Or: From sea to shining sea…
From high above,
An all-seeing eye
Beckons us to
Sit in quiet contemplation,
A procession from West to East,
Of images, shapes, patterns
Organic, man-made,
Of scales gargantuan and lilliputian,
They emerge and recede…
Take a break. Settle in with an adult beverage, set the view to full screen, start your favorite playlist or let the soundtrack there play on, and savor the sheer magic of Nature unfolding before you, from 450 kilometres above you, rendered four times more slowly than the actual traversal too in real time.
A few words from Jason Kottke about the genesis of the work:
During her time aboard the International Space Station, NASA astronaut Loral O’Hara took a series of photos of the Earth from directly overhead. Seán Doran has stitched those images together into a gorgeous 4K video of a journey across North America, from San Diego to cloud-covered Quebec.
The footage is a simulation, converting an image sequence into video footage using image processing and animation. In reality this journey from California to Quebec took 11 minutes to traverse. In order to better appreciate the view this film slows that speed by a factor of 4.
Let it flow by, as shapes and patterns that result of millions of years and a few months ago, reveal themselves. If it doesn’t move you somehow, ask yourself if you are dead inside.
[random screen capture from the video]
