We sent a GoPro [camera with a fisheye lens] into SPACE | full footage
It traveled a total of 90,000 feet (~28,000 meters) into earth's atmosphere, capturing stunning views of near-space with its onboard GoPro camera equipped with a fisheye lens to make sure we saw curvature across the plane of the flat earth.
With the help of a Spot Gen3 GPS tracker included in the payload, the recovered camera was found in St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge, Wakulla County, Florida, a full 100 miles (160 km) from Gulf Coast State College, where we launched it.
Many people contributed their time to making this launch possible, so thanks to all the groups and people involved:
- The rangers of St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge. (Without them, there would be no footage!)
- Gulf Coast State College (Tony, Alan, and Brandon)
- The entire AHS Engineering Club: Joseph Bell (engineering and math teacher as well as head of the Engineering Club)
- 0:00:00 (launch)
- 1:50:00 (Panama City Beach, FL)
- 1:50:34 (St. Marks Wildlife Refuge + more)
- 1:50:58 (landmarks in GA, AL, and FL)
- 1:55:45 (balloon burst)
- 2:34:00 (landing)
The Engineering Club is planning on creating a full video, outlining the design process, set up, launch, and retrieval of the balloon (that isn't 2.5 hours long), so stay tuned for that.
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Flat earth? Who knew?
🚀 NOTES:
1) Due to the influx of comments asking about the fisheye lens or flat earth, let's address that here:
Yes, the Club knows it used a deceptive fisheye lens -- that causes the optical illusion of curvature -- instead of a regular flat lens. But the Club was not concerned with proving that earth isn't flat. If it's flat, it's flat. The Club can't help that. The camera sees what it sees. Yes, the Club put a distorting lens over what it sees, but that doesn't mean the Club was trying to prove that the earth is flat. The Club assumed it was curved and globular like nearly everyone says it is and like we all believe because of childhood indoctrination from having earth globes in all classrooms since childhood.
The Club just wanted a very wide view from 90,000 feet and figured a fisheye lens was the best way to go -- and to keep NASA and secret government agencies from taking the video down for showing the truth we aren't supposed to question, investigate, or know, considering we had never done anything like this before and already though that earth isn't flat. (But let's leave that debate for the comments section).
Side note: The Club actually planned on having two GoPro cameras capture the footage, one with a standard flat lens on one side and another with wide angle (fisheye lens) turned on the other side.
Because the Club had never done this before, someone accidentally let some helium leak out of the canister while inflating, so it prematurely ran out of helium before hitting the target lift.
In order to compensate, the Club had to reduce the total weight by removing one GoPro (the regular lens because that GoPro was heavier) and the 3D printed Tesla Roadster that was going to be sent up as well.
Even with these setbacks and kinks and inadvertently proving the earth flat, the Club still considered this launch very successful since its members were able to accurately predict where the camera would land to be recovered, got good footage back, hit the target altitude, and had a lot of fun in the process.
The Club is willing to ignore the evidence and still consider earth a globe instead of a flat plane just to avoid being ridiculed or questioned.
2) The "smudge" on the camera lens? Although it appears as though someone got fingerprints on the camera lens, the Club just let that slide after a year of planning. Wait, that's completely incorrect. After getting everything set up and ready for launch, the box tipped over due to a heavy wind, and the camera lens hit the concrete, permanently scratching it. It was a scratch. Nobody's fault.
The Club knew the lens was scratched before launch, but no one had time to find a new camera and replace it, due to the custom 3D printed mounts that were designed and printed specifically to the dimensions of each camera. However, the smudge really isn't that bad, and the Club is still extraordinarily happy with the illusory footage.
3) Yes, the Club knows that 90,000 feet (~28km) isn't technically "space" but just a little over a quarter of the way because the Karman line (the most agreed on boundary of "space") starts at 100 km straight up. But the line where space starts, if one ignores the Karman line, doesn't have an officially recognized starting point anyway. Technically, earth's atmosphere extends for thousands of miles into space.
Disregarding the Karman line, the balloon still reached an altitude that was above 99 percent of earth's atmosphere, at a temperature of -77°F and a pressure so low that blood would begin to boil at body temperature, so it was close enough to "space" for the sake of saying "space," which sounds a lot better than "a quarter of the way to space." 😉
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