Two lovers.
For a group show at the Ayden Gallery in Vancouver, BC.
Prints are sold here! .
Today’s Google doodle pays tribute to famed Egyptian tomb raider Howard Carter, who discovered King Tutankhamun’s tomb. That makes today the perfect time to share with you an excerpt from Lincoln Child’s latest thriller, THE THIRD GATE (coming June 12th), which brings Professor Jeremy Logan down to the “Sudd,” an impenetrable swamp near the Sudanese-Egyptian border, in search of a tomb that holds untold treasures – and possibly an ancient curse…
May 5, 1961: Alan Shepard becomes the first American in space.
Three weeks after cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man in space, a naval aviator named Alan Shepard commanded the United States’ first manned space mission in the Freedom 7 spacecraft - a historic flight that was watched by nearly 50 million people, though it lasted only fifteen minutes.
The mission (Mercury-Redstone 3) was actually postponed twice due to weather problems, and, when the countdown finally commenced, Shepard is said to have yelled “Let’s light this candle!” Unlike Gagarin in his Vostok flight, Shepard actually had limited control of his craft, which is probably why he uttered another memorable line before the launch, that being “don’t fuck up, Shepard”. Three days later, he became the second person to receive NASA’s highest honor - the Distinguished Service Medal.
nypl:
Happy Mustache Monday!
This is Charlie Gould, who played ball for the Cincinnati Red Stockings, among other teams. According to Harry Ellard’s book Baseball in Cincinnati: A History, he was one of the more affable players in the league and his fielding prowess was so well known that fellows called him “the bushel-basket.”
We have a photo of his wife Laura, as well, so she joins him as a special, non-mustached Mustache Monday guest.
What are Saturn’s Rings Made Of?
Saturn is sometimes called the ”Jewel of the Solar System” because its ring system looks like a crown. The rings are well known, but often the question ”what are Saturn’s rings made of” arises. Those rings are made up of dust, rock, and ice accumulated from passing comets, meteorite impacts on Saturn’s moons, and the planet’s gravity pulling material from the moons. Some of the material in the ring system are as small as grains of sand, others are larger than tall buildings, while a few are up to a kilometer across.
Below is a list of the main rings and gaps between them along with distances from the center of the planet and their widths.
- The D ring is closest to the planet. It is at a distance of 66,970 – 74,490 km and has a width of 7,500 km.
- C ring is at a distance of 74,490 – 91,980 km and has a width of 17,500 km.
- Columbo Gap is at a distance of 77,800 km and has a width of 100 km.
- Maxwell Gap is at a distance of 87,500 km and has a width of 270 km.
- Bond Gap is at a distance of 88,690 – 88,720 km and has a width of 30 km.
- Dawes Gap is at a distance of 90,200 – 90,220 km and has a width 20 km.
- B ring is at a distance of 91,980 – 117,580 km with a width: 25,500 km.
- The Cassini Division sits at a distance of 117,500 – 122,050 km and has a width of 4,700 km.
- Huygens gap starts at 117,680 km and has a width of 285 km – 440 km.
- The Herschel Gap is at a distance of 118,183 – 118,285 km with a width of 102 km.
- Russell Gap is at a distance of 118,597 – 118,630 km and has a width of 33 km.
- Jeffreys Gap sits at a distance of 118,931 – 118,969 km with a width of 38 km.
- Kuiper Gap ranges from 119,403 -119,406 km giving it a width of 3 km.
- Leplace Gap is at a distance of 119,848 – 120,086 km and a width of 238 km.
- Bessel Gap is at 120,305 – 120,318 km with a width of 10 km.
- Barnard Gap is at a distance of 120,305 – 120,318 km giving it a width of 3 km.
- A ring is at a distance of 122,050 – 136,770 km with a width of 14,600 km.
- Encke Gap sits between 133,570-133,895 km for a width of 325 km.
- Keeler Gap is at a distance of 136,530-136,565 km with a width of 35 km.
- The Roche Division is at 136,770 – 139,380 km for a width 2600 km.
- F ring is begins at 140,224 km, but debate remains as to whether it is 30 or 500 km in width.
- G ring is between 166,000 – 174,000 km and has a width of 8,000 km.
- Finally, we get to the E ring. It is between 180,000 – 480,000 km giving it a width of 300,000 km.
(via itsfullofstars)
I’m an Illustration student, as we were set a collage/montage project with the option of “The Universe” as a theme. One of my classmates, Esme Lonsdale, (who you can see here!) made some beautiful textured, pastel galaxies and nebulae, and I took inspiration from her and the amazing posts of this blog to try my hand at it.
There’s something pleasingly abstract in the globular organic shapes of space stuff that seems to lend itself to collage, and a welcome opportunity to play with colour. I got completely carried away!
1) A collection of galaxies on brown card. The splotchy reds/orange/yellows and blue/greens — these feature in all the pieces – are made from a powdered dye that react with bleach and salt. They bleed perfectly for washy-cloudy-nebulae effects. In some cases I used wax crayon to resist the ink. Sunset and sea scenes from an old calendar neatly matched the colours. There’s chocolate wrappers, white gel pen, and tip-ex in there too.
2 and 3) A black hole feeding – based on the gif here – with and without pearlescent ink clouds.
4) Something a bit more silly to finish! Astronaut and Catronauts admiring a distant galaxy.
(via itsfullofstars)
Clarence Birdseye once tried to freeze green peas individually.
