APOD: Cassini Approaches Saturn (2011 Mar 15)

[SaraBiga]

Moving. Images AND music. Deeply moving.

It does look like falling into Saturn and than bouncing away defying gravity; but isn't that the point? To use real images to show how an extreme starship trip would look like?
Wondering about the alignment of the moons too...

Still, deeply moving. Both thumbs up!

[bystander]

NASA generally doesn't fly spacecraft through the dense part of the rings. In fact, I don't believe Cassini ever passed through the rings, am I right?

You are correct in assuming Cassini does not generally pass through the densest part of the rings, but it does occassionally pass through the gaps. See Cassini's Wild Ring Ride.

Moreover, the moons aren't depicted to proper scale with the imagined flight path. They are really just shrunken icons pasted onto a single backdrop of a small number of Saturn images. "Motion" is simply a lot of image scaling.

I would expect a little more scientificly informative out of an APOD page.

The images are from Cassini, not just shrunken icons, and the movie is meant to be artistic, not scientific. It is meant to give a sense of wonder of Saturn and the Cassini mission. See the filmmaker's statement above and at vimeo.

[BMAONE23]

I'm the filmmaker....

Very honored to have my clip chosen. For the questions so far - this is an art film about space exploration. It's also a work-in-progress clip. This is not the path Cassini followed obviously - creating the motion is far more complicated than stringing a series of images together. The path was chosen by me but all the images are from the spacecraft.

The real challenge though was creating it at this high resolution (32 times HiDef) for IMAX screens as Cassini takes 1024 x 1024 images - some of the composites used in this shot are 10,000 x 10,000 pixels. The processing takes place in 32-bit color which mean each frame is over 1 gigabyte of pixel data at 24 frames per second. What you are seeing here is very low rez even at 1080p.

Per the music, it's a strong choice and usually provokes a strong reaction, pro or con. But the emotion of the music is designed to work for this section of the film.

Thanks again to APOD for featuring and very nice to hear all the compliments here.

stephen

As others have mentioned, a lot of artistic freedom here. The moons do not move as we approach Saturn, Saturn does not rotate, which makes the movie seem less realistic. Still very cool.

This movie looks to me like a missed opportunity to show what Cassini's approach would have looked like.

If the Cassini team had taken my suggestions, it could have been done but they claim "science" is more important

Unfortunately, image data for that approach does not exist anyway - so it could only happen with CGI. The arrangement and placement of the moons is roughly correct. But the Cassini cameras have very long focal lengths and this is a crop/pan & scan of the IMAX 4:3 frame - thus the motion is a bit strange at times. Note, this was just a first footage clip I uploaded 10 months ago and had no idea would end up widely seen.

Stephen,
Tremendous work regardless of those that "PAN" the reality of the motion or lack there of. This is a marvelous accomplishment using the actual Cassini photos as the image source.
For those that wish to make derogitory comments on the work presented, try to reproduce the effort yourselves. The programs to do so are out there. If you can come up with something better, post it here.

[Guest]

The official site outsideinthemovie.com is having problems. When I clicked Contact, I got

Fatal error: Out of memory (allocated 17563648) (tried to allocate 19456 bytes) in /home/jupitert/public_html/wp-content/plugins/role-scoper/data_sources_rs.php on line 104

So of course I can't tell them directly.

I see that the full movie will have much more content, including much more music. I find the Adagio (slow walk) to be quite appropriate for the very gradual approach to Saturn, even though we see it greatly speeded up.

[bystander]

The filmmaker's, Stephen van Vuuren (stephenv2), commentary on the video.

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

[bystander]

problems with apod capture split to here

[Guest]

The sentiment is nice, and the images are cool, but the video is not factually sound. Cassini does not fly the fantastical trajectories depicted by the animation and NASA generally doesn't fly spacecraft through the dense part of the rings. In fact, I don't believe Cassini ever passed through the rings, am I right?

Moreover, the moons aren't depicted to proper scale with the imagined flight path. They are really just shrunken icons pasted onto a single backdrop of a small number of Saturn images. "Motion" is simply a lot of image scaling.

I would expect a little more scientificly informative out of an APOD page.

It's an art film, not a scientific visualization. I'm honored to be here but don't pretend to be a scientist.

Plus, the if only the motion were just "image scaling", I would be done years ago. Again, this is from a 5600 X 4200 pixel size frame. What appears to be a single image is fact not that. It's far more complex than scaling as pixel artifacts, even at HD rez, much less IMAX 5.6k rez.

[orin stepanek]

For me; the movie was fantastic. I wouldn't mind seeing Saturn on Imax!

Cassini and the rings.

Click to view full size image

[Indigo_Sunrise]

This is marvelous! Absolutely fantastic. Excellent 'assembling-of-the-images'; some 'artistic license', yes, but isn't that why we come here: to learn and to be entertained just a bit also? And the music choice is perfect. (I don't associate that piece of music with death.... )

Oh, and:

For those that wish to make derogitory comments on the work presented, try to reproduce the effort yourselves. The programs to do so are out there. If you can come up with something better, post it here.

^ ^ ^ this is worth repeating........


Keep those awesome APOD's and AVOD's (Astronomy Video Of the Day - ) coming!

[JohnD]

did Cassini really pass through the rings

Cassini crosses the ring plane twice every orbit, sometimes passing directly through it. See: Cassini: The Great Crossing

Indeed it did, through one of the ring gaps.
See: http://www.esa.int/esaMI/Cassini-Huygen ... 6WD_0.html
The Cassini team even recorded the 'noise' of the fine dust that's in the gap colliding with the spacecraft.

John

[bystander]

http://asterisk.apod.com/viewtopic.php? ... 47#p145047

[starswarm magellan]

Now that's the kind of detailed flyby I'd like to see on Uranus. Gawgeous. Please make the spambot blocker easier to unscramble for the laymen. Thanks!!

[geckzilla]

Starswarm, I can't make it easier because then the spambots come through a lot more frequently. I recommend creating an account so that you can remain logged in and do not have to solve anymore riddles.

[Mactavish]

Unimpressed? I wonder if Cassini, and Galileo, and Kepler, Newton and Einstein would be "impressed"? I think that if they could sit in front of our computer monitor and view this video they would be absolutely astonished!

Personally, I am grateful for the effort and time that Stephen has devoted to making something so pleasurable out of a collection of scientific imagery. (And, I think Barber's Adagio is a perfect choice.)

How fortunate we are to be able to relax and enjoy the incredible images from Hubble and the huge earthbound telescopes... not to mention the brilliant images contributed by thousands of "amateur" astronomers. Let us also not forget Robert & Jerry who have made these images something exciting to look forward to every day for the past 15 years.

If you're unimpressed or have a headache, consider Cassini. He was looking through his telescope... not at his thumbs.

[csudhind@gmail.com]

Totally awesome display that you folks have put together! I am a SciFi buff and this stuff blew me away completely. Kudos to the team (and ofcourse the team behind Cassini), who put this together!

[Regulus1951]

This is simply the most beautiful video clip I have ever seen and, combined with the wonderfully evocative music by Samuel Barber, it is absolutely overwhelming. Fantastic!

[NoelC]

Glad to see Outside In getting some good press.

So far it looks stunningly powerful and beautiful, top to bottom. The APOD clip in HD draws tears of wonder.

I contributed an image to the film - the Moon that shows right after the "Cradle" comment in the trailer posted on this page: http://www.outsideinthemovie.com/watch/

I can't wait to see Outside In in IMAX.

-Noel

[stephenv2]

Thanks to all for the kind words. Just a couple of quick updates. First, I received a signed Saturn poster from the members of the Cassini Navigation Team - that was a real thrill and honor as without their years of work, nothing like this would be possible.

Second, working on something similar with Messenger data for another section the film.

[BMAONE23]

Thanks to all for the kind words. Just a couple of quick updates. First, I received a signed Saturn poster from the members of the Cassini Navigation Team - that was a real thrill and honor as without their years of work, nothing like this would be possible.

Second, working on something similar with Messenger data for another section the film.

If you're doing the same thing with Messenger images that was done with Cassini, I can't wait to be

[bystander]

CASSINI MISSION
by cabbas

I truly enjoy outer space. It's absolutely amazing that we now have the ability to send instruments out into the void of the universe to observe all sorts of interesting things. Asteroids! Moons! Planets! Dark matter! This is the perfect opportunity for a Carl Sagan quote:

"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known."

The footage in this little film was captured by the hardworking men and women at NASA with the Cassini Imaging Science System. If you're interested in learning more about Cassini and the on-going Cassini Solstice Mission, check it out at NASA's website:

saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/​science/​index.cfm

Music by: Nine Inch Nails

• Cassini at Saturn, the Movie
  Universe Today | 2011 June 02
  
  The stark beauty of Cassini’s Saturn
  Bad Astronomy | 2011 June 02
  
  When Cassini Met Nine Inch Nails
  Discovery News | 2011 June 02

[owlice]

(gasp)



(gasp)




(gasp)

[BMAONE23]

CASSINI MISSION
by cabbas

I truly enjoy outer space. It's absolutely amazing that we now have the ability to send instruments out into the void of the universe to observe all sorts of interesting things. Asteroids! Moons! Planets! Dark matter! This is the perfect opportunity for a Carl Sagan quote:

"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known."

The footage in this little film was captured by the hardworking men and women at NASA with the Cassini Imaging Science System. If you're interested in learning more about Cassini and the on-going Cassini Solstice Mission, check it out at NASA's website:

saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/​science/​index.cfm

Music by: Nine Inch Nails

That VIMEO was too time compressed and jerked too much though

[stephenv2]

I think it's an artful use of the sequential raw images.