I’ve spent the last week trying to take photos of the moon. It’s still not close to what I see through the telescope, but it’s getting better.

As I look at the stars from our deck tonight (seen above) I am once again incredibly disappointed in humanity. As a child I was promised space travel. It was an empty promise of course, and as an adult I should maybe have put those hopes aside. Alas, I can not.

Yes, we have the International Space Station, but it is a pitiful thing when compared to the space stations of my dreams. The epic structures of which I read, that I see in movies and which I walk through (and often blow up) in video games would only use the ISS as an antenna…. for the servants courters.

I honestly find it hard to believe that no one has been back to the moon. I mean really! What has happened to the sense of adventure and exploration? While I was initially shocked that NASA was for all intents and purposes giving up, perhaps the US are right to hand it over to private industry. They have really done fairly little over the decades since the moon landing. It’s embarrassing.

I really love what Virgin Galactic are doing, and I hope it all works out for them. It certainly looks to be, but time will tell. I want it to go well enough for them to fast track orbital tourism, and ultimately… build a damn moon base. Then we can go find those sneaky mars aliens.

Star Wars is awesome because it has cool space stuff. The original trilogy may very have the look that it does thanks to the concept art created by a man named Ralph McQuarrie.  As you scroll through them you will notice that they look an awful lot like the movies.  Or rather, the movies look an awful lot like his concept art. I hear he is somewhat of an inspiration to many of the great concept artists out there, and looking at these it’s not hard to see why.

(continue reading…)

Well was there? No. But an amateur special effects guy going by the name The Faking Hoaxer created a video showing 12 different horrible ways for the Space Shuttle to go bang. I am constantly amazed by the quality of work produced by “amateurs”.