MarsQuest

From marsquest.org, produced by Loch Ness Productions, narrated by Patrick Stewart. MP3 sound bites:

  1. Astronomers named Galileo, Kepler, …
  2. In 1997, the Mars Pathfinder mission …
  3. The hopes of humanity followed them …

NASA’s Mars page has links to the rovers, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (arrived March 10, 2006), and two older orbiters, Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey. The next lander will be Phoenix. Haughton crater (line 752).

MarsQuest was last shown on Sunday, October 29, 2006. If we ever revive it, we should terminate it in the moment of darkness and silence right after 

721 ' cheesy Mars zoom...
In fact, we should cut the opening litany of Mars names (climaxing and ending with “Ares” and “Mars”) and start at line 
185 ' title sequence
The extra time should be used for a little Sky Tonight.

Setup

  1. Sound board: volume up for output, CD or XP computer, and DVD; down for all others.

  2. CD: entrance music. Or use Orson Wells’s War of the Worlds, October 30, 1938: Real Audio, MP3. MP3 launches faster.

  3. Video projector: monitor select line 2, input select line 2 to enable laser disc; brightness and volume down.

  4. Show DVD: MarsQuest.

  5. Animation DVD: cue Mars large rotating, page 3, line 2. Used at line 351 of DVD-MARS.CUE.

  6. Zeiss: position so that Mars will cross the meridian when you do forward annual motion.

  7. Orrery: turn on Sun, Earth, Moon, Mars.

  8. Spice Computer: DVD-MARS.CUE.

  9. Slew (projector R): when line 55 lights it up, move comet to right and leave it in automatic. First slew in show is to left (comet at 211 SwitchoN SWCH: M).

  10. Zoom (projector T): when line 57 lights it up, move it to small, slow speed (2:00). Leave zoom in automatic (down). First zoom in show is a zoom in at Roman deity at 236 SwitchoN SWCH: K.

  11. Down arrow until 79 ' start show is highlighted.

  12. Audience entry sequence.

Show

  1. DVD PLAY/PAUSE twice to launch the show.

  2. Wandering stars: Zeiss stars and planets on. Annual motion to move Mars across meridian.

  3. Zeiss stars and planets on. Laser point to Zeiss Mars. When “larger telescopes allow us to see polar ice caps”, animation of Mars large rotating.

  4. Orrery on, blink Mars.

  5. Orrery: Earth and Moon only, speed zero. “Pale, blue dot shining…”

  6. Before credits appear at line 814, DVD PLAY/PAUSE as soon as the lights in the Martian city fade (“We are the Martians”). Do a very brief sky tonight, showing Mars.