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Unmanned Spaceflight.com _ Saturn _ "Sixty-four Sights from Saturn" Movie available for download

Posted by: jsheff Jun 18 2006, 05:40 PM

The Cassini team has composed a tribute to Paul McCartney.
Caution! The file is 147 MB in size. Right-click on it and do a "Save Target As ..." to your local machine. Even using a broadband connection, it is a very long download!
- John Sheff
Cambridge, MA


A SATURNIAN MUSICAL CELEBRATION TO HONOR PAUL MCCARTNEY

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
CASSINI IMAGING CENTRAL LABORATORY FOR OPERATIONS (CICLOPS)
SPACE SCIENCE INSTITUTE, BOULDER, COLORADO
http://ciclops.org
cpcomments@ciclops.org

Preston Dyches (720) 974-5859
CICLOPS/Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo.

Image Advisory: June 18, 2006


A SATURNIAN MUSICAL CELEBRATION TO HONOR PAUL MCCARTNEY

On the occasion of Paul McCartney's landmark 64th birthday, the Cassini
Imaging Central Laboratory for Operations (CICLOPS) is releasing today
an 8-minute movie as a birthday gift to the former Beatle. Sixty-four
of the most dramatic and spectacular images taken by NASA's Cassini
spacecraft, including one mosaic from the European-built Huygens probe
of the surface of Titan, are composed together in a cinematic voyage
through the Saturn system and put to the music of the Beatles.

"In their creation of new musical forms and directions, and in their
expansive vision of the art of popular music, the Beatles reached
heights of achievement in their brief time together that nobody has been
able to surpass", said Carolyn Porco, Cassini imaging team leader and
the producer/director of the movie. "And being a major element in that
incredible story makes Paul McCartney, in my mind, one of planet Earth's
brightest stars. It makes me very happy to be able to celebrate him in
this way. I hope he likes our movie."

The movie `Sixty-four Sights from Saturn' is available today on the home
page of http://ciclops.org. High resolution versions may be obtained
by emailing cpcomments@ciclops.org.

The Cassini imaging operations center (CICLOPS) is based at the Space
Science Institute in Boulder, Colo.

-end-

Posted by: Toma B Jun 19 2006, 09:32 AM

So...has anybody downloaded this file yet???
What's the resolution (in pix)???
Any screenshots???

Posted by: um3k Jun 19 2006, 01:21 PM

I managed to D/L it overnight, at an average transfer rate (before I went to bed) of 7 kb/s. Very odd, considering I have cable internet. The video is 640x480 pixels. No point in posting screenshots, they're all press release images. I'll start a torrent if I see enough interest, otherwise I'll upload a lower res version of the video later today.

Posted by: ugordan Jun 19 2006, 01:26 PM

QUOTE (um3k @ Jun 19 2006, 02:21 PM) *
I managed to D/L it overnight, at an average transfer rate (before I went to bed) of 7 kb/s. Very odd, considering I have cable internet.

The CICLOPS site is notorious for slow downloads, especially at times when new multimedia content is published and demand is high. One might try sidestepping the problem with a download manager that supports segmented downloads, set 4 simultaneous connections and you get a decent 30 kb/s cumulative speed.

Posted by: elakdawalla Jun 19 2006, 05:28 PM

We've just set up a new agreement with amazon.com to serve out large-sized files, so I could make this available to more people more easily -- if I could download it. My computer's been chugging away for more than 2 hours and has managed to grab about 24% of it. Um3k, would there be some way I could get the file from you sooner than the 8 or 10 more hours it'll take me to download it? I could send it to Amazon and then put a link in the blog for everyone.

--Emily

Posted by: volcanopele Jun 19 2006, 05:33 PM

so that's why the site's been slow today...

Posted by: djellison Jun 19 2006, 06:14 PM

Would have made sense to have started it with a bit-torrent really.

Doug

Posted by: um3k Jun 19 2006, 08:45 PM

QUOTE (elakdawalla @ Jun 19 2006, 01:28 PM) *
We've just set up a new agreement with amazon.com to serve out large-sized files, so I could make this available to more people more easily -- if I could download it. My computer's been chugging away for more than 2 hours and has managed to grab about 24% of it. Um3k, would there be some way I could get the file from you sooner than the 8 or 10 more hours it'll take me to download it? I could send it to Amazon and then put a link in the blog for everyone.

--Emily

I'll see if I can email it to you.

Posted by: djellison Jun 19 2006, 09:55 PM

Just a thought - would recompressing to something like an H264 codec Quicktime or a WMV help?

I'm still striving to get the damn thing.

Doug

Posted by: elakdawalla Jun 19 2006, 10:52 PM

The email thing probably won't work, but downloading should, presently. I've got 67% of it now, and am down to 3.77 KB/sec. Still, it seems to be coming steadily. I'll have it eventually, and when I get it I'll post it to that amazon site -- should be easier for you guys after that.

--Emily

Posted by: mars loon Jun 20 2006, 01:26 AM

I downloaded it last night and it took quite a few hours (>6) via cable modem. patience needed

The end result is worth it. Its quite nice.

the resolution is decent but varies. there is a mix of old and very new shots, including from this month, June 2006.

this may not be the absolute final version.

ken

PS: if you are lucky, maybe you will complete the download before your new package arrives

Posted by: dvandorn Jun 20 2006, 05:22 AM

I downloaded it overnight last night (I usually get download rates between 300 and 600 KB/sec.; this thing averaged 6 KB/sec.) and just got around to looking at it.

I guess I could have wished for a little more finesse in the audio track cutting -- maybe fewer individual song snippets that lasted a little longer. But generally, there was a good "feel" between the images and the soundtrack.

And the final sequence was quite well done.

-the other Doug

Posted by: Bob Shaw Jun 20 2006, 12:30 PM

My review: Mostly Harmless.

Bob Shaw

Posted by: ljk4-1 Jun 20 2006, 01:49 PM

Dare I ask - what does Paul McCartney have to do with Cassini or Saturn?

Jim Lovell's daughter in Apollo 13 was upset about the Beatles breaking up
and appeared to have no interest in her father's work, but other than that....

Posted by: um3k Jun 20 2006, 02:00 PM

The CICLOPS team are Beatles fans. smile.gif

Posted by: ljk4-1 Jun 20 2006, 02:05 PM

QUOTE (um3k @ Jun 20 2006, 10:00 AM) *
The CICLOPS team are Beatles fans. smile.gif


They should be Sun Ra fans. The guy is from Saturn, after all.

Posted by: djellison Jun 20 2006, 02:08 PM

http://ciclops.org/team/abbey_20xc2.jpg

PI on extreme right I believe.

Doug

Posted by: um3k Jun 20 2006, 02:10 PM

QUOTE (djellison @ Jun 20 2006, 10:08 AM) *
http://ciclops.org/team/abbey_20xc2.jpg

PI on extreme right I believe.

Doug

Apparently CICLOPS doesn't allow direct linking. blink.gif

Posted by: ugordan Jun 20 2006, 02:14 PM

Imagine the transfer speeds if they did allow direct links... huh.gif

Anyway, the image Doug's trying to show is on http://ciclops.org/team/iss_team.php, second one from the top. Beatles fans will recognize the inspiration for this one.
What's even stranger is that even if you click on the image directly from the CICLOPS site, it still pops up that generic hosting image...

Also, you Mars fans out there can see a familiar face sitting beside Carolyn in the topmost pic wink.gif

Posted by: djellison Jun 20 2006, 02:22 PM

Blugh - well - go to the home page, click on 'team' and it's the second one down.

Doug

Posted by: mars loon Jun 20 2006, 02:33 PM

QUOTE (ljk4-1 @ Jun 20 2006, 01:49 PM) *
Dare I ask - what does Paul McCartney have to do with Cassini or Saturn?


Well I think Paul McCartney IS a space exploration fan since he sang a song live to the International Space Station astronaut/cosmonaut team last summer during his tour.

ken

Posted by: ljk4-1 Jun 20 2006, 02:35 PM

QUOTE (mars loon @ Jun 20 2006, 10:33 AM) *
Well I think Paul McCartney IS a space exploration fan since he sang a song live to the International Space Station astronaut/cosmonaut team last summer during his tour.

ken


He has my forgiveness, then.

Posted by: elakdawalla Jun 20 2006, 03:08 PM

I finally got it after 14 hours of downloading (much of it under 4 kbps). I have to go in to work in order to get the login info for this new hosting setup we've got, then I'll post it for the lot of you. It's cute and I'm sure my Dad the Beatles fan will enjoy it but I agree with the other Doug, there are too many songs cut too short and abruptly. (And considering the fact that you can't even buy Beatles music online I have to wonder whether Sir Paul will appreciate this digital birthday card or not.) The pictures are, as always, fantastic, however.

--Emily

Posted by: ljk4-1 Jun 20 2006, 03:10 PM

Has anyone else caught on to the irony of one Beatles song
"When I'm 64?"

God, the ultimate nasty and ironical practical joker.

Posted by: volcanopele Jun 20 2006, 04:03 PM

yes, that's the specific reason for the video card. Kinda nice, if you ask me. The short clips are necessary since it is the only way to get around the copywrite issue.

as for Beatles fans, I can only attest to Carolyn being a major Beatles fan, not sure about anyone else.

And yes, technically Steve is on the imaging team, though obviously he has other work to attend to first. He did some of his early work on Voyager images of Enceladus.

Posted by: ljk4-1 Jun 20 2006, 06:11 PM

QUOTE (volcanopele @ Jun 20 2006, 12:03 PM) *
yes, that's the specific reason for the video card. Kinda nice, if you ask me. The short clips are necessary since it is the only way to get around the copywrite issue.

as for Beatles fans, I can only attest to Carolyn being a major Beatles fan, not sure about anyone else.

And yes, technically Steve is on the imaging team, though obviously he has other work to attend to first. He did some of his early work on Voyager images of Enceladus.


Actually I was making a more subtle and less happy connotation with the
lyrics in the song and McCartney's current personal life. I'll just leave it
at that.

As for Beatle songs and legalities, the latter is what kept a Beatles song,
"Here Comes the Sun", from being preserved for at least 1 billion years on
the Voyager Interstellar Records.

According to the 1978 book Murmurs of Earth, all four Beatles were quite
happy to have their song on the records, but the company that owned them
refused to release it.

Like they'll be getting royalties off it in a billion years.

Posted by: elakdawalla Jun 20 2006, 07:23 PM

Finally! I got it uploaded to Amazon, and tested the download speed, and was getting a much more reasonable 170-180 kbytes/sec. Here's the link:

http://s3.amazonaws.com/planetary/4749/Paul64_MacPC_147MB.avi

Enjoy!

Emily

Posted by: djellison Jun 20 2006, 07:27 PM

Thinking about it - they could have done this with something 1/10th the size with Flash

Doug

Posted by: tfisher Jun 20 2006, 08:11 PM

QUOTE (elakdawalla @ Jun 20 2006, 02:23 PM) *
http://s3.amazonaws.com/planetary/4749/Paul64_MacPC_147MB.avi

Enjoy!

Emily


On my laptop I get music clips but no images. (windows xp playing through the quicktime plugin in firefox) :^(

Posted by: angel1801 Jun 21 2006, 02:38 PM

I have just dowloaded the "64 sights" movie from the amazon server.

I got an average of 72kb/s for the download.

I have 1500K spped for downloads and 256K for uploads.

Posted by: elakdawalla Jun 21 2006, 02:48 PM

I just got an email from Carolyn Porco asking me to remove the link, because they're planning on making improvements and don't want this version to circulate widely. I did take it down from my blog but it's more trouble than it's worth for me to take it down from the Amazon site. Download this one if you wish, or wait for them to post another version.

I am sure you won't get your max download speeds from Amazon, they have to ration their bandwidth too; but hopefully at a more reasonable level than 4 kbps.

--Emily

Posted by: Borek Jun 21 2006, 03:47 PM

I downloaded it within half an hour or so. To be honest, I haven't liked it. The arrangement of music is nonsensical at best and the switches to different song when you least expect it are bewildering. The Cassini images are great, of course, but I can imagine a better job of making a slideshow out of them.

Borek

Posted by: mars loon Jun 21 2006, 09:21 PM

QUOTE (elakdawalla @ Jun 21 2006, 02:48 PM) *
I just got an email from Carolyn Porco asking me to remove the link, because they're planning on making improvements and don't want this version to circulate widely.
--Emily

I heard the same thing from her about improvements in progress.

Borek,

try listening to it a few times and you may enjoy it more. There are copyright issues with the length of the snippets and I think they wanted to include as many snippets as reasonably possible.

I think its quite nice, just needs some adjustments. and given the thousands of images they picked the real winners for the most part

ken

Posted by: djellison Jun 21 2006, 09:26 PM

Even just with the sound turned off it's awesome actually....just a "remember THIS.....cool eh?.....now...what about THIS ONE....ha haa....and then we took THIS ONE.....funky n'est ce pas?"

Doug

Posted by: mchan Jun 22 2006, 04:15 AM

QUOTE (elakdawalla @ Jun 21 2006, 07:48 AM) *
I am sure you won't get your max download speeds from Amazon, they have to ration their bandwidth too; but hopefully at a more reasonable level than 4 kbps.

I got it downloaded in a little over 2 minutes at >1 MB/s. Thanks for saving me 14+ hours.

Posted by: elakdawalla Jun 22 2006, 04:46 PM

OK, so now I got an email from Preston Dyches asking me to remove this file entirely, so it's now gone. sad.gif

--Emily

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