Millions looked skyward as Venus crosses the Sun on June 5 for the last time more than 100 years. Astronomers Without Borders webcast live from world-famous Mount Wilson Observatory during this rare event, with expert interviews, amateur astronomers, public, videos and the world premiere of a musical composition for the 2012 Transit of Venus for one of the world's rarest musical instruments, the glass armonica, invented by Benjamin Franklin.
Watch recorded segments of the webcast below. Click on "Playlist" at the bottom of the viewer to see the segments that are available. See content notes to the right.
Credits are below. Special thanks to those who made the production at Mount Wilson possible:
- Gary Taillon and Randy Gomez of Camera Support, rental house to the television and film industries.
- Randy Gomez of Hollywood Airstream for the luxuriously refurbished 1965 Airstream production trailer.
- Liam Kennedy of ImageBEAM for the live streaming, HD capture, and editing and uploading to Youtube.
- Mike Dennis who donated use of audio equipment.
- All of the crew who supported us by donating their time.
- Ian O'Neill of Discovery News for co-hosting the webcast.
- NASA Sun-Earth Day and NASA Edge who provided streaming to spread this to the world ad-free.
- D. Mittelman and J. W. Briggs, HUT Observatory, Eagle, Colorado, for the live H-alpha telescopic feed.
- And especially our partner, 20th Century Fox's new Ridley Scott sci-fi film, Prometheus.
This live webcast was made possible by:
See a video of the Mount Wilson Observatory event created by film-makers Todd and Robin Mason, producers of Journey to Palomar.
Liam Kennedy has posted photos of the webcast and event on Facebook.
Webcast Credits:
Producer: Mike Simmons
Hosts: Mike Simmons, Ian O'Neill
Production / Stage Manager: Steve Simmons*
Director: David Irete
Technical Director / Tricaster Operator: Brett Collins
Streaming: Liam Kennedy
Camera Operators: Ray Gonzales, Clint Childers, Sketch Pasinski
Video Engineer: Armen Allen
Audio: Mike Dennis
Craft Service: Linda Simmons
Production Trailer: Randy Gomez
Utility: Justin Hogan
Production Assistant: Eric Marquez, Jr.
* As well as helping out at times as/in Producer, Director of Photography, Assistant Director, Technical Director, Grip, Utility, Jib Tech, Electric, Production Assistant, Accounting, Craft Service, Set Decorator, Photographer and maybe some other things. In other words, making it all happen.
