Night sky time lapse corrected to show earth moving rather than stars. Gorgeous.

Full screen, HD, you can thank me later.

“From the frame of reference of a human on earth, it can seem that the stars move across the night sky. In fact, it is just the rotation of the earth that constantly reveals new parts of the night sky.
By using software to track the stars and keep them still, the rotation of the earth is revealed.” More vids on Alex Rivest’s channel here.

(Via B3TA)

Four-year timelapse of an exploding star (one for the full screen)

“The unusual variable star V838 Monecerotis (V838 Mon) continues to puzzle astronomers. This previously inconspicuous star underwent an outburst early in 2002, during which it temporarily increased in brightness to become 600,000 times more luminous than our sun. Light from this is illuminating the interstellar dust surrounding the star, producing the most spectacular ‘light echo’ in the history of astronomy.

“As light from the eruption propagates outward into the dust, it is scattered by the dust and travels to Earth. The scattered light has travelled an extra distance in comparison to light that reaches the earth directly from the stellar outburst. Such a light echo is the optical analogue of the sound echo produced when an Alpine yodel is reflected from the surrounding moutainsides.

“The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has been observing the V838 Mon light echo since 2002. Each new observation of the light echo reveals a new and unique ‘thin-section’ through the interstellar dust around the star.

“This video morphs images of the light echo from the Hubble taken at multiple times between 2002 and 2006. The numerous whorls and eddies in the interstellar dust are particularly noticeable. Possibly they have been produced by the effects of magnetic fields in the space between the stars.”

Credit: ESA/Hubble

====

Shirlene Maria: “In January 2002, astronomers discovered a massive explosion coming from V838 Monocerotis. They initially thought they were witnessing a supernova, but after the initial flash of light began to dim (as expected), it began to brighten again in infrared wavelengths at the beginning of March. After that brightening faded, another one happened in April. While astronomers were certain they weren’t witnessing a supernova, they weren’t quite sure what it actually was.”

Read more here.

Your Sunday Bukowski: “Air and light and time and space”

AIR AND LIGHT AND TIME AND SPACE

”– you know, I’ve either had a family, a job,
something has always been in the
way
but now
I’ve sold my house, I’ve found this
place, a large studio, you should see the space and
the light.
for the first time in my life I’m going to have
a place and the time to
create.”

no baby, if you’re going to create
you’re going to create whether you work
16 hours a day in a coal mine
or
you’re going to create in a small room with 3 children
while you’re on
welfare,
you’re going to create with part of your mind and your body blown
away,
you’re going to create blind
crippled
demented,
you’re going to create with a cat crawling up your
back while
the whole city trembles in earthquake, bombardment,
flood and fire.

baby, air and light and time and space
have nothing to do with it
and don’t create anything
except maybe a longer life to find
new excuses
for.

+

Via Brain Pickings

The Long Swath

On April 12, 2013, the Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) reached its final orbit, 705 kilometers (438 miles) above Earth. One week later, the satellite’s natural-color imager scanned a swath of land 185-kilometers wide and 9,000 kilometers long (120 by 6,000 miles)—an unusual, unbroken distance considering 70 percent of Earth is covered with water. That flight path—depicted on the globe below—afforded us the chance to assemble 56 still images into a seamless, flyover view of what LDCM saw on April 19, 2013. Stretching from northern Russia to South Africa, the full mosaic from the Operational Land Imager can be viewed in this video. Read and view more at http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Feat…

You’ll probably want to stick it on full screen. Make sure you’ve got some suitable music to hand.

 
This excellent YouTube comment by “nhstorrs” puts it in perspective: 

No way. This is amazing! Landsat flew right over the spine of the birthplace of the human species, and at the same time the birthplace of agriculture. This is where we came from, and the environment which might be said to have had the biggest impact on what made us. . . us. There could almost be no other landscape so interesting to see in one large glimpse as this one.

Jean Michel Jarre – The China Concerts, 1981 (full)

The first proper outdoor concert I went to was Jean Michel Jarre, when he played the Docklands in the early/mid Eighties. Mad crazy space music and lasers all over the shop. I didn’t know about the China concerts. Must have been an amazing experience. Synth-pop pioneer!

VientDeMe says: “The Concerts in China was a concert tour by Jean Michel Jarre, notable for marking the opening of post-Mao China to live Western music, in 1981. Five concerts were held in the two biggest cities, for an estimated audience of 120,000 spectators, on October 21 and 22 in Beijing, and on October 26 through 28 in Shanghai.

“The concerts were filmed and recorded for commercial releases. Due to the low quality of the recorded sound, the tracks were enhanced (overdubbed) for the release of the double album The Concerts in China.

“An 80-minute documentary entitled ‘Jean-Michel Jarre – China Concerts 1981’ was made by producer/director Andrew Piddington for Central Television in the UK. It was shown once in 1982 on the ITV network in the UK, and did not receive a video release until 1989, when a VHS-video was released. The film was partially released by Shock DVD in Australia in 2008, but they were prevented from selling it by Jarre and record label Disques Dreyfus. The release was not from the master tapes, but from an ‘off-air’ Australian TV showing, so the quality was imperfect. The film has yet to receive an authorised, high-quality DVD release.”

Space Hair

Tour of the International Space Station by NASA Astronaut Sunita Williams. Genius. Sensory overload.

What happens when the highest man in the solar system feels low…

Apart from anything else, this is a fantastic look at the ISS – mind-boggling!

Earth by night, taken from International Space Station. Bonkers beautiful brilliant.

Turn the lights down, click full screen and maybe tickle a little volume up to watch this stunning piece of film. Lightning storms and northern lights are just one of the highlights – look at how SMALL WE ARE. Crazy.

Time lapse sequences of photographs taken with a special low-light 4K-camera by the crew of expedition 28 & 29 onboard the International Space Station from August to October, 2011. All credit goes to them.

HD, refurbished, smoothed, retimed, de-noised, de-flickered, cut, etc.

Music: Jan Jelinek | Do Dekor, faitiche back2001
w+p by Jan Jelinek, published by Betke Edition
janjelinek.com | faitiche.de

Editing: Michael König | koenigm.com

Image Courtesy of the Image Science & Analysis Laboratory,
NASA Johnson Space Center, The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth
eol.jsc.nasa.gov

Shooting locations in order of appearance:

1. Aurora Borealis Pass over the United States at Night
2. Aurora Borealis and eastern United States at Night
3. Aurora Australis from Madagascar to southwest of Australia
4. Aurora Australis south of Australia
5. Northwest coast of United States to Central South America at Night
6. Aurora Australis from the Southern to the Northern Pacific Ocean
7. Halfway around the World
8. Night Pass over Central Africa and the Middle East
9. Evening Pass over the Sahara Desert and the Middle East
10. Pass over Canada and Central United States at Night
11. Pass over Southern California to Hudson Bay
12. Islands in the Philippine Sea at Night
13. Pass over Eastern Asia to Philippine Sea and Guam
14. Views of the Mideast at Night
15. Night Pass over Mediterranean Sea
16. Aurora Borealis and the United States at Night
17. Aurora Australis over Indian Ocean
18. Eastern Europe to Southeastern Asia at Night

Nuclear sky at night

(thanks Adam)