ESA uses Celestia

Art Vandelay · Post #1by **Art Vandelay** » 30.12.2003, 18:02

Hey, visit this address

http://www.esa.int/export/SPECIALS/Mars_Express/SEM4GC374OD_1.html#subhead1

Those screenshots look familliar...

JackHiggins · Post #2by **JackHiggins** » 30.12.2003, 19:18

Whoa!! How sweet is that...

Does anyone know where the orbital data shown in those diagrams could be downloaded..? id like to see MEX's orbit in real time now that it's around mars...

boo · Post #3by **boo** » 30.12.2003, 20:30

Sadly they are not giving a link to the Celestia site - would be THE promotion.
Furthermore they could offer the orbits for download and a small guide on how to experience the current happenings around Mars for oneself - using Celestia.
Hell, someone mail them and get some info :wink:

Rassilon · Post #4by **Rassilon** » 30.12.2003, 21:17

I think they should show a bit of professional courtesy and include credits...

diegorodriguez · Post #5by **diegorodriguez** » 31.12.2003, 09:21

Guys, I've just contacted ESA looking for an old mate. They replied me yesterday. I suggest we all address an e-mail to contactEsa@esa.int to get some credit from them on the work of Chris Laurel and his fellow developpers at Celestia.

As an example, I've sent them the following lines:
Sirs,

"Celestia is a free real-time space simulation that lets you experience our universe in three dimensions, that you can download for free at http://www.celestiaproject.net/celestia/ .

Today, some Celestia users have been delighted to see that ESA has been using it to generate several views of an orbiting Mars Express at http://www.esa.int/export/esaCP/SEM4GC3 ... dex_1.html

Unfortunately, no reference to Celestia is made in those pages. I think it's a question of common sense and honesty to credit somehow those images, let it be thru small letters, to it's main developper, Chris Laurel, and his bunch of enthusiast developpers and supporters that have been offering totally unselfish this superb astronomy tool for years to the general community of educators, scholars or simply aficionados. According to these supportes, such credit would be 'the promotion' for Celestia.

Moreover, many space exploration enthusiast would welcome to access the data ESA has been using to generate those images, so they could load their own copies with 3d models and orbital data as they do with ISS or other present or past spacecrafts."

Let's bring Celestia to an upper stage!

Diego

Stargazer_2098 · Post #6by **Stargazer_2098** » 31.12.2003, 13:29

Yup! This is quite a pleasent surprise, that quite proves Celestia's superiority above most other planetarium softwares. Well deserved congrats to Chris and everyone!

Edit:

Yes, I suppose they should have included a mention of Celestia in the image credits, hopefully they'll do so soon.

TERRIER · Post #7by **TERRIER** » 31.12.2003, 13:42

Diego

Cheers for posting the e-mail address for the ESA. I think that a few polite and well worded lines of communication, like the one from yourself will help nudge the ESA into giving Celestia and its developers, the credit it deserves.

regards
TERRIER

don · Post #8by **don** » 01.01.2004, 10:21

Jan 1 ...

Looks like they removed the hi-res JPG images -or- the links never worked.

boo · Post #9by **boo** » 01.01.2004, 10:29

Hi,

the links to the hi-res JPG images never worked.
Did anyone get feedback from e-mail conversation?

Pollux · Post #10by **Pollux** » 07.01.2004, 11:11

Links to the hi-res JPG images now work, but still no credits nor mention to Celestia.

AuReality · Post #11by **AuReality** » 07.01.2004, 14:39

diegorodriguez wrote:Guys, I've just contacted ESA looking for an old mate. They replied me yesterday. I suggest we all address an e-mail to contactEsa@esa.int to get some credit from them on the work of Chris Laurel and his fellow developpers at Celestia.

As an example, I've sent them the following lines:
Sirs,
......

Just wrote a letter to ESA with words in the same vein.
I will let everybody know when I get an answer, if any...

Paul

jim · Post #12by **jim** » 07.01.2004, 19:51

Hi all,

Today, I saw on tv news ("Heute") and a small reportage about ESA's last try to contact beegle. They show ESA's conrtol center and for a short time a monitor where Celestia run with Mars. I was not sure about Celestia therfore I had a look at another tv news and there was Celestia runing on a big screen at the wall.

Have a look at the left sreen...

picture found on ESA's web site...
http://www.esa.int/export/esaSC/SEM2AK3 ... dex_1.html

It seems that Celestia is regular used by ESA.

Bye Jens

Post #13by **Christophe** » 07.01.2004, 21:17

jim wrote:It seems that Celestia is regular used by ESA.

If that's the case then there's probably someone from ESA reading this forum.

Hello?

don · Post #14by **don** » 08.01.2004, 01:02

Or, they could have simply got hold of the code some time back and altered it for their specific needs.

Either way, this is SOOOOO COOOL !!!

-Don G.

Post #15by **chris** » 08.01.2004, 03:05

This is so cool . . . both NASA and ESA are using Celestia now, though for completely different purposes. Paul and Diego: thanks for writing the ESA--I appreciate it.

--Chris

Pollux · Post #16by **Pollux** » 08.01.2004, 08:59

chris wrote:This is so cool . . . both NASA and ESA are using Celestia now, though for completely different purposes.

Here is a link to NASA's Learning Technologies Project, taken from another forum:
http://learn.arc.nasa.gov/exp/

It seems they use huge customized versions of Celestia for teaching puposes.

Pollux · Post #17by **Pollux** » 08.01.2004, 09:10

Wow! Among others, NASA's version has bookmarks to MER-A (Spirit) at Gusev crater, including the 3DS model of the rover.

jestr · Post #18by **jestr** » 08.01.2004, 16:19

Unfortunately the model for 'Spirit' has a few errors when it is translated into Celestia (although it looks fine in 3DS MAX),so I've fixed them.I also changed the SSC slightly because in Celestia 1.3.1 the radius of mars is different to that in the Nasa package so the models were under the surface.If anyone wants to download my new version they can get it here
http://www.geocities.com/jestrjestr/extras
It's called 'Mer.zip'.I've also added some new textures as they seem to be missing from Nasa download.Cheers Jestr

hal9000 · Post #19by **hal9000** » 08.01.2004, 21:59

....It seems that Celestia is regular used by ESA.
--------------------------------------------------------
30 December 2003
Upcoming Mars Express flight orbits until 7 January, getting closer to the Red Planet. Generated with Celestia software.
--------------------------------------------------------
Copied from the ESA-Site

Post #20by **selden** » 08.01.2004, 22:18

See the second image on the page http://www.esa.int/export/esaCP/SEMOUD374OD_index_1.html#subhead1

I think the credit for Celestia was added in just the past day or two. I don't recall seeing it before, and it can't be found using the site's search engine.

As yet, there are no Celestia credits on the page http://www.esa.int/export/esaSC/SEM4GC374OD_index_1.html#subhead3

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