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46. Scale
1 year ago
If you liked 'SCALE', please watch my next astronomy video: 'VISION - A plea to save the James Webb space telescope'. vimeo.com/30224434
Please also have a look at my new showreel here: vimeo.com/25506876
From bradblogspeed.com Check out this post at post.ly/1XOrk
Please follow me at twitter.com/bradgoodspeed
NOTE: THE FOLLOWING VIDEO DOES NOT REPRESENT THE ENTIRE NIGHT SKY, or at least it doesn't anymore. I've updated the video to omit the foreground landscape in an effort to account for an error in perspective. Unfortunately, due to my error, websites are widely reporting that Jupiter would fill the entire night sky, but it wouldn't. What's depicted here is a much narrower perspective than the previously mentioned 62 degrees, something that I imagine could be calculated by people much brighter than I. I imagine this view is closer to what you'd see through some very weak binoculars, but that's just a guess. For a somewhat technical explanation of what was wrong with the original version of this video, and what that realization can teach us about skepticism, please read the following: bradblogspeed.com/im-bad-at-math
ORIGINAL POST
Here's an animation I did to make you feel small, and also convey the deep awe I feel at the feet of the Universe.
While watching the video of the lunar eclipse I posted the other day I was looking at the curvature of the earth's shadow on the moon. It made me think about how large the earth might look if an exact copy of it was up there instead of the moon. Soon curiosity got the better of me, and I was animating!
So the basic idea is, each planet you see is the size it would appear in the sky if it shared an orbit with the moon, 380,000 kms from earth. I created this video in After Effects, and because of certain technical considerations had to keep the field of view at 62 degrees. That means the foreground element is not precisely to scale. I realized this after the fact and may update the video at some point in the future. All planets are to correct scale with one another in any case.
Please watch full screen in HD if possible. Oh! And please consider sharing with your friends on Twitter or Facebook.
Music: Where We're Calling From - Doves
Great write-up by Jessicsa Palmer at Bioephemera: scienceblogs.com/bioephemera/2011/02/art_vs_science_part_4_gas_gian.php
Please also have a look at my new showreel here: vimeo.com/25506876
From bradblogspeed.com Check out this post at post.ly/1XOrk
Please follow me at twitter.com/bradgoodspeed
NOTE: THE FOLLOWING VIDEO DOES NOT REPRESENT THE ENTIRE NIGHT SKY, or at least it doesn't anymore. I've updated the video to omit the foreground landscape in an effort to account for an error in perspective. Unfortunately, due to my error, websites are widely reporting that Jupiter would fill the entire night sky, but it wouldn't. What's depicted here is a much narrower perspective than the previously mentioned 62 degrees, something that I imagine could be calculated by people much brighter than I. I imagine this view is closer to what you'd see through some very weak binoculars, but that's just a guess. For a somewhat technical explanation of what was wrong with the original version of this video, and what that realization can teach us about skepticism, please read the following: bradblogspeed.com/im-bad-at-math
ORIGINAL POST
Here's an animation I did to make you feel small, and also convey the deep awe I feel at the feet of the Universe.
While watching the video of the lunar eclipse I posted the other day I was looking at the curvature of the earth's shadow on the moon. It made me think about how large the earth might look if an exact copy of it was up there instead of the moon. Soon curiosity got the better of me, and I was animating!
So the basic idea is, each planet you see is the size it would appear in the sky if it shared an orbit with the moon, 380,000 kms from earth. I created this video in After Effects, and because of certain technical considerations had to keep the field of view at 62 degrees. That means the foreground element is not precisely to scale. I realized this after the fact and may update the video at some point in the future. All planets are to correct scale with one another in any case.
Please watch full screen in HD if possible. Oh! And please consider sharing with your friends on Twitter or Facebook.
Music: Where We're Calling From - Doves
Great write-up by Jessicsa Palmer at Bioephemera: scienceblogs.com/bioephemera/2011/02/art_vs_science_part_4_gas_gian.php
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Alas, here's the excuse I've been giving. ;-)
"To keep the maximum dramatic effect I went only with representatives of the size classes of planets. Saturn's a lot less massive than the big guy but it's radius isn't that much smaller. (60,268km)
I wanted the jump to Jupiter to be dramatic, so showing Saturn first would have spoiled it."
Strange how much it makes me feel big brotherly towards Mars - I don't think I ever took it that it was smaller than earth. (And yes, blimey, Jupiter!)
Just want to keep attribution in check, at least at first.
Would be good to download and watch outside of the browser.
If that so, I'll move from Earth to nowhere.
I hope you can compare it also with other galaxies and stars.
:-O
I first wondered why you hadn't shown the Sun then realised it is about twice as big as the orbit of the moon!
But does make me think you could do something similar with the Sun, and show some other stars in place of the Sun?
For more on that, check out my little doc on music here: bradblogspeed.com/a-love-song-for-love-songs-the-podumentary
Also I'd like to see Saturn too!
your video will probably have more impact on the "average joe" knowledge on the solar system, than years of school education :-)
but having said that, i'm disappointed that it actually creates a false impression about the planet sizes, especially Jupiter.
looking at your own data, Jupiter is about 40 times larger than the Moon, so its apparent diameter would be only 21 degrees. this is far from covering the whole sky, as the video suggests, and even far from filling your declared 62 degrees field of view. The curved horizon strongly suggests fisheye-like wide angle camera, which improves the dramatic Jupiter effect, but makes the actual size comparison very difficult.
i used Stellarium to place the all the planets (including everyone's favorite Saturn) on the Moon orbit, and here is the result:
forum.astropolis.pl/topic/35098-porownaj-wielkosci-planet-w-swoim-stellarium/page__pid__414930#entry414930
the above post is in Polish, but you can ignore the text and go straight to the picture.
there is also a modified ssystem.ini file in case you wanted to recreate this (or similar) view in your Stellarium.
btw. ANYONE interested in astronomy should install Stellarium, which is not only easy to use and nice looking, but also completely free :-)
It's like that quote goes, which I'm about to butcher: "It's only error and never truth that's diminished with greater inspection."
JKBdaybreaks.blogspot
I follow your reasoning, and obviously your tools are much better than mine for building this sort of model.
As I mentioned to somebody else that brought this up, I'm at least a little bit comfortable with the artistic license, because the technical specifications of the human eye aren't necessarily directly related to the way we perceive things neurologically, at least I think not.
By that I mean, when we look at the moon it 'seems' larger than half a degree, because we tune out the surrounding noise and focus on the one item of interest.
Don't know if that makes any sense or if I'm just full of it, but that was how I justified it as an artistic interpretation. Of course, the only way to accurately illustrate how it would 'look' would be using some interactive 3D hologram, but on a flat screen there's some degree of artistic license needed.
That's my defense! Strap on the cuffs! ;-)
using a wide view, like in my picture, reveals the "true" scale, but removes most of the dramatic effect... so it's probably inevitable that some things should be hidden from the viewer... like in magic tricks ;-)
and here is another picture from Stellarium - wide angle shot of our nice big planets in dawn sky:
img51.imageshack.us/f/planetsdawn.jpg/
I suppose I could have fixed it when I updated the video but that was going to be a huge render, and I'm lazy.
I would love to do a version of this where the planets are inserted into motion tracked footage so we could get a sense of what it might look like from the surface.
Great choice of music too!
(one of my personal faves for listening to whilst imagining flying past the solar system's planets is ulrich schnauss's 'on my own'. Erm, does anyone else do that sort of shit? :0)
I've always wondered what it would be like to see a massive planet right next to us, and this is so much more meaningful then trawling thru artists impressions of exoplanets on google (i assume i'm not the only one doing that sort of shit, either? :0D.)
Neptune's smaller than i expected actually.
(i'll predictably join the cry for Saturn tho)
Good work, sir :0)
All hail The Universe!
You know, you could have just looked at the pictures of the rising earth taken by the Apollo astronauts. But I'm glad you didn't because I like this kind of "What if...?"-animations.
Marc
Wasn't 2011 the year we were supposed to be able to think of a gastropub on Jupiter really hard and just teleport to it? It would save having the astrogation reticle or portal-of-unusual-size flip through a magazine of planets, waiting for the light to close the gap, etc.
Either way, very nice work!
Nice touch, the "black smoke" sound. Or is it just me?
Awesome vid.