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The Big Picture: The mouth of an interstellar beast
While Hubble certainly has the advantage out there in low Earth orbit, its ground-based counterparts have also been capturing their own mesmerizing shots of the universe. Take, for example, this image of the cometary globule CG4 taken by ESO's Very Large Telescope. CG4 is also known as "The Mouth of the Beast," because, well, it looks like the gaping maw of a gigantic serpent, though some call it "The Hand of God" instead. Cometary globules are elongated comet-like clouds of gas and dust -- the CG4, in particular, is located 1,300 light-years away from Earth in a constellation called "The Poop" or Puppis, if you want its fancier name.
The Big Picture: A sharper, more haunting Pillars of Creation
Does the image above look familiar? It's because the "Pillars of Creation" is one of the most iconic images captured by the Hubble Space Telescope -- except what you see in this post isn't the exact same photo taken in 1995. To celebrate the telescope's 25th birthday this year, the Hubble team has revisited the columns of cold gas and dust that give birth to new stars, 6,500 light-years away from us in the Eagle Nebula. They look quite different and more fantastical than in the original photo, since Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 took the photo in visible (above) as well as near-infrared light (below the fold), and different gases were processed to be represented by different colors. Plus, the pillars now look more translucent, because they've eroded significantly since we've seen them in 1995. The one taken in infrared light shows more stars, on the other hand, because infrared can penetrate deeper into the gases.
The year in Big Pictures: 17 thought-provoking images from 2014
Whatever you were doing in 2014, there's a good chance you took a picture or two while you were doing it. Thanks to the ever-increasing quality of cameras in our phones, and the popularity of sites like Instagram and Pinterest, images are the de facto currency when it comes to immediate, lucid story telling. We all know the old adage about how many words one picture is worth. As such, we're pleased to bring you 17,000 words' worth of them right here, from some of the more unusual technological happenings that occurred in 2014.
The Big Picture: Building an electric 'armored' car out of wood
If you think the coffee table you've been building in your spare time is pretty sweet, just wait until you get a load of what Liu Fulong has been making. The Shengyang, China resident recently finished his own electric armored car after four months of work, despite having no formal training in automotive design. As you might guess from the photo above, the "armored" label is based more on appearance than functionality. That wooden body probably wouldn't stop many bullets, and the missiles are purely cosmetic. But hey, the car underneath works -- Liu can get around at a respectable 30MPH (faster than his previous 20MPH project), and he factored in crucial elements like lights, mirrors and spare tires. Is this safe? Probably not, but it's proof that you don't need to be a wealthy entrepreneur to build your own eco-friendly ride. [Image credit: STR/AFP/Getty Images]
The Big Picture: A Dragon heads to the International Space Station
The last time SpaceX's Dragon visited the International Space Station, they brought along some nifty presents that included the first zero-g 3D printer. SpaceX captured this photo of Dragon lifting off from Cape Canaveral in September on its fourth commercial resupply mission to the orbital outpost. The company is planning another launch on Friday. What does Elon Musk have up his sleeve this time? They'll attempt to land a Falcon 9 rocket booster on an "autonomous spaceport drone ship" (i.e., a barge). Will this crazy idea work? Musk estimates a 50–50 chance of success. Tune in on Friday to find out how it goes. [Image credit: SpaceX]
The Big Picture: Galactic collision provides amazing X-ray light show
'Tis the season for holiday light shows, and two galaxies about 130 million light years from Earth got together to put on a display of their own. NGC 2207 and IC 2163, both part of the constellation Canis Major (the Great Dog), got cozy and the "ultraluminous X-ray sources" (ULXs) were on full display for NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory to capture. In this case, the light is created when matter is pulled from stars to a neutron star or black whole, generating X-rays during the heating process. What's pictured here is a composite image of the encounter with Chandra data in pink, details from the Spitzer Space Telescope in red and info from the Hubble Space telescope in red, green and blue (seen as blue, white, orange and brown). The interaction between galaxies also features "intense star formation" thanks to shock waves that spawn during the collision.
The Big Picture: measuring the 'Eye of Sauron' galaxy
The galaxy you see here (NGC 4151) may be best-known for looking a bit like the Eye of Sauron in the Lord of the Rings movies, but it's now much more important than that -- it may be the key to mapping the universe. Researchers at the Univerity of Southampton have developed a measurement technique that helped them gauge the distance of NGC 4151 (and possibly other galaxies) with greater precision than any previous method would allow. Instead of using the light from other galaxies as a rough yardstick, the team compared the physical size of the dust ring around NGC 4151's black hole against the apparent size taken from infrared readings. These relatively concrete pieces of information helped them narrow down the distance of the galaxy from a very broad range of 4 to 29 megaparsecs to 19, or about 62 million light years; even with 10 percent uncertainty, that's a vast improvement.
The Big Picture: cooling molten metal in space
Ever wonder what hot metal would be like if it weren't bound by containers, liquids... or even gravity? You're looking at it. The European Space Agency has developed an electromagnetic levitator that the International Space Station is using to see how molten metal cools when it's free of the constraints you typically find on Earth. This experiment isn't intended solely as eye candy, of course. The station crew will use a high-speed camera to record the cooling process and make note of how it affects material structures. If the tests prove fruitful, they could teach people on the ground how to forge metal alloys with greater strength, exotic patterns and other traits that are very hard to produce using modern day techniques.
The Big Picture: NASA's Orion capsule floats inside US Navy ship
It might take some time before space taxis become the real deal. Yet, that doesn't take away from the fact they're extraordinarily amazing in their current stage. One of the most well-known programs is, of course, NASA's Orion capsule, which has been in development for a few years now. Obviously, putting Orion through its paces is key for the space administration. So, what you see above is a test model of the spacecraft while it floats inside the USS Anchorage, a US Navy ship. Reuters snapped the image after Orion was found during a recovery test near the Californian coast, as NASA prepares by simulating different scenarios ahead of the capsule's first official unmanned launch. [Image credit: Reuters/Mike Blake]
The Big Picture: Scientists pick a landing site for their historic comet probe
You're not just looking at an unassuming piece of rock -- if anything, it's a piece of history. That's Site J, the European Space Agency's long-awaited choice of landing spot for Philae, the first probe built to reach a comet's surface. Scientists chose the seemingly uneventful location because it should offer the best chances of studying the comet's nucleus and other material without worrying about impurities. It should also guarantee that Philae both stays in touch with its Rosetta mothership and maintains just enough power to get its job done. You'll likely have to wait until touchdown on November 11th to get a closer look, but this at least serves as a good preview. [Image credit: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA]
The Big Picture: a heat map of the 'entire' internet
As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words. In this case, though, let's say it's worth millions and millions of internet connections. Thanks to John Matherly, founder of Shodan, a search engine which focuses on helping companies locate internet-connected devices, we are getting a pretty detailed look at how the web looks on a map. While Matherly's tweet says the picture shows where "all devices on the internet" were located after he pinged them, that might be a bit of a stretch. Still, the image manages to give us a really good idea of the internet traffic across different parts of the world. And we reckon it's beautiful.
The Big Picture: a 3D-printed castle
Yes, people, this isn't a dream. What you see above is, indeed, a 3D-printed castle. After working on it for a few months, an architect from Minnesota has now finished building a fancy home made out of 3D printing materials. The man behind it, Andrey Rudenko, began his construction adventure back in April, when he decided he wanted to be the one to set a new bar for 3D-printed homes -- there have been some in China, but questions have been raised about the quality of them. "It has been two years since I first began toying with the idea of a 3D printer that was capable of constructing homes," Rudenko told the site 3DPrint. "When I started out, people struggled to believe this project would progress any further." Well, its very real now, and we can only imagine how dazzling it looks in person. [Image credits: 3D Print]
The Big Picture: How EA captured player faces for Madden NFL 15
If you've ever wondered how video game studios transform real-life people into their multi-pixeled personas, here's one method. SB Nation's Sarah Kogod recently made the trip to Baltimore where EA was set to capture facial images from the Ravens' players for Madden NFL 15. There, she encountered the developers new "mobile" rig that leverages a dozen DSLRs situated in two rows of six each in order to snap all of the close-up details. The frame is part TV stand and part wheel chair lift that allows the entire thing to be positioned just so from a connected laptop. In fact, three teams, each outfitted with one of the multi-camera rigs, set out this summer to capture player images from all 32 NFL teams during OTAs and training camp. Before now, artists have had to work from stock photos in order to create a player's virtual counterpart, and accuracy suffered. The folks at EA say that as games become increasingly more life-like, that gamers notice "any blemish that's off... people catch that." [Photo credit: Sarah Kogod/SB Nation]
The Big Picture: Neptune's largest moon, Triton
Neptune has more moons than we have planets in our Solar System, with a total of 14 (and counting) orbiting around it. Its largest, Triton, is big enough to practically be considered a planet, so much so that scientists often compare it to Pluto. (You know, the planet which isn't really a planet, but some people think it should be a planet? Yeah, that's the one.) Now, courtesy of old NASA footage from the Voyager 2 spacecraft, we're getting a closer look at Triton and how it looked back in 1989. Not only that, but NASA's taken images from the aged trek and used them to create the best global map of Triton yet, with color schemes which "are a close approximation to Triton's natural colors." The map, according to NASA, features a resolution of 1,970 feet per pixel, which makes for very, very interesting viewing action.
The Big Picture: SpaceX Falcon 9 departs from Cape Canaveral
Before most of us here in the States woke from last night's slumber, Elon Musk's outfit launched a rocket into space. The SpaceX Falcon 9 blazed across the sky from Cape Canaveral, Florida at 4AM ET, carrying an AsiaSat 8 satellite to deploy into orbit. Liftoff came just hours after the announcement that the company's new facility and the world's first commercial launchpad would be built in Brownsville, Texas.
The Big Picture: A Robot writing the Torah in longhand
A robot arm in the Berlin Jewish Museum is hard at work, carefully inking thousands of Hebrew letters on an 80-meter (260-foot) scroll. In about three months, it will have transcribed the entire Torah "by hand," a process that normally takes Jewish scribes about a year. The robot's penmanship is delicate and exact, but its work is merely an exhibit: the completed work won't be considered holy. "In order for the Torah to be holy, it has to be written with a goose feather on parchment," explains Rabbi Reuven Yaacobov. "The process has to be filled with meaning, and I'm saying prayers while I'm writing it." Yaacobov and the Robot are part of "The Creation of the World," a new exhibit at the museum that highlights the significance of Hebrew handwriting. Yaacobov is on hand to show patrons how the Torah is written traditionally, and to explain the religious significance of the process. The human element will only be on site until August 3rd, but his robotic companion will be writing Hebrew scriptures until January of next year. [Image credit: Adam Berry, Getty Images]
Xi3 starts Piston pre-orders: buy an early Steambox for under $1,000
While Xi3's Piston may only be a Steambox through its software optimization, that still leaves us with a milestone on our hands now that the system is available for pre-orders: it's the first Valve-blessed PC on sale. If you're willing to set aside just under $1,000 ($900 during SXSW), you can claim a Big Picture-friendly mini PC with an embedded, 3.2GHz version of AMD's quad-core A10 in addition to 8GB of RAM and a 128GB solid-state drive. There's no mention of the conventional spinning storage referenced at CES. Expansion is limited to larger-capacity SSDs, although that's not surprising when the entire computer is smaller than a GeForce GTX Titan. The real jolt will be the launch timing. Xi3 won't have Pistons shipping until around the holidays, which could leave some of us hunting for less-than-official (if considerably larger) substitutes for the full Steam experience.
Gabe Newell hints at possible 'turnkey' Valve living room system, sees others following suit
Valve has been making a visibly deep push into the living room, but in bits and pieces -- controllers here, Big Picture interfaces there. Company chief Gabe Newell may have just hinted at a more holistic, though non-exclusive, approach in the works. Chatting on the sidelines of the Video Game Awards, he tells Kotaku that any Valve hardware would involve a "turnkey solution" with a "very controlled" environment, not unlike a console. While that's not necessarily the confirmation of the rumored Steam Box, Newell only stokes the speculation further through his eagerness to put Big Picture on Steam for Linux and get that much more control when building hardware. The game developer doesn't see his company monopolizing couch-based devices should it get involved, however -- he predicts more companies will be selling PCs in 2013 tailored for the TV in a way that would favor Steam. We won't consider either a Valve-made gaming box or its third-party equivalents to be imminent based solely on award show banter, but the remarks suggest that at least one of the PCs is more than just a dream.
Steam Big Picture beta hands-on
Been keeping up with Steam's Big Picture interface? Then you probably know it's already in beta. The 10-foot UI hopes to help Valve's content distribution portal get comfortable in front of your couch, offering gamers access to their favorite PC titles from a gamepad-friendly interface. We piped the beta out to our own living room to take a look, and weren't surprised to find a sleek attractive UI with a heap of polish. That said, we were glad we didn't leave our mouse and keyboard at the office.
NYT: Steam's Big Picture public beta begins Monday
Can't wait to use Steam's forthcoming Big Picture mode to game from the comfort of your couch? Well, you're in luck, because it might be ready for a test drive tomorrow. According to The New York Times, the living room-friendly user interface is getting the public beta treatment starting Monday. Gabe Newell let loose last month that both the TV-geared view and Steam for Linux betas would be "out there fairly quickly," but there's still no word on when the Ubuntu-bound preview will land. In the meantime, we'll keep busy by gawking at Valve's augmented reality headset, which the NYT got a glimpse of during a trip to the firm's headquarters, at the source link below.