Thursday, November 8, 2007

A Matter Of Perspective


Imagine with me if you will, you are orbiting the Moon in spaceship Boba at about 150 miles distant from the Lunar surface traveling 2,000 mph on your way to Tycho City (Tycho is the crater at the top of the image with a central peak), and you look out your window and snap an image, the above image is what you'd see, no it's not taken by a lunar probe or any of the Apollo missions, it is one of my highly magnified lunar images, I figured out how to change the perspective of an image in photo shop so that it looks like your flying over the Lunar landscape as opposed to looking at it through a telescope. I was going through some of the images taken by lunar probes and the Apollo missions in Virtual Moon Atlas and thought it would be cool if I could get the same effect on some of my images, so after many hours of fooling around with the free transform edit tool in photo shop I was able to come up with a totally different viewpoint hence the above image. You may ask why would I spend all that time doing that, I ask why not, it looks cool, takes me away even further then I already am from our Earthly constraints to a place where you can imagine the impossible, besides a had a few hours to kill the other night.

The Shuttle Discovery arrived home safely yesterday at 1:01 pm. EST. after a successful and complex mission. This is space exploration at its finest, from the ability and ingenuity of being able to develop things like cufflinks to repair one of the International Space Station's solar arrays to preparing the Space Station for further space exploration with the installation of the Harmony module, this is why I blog so much about the Shuttle program, these people are making things happen up there so we can reach for the Moon and beyond, they are our modern day Columbuses!



Okay this is just too cool. Japan's Lunar orbiter Kaguya has just sent back high definition Images of the moon along with a HD Movie. The movie has 2 sequences, one of the Lunar polar area as in the above image, and another sequence of the Oceanus Procellarum region. The images were shot about 100km from the Lunar surface, how exciting is this?!




NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center's Fabrication Plant released a picture of a mock up of the Orion crew module. It is America's first new manned spacecraft since the shuttle was developed 30 years ago. The Orion is part of the Constellation Program which will return us to the Moon by 2020.

22 comments:

Nature Nut /JJ Loch said...

Great photos and post again. You're educating me and I'm loving it. :D I've often fantasized about living on the moon. Used to think I'd travel up there to be a dental hygienist.:D Was one on earth too.


Hugs, JJ

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks JJ, gee that's one fantasy I can say I've never had,:))

MYM said...

I'm with nature nut...very educational as always bob. (I'm talking about you again today...just a warning) :)

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks drowsey for the compliment and the heads up,:))

myonlyphoto said...

Bob, oh I can imagine very clearly. Everytime I look at the Moon even it is through my photo lens, I have difficulty to unglue from my eye. The when I bring it to my computer and magnify, oh it is even better, if feels like looking out the window. And tell you the truth, I am waiting for the crater explosion to be caputured one day by me, that is why I get excited when I find a 'bird' on the Moon. Well, you got some imagination too, and I like what you did with that photo, I will try it myself. Cool post as aways Bob, and thanks for the superwoman comment, lol. Anna :)

Anonymous said...

Great job on the moon shot Bob. The perspective is certainly there. I also agree with your readers that have commented here that reading the posts on your site are quite educational, AND the high definition shots from Japan's Lunar orbiter are something else. I checked out the link you posted. Quite awesome. Keep it up. You've got a great site!
~JD

Anonymous said...

Great photos. Glad it arrived home safely.

Bob Johnson said...

Hi Anna and thanks for all the kind words, the nice thing about the perspective thing is that you can do it with any pictures, never tried it with big eared deers though,lol

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks JD good to hear from you, those Moons shots in HD are awesome, the first HD images from another celestial body is quite a big deal.

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks Rose, I'm very happy the landing went okay as well.

Lynda Lehmann said...

Bob, you do it because you have curiosity and a passion for it, which are wonderful states/traits of mind. I think it's great how you have followed your bliss and learned so much, and that you share it with others.

I know what you mean about getting away from earthly constraints. I think that's what making art does for me. It's both a fascination and an escape from harsh realities.

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks Lynda, it's nice to be able to do something we like and escape if only for awhile.

Anonymous said...

Since I've got very little knowledge about the stuffs you write here, I guess its okay if I say I didn't know that telescopes can capture such images. I guess I have to pay a visit to the Planeterium to increase my knowledge. That image is great and it really reflects what you wanted it to be.

Bob Johnson said...

Good to hear from you Zunnur and thanks fot your kind words. It's amazing what today's technology has allowed us to do in amateur astronomy. You can take images of the Moon, Comet Holmes, or nebulae, process them, print them off and have them hanging on the wall in a manner of minutes.

kml said...

Your photo really gives the impression of flying over it rather than at it. A whole new perspective - glad you took the time to play!

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks Kathy, glad you liked it!

Anonymous said...

Bob - I had no idea that a photo like that was possible from earth. Thanks for keeping me aware of some of the stuff happening above me!

Bob Johnson said...

No problem Danny, glad to do it.

myonlyphoto said...

Hi Bob, and lol. I think if you use the same technique on the big eared deer, never know it will probably will look like 'ready to charge at you deer', lol. Anna :)

Bob Johnson said...

Hey Anna you should give it a try with some of your animal pics, I bet you could get some wild and crazy things, kinda like they went through a blackhole,lol

myonlyphoto said...

Hey Bob, now that days are shorter and too cold to go for longer expeditions, may be I should go back to Adobe Photoshop and try those crazy wild things with animal pics, lol. After all I did a lot with people when I did temporary photo restoration for few years, you wouldn't believe how many asked - can you remove this person, and put this person in here etc. lol. Never really liked to do that part much because it never happened. Thanks for suggestions, I will keep you informed, lol. Anna :)
PS I wanted to thank you for visiting David's and Robbay (cartoonist) blogs, it is appreciated. Thanks.

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks Anna, no problem,lol about removing people, I go through the winter doldrums, can't get outside to do astronomy when it's 20c below,:((