Comments on: Time lapse: IRIDIUM

By: Iridium | Richer Ramblings

Iridium | Richer Ramblings — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 20:35:44 +0000

[...] this video is a great example of how the stars move differently in the southern hemisphere. The Bad Astronomy blog has some clearly written extra information on this, and is worth [...]

By: jojodancingbear

jojodancingbear — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 12:32:19 +0000

Really OT, but yall check out this comic about JWST
http://www.calamitiesofnature.com/

By: Nigel Depledge

Nigel Depledge — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 12:04:39 +0000

The BA said:

Hmph. It occurs to me that in the quote above, I assume the driver’s side of the car is on the left. Between writing that, and still feeling weird watching videos like IRIDIUM, I guess I still have lingering traces of northern hemisphere bias.

That’s not northern hemisphere bias, that’s USA-centrism. Other countries in the northern hemisphere drive on the correct (i.e. left) side of the road – it’s not just Australia and New Zealand.

By: db26

db26 — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 11:41:15 +0000

Brilliant videography, unfortunately the music was lacking. The flute didn’t sit well with me at all. Would have been spectacular set to Staralfur by Sigur Ros.

By: bassmanpete

bassmanpete — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 07:50:33 +0000

Lake Eyre, a dry salt bed in central Australia.

Normally yes, but it’s been wet for over a year now although drying up rapidly at the moment.

And I have to admit that in some of those night shots, I was tricked by the play of moonlight on the salt flats… I thought I was looking at a verrrrrrry still water surface!

You were, that is water. Notice the water birds in the day time shots. Millions of them went there to breed once the waters arrived.

By: ASDCR

ASDCR — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 07:33:03 +0000

thx CR

By: Naomi

Naomi — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 07:27:54 +0000

Oh man, that was the most disconcerting thing when I did a semester in the States. I could deal with the food, I could deal with cars on the wrong side of the road – but then the moon rose from the wrong direction and upside down and my brain just went WHAT.

By: Ronald

Ronald — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 06:54:10 +0000

The wrong way?

Nothing wrong with that!

Ronald McCoy

Melbourne, Australia

Seriously, good posting. I really enjoyed it.

By: CR

CR — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 05:01:15 +0000

@ ASDCR (14)… that’s not the sun visible with the stars, it’s the moon. (And I have to admit that in some of those night shots, I was tricked by the play of moonlight on the salt flats… I thought I was looking at a verrrrrrry still water surface!)
_____________

I loved the shots in the video of the galaxy turning overhead… the particular one with the bright blinking light had me wondering which star that was… Sirius? I didn’t pay attention to the surrounding constellations to properly get it. Still, very neat.
_____________

As for the video’s title, might it have something to do with the music accompanying it? The song is titled “Iridium.”

By: Ed

Ed — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 23:51:50 +0000

I’m brazilian and every time I travel to the northern hemisphere I have a lot of trouble recognizing stars and constellations. And when I (jokingly) tell people that the moon is upside down nobody ever seems to understand what I’m saying…

By: jjmcgaffey

jjmcgaffey — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 23:43:29 +0000

8 Skygazer – I remember that from rural Virginia in the US. We had a permanent campsite, and while there were (dim) streetlights on the main roads we were well back in the woods. I could easily go the quarter mile to the bathrooms after dark purely by starlight – though where the tree-shadows crossed the road was really dark! There’s not enough light from starlight to scatter the way sunlight does, so starlight shadows (and to a slightly lesser extent, moonlight shadows) are much darker than shallow shadows like trees in sunlight (caves etc can get that dark, since the sunlight never gets in).

By: Tara Li

Tara Li — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 23:02:14 +0000

Yeah – I’m missing why this was titled “Iridium” as well.

By: Lab Lemming

Lab Lemming — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 22:55:03 +0000

For Lake Eyre there is an unusually large amount of cloud present.

By: Pete Jackson

Pete Jackson — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 22:11:40 +0000

@11Peter: Yes, you need to stand on your head to see this the proper way.

By: Peter Tibbles

Peter Tibbles — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 21:36:38 +0000

As far as I can see, everything is the right way up and moving in the correct direction, but then, I live in Melbourne.

By: Mario

Mario — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 20:34:45 +0000

I guess you cleverly deduced the hemisphere of the video’s origin by reading its caption on vimeo: “Time-Lapse short produced at Lake Eyre in central Australia as part of the SALT project”

By: Doug Jones

Doug Jones — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 20:30:55 +0000

The sunrise at 5:06 was either filmed in the northern hemisphere, or flipped L-R.

By: ASDCR

ASDCR — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 19:48:31 +0000

how can the camera pick up stars and the sun in the same scene??

By: Navneeth

Navneeth — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 18:37:29 +0000

Gonçalo Aguiar,
I assumed it was the constellations as well.

By: Bob

Bob — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 18:04:49 +0000

I once had a creative writing teacher whose editor pointed out that her character was watching sunrise and sunset from the same window. Oops.

By: StarkRG

StarkRG — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 17:37:47 +0000

“I knew it was filmed in the southern hemisphere. Can you guess how?”

Guy’s name was Murray, such an Aussie name…

By: Gonçalo Aguiar

Gonçalo Aguiar — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 17:18:01 +0000

“I knew it was filmed in the southern hemisphere. Can you guess how?”

Pleiades are upside down.

By: Vagueofgodalming

Vagueofgodalming — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 17:15:07 +0000

It’s the Coriolis force, isn’t it, that causes cars to pass each other on the other side in the Southern Hemisphere, right? And if you try to drive on the Equator, you always collide with the cars coming the other way.

Laws of physics. You just can’t beat ‘em.

Lovely video, by the way.

By: SkyGazer

SkyGazer — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 16:40:42 +0000

Always funny how people say “I can only guess how dark the skies must be there”.
I remember the really dark skies of my youth on Formentera. And those clear nights were bright as hell! In those days (mid 60s to begin 70s) there was one bar (run by Amador) that had a (one) electric bulb and a fridge and a ginormous generator. Homes were lit with oillamps and candles. When there was no moon there was enough light to see were you were going.
And that´s just starlight.

By: alfaniner

alfaniner — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 16:08:08 +0000

Question: If they flopped the film, would anyone be able to tell the difference?