I came across this awesome story about two MIT students who built and launched a space camera for only $150. Goes to show, you don’t need a NASA budget to capture that perfect picture!
This shot was taken at about 93,000 feet high using a Canon camera, a helium weather balloon, a Styrofoam cooler and instant hand warmers to keep the camera and battery from freezing. The students rigged it with a prepaid GPS-enabled cell phone, so they can track the camera when it landed back on earth. They set the camera to take pictures at 5-second intervals and the flight lasted about 5 hours total. The balloon got high enough, that the descent took about 40 minutes to return the camera back to earth. Check out the project website to see the time-lapse video, look at more photos and to read up on how they did this. Pretty awesome and creative! Now, maybe NASA can save money by using some of these students’ ideas!
-Nayla
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