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Reflections on the 2018 International Space Development Conference

Monday, June 25th, 2018

Jim Plaxco and Jeff Bezos at the International Space Development Conference VIP Reception
Talking with Jeff Bezos at the International Space Development Conference VIP Reception

If you were searching for me the last week of May you would have found me at the International Space Development Conference in Los Angeles. This is the second year in a row I’ve attended the conference. Before that, the last time I attended was in 2010 when the conference was held here in Chicago and for which I served as the conference website’s webmaster.

I had three tangible reasons for attending the conference this year. First, the conference had a compelling collection of speakers and presentations. Add to this the presence of Jeff Bezos (Blue Origin and Amazon) and physicist Freeman Dyson whom I hoped to meet (it would be my second time meeting Freeman Dyson).

Factors Impacting the Sustainability of a Cislunar Economy
Factors Impacting the Sustainability of a Cislunar Economy presentation for the 2018 International Space Development Conference

Second, it turned out that I was one of the conference’s speakers. I had submitted a proposal for a presentation titled Factors Impacting the Sustainability of a Cislunar Economy but did not hear back and two follow up inquiries went unanswered. I had no choice but to assume that my submission had not been accepted. I only learned that my presentation proposal had been accepted a couple days before leaving for California. I wound up putting the presentation together in my hotel room as I found the time. As such it was a simplistic presentation completely lacking in graphics (I added an image for the title slide for posting here) and numbers. I was however quite pleased when a number of folks, including Robert Zubrin of the Mars Society, complimented me on my talk. I even got a request from a representative of the Aerospace States Association for a copy of my talk.

Third, I am currently contracted with NSS to perform a number of IT (information technology) tasks. These include designing and deploying a new WordPress mobile-friendly website (see it at space.nss.org), code cleaning and converting the NSS mirror of the NASA Ames Space Settlement website so that it too would be mobile-friendly (with “our” version now running on the NASA side as well), assisting with a migration of the organization’s membership system, and other duties as assigned.

My intangible reason for attending was the opportunity to reunite with old friends and to make new ones.

As it turns out, I was also asked to serve as a judge for the student debate on the topic of universalization. Specifically the debate question was: Can universalization promote global peace through cooperation? A definition for the term universalization that is being advocated by Dr. Lorna Jean Edmonds, Vice Provost for Global Affairs and International
Studies at Ohio University and one of the debate judges, is one meant to describe the next phase of human development, specifically:

as marking the transition from trans-national to interplanetary relations and much more aggressive exploitation of opportunities that lie beyond the confines of Earth. As both a process and an end state, universalization implies an increasingly pervasive, abiding and singular human focus not only on global issues per se but on social, technological, economic and cultural challenges and opportunities extending into our solar system, our galaxy, and well beyond, where cooperation supersedes conflict negotiation.

While I very much enjoyed my experience as a judge, I was disappointed that the debate topic was not more space-centric. If student debates are to be a feature of the 2019 ISDC, I do hope that their topic will be more directly relevant to the theme of the conference.

One unexpected bonus for me was getting to meet Cara Gee, the actress who plays Drummer on the TV series The Expanse and who coincidentally is my favorite female character in the show.

Posing with Cara Gee and Ken Ruffin
Posing with Cara Gee and Ken Ruffin

The photo above was to be a photo of Cara and I taken by Christian Meza, CTO of Aerolite Meteorites. Seeing Ken Ruffin of the National Space Society of North Texas standing nearby, I asked him to join us for a group photo. After the dinner that followed, I did get to speak with Cara Gee some more. I also had a lengthy conversation with Tasha O’Neill, the widow of Gerard K. O’Neill. It was Tasha who presented Jeff Bezos with the NSS Gerard K. O’Neill Award (shown below). Much of my conversation with Tasha dealt with photography as Tasha is a fine art photographer.

With respect to space art, the conference had a screening of the documentary movie "Chesley Bonestell: A Brush With The Future" which was an in-depth look at the life and art of Chesley Bonestell, the greatest of space artists and one whose impact will most likely never be equalled. There was also a sweet exhibit of space art put on by the International Association of Astronomical Artists (IAAA) of which I am a former member. It was great getting a chance to see Rick Sternback and Aldo Spadoni again after so many years (although we do interact on occasion on Facebook – which I am an infrequent user of).

All in all, it was a wonderful, fun, educational, multi-faceted conference which I can highly recommend to anyone with a serious interest in the exploration of space and the development of the space frontier.

A Few Photographs from the
2018 International Space Development Conference

In total I took 560 photographs at ISDC, a few of which I share below. A good number of the photos I took were of the fashion show (yes, a fashion show) that was a part of the Filipino Heritage Night which was also a part of the conference and which featured a variety of music and dance performances. A wonderful way to spend the last evening of the conference.

Jeff Bezos NSS Gerard K. O'Neill Award for Space Settlement Advocacy
Jeff Bezos NSS Gerard K. O’Neill Award for Space Settlement Advocacy

ISDC Award Ceremony with Tasha O'Neill and Jeff Bezos
ISDC Award Ceremony with Tasha O’Neill and Jeff Bezos

Cast of the SciFi TV Show The Expanse Viewing Episode Clip
Cast of the SciFi TV show The Expanse viewing a scene from an episode

Student Space Settlement Design Contest Displays
Student Space Settlement Design Contest Displays

Posing for a photograph with Freeman Dyson
Posing for a photograph with Freeman Dyson

Dancing to the music of The Zippers
Saturday night dancing to the music of The Zippers

Jeff Bezos and actor Cas Anvar from The Expanse
Jeff Bezos and actor Cas Anvar from The Expanse

ISDC VIP Reception Buzz Aldrin, Jeff Bezos, Bruce Pittman, and Howard Bloom
At the ISDC VIP Reception from left to right Buzz Aldrin (Apollo 11), Jeff Bezos (Blue Origin and Amazon), and Bruce Pittman (National Space Society Senior Vice President). Behind and to the left of Buzz is Howard Bloom (author and founder of the Space Development Steering Committee)

HP Mars Home Planet: Designing a Future Human Civilization on Mars in VR by Sean Young of Hewlett Packard
HP Mars Home Planet: Designing a Future Human Civilization on Mars in VR by Sean Young of Hewlett Packard

John Mankins ISDC presentation on Space Solar Power
John Mankins ISDC presentation on Space Solar Power

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Juno Perijove 8 View of Jupiter Generative Space Art

Monday, September 25th, 2017

Juno Perijove 8 View of Jupiter Generative Art
Juno Perijove 8 View of Jupiter Generative Space Art,
50 by 30 inches printed on metal

Recently I got back in to working with images of Jupiter taken by the Junocam camera on the NASA Juno mission to Jupiter. Most of the time I’ve spent was in the early phase of the mission as I attempted to come up with a work flow that would allow me to effectively process the raw images that were being made available to the public. My tool set consisted of Rawtherapee, Adobe Photoshop CS4, and a couple of Processing programs I had written. I also experimented with using some other software tools. You can read about my initial adventures in Image Processing and the Juno JunoCam. Once I had come up with a reasonable work flow my interest waned and other projects percolated up the to the top of my task list.

Cassini’s plunge into Saturn a week ago led me to revisit the Junocam web site. Finding an appealing image from the perijove 8 sequence of images, I downloaded it and ran it through my work flow. Pleased with the results, I submitted it to the Image Processing section of the Junocam site.

Image processed version of Junocam Perijove 8 image of Jupiter, imageid=JNCE-2017244-08C00123-V01
Image processed version of Junocam Perijove 8 image of Jupiter, imageid=JNCE-2017244-08C00123-V01

You will find the above image on the Junocam web site at Junocam Perijove 8 Poi: Phantom Image Processing

No sooner had I finished work on the above image than the thought hit me to create a generative painting of the image. I really was taken by the colors and complex patterns of the Jovian atmosphere and felt that it would make a wonderful subject.

The first decision I had to make was with respect to which of my generative painting programs I would use. I decided on using a program that I’ve been actively modding (aka incremental development) over the last year – with each modification adding some new category of functionality.

In creating the painted version of the image of Jupiter, my principal artistic challenge was deciding whether to have a starry sky as a background or to simply go with a flat black background. For my aesthetic tastes for this particular image, I decided to go with a simple flat black background.

Another artistic decision was to figure out whether or not I wanted to soften Jupiter’s limb. Did I want Jupiter to be hard edged or soft edged? In this case, I opted for the soft edged approach.

The last decision was how much negative space to provide. For those not familiar with negative space, it is simply the space that surrounds the object in the image. Consider as an analogy the concept of white space – the amount of empty space that separates content elements on a web page. In this case it was a question of did I want Jupiter to fill the entire canvas or did I want it to fill only a fraction of the canvas. Experimenting with different ratios of width to height and sizes I ultimately decided on what you see above. One of the things about the artwork is that due to the abstract nature of the Jovian atmosphere, you can pretty much hang the painting at any orientation.

For details about the artwork, which is 50 by 30 inches, see the art gallery page for Juno Perijove 8 View of Jupiter

I have also made a cropped and downsized version of the artwork available on a variety of products in my Redbubble gallery: Jupiter On Juno Perijove 8 artwork on Redbubble

Jupiter On Juno Perijove 8 artwork on Redbubble

Jupiter Coffee Cup
Jupiter on a Coffee Cup

My vote for the most artistic planet in the solar system definitely goes to Jupiter.

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Space Art Program At Elmhurst Art Museum

Thursday, October 27th, 2016

Space Art and the Exploration of Space Program
Space Art and the Exploration of Space

This Saturday October 29 I’ll be giving my presentation Space Art and the Exploration of Space at the Elmhurst Art Museum in Elmhurst IL. It will actually be a somewhat modified version of my normal presentation because of the why of why I was asked to speak. I was contacted by a representative of the Elmhurst Art Museum after she read about the Bigelow Aerospace BEAM inflatable module on the International Space Station. She was looking for a way to connect ISS/BEAM with the museum’s BLOW UP: Inflatable Contemporary Art exhibit.

Unfortunately inflatable space art is not a "thing". However I was taken up on my offer to give my presentation about space art – which would be modified to include artist impressions of inflatable space architecture – an idea that is much older than you might think.

Many may remember TransHab, a NASA effort from the 90’s to develop an inflatable habitat for the International Space Station. While the project was canceled, all was not lost because Bigelow Aerospace had the foresight to purchase the rights to the patents developed as a part of that NASA project. This lead to the Genesis I, Genesis II, and now the BEAM inflatable modules – which makes very real the prospect for the commercial availability of private, inflatable space stations. Thank you Robert Bigelow for your vision.

Others may remember the Goodyear inflatable space station prototype from 1961. Much earlier references to inflatable space structures are to be found in the imaginations of science fiction authors. For example, from 1939 is the story Misfit by Robert Heinlein where he writes about covering an asteroid valley with a tarp-like roof and inflating.

So if you are in the area and are up for a presentation on space art, I invite you to attend my talk. Note that while there is no charge for my program, you do have to purchase a museum admission to get in. Museum admission is $8 for adults and $7 for seniors, but admission is free to all students and anyone under 18. For more about the Elmhurst Art Museum, visit the Elmhurst Art Museum web site. To learn more about my presentation, see Art and the Exploration of Space.

Program Description at Elmhurst Art Museum Programs
Saturday, October 29, 2016 – 1:00pm
Space Art and the Exploration of Space
Jim Plaxco, President of the Chicago Society for Space Studies, will be giving a lecture which explores the development and evolution of space art from its beginnings in science fiction to its use as a tool to illustrate and promote space exploration. His lecture will demonstrate the large role that inflatables have played in the exploration of space as well as the creation of space art.

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Winners of 2016 NSS Space Settlement Student Art Contest Announced

Friday, April 8th, 2016

Space Settlement Student Art Contest Grand Prize Winner
Space Settlement Student Art Contest Grand Prize Winner
Pioneers of the Cosmos by Adrianna Allen

The National Space Society has announced the winners of its 2016 NSS Space Settlement Student Art Contest. As one of the contest’s art judges, it was once again an interesting experience. While I did not write about my experiences judging last year’s contest, I did write about Judging the 2014 NSS Space Settlement Student Art Contest. As an art contest for students, entries were received from grade levels 5 through college with the vast majority of entries being submitted by non-U.S. students.

A number of entries were disqualified for failing to meet the contest’s few but clearly stated criteria. Unfortunately some of the art disqualified was pretty good. Even worse, there were a few submissions of plagiarized work. For example, taking an existing work of space art and running an edges filter on it does not give an "artist" the right to call it their own art. Worse yet is lying about the process and claiming it to be a drawing by hand.

Aside: As a digital artist who enjoys writing his own image processing and digital art software, one of the self-challenges I used to do quite regularly was analyzing digital art and attempting to figure out exactly how it was created and what software was used. This process helped me to develop my own programs and to have a better feel for the overall digital art creation process.

The judging of the art consisted of two stages. In the first stage, I, Lynne Zielinski (contest manager), and David Brandt-Erichsen (fellow judge) went through the art eliminating those entries that clearly failed to meet the stated criteria regarding size, subject, and content. Once this was done, I created a browsable version of initially valid submissions and distributed that package to the panel of judges (there were six of us judging the art). We had a total of 125 entries to judge with a remarkable 66 coming from 5th graders, the largest grade submission category by far. In contrast, there were only 2 submissions from 6th graders.

It was two weeks ago that all contest judges had a web conference to judge all the accepted entries. It was quite the marathon session with some of the art submitted generating significant discussion. The structure of the art contest’s rules provided us with complete latitude when it came to selecting winning art entries. In fact, we judges were not required to select any entries as winners if we decided that all were of sub-standard quality. Fortunately that was not the case. It was at this stage that we looked more seriously at whether or not the submitted art fully met our subject and content criteria. Unfortunately a large number did not. The most common shortcoming was the failure to show any people in the artwork – as showing people living and working in space was a central theme to the contest.

The easiest part of the entire process was selecting the art to be awarded the Grand Prize. We judges immediately and unanimously chose Pioneers of the Cosmos, a digital painting submitted by Adrianna Allen, as the Grand Prize winner. Adrianna attends Kendall College of Art and Design in Grand Rapids, MI.

The judges awarded one First Prize for the submission Space Aviary by Vindya Malla, an 11th grader from India.

There were also three Honorable Mentions awarded. A very well done work of 3D digital art was the piece Micro-Gravity Lunar Orbit Research Center Apollo submitted by Hidayat Saad, a college student from Malaysia. Frankly I thought this artwork to be deserving of a First Prize. The second Honorable Mention went to The Martians submitted by Pranab Kumar Padhi, a 12th grader from India. The artwork depicts a settlement on Mars. What most sold this artwork to the judges was a table of people in the foreground having a meeting. The third and final Honorable Mention went to Shuttle Transport Station (shown below) submitted by Anushka Hebbar, a 9th grader from India. Given Anushka’s wonderful depiction of an O’Neill Colony, this was my second favorite submission to the contest and I thought it should have been awarded a First Prize. So Anushka Hebbar: consider this my personal congratulations to you for your wonderful submission.

Space art contest honorable mention - Shuttle Transport Station
Space art contest honorable mention – Shuttle Transport Station by Anushka Hebbar

A gallery of the winning art and the art submissions that met all the contest’s criteria is now online at Gallery for NSS Roadmap to Space Settlement International Student Art Contest 2016. Enjoy.

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Space Settlement Student Art Contest

Wednesday, March 2nd, 2016

Earth and Moon Digital Art Wallpaper
Earth and Moon Digital Artwork

Once again I’ve been asked to be an art judge for the National Space Society’s Roadmap to Space Settlement International Student Art Contest with this year’s theme being People Living and Working in Space Settlements. The objective for the student artists is the creation of realistic illustrations of some aspect of what life would be like in a space settlement – whether it be on the Moon, Mars, an asteroid, or in free space. The artwork must include at least one person and a view or perspective that clearly establishes the setting for the space settlement. This means interior-only views are out – unless it includes a grand window view of the world outside. The "realistic" includes not only scientific and engineering realism, but also representational realism, aka photorealistic.

I find judging these art contests to be a rewarding, yet challenging, adventure. What is particularly challenging is the back and forth between individual judges over the pros and cons of the individual artworks submitted. Picking winners can be difficult in a crowded field of submissions. FYI, the grand prize winner of last year’s contest was an artwork titled Lunar Outpost Construction by Hidayat Saad of Malaysia.

In order to enter the contest, the artist must be a full-time student between the ages of 13 and 25. Artists not yet 18 years old must have parental permission to participate in the art contest. And it goes without saying that the artwork must be the original work of the artist (yes the contest has received a few entries over the years that were plagiarized works).

The contest will have one Grand Prize winner and up to twelve First Prize winners based on student grade level. There may also be Honorable Mention prizes award. I must point out that if no entries are judged to be suitable, then no prizes will be awarded.

Two of the prizes that will be awarded to the Grand Prize winner are having their art published on the cover of Ad Astra magazine, the official magazine of the National Space Society, and complimentary registration to the 2016 International Space Development Conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico (does not include trip expenses) The deadline for submitting art to the contest is March 16, 2016. For complete details, visit Roadmap to Space Settlement 2016 International Student Art Contest.

The Earth and Moon Illustration

The art I used to illustrate this post is The Earth and Moon, which is a generative artwork I recently completed. I cropped out most of the Earth in order to use this art as a masthead for the post so I’ve included the uncropped version below. I have also made this artwork available for purchase at Redbubble and CRATED.

Earth and Moon Generative Space Art on Redbubble
Earth and Moon Generative Space Art on CRATED

Earth and Moon Generative Digital Painting by Jim Plaxco
Earth and Moon Generative Digital Painting

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Dust Storm on Planet Dune Science Fiction Art

Saturday, January 2nd, 2016

Dust Storm on Planet Dune
Cropped version of Dust Storm on Planet Dune

To ring in the new year, my first work of art for 2016 wound up being a work of astronomical art with a science fiction setting. Titled Dust Storm on Planet Dune, it depicts the science fiction planet Arrakis, from the Hugo and Nebula award winning novel Dune by Frank Herbert. The scene is that of Dune experiencing a global dust storm, not unlike the global dust storms that Mars regularly experiences.

In this case I did not set out to create Arrakis but rather simply a desert planet. As I worked on the piece my thoughts drifted to Herbert’s Dune novel which I first read many years ago. It was at this point that I decided to create the planet with a specific objective in mind.

Initially planet Dune was set against a nice solid darkish blue backdrop – thinking that might make for an interesting alternative to the standard starfield background. But the more I looked at it the more I felt the need to add those stars to the scene. So after completing work on the planet, I went back and added in a starfield for the background.

My next consideration was whether or not to convert the planet into a crescent planet – with some fraction in light and some fraction in darkness. You may be surprised to learn that when I create a planet, I always create the entire hemisphere. I then use a masking technique to play with the positioning of the terminator (the line that divides the day side from the night side). Having a completed planet gives me the freedom to fully experiment with the terminator’s placement, altering the amount and orientation of the day/night sides. In this case I decided to go with the hemisphere facing the viewer as being fully lit so as to fully communicate the global nature of the desert surface.

At this time, prints of Dust Storm on Planet Dune are only available on Redbubble and Crated. Follow the links below to see the product offerings that are available on each site.

"Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic."
Frank Herbert, author of Dune.

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