Hooker 100-inch telescope
Mount Wilson Observatory, California

Here’s the first glimpse of our PictureBubbles tour of the Mt. Wilson Observatory, out in the mountains north of Los Angeles. Unlike most of our other work, this is an “object movie.” Rather than pivoting around where the viewer stands, like most spherical panoramas, this image allows you to drag across, left to right, and rotate about the focal point. In this case, that focal point is this massive telescope, finished somewhere around 1917.

Making this was quite a lot of fun. Rather than walk around the entire installation at set intervals, Carel was able to set up the tripod in one position while Arthur Vaughan (Deputy Director of the Observatory) and I marked off the floor in 5° intervals. The entire domed turret revolves around the telescope, allowing us to create an image that would be otherwise impossible.