Interview de Don Davis, un des plus talenteux Space Artist contemporain

Donald ‘’Don’’ Davis, est un des plus grands et plus célèbres Space Artist contemporain.

Spécialiste de la peinture spatiale très détaillée, son talent est reconnu partout.

Il a travaillé pour la NASA, avec notamment, des représentations très réalistes d’impacts planétaires (météorites ou comètes contre des planètes).

Il a également travaillé avec Carl Sagan sur la série Cosmos, pour laquelle il obtiendra un Emmy.

Il est également l’auteur de plusieurs couvertures de livres de Carl Sagan dont Les Dragons de l’Eden qui obtient le Prix Pulitzer en 1977.

Il a également réalisé plusieurs cours métrages d’animation astronomique pour la NASA ou Discovery Channel

Il a un site où l’on peut admirer son travail : www.donalddavis.com

Interview réalisée en 2011

Q : When have you decide to became space artist ? And why did you like space exploration, aviation,etc  ?

A : I first saw space art in the Life Magazine book  The World We Live In, with the work of Chesley Bonestell at the beginning and end chapters.
This would have been about 1960, when I was 8 years old.

(Ndlr : The World We Live In est une nouvelle publiée dans Life Magazine en 13 chapitres du 8 décembre 1952 au 20 décembre 1954, dont voici les deux couvertures)

Later I saw more of the work of Bonestell and other artists on science fiction magazine covers and other books.


Why did I like space, it's hard to say... Earlier I was very interested in dinosaurs, and studied them and the artists who painted them.

At that time space travel was beginning to happen and there was a sense of a race between the US and the Russians to reach the Moon.
A lot of space related television programming, magazine articles, books and toys brought space travel to the attention of kids growing up then and there. 
It was probably getting a small telescope as a child that first made me amazed with the universe, seeing the Moon and planets close up for myself.

Q : What was your 1st professional artist space work and how have you worked on this ?

A : My first professional space art work was in 1968 as a high school student  hired by the U.S. Geological Survey in Menlo Park, California USA.

We students were originally hired to color in maps showing the different surface types on the Moon in the proper outlined places with colored pencils of the proper color. This was how it was done before we had computer printers!

I  brought a painting of the Moon I had recently done for my interview, and I was hired on the spot. Soon I was painting the moon while learning much about why it appears as it does and what forces of nature shape its landscape.

My supervisor at the U.S. G. S. was the great Lunar scientist Don Wilhelms.

Because of working there I was invited to do a painting of the Apollo 11 astronauts on the Moon for a newspaper Sunday magazine the week of the landing. That was my first published work.

Q : What are your(s) feeling(s) about that many people saw and loved yours painters and works every days ?

A : I feel lucky to have been able to share my love of these subjects in this way.

I know many have seen my work and I hope some will be inspired to create art of their own, or perhaps be interested in space and astronomy.

Q : Did you like to go in space ? And why ?

A : Yes I did and would still like to go into space.

With the progress in commercial groups working to make space available there is still a chance I could spend at least a few minutes up there.

I would really like to go to the Moon and explore in a large vehicle. Perhaps in the next life!

Q : What memories have you o the Apollo 11 lunar landing in 1969 ?

A : My parents were going camping then, I decided to stay home.
I watched on a black and white TV as the final approach to the landing was made by the astronauts in the LM, and on television they played part of President Kennedy's speech 8 years earlier announcing the goal of landing on the Moon.
It made me think of how glad JFK would have been to see his goal accomplished if he had lived. 
I of course watched every moment of the time on the surface.

Q : What is your best memory about your space artist career ?

A : There are so many to choose from...

My work as one of the artists on the television show Cosmos was one high point, I worked with Carl Sagan on this and other projects. I won an 'Emmy' for my work on that series. 

Now I work on visuals for planetariums, animating what I used to paint.

My work in this field has taken me to places like Greece and Egypt, and is a lot of fun. 

So happily a lot of my most satisfying projects are among my most recent.

Interview de Fred Leslie, astronaute de la NASA qui a volé à bord de la navette spatiale Columbia lors de STS-73

Fred Leslie est ingénieur et docteur specialiste en météorologie.

Scientifique travaillant à la NASA depuis 1980 comme météorologiste spécialisé dans la dynamique des fluides.
Il collabore à la mise au point de plusieurs expériences qui seront emportées à bord de Spacelab 3.
Il est aussi le responsable d’ expériences emmenées à bord du KC-135 Zero Gravity de la NASA (Fluid Interface and Bubble Experiment).

Il participe à la mise au point d’expériences pour le Spacelab J qui seront transportées à bord de STS-47.

Il coordonne la mise au point des expériences emportées par USML-2 (United States MicroLaboratory) ce qui lui vaut d’être sélectionné en 1994 comme Payload Specialist pour la mission ST-73 qui emporte ledit laboratoire.

Il vole à bord à bord de Columbia pour la mission STS-73 du 20 octobre au 5 novembre 1995.

Fred Leslie est un passionné de parachutisme et en février 2011, il décide de sauter en même temps que le lancement de STS-133 et le dernier vol de Discovery. Un bel hommage. La photo fera le tour du monde.

                                                                    (credit photo : Curt Bartholomew)

Interview réalisée en 2011.

Q :  How many years were you connected to the space program prior to your flight ?

A : I began working for NASA in 1980 as an atmospheric scientist and was involved in a number of projects.

One of my assignments at the Marshall Space Flight Center involved a geophysical fluid flow experiment being developed for the Spacelab program.

The instrument was eventually manifested to fly on Spacelab 3 in 1985 and my duties included training the payload crew how to operate it.

It was during this time that I realized I could perform those activities myself should the experiment ever fly again.

So, when the experiment was manifested for reflight on STS-73, I applied to be a payload specialist and flew with it in 1995.

Q :  How did you feel prior to the flight ?

A : After a year and a half of training, I felt ready to fly.

Our crew had spent weeks in quarantine waiting for launch issues to be resolved.

When I was strapped in for the third time I had two hopes: that we would launch without another delay and that I would do a good job for the tasks assigned to me.

                                                                                                                                    Ready to go !

Q :  What kinds of sensations did you experienced during take-off ?

A : This is no doubt one of the most exciting parts of the mission.

At about 6-1/2 seconds before launch, the three Main Engines ignite and the entire Shuttle vibrates. A T-0 the Solid Rocket Boosters ignite and the Shuttle is released.

                                                                                                                 Décollage de STS-73

The noise and vibration increase and you feel the acceleration skyward. However, the ascent is not so violent that you cannot communicate through the headset.

As the Shuttle picks up speed through the thick lower atmosphere, pressure on the Shuttle increases.

The Main Engines are throttled back to reduce the aerodynamic loads. Then the engines throttle up. After about two minutes, the boosters burn out. When they leave, you see a flash of light in the windows from the small rockets that push the boosters away.

Then the ride smoothes out as the Main Engines alone continue to push us upward.

At this point the acceleration reaches its maximum of 3 g and stays there until Main Engine Cutoff.

Q : What does weightlessness feel like, and what did you think about during the flight ?

A : A number of things are different.

In the absence of gravity's effects, fluid that normally pools in the lower part of the body shifts upward.

Initially this makes your head feel a little full like when you do a hand stand. It was noticeable but not annoying for me since I did reduce my intake of fluids just before the flight.

After a couple of days, I didn't really notice it at all.

The feeling of orientation also changes. Even though the body cannot detect up or down, my mind determined orientation.

Since I had trained in mockups of the orbiter in the landing position, the floor seemed to be "down" for me.

The Spacelab tunnel has no obvious top or bottom, so I often felt like "down" was where my feet happened to be. Eventually, I could even trick myself . For example, I could put my feet on the ceiling and in a few seconds would suddenly feel like the ceiling was now "down."

Q : What were some of the problems you encountered and how did you fixed them ?

A : Most of the problems occurred before the flight with mechanical and weather issues.
Once we launched, the flight went smoothly.

There was a few anomalies with some experiments and one with the Spacelab, but we fixed them without much effort.

Q : What did you eat, and did it taste real ?

A : Much of the food I had was dehydrated and stored in plastic bags.

To prepare it, I took it to the galley (in the middeck on the port side) and placed it in the rehydration station - basically, a special water fountain. A needle penetrates a septum in the bag and you just dial in the amount of hot water you want and hit the hot button. The bag fills with hot water and you let it soak it up for a few minutes.

Drinks are prepared in a similar way with cold water.

Some food was in sterilized packages and just needed heating in the oven below the rehydration station.

Before the flight, our crew met with the NASA dieticians and tasted just about everything that can be flown. We individually ranked each item and came up with our own personal menus. The dieticians reviewed this and worked with us to ensure that we had the necessary nutrients and calories for each of the 3 meals per day.

In reality, of course, once you get up to space, you do what you do at home. We'd open up the food containers and just take what seemed good at the time.

Q : What was re-entry like ?

A : The re-entry was rather smooth, not as depicted in many movies showing high g's and vibration.

From my seat on the middeck I could see the plasma through the window in the hatch. It appeared as an almost continuous glow once we began atmospheric entry interface.

As we descended, the plasma waned and the black sky transitioned to dark blue and then the familiar sky blue.

Atterrissage de Columbia lors de la mission STS-73

Q : Were you glad to be back on Earth, or did you feel you could have spent the rest of your life up there ?

A : On the last day of my Shuttle flight (day 16) I was not quite ready to return to Earth.

Space is such a delightful place to live and I tried to capture enough memories to last a lifetime.

Perhaps someday spaceflight will be more routine so that everyone will have the opportunity to experience it.

Interview de Gerhard Thiele, astronaute allemand de l'ESA qui a volé à bord de la navette spatiale

Gerhard Thiele est un physicien allemand.

Il est sélectionné en 1987 par l'Agence Spatiale Allemande DLR et il sera doublure pour la mission STS-55.

Il est sélectionné dans le groupe des astronautes ESA en 1996. Et se prépare à sa future mission spatiale STS-99.

Il effectue une mission spatiale du 11 au 22 février 2000 à bord de la navette spatiale Endeavour pour la mission STS-99.

De 2002 à 2003, il le responsable des astronautes (chief-astronaut) de l'ESA.

En 2003-2004, il est la doublure d'André Kuipers pour la mission Soyouz TMA-4.

Interview réalisée en mai 2011

Q :  How many years were you connected to the space program prior to your flight ?
A: I joined the German Space Agency (DLR) in 1987 as science astronaut and flew into space in 2000. So overall I was for more than twelve years in the space programme before my first flight.

Q : How did you feel prior to the flight ?
A : From a professional point of view we were very well trained and prepared to discharge the mission. We were convinced that with some luck we could be highly successful and get the results, which the scientist worked for and hoped for.


On the personal side I sensed a certain anxiety, which was in my opinion the result of two major things: first, a dream was about to come true. And second, I have never flown into space before, you never know what is going to happen ! 


The good thing: As soon as you are strapped into your seat in the orbiter the concentration focuses on the work at hand. The anxiety seems to fade away and in the end disappears, which allows one to focus on what needs to be done at the moment.

Q : What kinds of sensations did you experienced during take-off ?
A : Lift-off feels extremely powerful!!


This is all the more astonishing as we have no sensors in our body, which measure acceleration or force.


And though the g-level at take-off is rather mild, one weighs only twice as much as normally, I felt an enormous pressure. I assume this has to do with the fact that we know that we are sitting in a rocket and that this knowledge affects our perception and feeling.


Q : What does weightlessness feel like, and what did you think about during the flight ?
A : Weightlessness feels like the jaunty lightness of being.
It is just the opposite as in Milan Kundera’s novel: The unbearable lightness of being.

Q : What were some of the problems you encountered and how did you fixed them ?
A : We encountered relatively little problems during our mission.


The first one was that one of the reaction control jets (RCS) failed. As these jets are also important for maintaining the proper attitude, this could have been potentially dangerous for the mission objective, which was to map the Earth’s landmass with high precision.


This of course requires that the various data are taken in the same (ideal) or at least similar attitude.


Luckily, the failure occurred while we were over the pacific ocean. Over water we didn’t take any data (only for reference close to the coast) and so we didn’t loose any data while dealing with the rcs failure.
Moreover, we were able to reconfigure the system just before Africa again, we had been really fortunate!

A second failure was that the container, into which the 60m long mast was retracted after the measurements, did not close.
It turned out that the cables which had been exposed to the chilly temperatures of space for about ten days became too stiff and prevented the lid from closing the container.
So we turned on the heater system, which was designed exactly for this case and moved the shuttle into a “baking attitude”.
This means, we allowed the sun to help heating the container as much as possible as well.
And it worked. After some hours (I forgot the exact number) the cables were warm enough, lost their stiffness and the mast could be fully retracted.

Q : What did you eat, and did it taste real ?
A : The food is actually quite good and tastes pretty well.
Generally the food is dehydrated, so you have to add a specified amount of water to the food container. Then the food is heated in the oven for some ten or twenty minutes and you are good to go, i.e. to eat.


My favorite food was shrimp in a horseradish sauce, which shows that the taste seems to shift towards more spicy food.


On Earth I love sweets. In space I avoided them for almost a full week.

Q : What was re-entry like ?
A : During re-entry I was seated in the middeck of the orbiter and therefore was not involved into any re-entry procedures flying the shuttle back home.


I was surprised to hear the noise as we entered the atmosphere and it became significantly warmer inside the cockpit.
Luckily, our suits had a cooling system integrated, which made the temperatures bearable.


Crossing the sound barrier was also very noticeable, below the speed of sound the shuttle just glides gently through the final miles towards the runway. Although this is a rather steep glide.


Most noticeable is of course “the return of gravity”. The initial weightlessness turns initially into a barely noticeable gravitational force, which increases steadily as the shuttle enters thicker and thicker layers of the atmosphere. Back on ground the “normal” weight feels actually quite heavy and not normal at all !

Q : Were you glad to be back on Earth, or did you feel you could have spent the rest of your life up there ?
A : Yes and No. I was glad to see my family again. And I would have loved to stay in space.
      Yes I could have envisioned living in space for a very prolonged period of time!

Q : Which memory(ies) have you of the spaceflight of Yuri Gagarin and about the Apollo 11 lunar landing ?

A : I have no memories of Yuri Gagarin’s flight, I assume for two reasons.
When Yuri Gagarin flew into space I was just seven years and at this age I certainly did not understand what it means to go to space.
To the best of my recollection I did not have any romantic approach to spaceflight, at least not at the age of seven.
The second reason is that the Soviet Union made a big secret out of this flight and the world learned that the flight has happened only after the fact.
This however means that people couldn’t participate in it “emotionally”, when it happened. Of course I realized that Gagarin became a big hero after his flight.

The situation was very different with Apollo.
The American space program was open and we were able to follow it in any detail we wanted to follow it.
And therefore memories of this historic moment are much more present and dominant for this historic achievement.

Visite de l'Exposition Stanley Kubrick à la Cinémathèque Française

Depuis le 23 mars, et jusqu’au 31 juillet 2011, se tient une formidable exposition consacrée à Stanley Kubrick et son œuvre, à la Cinémathèque Française à Paris (rue de Bercy dans le 12ème).

Photos ICI : http://www.flickr.com/photos/famillesebile/sets/72157626768211092/with/5741753594/

Exposition itinérante, elle a déjà été présentée à Berlin, Zurich, Gand, Rome et Melbourne.

Elle doit sa création à Hans-Peter Reichmann et au Deutsches Filmmuseum de Francfort, ainsi que l’étroite collaboration de Christiane Kubrick (sa femme, actrice), Jan Harlan et The Stanley Kubrick Archive de Londres.

De par sa taille imposante et du matériel présentés, l’exposition se répartie sur 2 étages (le 5ème et 7ème). Grâce au Fond d’Archives Kubrick, aux nombreux documents de travail, photos de tournages, scénarios, correspondances, recherches, maquettes, costumes, accessoires, etc…, nous plongeons dans le monde de Stanley Kubrick, nous permettant de mieux comprendre sa façon de travailler, au travers de ses films réalisés, en projet ou non réalisés (son Napoléon ou son projet sur les camps Aryan Papers).

L’exposition reprend donc l’itinéraire artistique de Stanley Kubrick depuis ses débuts de photographe pour le magazine Look.

''Kubrick s'est intéressé avant tout aux fractures de l'Histoire, à ces moments où tout bascule, où les bases d'un ordre établi cèdent le pas au surgissement de l'inconnu.'' (La Cinémathèque Française).

On peut y voir aussi, dans tous les films de Kubrick, un état d’affrontement entre ''2 mondes''.

- Le Baiser du Tueur

- Les Sentiers de la Gloire et la guerre qui voit naître le 20ème siècle.
- Spartacus et la révolte des esclaves
- Lolita et l’ordre moral établi
- Docteur Folamour et la peur de la destruction nucléaire

- 2001 l'Odyssée de l’Espace, conquête du cosmos et avancée spectaculaire de la science et de la technologie

- Barry Lyndon (fait ''à défaut'' de pouvoir réaliser son Napoléon) qui tourne autour de la période révolutionnaire française.

- Orange Mécanique et sa vision ''décadente'' et policée d’une nouvelle société.

- Shining et la plongée dans la folie et l’horreur
- Full Metal Jacket et la première défaite des Etats-Unis de leur histoire

- Eyes Wide Shut et aussi l’ordre moral. C’est aussi son seul film où une femme a autant de poids que l’homme (le duo/duel Nicole Kidman-Tom Cruise)

Musiques de film, Photos
Projets inaboutis : Napoléon, AI, Aryan Papers…

En plus de son talent de réalisateur, Stanley Kubrick, innova aussi, par la création de beaucoup de matériel de prises de vues uniques.

Photographe, il composa beaucoup de ses scènes de films comme une photo.

Petite visite de l’Exposition, avec bien sûr, une longue halte pour 2001 l'Odyssée de l’Espace…

Les Sentiers de la Gloire

Spartacus

Lolita

Docteur Folamour

avec plusieurs maquettes dont celle-ci, ainsi que de nombreux dessins ''Story Board''.

2001 L'ODYSSEE DE L’ESPACE

Enormément d’objets magnifiques et souvent inédits (parfait complément des costumes et maquettes de l’Exposition Science et Fiction à la Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie).

Un seul regret, MAIS UN ENORME REGRET… Aucun mot sur Robert T. McCall, l’artiste, créateur de l’affiche du film, des combinaisons spatiales, de nombreux décors du film… c’est VRAIMENT DOMMAGE… Il manque aussi HAL…

La partie des objets, maquettes, etc… consacrés à 2001 Odyssée de l’espace occupe le centre de l’exposition au 5ème étage et est celle où il y a le plus d’objets et documents.

Le clap du film

La fameuse roue gravitationnelle

Une des fameuses combinaisons

avec son fameux casque

La fameuse montre spatiale Hamilton qui a fait rêver beaucoup de personnes à l’époque

Les toilettes Zero Gravity de la navette spatiale

L’Oscar des Meilleurs Effets Spéciaux pour 2001 l'Odyssée de l’Espace

Orange Mécanique

(Violence, Sexe et Beethoven)

Barry Lyndon

avec la présentation du fameux objectif que la NASA a utilisé pour les missions lunaires. Il s’agit d’un objectif 50mm f/0.7 Zeiss Planar, utilisé pour filmer les scènes à la bougie.

Shining

Full Metal Jacket

Eyes Wide Shut

Il y a également une exposition avec différents matériels de prises de vues utilisés, inventés par Stanley Kubrick ainsi qu’une partie de tout son travail de recherche pour la préparation de son Napoléon, qu’il n’a pas pu tourner ou son travail sur les camps avec Aryans Papers ou de son AI (Intelligence Artificielle que reprendra Steven Spielberg).

La partie consacrée à la musique de films, partie intégrante de l'oeuvre de Kubrick, est très intéressante.

Il y aussi une boutique ''de souvenirs'' mais je vous conseille, plutôt d’aller, à celle de la Cinémathèque au 1er étage qui est beaucoup plus complète et achalandée.

Bonne visite…

Crédit : Stéphane Sebile / Spacemen1969

             Space Quotes - Souvenirs d'espace

Un ENORME merci à la Cinémathèque qui m'a autorisée les prises de vues et facilitée les accès aux objets  pour la réalisation de ce reportages 'normalement interdites)