it has everything to do with your payload weight. FAA requires that it's below 4 lbs. Ours was a pound and a half. The lighter it is, the faster it will rise and the less helium you have to put into it and so the more it can expand into the oversized balloon, hence the higher it will go. It also has to be able to shred in a jet engine, which isn't easy. There are density requirements and you can't use any cable or tie that won't break with 50lbs of weight among other things. This is why it took so much R&D.
Jay Robinson 1 year ago

This is amazing!
Craig Birmingham 1 year ago

Too cool - good work guys.
mpared 1 year ago

very cool posted at the curious brain
abi 1 year ago

excellent
Ade Rowbotham 1 year ago

What a great project to inspire your kids. Fantastic.
Steve Montalto 1 year ago

This is so very cool! What a great way to get the kids interested in science and experimenting!
Christina Velasco 1 year ago

Such a fantastic project to do — and to do it with your kids! I love it!
Carlos De la Peña 1 year ago

Cool, never seen anything like it. Loved it.
Michael Dacre 1 year ago

I hope when I eventually have kids I am half this cool.

What a brilliant idea, I am amazed it actually worked!
Paul Gamba 1 year ago

Thank you so much for sharing this. This was exciting and a great lesson. Do you have any of your notes to share so that some of us other fathers can share this with our kids? Thanks gain this is great.
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

I wrote some things above. Be responsible is the biggest.
Yann L'hénoret 1 year ago

This is so poetic also...
selfish pig racing 1 year ago

very cool!!!!
dave huffman 1 year ago

Awesome video.
Blue Skies 1 year ago

Incredible!
No Name 1 year ago

Tears in my eyes, man. What a great way to get your kids interested in science. So, so cool.
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

Wow, thanks. It's funny how many people react to the father son thing. We were just having fun.
Oliver Reischl 1 year ago

Hey, if my dad would have done something like this with me, i'd be a freakin scientist by now! :-D

Great project!
Ken Hall 1 year ago

Well, Luke. You have to admit, even though you might be calling it "just having fun", your kid will thank you someday for doing anything with him. We as Dads have an obligation to put an imprint on their lives that is positive and just doing something like this is way better than most Dad's are doing with their son's right now. I don't care if you thought it was just having fun, you are a cool Dad anyway! And btw, I would love to try this out with my 5 y/o son. He craves "Daddy" time and this would be a great project for us to do. I hope you don't mind us trying it out. I hate taking other people's ideas and using them for myself, but I gotta try it even if just once. We are space/aircraft/science buffs here and he would just love the opportunity to do something like this I'm sure. Kuddos, Luke! You are a cool Dad!
Luis Caffesse 1 year ago

Absolutely awesome. Fantastic!
Josiah Kortje 1 year ago

this is so amazing!!! wow, wow, wow, wow, wow,!!!!!!!!!!!!!
zonabi 1 year ago

beautiful
Jorgeeeeenho 1 year ago

Wow! Beautiful! I'm completely amazed.
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

Here are the FAA rules regarding unmanned free balloons.

ecfr.gpoaccess.gov/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=ecfr&sid=ea968eea871ed9ab2380f6d979eaa7a6&rgn=div5&view=text&node=14:2.0.1.3.15&idno=14
Camp Mozart 1 year ago

so beautiful it almost made me cry

iamcornelia.com/?p=1121
nick humphrey 1 year ago

i had to keep telling myself to breathe once it was in space! =)
Charles Hunt 1 year ago

Brilliant and beautiful. Thanks.
G MCK 1 year ago

STUNNING 3 QUESTIONS
1. Was that a Volvo you were driving? .If so nice :)
2.How did you measure the altitude ?
3 Next time would you consider sending one of the kids up to keep the camera warm?
david w pinkston 1 year ago

if luke can do this, maybe there's hope vimeo can have a decent video player
david w pinkston 1 year ago

vimeo is just slo-load. i could understand having to buffer when i had entry level dsl, but i have next to fastest dsl now. this doesn't happen on youtube.
Dominic Wood 1 year ago

Random trolling ftw?
Mark Petereit 1 year ago

I'm on AT&T's slowest DSL and it played beautifully.
Oscar Falcón Lara 1 year ago

THAT WAS AWESOME! brilliant experiment!
Estelle Bajou 1 year ago

Incredible.
Christopher M. Ryan 1 year ago

Whoa! Fantastic!
condor 1 year ago

You really inspired me.I have a question.Did you calculate landing spot.Of course you cant calculate it precisly.if you made prediction about landing area , what variables did you use to calculate it?
Thanks a lot.
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

We watched weather radar animations for a few days. We were totally off as to where it was going to land because you can't see how "thick" the winds are and calculating how fast it will rise through them is high science. Honestly, we just wanted to keep it out of the Atlantic (and New York City) and picked the launch spot accordingly. It must have back-tracked because it launched going south, and ended up 30 miles due North.
Jon Witort 1 year ago

You could have had foursquare check in at 100,000ft... you'd be the mayor of outer space! :)
JMS 1 year ago

I'm giving you credit for this:

edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/social.media/10/22/astronaut.foursquare.space/
Dren Qerkini 11 months ago

Good idea :)
Markus Zapke-Gründemann 1 year ago

Wow, what a brilliant idea. And a great inspiration for the kids to be creative.
Stephen Clee 1 year ago

That's unbelievable! Makes me even more stoked for my GoPro camera in the mail :)
Jamtron 1 year ago

Way to copy N.A.S.A. guys. You should check out their stuff, it's really high-tech.
Luke Geissbuhler 1 year ago

Check out this freaky footage. It's a pinhole camera attached to a booster rocket as it separates and falls into the ocean. Incredible.

tv.gawker.com/5616778/the-beauty-of-plummeting-out-of-the-sky
PointOfViewCameras 1 year ago

very very cool, we had another one we were sharing, which we found done by a group of Engineers and Designers in San Francisco.. and yours beat their altitude!

pointofviewcameras.com/blog/pov/article/gopro-hd-hero-falls-80000-feet-back-to-earth
Mike Marshall 1 year ago

Thanks so much for posting this. Very inspiring!
e jones 1 year ago

WOW!!! very cool!
Fran Marin 1 year ago

compelling stuff!