Brilliant! Credits for the first music video ever produced in space include guitar and tenor vocals by Chris Hadfield (recorded on the International Space Station), plus terrestrial video production by Hadfield's son Evan and TV producer Andrew Tidby, music production and mixing by music producer Joe Corcoran, with piano arrangements by Canadian singer-songwriter Emm Gryner. "Space Oddity" was written by David Bowie and first performed by him in 1969, when Hadfield was 10 years old. Who knows what this may inspire in the next generation of space enthusiasts....

13 May, 2013

This may be Astronaut Chris Hadfield's last snapshot of Cape Breton Island from 370 km up, as he returns to Earth Monday evening via  the steppes of Kazakhstan. Hadfield's tweeted comment: "The highlands of Cape Breton still wear the winter's snow, sun highlighting the connecting waters." The May 5 image above is a rotated segment of a larger photograph you can download at its original resolution here. Previous snaps of Contrarian's Primary Residences here and here. A world map with links to all Hadfield's tweeted photos here....

11 May, 2013

Having already photographed Kempt Head, Cmdr. Chris Hadfield turns his attention to less important parts of Nova Scotia: Hadfield has now photographed both of Contrarian's official residences. The universe is unfolding as it should. [UPDATE] Oops! A Twitter user with a Suessian pseudonym points out that Hadfield passed over, and photographed, Halifax on January 2: [Click these images for larger versions.]...

25 April, 2013

Last week, I posted a photo of Contrarian's home turf that Chris Hadfield, 35th Commander of the International Space Station, had taken from 370 kilometres overhead. An avid photographer, Hadfield has produced scores of images depicting locations all over the earth, including at least 10 of Nova Scotia sites.* You may already know what I managed to miss: that geographer David MacLean and his students at the College of Geographic Sciences in Lawrencetown, NS, have created a database of Hadfield's images (and some by fellow astronaut Thomas H. Marshburn) that you can access through a wonderful, interactive map. MacLean has been kind enough to let...

07 April, 2013

Less than an hour ago, from his perch aboard the International Space Station, Cmdr. Chris Hadfield posted this photo of Contrarian's Kempt Head, Boularderie Island, home. (Just incidentally, the photo also shows the ice of Baddeck Bay, from which Alexander Graham Bell's research team flew Canada's first powered aircraft, the Silver Dart, in 1909, a factoid Hadfield happened to mention.) For the geographically challenged, Boularderie Island is the slender finger of land extending in from the right edge of the photo. Kempt Head forms the island's southwestern tip, and is the name applied to the community that occupies the portion of the island...

04 April, 2013