Here’s an amazing time-lapse created using NASA’s Earth Observatory photographs of our planet. It spans an entire year, and shows how lands change with the passing of seasons. You can download a higher-res version here.
(via Reddit)
If you had the task of choosing some photos that represented Earth and mankind to extraterrestrial life forms, which photos would you select? NASA had to do this back in 1977 when it launched the Voyager space probes, which are now the farthest human-made objects from Earth. A committee led by Carl Sagan eventually settled on 116 images:
[...] a collection of 116 pictures (one of which is for calibration) detailing but not limited to human life on earth and the planet itself. Many pictures are annotated with one or many indications of scales of time, size or mass. Some images also contain indications of chemical composition. All measures used on the pictures are first defined in the first few images using physical references.
Among the photos chosen was Ansel Adam’s famous Snake River and Grand Tetons photograph.
Read more…
This amazing image might look like a computer generated graphic, but it’s actually a composite photograph by NASA showing India’s population growth over the years. The white areas show the illumination visible in the country prior to 1992, while the blue, green, and red lights indicate new lights that became visible in 1992, 1998, and 2003, respectively. The four photos were tinted and then combined into an image that reveals where new populations are appearing. NASA definitely needs to do one for every country!
Nighttime Lights Of India (via Business Insider via Photojojo)
P.S. The image is currently being circulated around the Internet as a photo that shows the Hindu celebration Diwali (AKA the “festival of lights”). Unfortunately, that’s not true.
Inspired by the incredible ISS time-lapse that went viral recently, YouTube user isoeph collected NASA photographs from The Gateway To Astronaut Photography of Earth and created this equally impressive time-lapse video showing the ISS passing over the auroras.
(via Laughing Squid)
While we’re on the subject of photos of Earth, did you know that the first photo showing the entire planet was captured by an unmanned NASA orbiter from the moon back in 1966? To accomplish this, they had to come up with a camera that could expose, process, scan, and transmit film photographs — something “akin to a flying television station and photographic mini-lab”.
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As Hurricane Irene bears down on the East Coast, NASA has published a satellite photograph of Earth to its Flickr stream in which the storm is clearly visible. The storm has a diameter of 510 miles — roughly 1/3 the length of the East Coast — so it could probably be seen very clearly from someone standing on the moon. President Obama is warning Americans that the hurricane could be of “historic proportions”.
Full Disk Image of Earth Captured August 26, 2011 (via Mashable)
One amazing perk that comes with being a NASA astronaut is that you can watch meteor showers up close and from above. Astronaut Ron Garan captured this awesome photograph from the International Space Station of a Perseid meteor burning up in our atmosphere.
By the way, did you notice the hot pixels littering the frame? That’s probably why NASA sometimes only uses DSLRs once before too many pixels are destroyed by space radiation.
Ever wonder what the bulky white coverings NASA uses on its DSLRs is for? Popular Photography sent the agency some questions regarding its use of the Nikon D2Xs, and found out some interesting details about astronaut photo gear:
The equipment under the thermal blanket is a Nikon SB-800 flash in a custom housing that is used during a spacewalk (EVA). The flash needed a special housing because it will not work properly in the vacuum of space. The housing holds air pressure so that the flash will function properly. There is also a bracket on the bottom (covered with a white thermal blanket) that the camera and flash mount to.
[...] The D2Xs used for flight has the same firmware modifications and a lubricant modification. Other than that it is the same as buying it from the store.
They also state that because of the damage inflicted on the camera sensors by the radiation in space, sometimes the cameras are only used on one mission before too many pixels are destroyed for them to be used again.
How Does NASA Get a Nikon D2Xs DSLR Ready to Go to Space? [PopPhoto]
As Space Shuttle Atlantis left the International Space Station to head back to Earth for the final time, one of the astronauts on the ISS captured this beautiful image of the shuttle’s glowing re-entry. Any guesses for what shutter speed this was shot at?
Station Crew Views Shuttle Landing (via Popular Science)
Update: Someone from the Photo Operations Group at the Johnson Space Center was kind enough to leave a comment with the answer: 1.6 seconds, f/2.8 at an ISO of 10000.
NASA created this beautiful time-lapse video with photos taken from Space Shuttle Discovery and the International Space Station. It’s a neat look at the size of the Earth, and includes a glimpse of the Aurora Borealis from space!
(via duckrabbit)
