The initial goal of the Blue Marble project was to combine
remotely sensed data of the Earth to produce imagery with
the same visual impact as one might experience looking
at the planet from a vantage point in space. Released
in April 2000, the original Blue Marble was so popular
that it beckoned a successor. The new effort,
Blue Marble 2002, covers all portions of the Earth,
not just the western hemisphere; it draws heavily on
data from the new MODIS instrument aboard the Terra
spacecraft; and it is at the heart of several spectacular
Earth-centric displays.
One of the motivations for producing the latest Blue Marble
data set was to make it the centerpiece of a large public
exhibit at the 2002 Olympic Winter Games in Salt Lake City.
The captivating imagery could be projected onto a 40 ft
wide sphere; at the base of the sphere would be positioned
8 large plasma display screens which would feature satellite
images of participating countries, along with zoom-ins to
the Olympic venues.
Dr. Fritz Hasler, along with a team of people who shared
his vision, developed a full proposal, and submitted it
to the Olympic committee. While the original plan
did not come to fruition, several components of it were
successfully integrated into the Salt Lake Olympic
experience:
Illuminated Globes
Three suspended globes, each 16 ft in diameter, were installed
during the Winter Olympic Games in Utah. One was hung in the
beatiful atrium of The Children's Museum of Utah, in full view
of the huge Olympics crowds which passed through the Gateway
Center. Another was installed in the Main Douglas Dining
Area at the Olympic Village. A third was placed in the
23rd floor atrium of the Wells Farg/SLOC building. All
three globes feature the Blue Marble 2002 imagery; they
are each illuminated from within, and rotate at
one revolution per minute. The globes were presented at
the Olympics as part of an informal partnership between
NASA/ESE/ESTO, The Children's Museum of Utah, and Tom Grimm/
World Quest.
Walk on the World
On the second floor of The Children's Museum of Utah, a
15 by 30 foot Blue Marble image was laminated to the floor,
for the Olympic crowds to walk and crawl on. This allows
visitors the chance to explore any region of the globe
up close and personal. This exhibit was set up with
the assistance of the Science Museum of Minnesota.
The Childen's Museum also mounted a very large mural of
the United States derived from Landsat data, and seasonal
images of Utah dervied from ASTER data, courtesy of JPL.
Also displayed were very high resolution images of
Salt Lake City and Park City, captured by the IKONOS
satellite of Space Imaging.
E-Theater
The NASA/NOAA E-Theater was on display at The Children's
Musuem of Utah, featuring footage from the new zooms
into the Olympic venues, as well as Earth Science
visualizations and movies from NASA/Goddard, American
Museum of Natural History, Los Alamos National Labs,
National Center for Atmospheric Research, NASA/JPL,
and the Science Museum of Minnesota. The presentations
were shown on a 30 ft screen using a 12,000 lumen
Panasonic projector provided by World Quest. Two
computers were used to drive the visuals: an HDTV server
provided by the Science Museum of Minnesota, and
a Pinnacle video editing system. A Mitsubishi X500
projector was also supplied by the manufacturer
for use in this exhibit.
Blue Marble imagery has played an important role in
the creation of Earth Science visualizations, several of
which are shown in the NASA/NOAA Electronic Theater.
