The official Google Earth plugin is one free download that makes all sorts of cool stuff possible in your browser. There's
a full screen version of the program (complete with underwater views and 3D buildings) which can be searched by entering queries at the end of the URL. There's
a framed version with support for layers, historical imagery, day/night cycles, and the Google Sky starmap.
Less useful but more fun are Google's collection of "experiments" demonstrating the possibilities of the Earth API, including
a "Geo Whiz" geography quiz,
an antipode locater,
a 3D first-person view of San Francisco,
a virtual route-follower, and
MONSTER MILKTRUCK!, a crazy fun driving simulator that lets you careen a virtual milk truck through the Googleplex campus, ricochet off the Himalayas, or explore any other place you care to name.
Lots more can be found in the
Google Earth Gallery -- highlights include
a look at mountaintop removal mining,
a real-time flight tracker,
a guide to trails and outdoor recreation,
a 360 panorama catalog,
geotagged Panoramio photos,
and the comprehensive crowdsourced
Google Earth Community Layer.
And while it's too large to view online, don't miss loading
the Metafilter user location map into a desktop version of Google Earth!
[more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Jun 9, 2011 -
15 comments
It is a stunning image and one that is bound to be reproduced over and over again whenever they recall the history of the US space shuttle.
posted by Trurl
on Jun 8, 2011 -
83 comments
Croatian software developer and amateur image processor
Gordan Ugarković takes images from NASA's unmanned space probes released to the
Planetary Data System, splices them together and tweaks the colors, sometimes combining higher resolution black and white images with color images, sometimes recreating what the object would look like in natural color (ie, in visible wavelengths, from images taken in multiple wavelengths), sometimes heightening the contrast to bring out detail. (
via)
[more inside]
posted by nangar
on May 20, 2011 -
7 comments
Space Project from photographer
Vincent Fournier.
"Playing on the stylised notion of a sci-fi utopia, Fournier’s otherworldly photographs of the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Centre, the Mars Desert Research Station in Utah and the Atacama Desert Observatories in Chile – alongside a series of surprisingly stringy trainee astronauts - offer an alternative view of the world, unseen by many and known by few."
posted by puny human
on Jul 18, 2010 -
11 comments
"
The arc of the Milky Way seen from a truly dark location is part of our planet's natural heritage," said Connie Walker, and astronomer from the U.S. National Optical Astronomy Observatory in Tucson, Arizona. Yet "more than one fifth of the world population, two thirds of the U.S. population and
one half of the European Union population have already lost naked eye visibility of the
Milky Way." In these areas, people are effectively living in
perennial moonlight. They rarely realize it because they still experience the sky to be brighter under a full moon than under new moon conditions. "
Reducing the number of lights on at night could help conserve energy, protect wildlife and benefit human health," astronomer Malcolm Smith of the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. One study found an increased risk of breast cancer for women living in areas with the most light pollution (
abstract). Some communities are
embracing their dark skies, such as
the New Zealand community of Tekapo, possibly home to first "
Starlight Reserve," waiting on UNESCO's official approval. Not sure where to look
in the vast night sky?
Follow some guidelines, or
check the view in Chile,
Queensland, Australia, or
Texas.
posted by filthy light thief
on Jun 13, 2009 -
74 comments
The evolution of Mars imaging from orbit:
Mariner 4 (1964),
Mariner 6 and
Mariner 7 (both 1969),
Mariner 9 (1971) (all NASA),
Mars 5 (1973) (USSR),
Viking 1 (1975),
Viking 2 (1976),
Mars Global Surveyor (1996),
Mars Odyssey (2001) (NASA),
Mars Express (2003) (ESA), up to this spy-quality shot of an
active avalanche taken by NASA's
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (2005).
posted by Chinese Jet Pilot
on Mar 5, 2008 -
11 comments
It's like Google Maps...for space. Wikisky is a draggable, zoomable, web-based star map. And if you click on a star or other object, it brings up a page with all the information you could want on it, including recent articles and astrophotos that contain that object. And it does lots more. Go explore.
posted by Jimbob
on Mar 22, 2007 -
25 comments
Chicago's current archetectual and artistic showcase,
Millenium Park seems to be causing some problems. The
pedestrian bridge was closed because the hardwood used to build it can not take the salt used to remove ice from pedestrian walkways. But it also seems that the massive sculpture
Cloud Gate aka "The Bean" is a copyright elephant in public space. Park security are
shaking down photographers for permits. As is typical, the copyright shakedown appears to be less about protecting the rights of the original artists, and more about the rights of
the distributor (in this case, the city's desired monopoly on postcards and prints). See
boing boing for editorializing and
Slashdot for the typical herd reaction.
posted by KirkJobSluder
on Feb 12, 2005 -
22 comments
The Best of Hubble Its mission will end in 2010. Four years later it will re-enter the atmosphere and burn up. Many astronomers are calling for Hubble to be
refurbished and its mission extended to 2020.
Here are some of it's best pictures.
posted by reverendX
on Dec 10, 2003 -
14 comments
Breathtaking Hubble picture of the Sombrero Galaxy (also identified as M104). The Hubble Heritage team took the original images during May and June of this year using the Advanced Camera for Surveys and multiple color filters. They then stitched 6 images together to make the final composite image.
posted by Irontom
on Oct 10, 2003 -
39 comments
Reflections on a Mote of Dust "We succeeded in taking that picture [from deep space], and, if you look at it, you see a dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever lived, lived out their lives. The aggregate of all our joys and sufferings, thousands of confident religions, ideologies and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilizations, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every hopeful child, every mother and father, every inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam."
Carl Sagan "Pale Blue Dot"
posted by crasspastor
on Sep 11, 2001 -
15 comments
