Students Take Pictures From Space On $150 Budget

An anonymous reader writes "Two MIT students have successfully photographed the earth from space on a strikingly low budget of $148. Perhaps more significantly, they managed to accomplish this feat using components available off-the-shelf to the average layperson, opening the door for a new generation of amateur space enthusiasts. The pair plan to launch again soon and hope that their achievements will inspire teachers and students to pursue similar endeavors."

This is hardly anything new

[Bruce Perens]

Groups like EOSS [eoss.org] have been doing this for at least 30 years, probably more. It's very common for a balloon launch to be a featured event in a ham radio conference. Their budgets per payload are similar, although they are able to do more technical work than featured in the MIT students work and often design their own radios, command devices, etc. None of this, though, is out of the range of a dedicated amateur. Note that there is a software-defined GPS [gpscreations.com] in development that might be the best way to get around the 20K foot altitude limit of consumer GPS devices. Its component cost is pretty low, despite the $495 cost charged for an assembled device at that site.

NOT from space

[Anonymous Coward]

20 miles up is very high, but it is NOT space. The edge of space is more like 65 miles.

Re:This is hardly anything new

[Bruce Perens]

This was in the range of a high-school teacher before. Indeed, there have been many high-school launches. Using donated parts doesn't really cut it. The camera has to be one of a few specific models that can run an Open Source download. The phone can't be just any one, unfortunately.

By the way, use of the phone at altitude violates FCC regulations and does a denial-of-service attack on cell sites because sites all of the way to the horizon are receiving that frequency.

Re:... they used a cellphone GPS?

[Bruce Perens]

It was in line-of-sight to the tower. Most of the signal loss is from obstacles on the ground. When you have line-of-sight, you can go very far.

That's why use of cell phones at altitude is illegal. They illuminate thousands of cell cites all of the way to the horizon, and probably lock users out of a frequency on every one of those sites. It's sort of a denial-of-service attack.

Re:... they used a cellphone GPS?

[JorDan Clock]

From their website:

The GPS cell phone we used to track the location of our vehicle lost reception soon after launch (at an elevation of ~2500 feet).

So I'm guessing it gave it's location up to 2500 feet, disappeared, then reappeared when it went below about 2500 feet.

Re:... they used a cellphone GPS?

[click2005]

It would only need to be when its nearing the ground.

20 miles up is NOT space

[damburger]

This is a fairly standard high-altitude photography method, that is just being hyped up. You attached a camera to a helium balloon. Whoop-de-fucking-doo. Doesn't have anything to do with space.

Re:Safety?

[Bruce Perens]

You can inform the FAA to issue a NOTAM (Notice to Airmen) and you can get your flight permitted, all of the ham groups know how to do this. You can get a fine for not informing the FAA if your payload is over a certain weight.

The terminal velocity of falling objects varies according to the weight of the object and the air resistance. A foam cooler and some ropes and torn balloon falling from altitude don't go very fast. Note that their descent took 40 minutes, and it was probably faster in thin air than thick.

There was an interesting mythbusters on falling bullets. They couldn't get much force out of them.

Re:This is hardly anything new

[Bruce Perens]

Another thing they can do is use a part-15 or Amateur transmitter. Now that there is no Morse Code requirement, passing the lowest level of ham test is something you can do with a few hours study. And then you can have live TV from the balloon, and you can command it to cut down the balloon when you wish.

Re:99 Luftballoons

[32771]

Not anymore my friend, not anymore. Not since the nineties at least.

Oh and by the way:

"You and I in a little toy shop
Buy a bag of balloons with the money we've got.
Set them free at the break of dawn
'Til one by one, they were gone.
Back at base, bugs in the software
Flash the message, Something's out there.
Floating in the summer sky.
99 red balloons go by."

Bugs in the software, eh? Well, they may still have them. Maybe it is still a relevant song.

I never knew there was an english version:

http://www.eightyeightynine.com/music/nena-99luftballoons.html [eightyeightynine.com]

It has been toned down quite a bit.

62mi / 100km

[imtheguru]

According to the Federation Internationale D'espace, space begins at 62 miles, about 100 kilometers. Often referred to as the 62 mile club.

Cheers.

Re:$50 GPS cell phone?

[QuantumLeaper]

No, I found the same cell phone for $40 at many online places, it took 30 seconds to do a search.

Re:NOT from space

[arth1]

Correct. A balloon can't be in space, simply because there must be atmosphere for the balloon to be lighter than, or it can't rise. Never mind that they tend to expand and explode before they reach that theoretical height...

Normally, what we consider the start of space is around 10 times as far out as the record for helium balloons. Even hydrogen balloons can get nowhere near space. If you could make a balloon filled with hard vacuum, you would be able to almost, but not quite, reach space.

So the correct tag for this article is !space

High School Students got better photos for $100

[nunoloureiro]

Some High School Students from Bilbao, Spain, did the same thing earlier this year for less than $100. Looking at the photos, it seems they got better shots.

Story here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/5005022/Teens-capture-images-of-space-with-56-camera-and-balloon.html [telegraph.co.uk]

Photos here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/meteotek08/sets/ [flickr.com]

Re:Yawn

[ivan_w]

Well, somehow, it is already being exploited..

It is used to *reduce* the overall kinetic energy of a re-entering bolide so that the acceleration (and hereby force) to which the payload is submitted at impact doesn't damage said payload.

And also.. the overall energy dissipated during atmospheric re-entry cannot exceed the amount of energy used to put the object wherever - and at whatever velocity - it was before re-entry. So if you are worried about energy expenditure.. just don't launch !

--Ivan

Re:High School Students got better photos for $100

[chocobanana]

Yep, here's more coverage from Wired: http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2009/03/kids-send-a-cam/ [wired.com] You may need to dig a bit in the Flickr slideshow but the amazing photos are sure there.

Old News

[ianturton]

Cambridge University and some UK high school (US Middle school) kids did this in 2008 - http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/news/dp/2008120401 [cam.ac.uk]

Re:NOT from space

[Eric52902]

You either need to divide by zero or dereference a null pointer inside it.

Re:Yawn

[Megane]

Atmospheric burn-up is caused as you lose orbital velocity when you contact the atmosphere. As balloons and their payloads were never in orbit in the first place, there is no worry about anything burning up.

Re:This is hardly anything new

[Bruce Perens]

Check out Stratofox [stratofox.org]. That's the serious tracking group.

Re:This is hardly anything new

[Bruce Perens]

If you can afford to, here [kaymont.com], otherwise you can get post-dated ones on ebay.