Transforming Transient Astronomy: The Universe’s Biggest Drama Becomes a Cinematic Masterpiece

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Imagine looking up at the night sky 1,000 years ago; you would likely see an additional point of light compared to today. Back then, Chinese astronomers referred to these phenomena as “guest stars,” believing they foretold significant changes.

Today, we understand these were likely supernovae—spectacular explosions from dying stars—one of many serendipitous discoveries made by astronomers observing at opportune moments.

In the modern era, the quest for these “transient” events has evolved into a strategic approach, revolutionizing the field of astronomy. We have since identified numerous fleeting events that span from mere nanoseconds to durations longer than a human lifetime.

“Astronomy considers both spatial and temporal scales, yet the latter remains largely unexplored,” states Jason Hessels from the University of Amsterdam.

To capture these ephemeral occurrences effectively, astronomers are innovating by synchronizing telescopes into a cohesive unit, akin to a well-oiled machine, as evidenced by the Palomar Temporary Factory project from 2009 to 2012. One significant flash observed by a telescope in San Diego prompted immediate follow-up investigations by others. “It was orchestrated like a conveyor belt,” Hessels remarked.

More specialized telescopes are emerging, focusing on time, rather than just space. Notably, the Zwicky Temporary Facility has taken over from Palomar, and the Pan-STARRS survey amassed 1.6 petabytes of astronomical data—recording the largest dataset ever captured from Hawaii.

These advanced telescopes have generated extensive data that unveil the twinkling and fluctuating events of the cosmos, including gamma-ray bursts, fast radio bursts, gravitational waves, and stars that either explode spontaneously or are ripped apart by black holes.

Transient astronomy is reshaping our perception of the universe. “We’ve progressed from painting to photography, and now to some form of stop-motion film,” Hessels describes. He continues, “We’re approaching a complete narrative. Each adjustment in my perspective of the sky feels as though the cinematic experience expands further.”

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Source: www.newscientist.com

AI Company Aims to Recreate Lost Footage from Orson Welles’ Masterpiece The Magnificent Ambersons

An AI company is set to recreate the missing 43 minutes of Orson Welles’ iconic film, The Magnificent Ambersons.

As reported by the Hollywood Reporter, Showrunner Platform aims to utilize AI technologies for this reconstruction project.

Edward Saatchi, CEO of the interactive AI filmmaking studio Fable, is overseeing the project. In a statement to Indiewire, he stated, “We’re starting with Orson Welles because he is the greatest storyteller of the last two centuries… Many people hold valid concerns about AI’s influence on cinema.”

The report indicates that the showrunner is collaborating with filmmaker Brian Rose, who has been working since 2019 to reconstruct the missing segments through animation and VFX expert Tom Clive.

Welles began production in 1942 on Ambersons, following his Oscar-winning debut with Citizen Kane. He had previously adapted the novel into a radio drama in 1939.

Unfortunately, some footage from the completed film was cut after unfavorable audience test screenings, and Welles lost final cut rights due to negotiations with the studio. While editing the film, he traveled to Brazil and started work on It’s All True, ultimately re-editing Ambersons’ finale. RKO stated that Welles felt “completely betrayed.” The master negative of the excised footage was later destroyed to free up storage space.

Numerous efforts have been made to restore or recreate the film. The working print sent to Welles in Brazil is believed to be lost. Filmmaker Joshua Grossberg is leading the search for this elusive footage. A reconstruction using still photographs was showcased at the Locarno Film Festival in 2005.


However, the search has informed Hollywood reporters that the showrunners do not hold the rights to The Magnificent Ambersons, making it unlikely that the resulting footage will be shown outside of academic settings and exhibitions. “The aim isn’t to monetize the 43 minutes, but to make it available after 80 years of speculation on whether this was the best film in its original form,” they stated.

Source: www.theguardian.com

Review: Team Asobi’s 3D Platformer Astro Bot Showcases Brilliant Ideas, Achieving Masterpiece Status

circleTo mention that Astro Bot brings back memories of Super Mario Galaxy is a high compliment. It’s not because it’s a copy, but rather due to the abundance of new ideas that positions this game as one of Nintendo’s top 3D platformers. Traveling around a small galaxy filled with asteroid-style levels, from bathhouses to diorama-sized jungle temples to rainy islands. Each level is brimming with innovative one-shot concepts, like frog boxing gloves, backpack monkeys, and a time-stopping clock that freezes giant speeding darts for you to navigate around. The creativity of this development team truly shines in this game.

Team Asobi, known for producing Rescue Mission for PSVR and the short game Astro’s Playroom packaged with the PS5 at launch, now presents a full-length game with bonus difficulty levels that serve as a stimulating challenge for fans of 3D platforming. The game is incredibly enjoyable and distinct thanks to the lovable blue-and-white robot and its quirky friends, many of whom are dressed as characters from obscure PlayStation worlds. The meticulous attention to detail in these robots, from their movements, expressions, dance sequences, to their tiny pleas for help when in distress, exudes personality.

In Astro’s Playroom, you explore levels inspired by the speed of the SSD and the graphic processing unit’s visual flair, housed within the PlayStation 5 itself. The visual design of the environments is tech-themed, featuring trees made of tangled wires and computer-chip-like patterns decorating every surface. Astro Bot maintains a similar aesthetic while extending beyond it.

In this adventure, your PS5 acts as a robot mothership that crash-lands on a desert planet, dispersing numerous robots across the galaxy. As the lone surviving robot, you journey into each level aboard a rescue ship shaped like your PS5 controller to reunite your allies and reconstruct your robotic crew back home.




An astrobot riding a PS5 controller-shaped ship. Photo: Sony/Team Asobi

At the conclusion of each planetary cluster, a boss reminiscent of a slapstick cartoon is encountered, guarding a section of your spaceship. You then engage in cleaning and reassembling that section using a massive robotic arm, strategically pulling triggers and tilting the controller to clear away debris, cut ice chunks, and align pieces. This interactive process is incredibly fun and tactile, emphasizing the unique and sometimes eccentric aspects of the PS5 controller. Various features of the controller, from the small microphone to the touchpad, are ingeniously utilized in Astro Bot’s gameplay. The protagonist searches for weak spots along walls, clinging to his ship as you navigate through space by tilting the controller like a steering wheel.

The developers’ profound understanding of the PlayStation 5 is evident. Whether constructing a bridge with 100 robots on-screen, witnessing landscapes shattering into tiny fragments, or careening down a waterslide accompanied by inflatable balls, the gameplay is seamless and responsive. Whether testing if a log floats by slicing it with Astro’s jetpack or feeling the impact of each action through vibrations in the controller, every detail is finely tuned. Astro’s movements, jumps, and maneuvers are flawless, showcasing the level of precision in the game. This attention to detail sets this game apart, offering players a luxurious experience akin to five-star service.




The Astro Bot puts Frog’s boxing gloves to good use. Photo: Sony/Team Asobi

Another aspect I appreciate about Astro Bot is its suitability for playing with children. While lacking two-player co-op, it functions well as a game to pass the controller among players. My 7-year-old enjoyed watching me play, while my 5-year-old explored safe areas of levels and handed me the controller when faced with challenges.

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Some planets in Astro Bot feature hub areas resembling enclosed playgrounds where players can engage in activities like kicking a ball, battling harmless enemies, jumping into pools, and taking on acrobatic challenges. My kids found the setting charming and dynamic, with references to classic PlayStation games like Uncharted, God of War, and Ape Escape scattered throughout.

Astro Bot, akin to Astro’s Playroom, pays homage to PlayStation’s history and design while expanding beyond a mere tech demo to establish itself as one of the top platform games in recent memory. It truly stands out as one of the finest platform games I’ve had the pleasure of playing. Until now There have been many games I’ve experienced, but being a 90s kid, I’ve played my fair share. The PlayStation hasn’t seen a captivating family game since LittleBigPlanet, and Astro Bot carries on that tradition of playful humor.

Astro Bot is set to release on September 6th, priced at £54.99.

Source: www.theguardian.com

1.5 Billion Pixel Masterpiece Captures The Running Chicken Nebula

The Running Chicken Nebula is made up of several clouds, all of which can be seen in this expansive image from the VLT Survey Telescope (VST) hosted at ESO’s Paranal Site. His 1.5 billion pixel image spans an area of ​​the sky the size of about 25 full moons. The cloud, marked by a wispy pink plume, is filled with gas and dust and lit by young, hot stars within it. Credit: ESO/VPHAS+ Team. Acknowledgment: CASU

of ESO has released a detailed image of the Running Chicken Nebula, located 6,500 light-years away in the constellation Centauri. This 1.5 billion pixel image of his captured by VST highlights young stars and regions such as IC 2948 and IC 2944, providing a cosmic treat for the eyes.

Many holiday traditions include a feast of turkey, buckwheat, latkes, or pan de pascua, but this year the European Southern Observatory (ESO) is bringing you the holiday chicken. The so-called Running Chicken Nebula, home to the birth of young stars, is revealed in stunning detail in this 1.5 billion pixel image captured by the VLT Survey Telescope (VST) at ESO’s Paranal Site in Chile. It has become.

This vast stellar nursery is located in the constellation Centaurus, about 6,500 light-years from Earth. Young stars in this nebula emit intense radiation that makes the surrounding hydrogen gas glow pink.

The Running Chicken Nebula is actually made up of several regions, all of which can be seen in this vast image spanning an area of ​​the sky the size of about 25 full moons.[1] The brightest region in the nebula is called IC 2948, where some people can see the head of a chicken, while others can see the back end. The wispy pastel outlines are fantastic plumes of gas and dust. His IC 2944 is characterized by a bright vertical, almost columnar structure towards the center of the image. The brightest sparkle in this particular area is lambda centauria star visible to the naked eye that is much closer to us than the nebula itself.

The Running Chicken Nebula is made up of several clouds, the most prominent of which are labeled in this expansive image from the VLT Survey Telescope (VST) hosted at ESO’s Paranal Site. The bright star, named Lambda Centauri, is actually much closer than the nebula itself and can be seen with the naked eye. The cloud, marked by a faint pink plume, is filled with gas and dust and lit by young, hot stars within it. In total, this image spans an area of ​​about 25 full moons in the sky, one of which is shown to scale for reference. Credit: ESO/VPHAS+ Team. Acknowledgment: CASU

But IC 2948 and IC 2944 themselves are full of young stars. And while they may be bright, they are definitely not cheerful. They tear through the environment like chickens, spewing massive amounts of radiation. Some regions of the nebula, known as Bok globules, can withstand the intense assault of ultraviolet radiation that spreads through this region. If you zoom in on the image, you may see small, dark pockets of dense dust and gas scattered throughout the nebula.

Other areas pictured here include gums 39 and 40 in the upper right and gum 41 in the lower right. In addition to the nebula, the sky is filled with countless orange, white, and blue stars like fireworks. Overall, this image is a wonder that cannot be explained. Zooming in and moving around the screen can be a feast for the eyes.

This 3D animation of the Running Chicken Nebula imagines what it would be like to fly near a swirling cloud of gas and dust. This video is based on real images from the VLT Survey Telescope hosted on his Paranal site in ESO. However, the 3D positions of the stars shown here are for reference only. Credit: ESO/VPHAS+ Team. Acknowledgment: CASU

This image is a large mosaic made of hundreds of individual frames carefully stitched together. Individual images are taken through filters that pass different colors of light and combined into the final result shown here.Observations were made with a wide-field camera omega cam in VSTis a telescope owned by the Italian National Institute of Astrophysics (INAF) and hosted by ESO at the Paranal site in Chile’s Atacama Desert, perfect for mapping the southern sky in visible light. The data used to create this mosaic were acquired as part of his VST photometric Hα survey of the Southern Galactic Plane and Bulge (VPHAS+), a project aimed at better understanding the life cycle of stars.

This diagram shows the location of the Running Chicken Nebula (IC2944) in the large constellation south of the constellation Centaurus (Centaurus). This map shows most of the stars visible to the naked eye under good conditions, and the location of the nebula itself is marked with a red circle. Although the star cluster associated with this nebula, IC 2948, is easily seen with small telescopes, the nebula is very faint and was only discovered in photographs in the early 20th century. Credits: ESO, IAU, Sky & Telescope

Note

  1. This image spans 270 light years from edge to edge. It takes the average chicken almost 21 billion years to run through it. That’s a long time since our universe has existed.

Access full size 3.9 GB image here.

Source: scitechdaily.com