10-01-2015, 09:10 AM
A colleague and I were talking this morning about how spectacular the view is in LEO (low-Earth orbit).
I've always assumed that you can't really get great viewing from the 1G areas of your habitat, but would instead go to some zero-G observation deck/bubble. (Hmm, we should probably add such an observation deck as a part in the game!) Even if you did have windows in your habitat, if you're rotating at say 2 RPM, I think viewers would get a bit dizzy watching the Earth and the rest of the universe rotate by.
But perhaps I've given up too easily. Can anybody think of some clever geometry that would let you sit comfortably in 1 G, and yet watch the Earth (or whatever else is outside) without it appearing to spin?
And no fair suggesting a display screen or VR helmet... displays are certainly getting better all the time, and maybe someday they will rival a real view out the window, but for the sake of this discussion I'd like to keep it to optics — mirrors and glass, the sort of thing you could look at through binoculars to get an even better view. Maybe mirrors or prisms that spin at the same rate as the habitat, in such a way that they produce a stationary virtual image?
Any ideas?
I've always assumed that you can't really get great viewing from the 1G areas of your habitat, but would instead go to some zero-G observation deck/bubble. (Hmm, we should probably add such an observation deck as a part in the game!) Even if you did have windows in your habitat, if you're rotating at say 2 RPM, I think viewers would get a bit dizzy watching the Earth and the rest of the universe rotate by.
But perhaps I've given up too easily. Can anybody think of some clever geometry that would let you sit comfortably in 1 G, and yet watch the Earth (or whatever else is outside) without it appearing to spin?
And no fair suggesting a display screen or VR helmet... displays are certainly getting better all the time, and maybe someday they will rival a real view out the window, but for the sake of this discussion I'd like to keep it to optics — mirrors and glass, the sort of thing you could look at through binoculars to get an even better view. Maybe mirrors or prisms that spin at the same rate as the habitat, in such a way that they produce a stationary virtual image?
Any ideas?
Joe Strout
Lead Developer, High Frontier