Gemini North in Cosmoquest

Thanks to Patrick Durrell for these very artistic High Dynamic Range (HDR) images of the Gemini North Telescope.  These were taken while filming for a Cosmoquest / Science on the Half Sphere time-lapse project in 2012.  All videos are freely available under a Creative Commons, Non-Comercial use 3.0 License. (Note: this image is not available at CosmoQuest but the full res version is available if you click on the image)

Photo Credit: Patrick Durrell associate professor at Youngstown State University

“Cosmoquest (cosmoquest.org) is a virtual research facility that provides the public with many of the opportunities professional researchers enjoy in their universities, including seminars, star parties, research through citizen science, and online community and collaboration spaces.   Members of the Ward Beecher Planetarium have partnered with CosmoQuest for a new project called ‘Science on the Half Sphere’, where materials for full-dome video systems will be made available for free to interested planetaria.   The first products of this collaboration include a new full-dome show (now available) called Cosmic Castaways, and a newly released collection of Creative Commons licensed images of the Mauna Kea Observatories.

“Fulldome still images and time-lapse sequences of the summit, telescopes, and the night sky from the summit of Mauna Kea were taken in May 2012 by Youngstown State University professor and Ward Beecher Planetarium director Patrick Durrell.  Included are images from inside some of the largest telescopes in the world, such as the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope, the Gemini North Telescope, the James-Clark Maxwell Telescope, and the  Submillimeter Array.   These images were taken as part of a National Science Foundation research grant awarded to Durrell in 2009, and are available to anyone who would like them to use in their planetarium shows or related projects.”

Keep going for a sample video and link to more.

Photo Credit: Patrick Durrell associate professor at Youngstown State University

Be sure to check out the Science on the Half Sphere/CosmoQuest’s for more full dome video.