White Label Space

Relax to a lunar flyover

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 20:48:00 +0000

Hard day at work?

Turn on some classical music, sit back and watch this amazing footage from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.

NASA's Vision for Human Space Exploration

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 10:43:00 +0000

This excellent promotional video by NASA is a captivating and clear explanation of its vision for human space exploration in the coming decades, a vision embodied by the Constellation Program. The first phase of the program starts with utilization of the International Space Station in Earth orbit. That is followed by long duration missions to the Moon's surface then eventually human exploration of Mars.

The video does mention the troubled Ares-1 launch vehicle but it does explain the role of the Orion spacecraft which will carry four astronauts after the Space Shuttle is retired. The video also shows the critical role that education plays in promoting and developing future space activities.

Preliminary Landing Site Considerations

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Fri, 15 May 2009 20:27:00 +0000

The International Atlas for Lunar Exploration by Phil Stooke (also available on our website’s Amazon.com carousel widget) shows the landing sites proposed by the Euromoon 2000 team. These are located at peaks of eternal light near the Moon’s south pole. In the Atlas Stooke also suggests other nearby landing sites with rover routes into the permanently shadowed zones.

We are considering targeting our Google Lunar X PRIZE mission for landing at or near one of those sites since they offer great potential for winning the Water Bonus Prize. Finding a useful deposit of water ice on the Moon would revolutionize space exploration by making a permanently manned lunar base more likely, and we would like to offer our sponsors the chance to be part of such a discovery. Talking about our sponsors, we would also like to offer them exciting video and photography. The Moon’s south pole region is a prime location thanks to its rugged landscape and dramatic shadowing.

There are also interesting scientific benefits of landing in this region including the opportunity of inspecting samples of the South Pole-Aitken impact basin in the ejecta of more recent smaller craters. We intend to reserve a certain amount of mass on our Google Lunar X PRIZE for such customer payloads.

However, landing at a peak of eternal light is quite difficult. Firstly, the polar areas of the moon are typical highland regions which have rough terrain, putting more demands on hazard avoidance and the stability and of the landing craft at touchdown. A mare region would be less demanding in that respect.

An even greater difficulty is the need for a precision landing capability. Missing the landing target at a peak of eternal light by even a few hundred meters could leave the craft in a shadowed area where solar panels cannot generate power, or in a 'communications shadow' where line of sight radio transmissions cannot reach the Earth, leaving relay by a lunar orbiting satellite as the only option for communications.

No robotically guided craft has ever soft-landed on the Moon with the required level of precision to ensure permanent sun illumination at a peak of eternal light, and there are complicated navigation challenges that still need to be solved before that technology becomes available. Remember, there is no satellite navigation system at the Moon with which the lander can determine its position, nor are there any road signs or beacons pointing out the runway!

Considering that landing anywhere on the Moon is already a difficult challenge, we are now focusing our efforts on defining a baseline mission with a landing in a mare region. Mare regions are much flatter than highland ones and this simplifies the landing system design. However, much of the mission architecture and the subsystem designs for a mare landing could also be used for a mission targeting more difficult locations so we will keep open the option to upgrade our Google Lunar X PRIZE mission in the future.

Eventually we will make our landing site selection based upon our assessment of the technical risks, considering also the needs of our potential sponsors and the level of interest in the scientific community for the respective options.

What is White Label Space

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Fri, 08 May 2009 23:00:00 +0000

We have been preparing a Google Lunar X PRIZE (GLXP) team since March of 2008. At first we didn't have a team name or even a vision for how we would approach the GLXP. At that time, we were united only by the common belief that the time had come for privately-funded space missions to the Moon and further destinations.

As we started work on our business plan, we realized that the GLXP is all about reaching out and engaging the general public so one of the first things we did was establish this White Label Space blog. Through this blog we have explored some of the commercial aspects of the GLXP including space advertising, our brand image, interesting news about space that impresses the everyday person (outside the space industry), recognition of our early partners, and even some speculation about how Star Trek would win the GLXP!

In parallel to the early blogging, we formed an engineering team to start developing the early concepts for our GLXP mission. So far we have progressed quite far in our preliminary design but we still have to do an enormous amount of work before we can see our GLXP mission blasting off towards the Moon.

In the coming weeks and months we will gradually introduce our team members and more details of our technical plans. Of course, we will have to keep some of the technical aspects confidential - this is a race after all!

From this blog post, the most important thing you should take away with you is the meaning of our team name. Our team leader Steve Allen, invented the "White Label Space" name during a brainstorming session on the 22'th of June 2008.

A "White Label Product" is a brandless (or generic) product provided ready for branding by another company. Some well known examples of white label products are supermarket goods, records, websites and electronics. Companies with a strong brand image use white label products in order to save the costs and risks of developing new products. In a similar way, White Label Space is a brandless Moon 2.0 space technology start-up, with the "product" being a complete space mission ready to win the GLXP.

Although the cost of access to space is decreasing, space missions are still very expensive and the most simple GLXP mission will have a cost in the many tens of millions of dollars. Our team of dedicated and passionate space engineers, together with our strong technical partners, will bridge the funding gap by developing the necessary technologies and designs in-house, and using the internet to promote our progress and test results.

When we are ready, we will sell our white label space mission to one or more of the biggest brands in the world, who will replace our White Label Space brand with their own brand/s, and together we will take part in humanity's next great step to a sustainable presence on Moon.

White Label Space Joins Google Lunar X PRIZE

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Fri, 08 May 2009 09:36:00 +0000

Team White Label Space was formed back in early 2008 by a group of experienced space professionals inspired by the challenge of the Google Lunar X PRIZE. With a strong background in space engineering and knowledge of the costs involved, the group realized that there were numerous global companies that could finance a Google Lunar X PRIZE mission with less than 10% of their yearly advertising expenditure.

Like the early Apollo missions, the winning Google Lunar X PRIZE mission will reach billions of people. By reaching this audience, White Label Space will offer an unprecedented advertising opportunity and will create strong and enduring brand associations for international companies operating in industries such as technology, automotive, telecommunications, transportation and finance.

From its Global Headquarters in the Netherlands, White Label Space will continue to build strong partnerships with companies and organisations around the world, particularly those that are interested in stepping into the space market or expanding their existing market share. Making maximum use of web technologies, White Label Space will provide an integrated promotional platform that showcases the partners' capabilities and products. By cooperating in the development of the White Label Space Google Lunar X PRIZE mission, the partners will also develop new technologies and products that can be reused in future space missions.

By extensively using social media to engage the public at large, White Label Space will reach beyond the space-enthusiast community and inspire people from all walks of life to join its exiting journey of discovery and adventure.

Team Composition

The team is comprised of people from many nationalities, including England, Netherlands, Australia, United States, France, Japan, Brazil, Italy, Germany, Norway and Portugal. The core team consists of eight members, Steve Allen, Robin Biesbroek, Marina Petrozzi, Andrew Barton, Kazuya Yoshida, Juergen Schlutz, Mark Bentley and Ayako Ono. Another 40 collaborators and advisors support the core team

The founding members of Google Lunar X PRIZE Team White Label Space include members of the Lunar Explorers Society (LUNEX) and participants in the Euromoon 2000 project, a European Space Agency (ESA) plan for a lunar surface exploration.

LUNEX is an international space advocacy organization that aims to promote the exploration of the Moon for the benefit of humanity. LUNEX members believe that the Moon is the next and most important step in the human exploration of the solar system and are dedicated to help achieve this goal through furthering international cooperation, outreach activities and general enlightening of the public. In pursuing this aim LUNEX hopes to bring the benefits of the Moon to all people on Earth through a sustainable exploration process.

Euromoon 2000 was an initiative of the European Space Agency (ESA) in the 1990s that aimed to land a robotic craft on the rim of the Shackleton Crater at the Moon's south pole in the year 2000. The efforts to develop the Euromoon 2000 mission plan were led by the Dutch Astronaut Wubbo Ockels, who assembled a team of over 25 engineers and scientists from ESA and industry to make a preliminary mission assessment study, building upon some related studies that took place in the preceding years. ESA was not able to find the budget for the mission but the efforts and progress made at that time are relevant to any European team wishing to compete in the Google Lunar X PRIZE.

Approach

The White Label Space team's goal is to appeal to investors by assembling a strong international technical team capable of winning the Google Lunar X PRIZE. White Label Space sees the creation of strong partnerships as a key element of this vision. Parters will benefit by showcasing their technology, products and capabilities on the international stage. To build an effective team, White Label Space will focus on interoperability and will develop interchangeable and modular designs that will lead to new interface standards for low cost space missions. This open and collaborative approach is analogous to what the internet revolution has done for business and the shift away from closed proprietary standards to open ones, where anybody can contribute and benefit.

White Label Space recognizes the enormous possibilities of the internet to share knowledge and organize information, to realize international collaborative projects more ambitious than ever attempted before. White Label Space intends to use the latest such internet technologies and will continue to update and modernise its internet infrastructure, looking to emerging internet technologies such as cloud computing for use with distributed project collaboration.

Partners

Today, White Label Space has five official partners developing different technologies and equipment for its Google Lunar X PRIZE mission;

The Swiss Propulsion Laboratory (SPL) is developing a low-cost engine for the landing stage of the White Label Space mission. SPL has long experience developing cheap and reliable rocket propulsion systems for numerous customers. SPL has a rocket motor test bench located on the same site as its workshop and engineering design offices, enabling rapid and extensive testing of its engine designs.
The Space Robotics Lab at Tohoku University in Japan will work with White Label Space to design a rover for the Google Lunar X PRIZE mission. The lab is led by Professor Kazuya Yoshida and has contributed to numerous Japanese space missions including the Hayabusa asteroid sample return mission.
JAQARsoftware.com is White Label Space's partner for orbital design and mission analysis. JAQARsoftware.com provides quality, easy-to-use intelligent software tools that allow its customers to solve complex spaceflight problems such as satellite trajectory optimization in short time on everyday desktop PCs. Clients include many of the top space companies and agencies across Europe, the USA and Asia.
Lunar Numbat is a team of Australians and New Zealanders who are using their skills and Open Source technologies to develop new software and electronic hardware in support of the White Label Space mission.
Wroclaw University of Technology's Institute of Telecommunications, Teleinformatics and Acoustics has extensive experience developing aerospace communications equipment including the Amateur Radio for the ISS (ARISS) antenna which is now flying on the European Columbus Module of the International Space Station.

White Label Space is continually looking to form new partnerships with capable partners from all over the world and discussions are currently under way with three other potential parters.

White Label Space sees this as the beginning of an adventure that has far reaching consequences for all of humanity. For us the GLXP is the starting point of the next wave of space exploration where the common person can become a contributor and not just a spectator.

Ikegami Camera Shows Full Earth from Moon

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Sun, 03 May 2009 10:11:00 +0000

This video shows what the surface of the Moon looks like in HD. The footage was taken by a special HD camera developed by Ikegami currently orbiting the Moon onboard the Japan's Kaguya spacecraft (also called SELENE). The camera design is a customised version of the HDL-40, modified by Ikegami to withstand the high radiation, vibration and thermal environment of space.

AGI Makes North Korea Space Launch a Reality

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 08:27:00 +0000

This video courtsey of Analytical Graphics Inc. shows what North Korea's recent satellite launch attempt might have looked like.

Officials from the US and South Korean governments announced that the Kwangmyŏngsŏng-2 satellite failed to reach orbit, and this was later validated by an official statement by the Russian Space Control who could not detect the clamined satellite in orbit. Russia however does intend to help North Korea launch future satellites according to this ITAR-TASS aritcle.

Well, too bad for North Korea, but in any case, thanks to Analytical Graphics, we have this great ring-side seat view of what the action would have looked like!

Note the first stage falling in the waters before Japan's land territories, and the second stage falling in the ocean long after passing Japanese territory. According to the wikipedia article the first stage impact point was within Japan's exclusive economic zone but outside its territorial waters.

It's a pity that in this verison we don't see one of those US missiles coming up to intercept it ;-)

The claimed North Korean satellite is absent from the United Nations Online Index of Objected Launched into Outer Space however North Korea did complete its accession to the Convention on the Registration of Objects Launched into Outer Space.

Control Your Car by iPod

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 09:30:00 +0000

Some of the latest tinkerings by Jon Oxer, a member of our parter Lunar Numbat...

It's all about synthesis of technologies. It's not hard to imagine how similar ideas can be applied to our Google Lunar X-PRIZE mission.

Why NASA's Budget Can't be Reduced

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 10:05:00 +0000

When 10,000 jobs are at stake, lawmakers start to listen. As reported in this article in Parabolic Arc, the big 5 space primes in America have ganged together to point out that NASA needs to accelerate its development of the next generation of space exploration vehicles, otherwise a lot of skilled labor will be forced to find work in other industries.

It is nice to see the specific reference to the Altair lunar lander in the plans that industry wants to start working on. Interestingly however, they don't refer to the Ares-1 launch vehicle which has recently suffered a 6 month delay.

Ares 1-X Test Flight Video

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 12:28:00 +0000

This great computer graphics vidieo shows the upcoming flight of NASA's Ares 1-X experimental flight demonstrating the feasibility of the Ares 1 launch vehicle, which NASA is developing as a replacement for the Space Shuttle to transport astronauts into space.

The 1X flight will include a simulated upper stage to measure the relevant parameters of the rocket's flight. In the video we see the burn of the first stage, the separation, and the recovery of the first stage. Included is a nice sequence of the staged parachute opening, which is done to ensure a more gradual decelaration of the empty stage as it returns to earth.

The single solid rocket booster on the first stage of the Ares 1 is a stretched version of the human-rated solid rocket motors that are currently used to power the lift-off of the Space Shuttle. In the case of the Shuttle, these boosters are designed to be recovered from their ocean landing site and re-used in later flights. NASA is also interested in using the same approach for Ares 1.

Australian Partner Lunar Numbat Joins White Label Space

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 21:57:00 +0000

White Label Space is proud to announce its newest partnership with the Australian/New Zealand group called Lunar Numbat. The Lunar Numbat group will use their skills and Open Source technologies to help us develop novel hardware and software solutions for our Google Lunar X PRIZE (GLXP) mission.

The Numbat is a small and cute marsupial animal native to Western Australia. The Numbat was formerly classified as endagered and had a total population less than 1000 in the 1970's. Today however, its population has increase somewhat and it is classified as 'vulnerable'.

While working with us on GLXP, the Lunar Numbat group also hopes to bring about innovations in space science using open source technologies, to collaborate with other space science entities, to educate as to the benefits that space science provides all people and advocate the formation of an Australian Space Agency. Perhaps the recovery from near-extinction of the Numbat can set a good example for the recovery of the Australian space industry, which is currently in a state of neglect by the Australian government.

In the coming months our White Label Space core engineering team will work together with the Lunar Numbat group to determine which parts or subsystems of our space mission they will develop.

White Label Space looks forward to forming partnerships with other like-minded organisations around world who have the right stuff to undertake ambitious space exploration and to inspire today's generation that wasn't even alive when humans last walked on the Moon.

Euromoon 2000

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 16:01:00 +0000

Euromoon 2000 was an initiative of the European Space Agency (ESA) in the 1990s aiming to land a robotic craft at the Aitken Basin near the Moon's south pole in the year 2000. The budget for the mission was never found but the efforts made at that time are certainly relevant to European team wishing to compete in the Google Lunar X PRIZE (GLXP).

The mission was envisioned as true partnership between space agency and industry where they both shared the initial costs and any potential financial returns. It also invited additional sponsorship from the European Union, the commercial sphere and the general public. The estimated cost was one ECU per European citizen, which at that time would have equated to around 250 million Euros.

The mission comprised two spacecraft, a lunar Orbiter and a lunar Lander, which were both launched on an Ariane 4 (the no longer operating predescesor to the Ariane 5). After a two-month phase orbiting the Moon and collecting topographical and geographical data, the Lander would separate from the Orbiter and land at a peak of eternal light. Once on the surface, scientific instruments would be used to search for frozen volatiles such as water. The Lander would also carry multiple robotic payloads for a exploration competition called the 'Millennium Challenge', which would have involved a robotic race to the Moon's South Pole.

The efforts to develop the Euromoon 2000 mission plan were led by the Dutch Astronaut Wubbo Ockels, who assembled a team of over 25 engineers and scientists from ESA and industry to make a preliminary mission assessment study, building upon some related studies that took place in the preceding years.

By lobbying the delegates of the various nations that make up ESA, Ockels was able to get the Euromoon 2000 project on the agenda of the ESA Ministerial Council of 1997 with a request for 50 million Euros (the remaining 200 million was to come from private industry). However, much to the dissapointment of the project participants, the ministers present at the council meeting voted not to support the project with any ESA money.

By assembling a sizeable interdisciplinary team working together in one room, the Euromoon 2000 project was the first attempt to do concurrent engineering in ESA and played a major role in the creation of ESA's Concurrent Engineering Facility (CDF), which is still led today by the deputy project manager of Euromoon 2000, Massimo Bandecchi.

British Partnership Aims to Launch Satellites

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 10:36:00 +0000

After many decades without a serious attempt to compete in the satellite launch business, two British firms have formed a partnership to develop a new air-launch service based on the White Knight Two aircraft developed by Burt Rutan's Scaled Composites.

Surrey Satellite Technologies Limited (SSTL) and Virgin Galactic are seeking financing to develop a low-cost rocket system that could be carried on the White Knight Two aircraft, which was recently developed with finance from Richard Branson's space tourism venture.

The new launch system would would comprise two solid stages and be capable of injecting satellites from 50kg up to 200kg into a polar orbit of 400km altitude. The target launch price is quoted here at $1 million, which would be a reduction by a factor of 5 to 10 times on the current launch costs for similar sized payloads.

This video explains more details of the partnership.

The predecesor aircraft, "White Knight", was used to win the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE, demonstrating the feasibility of an aircraft launched sub-orbital space tourism system.

Rare Apollo Guidance Computer - AGC video

noreply@blogger.com (White Label Space) — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 20:15:00 +0000

During the transfer of our blog to it's final domain www.whitelabelspace.com some time has been sent tidying up the old posts, reading the old comments and recategorising the tags. A couple of our posts (Build Your Own Apollo Guidance Computer & Why not try a Virtual Apollo Guidance Computer) centered the Apollo Guidance Computer AGC.

Google Lunar X-PRIZE's own Mike Fabio had commented on one of the posts:

Can we get some videos of this thing in action? That is truly awesome. The MIT Press (go Engineers!) has recently published a book all about the computers used on the Apollo missions. Check it out here.

Well after another trawl through YouTube's immense archives we finally hit the jackpot. Here's actual footage of the Apollo Guidance Computer staring in it's own YouTube video. We're wondering how much more historically significant space age video will turn up on YouTube & how long that footage will stay available. Let's hope that this one stay's up long enough for you all to see.

SpaceX Sends Message to US Taxpayers - Hire Us

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 11:10:00 +0000

In this update Elon Musk is sending a clear message to American taxpayer - supporting the SpaceX Falcon 9 human rated launcher is in your best interests!

(Image adapted from the SpaceX post)

Elon presents the undeniable logic of his plan as follows:

it will save the taxpayer $2 billion
it will bring 1000 high quality jobs
it will help fill the gap between shuttle and the new manned launcher under development by NASA - the troubled Ares-1

Upcoming GLXP team White Label Space: Recruiting now open

noreply@blogger.com (Steve Allen) — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 10:37:00 +0000

White Label Space and its Partners are now preparing to recruit talented and motivated staff to help us realize our goals of developing a space mission to win the Google Lunar X PRIZE.

Work locations will be in the Netherlands, Switzerland and Australia.

The roles we are currently seeking qualified staff for are:

Chemical Propulsion Engineer
Guidance Navigation and Control Engineer
Optics Engineer/Physicist
Space Telecommunications Engineer
Avionics System Engineer
Structures Engineer
Aerospace Engineer
Thermal Design and Analysis Engineer
Web Application Developer
Public Relations Officer

Interns and postgraduate researchers are also welcome to apply.

If you are young, innovative, motivated and passionate about space exploration, please send a copy of your resume with a brief cover letter explaining your vision on how you can be part of our effort to: careers@whitelabelspace.com.

Your details will also be distributed to our Partners unless you request otherwise.

Greatest Space Ads - Irresponsible Astronauts Lose Bridgestone Tires

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 06:21:00 +0000

This space advertisement played on TV during the superbowl features a pair of fun-loving astroanuts enjoying their stay on the Moon but when they come back to their rover, they find that there is a little surprise waiting for them.

Superbowl advertising is the most expensive in the world. In 2009 a 30 second advertisment slot cost $3 million (see USA Today article). We are happy to see that this Superbowl ad included two themes quite close to the Google Lunar X PRIZE (GLXP) - rovers and Moon exploration.

Project Enterprize - Privately Funded European Space Tourism

noreply@blogger.com (White Label Space) — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 20:30:00 +0000

Project Enterprise is a German/Swiss/Austrian collaboration started in 2004 as Europe's first privately funded spaceflight project with the goal of carrying out sub orbital flights for space tourism and scientific experiments.
Website: http://www.european-spacetourism.eu/i... (in German only)
Google translation

Kim Jong Il Announces Plan To Bring Moon To North Korea - ONN

noreply@blogger.com (White Label Space) — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 18:41:00 +0000

The Onion News Network are at it again, this time with a controversial report on Kim Jong Il's plan to bring the Moon to North Korea. If he was to succeed this would of course make nonsense out of Nasa's Lunar program & the Google Lunar X-PRIZE :)

<a href="http://www.joost.com/163q1cy/t/Kim-Jong-Il-Announces-Plan-To-Bring-Moon-To-North-Korea">Kim Jong Il Announces Plan To Bring Moon To North Korea</a>

The mission is to be completed by 2015, using 5 rockets to drag the moon back to earth. For the sake of humanity, let's hope this plan does not succeed :)

Google add Mars to the latest release of Google Earth

noreply@blogger.com (White Label Space) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 18:09:00 +0000

This is the result of a 3 year cooperation between the Silicon Valley's company with its NASA Ames neighbour aiming to bring the Martian landscape to the public.
Also, note that on this new release, you can Dive beneath the surface and Explore the ocean.

After Earth and the Stars, the now famous Google product "Google Earth" just released a new version with this time the opportunity to explore the Martian surface.

Have a look, explore it and let us know if like us you enjoyed it !

Interview with Dr. Michio Kaku

noreply@blogger.com (Steve Allen) — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 00:10:00 +0000

Steve Paikin from TVO The Agenda interviews Dr. Michio Kaku.
A fascinating talk covering topics from Dr. Michio Kaku's book "Physics of the Impossible".
Subjects discussed range from psychokinesis and telepathy to teleportation and time travel. Impossibilities are split into classes

Class I. Impossibilities Includes force fields, telepathy and antiuniverses. These don't violate the current known laws of science & could be become reality within the next 100 years or so.

Class II. Impossibilities Includes faster than the speed of light travel and parallel universes.

Class III Impossibilities Includes perpetual motion machines and precognition.

In the distant future the need for tons of advanced technology to land payloads on distant planets could be a thing of the past. What will be evidently needed is the ability to harness a power source that is beyond comprehension. The only thing I can say to that is "Beam me up Scotty".

Live 720P HD recording using a Canon 40D & Nikon D700

noreply@blogger.com (Steve Allen) — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 10:48:00 +0000

I'm looking forward to what these hacks will bring us. The Indie film maker has never been in such a good position to produce high quality movies for an extremely low cost.
This is also good news for GLXP teams, as recording their progress in high quality HD suddenly becomes a whole lot more affordable.

Nikon D700

Some Canon die-hards have already managed to coax their DSLRs to record video via live-view, and it looks like Nikon aficionados are now able to do the same, albeit not quite as easily just yet. That's because the mod requires both access to Nikon's SDK for the D700 and the necessary skills to actually do something with it, in this case capturing video from the live-view feed via USB. see rest of story on engadget

Canon 40D

If you're just now starting to come to grips with the fact that Canon's utterly succulent EOS 5D Mark II is just way, way out of reach, here's a little something to lessen the impact of your inferiority complex. An enterprising young buck with a passion to bring video capture abilities to other EOS cameras figured out a way to enable that very capability on all Liveview EOS DSLRs.see rest of story on engadget

Video on Flickr

Near 720p video made with a Canon 40D, using the Live View feature. Camera was connected to the laptop via USB, and a russian program recorded the output. See the video ouput see here on Flickr.

Russian source
Canon 40D-vel készült videó. Részletek a spottr.hu-n!

Migrating from @LunarX_EU to @whitelabelspace

noreply@blogger.com (Steve Allen) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 17:40:00 +0000

First we would like to thank all the people that have followed us on @LunarX_EU & for all your great comments so far. In the lead up to joining the Google Lunar X-PRIZE we are now migrating over to use our @whitelabelspace account instead as @LunarX_EU as this was only meant as a place holder until we found an official name for our project.

Please join us at @whitelabelspace & feel free to comment/ask questions/make suggestions on how we can improve our chances of winning GLXP, what you would like to know about us, how we can improve our ongoing dialogue with you or how you can join or contribute to our project.

We would like to thank the 600 plus people that have followed us on twitter in the last 4 days. It seems at least that the word has managed to reach many of our blog readers. If you would like to follow our web 2.0 progress on other services, please use the "Contact" link in the navbar above or link here.

Content is sparse at this moment in time but you expect it to start to fill up soon as the details around our team & project become more public. Thanks for all the kind words of support we have received from many of you up to now. We look forward to hearing from you!

Tohoku University's SPRITE-SAT Successfully Launched

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 17:01:00 +0000

The SPRITE-SAT spacecraft designed and built by Tohoku Univeristy, a partner of White Label Space, was successfully launched into space last week on a Japanese H-IIA rocket. The satellite was inserted in the prescribed orbit and radio signals from the satellite have been received at the ground station in Tohoku University, and have confirmed that the satellite is in good health.

SPRITE-SAT has now started its mission to observe Sprites and Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes (TGF). The spacecraft was developed by the faculty and students of Tohoku Univeristy, with technical support from external mentors experienced in satellite development. Students played a leading role in the assembly and testing of the spacecraft, giving a unique opportunity for hands-on education in space science and space engineering.

Onboard the satellite was a minature gallery of art, etched onto a silicon wafer by photolithography, making this mission also one of the first art exhibitions in outer space.

Tohoku University, led by Professor Kazuya Yoshida, will use the experience gained from SPRITE-SAT to develop the rover for our Google Lunar X PRIZE (GLXP) mission, which will be a small rover capable of travelling at least 500m across the lunar surface and capturing hi-definition videos and photographs for transmission back to Earth.

NASA's Ares-1 "Stick" Broken in Two

noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Barton) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 15:36:00 +0000

This video shows the (intentional) separation of the first and second stages of NASA's planned Ares 1 launcher, which is currently under development as a man-rated replacement for the Space Shuttle.

The separation simulated by this test will take place after the first stage solid motor completes its burn and will be effected by a ring shaped explosive charge that cuts through the aluminium structure that joins the two stages together. Remember, this structure must be thick enough to transmit the high bending loads anticipated during the flight of this long slender rocket, called the "Stick" by some.

The test shown in this slow motion video was to check that the separation charge makes a clean break between the two stages. The shocks generated by the explosive charge were also measured during the test, and this will give important information enabling the engineers to design and layout the nearby equipment mounted in the launcher that must withstand the shock environment.

Earlier Post: When the Change the Ares-1 "Stick" into a Normal Rocket