Window to outer space

First, I apologize if this is the wrong place to post this. I also apologize if it's been asked before and welcome references to those posts. I'm really not certain what to search under.

Anyway, I'd like to produce the effect seen on so many sci-fi shows where there are stars outside of a window, but in real life. I was thinking the most obvious way would be to place a sort of sci-fi window frame in front of a monitor/TV and display stars. (larger the better). I like this because it would allow me to change the theme to underwater, mountains or any other scene. But I would like to shut if off and turn it on without having to boot up. I don't mind if there's a bit of a delay, I just don't want to have to attend it (passwords, navigating to image, etc.). I just want to flick it on with a switch. I was thinking a supersized version of an electronic picture frame might work, but I'm not sure if they exist or how to implement it.

Another idea would be a black velvet background with LED's, but I want it to look fairly convincing, and I'm afraid that velvet would gather dust and be visible. This is the same reason I don't want to use a mural or static picture. The black won't be black enough and the stars won't give off light.

There is a similar effect riders can see waiting in line for Space Mountain in Orlando, Florida, but I don't really know how they do it. You'd have to know what that looks like from experience. I couldn't find a picture.

I'd appreciated any suggestions.

Thanks.

O3

How much space do you have? If a monitor works, that's great. If you have more room perhaps you could set up something like a 'pepper's ghost' illusion, that might give a better sense of depth?

I can't find anything on the effect you mention at space mountain. The imagineers do some great stuff though!

Anything that would output a picture or video to a screen would generally need to boot up at some point. But once booted, you could simply leave it on and then press a button to select the backdrop. A raspberry pi is a tiny computer that can output pictures or video to an HDMI port on a high def TV screen. You could have some physical buttons hooked up to the raspberry pi to select the background. If you chose video, you could even have the stars twinkling or moving and for underwater, have fish swimming by. The raspberry pi and the TV screen would need to plug into power, so you'd have to figure out how to hide the cords.

I found a button console on eBay that could be used, and even has a Trek TOS feel to it. (above)

If programmed correctly, the raspberry pi could boot to your default background choice upon powering up and would run independently without keyboard or mouse or other input other than the buttons to select background.

You can send me a PM if you wanted me to do it for you $.

Thank you for the replies. While aware of the effect, I was not aware of the name. The Pepper's Ghost thing is really cool. To answer your question, I really don't know how much space I have. You see, i saw a guy on here that built a workshop in the style of the movie Oblivion. I liked it very much and in two or three years, I plan to move to a place with a large shop and wanted to do something similar. In my room, I'd have the outer space effect discussed, so I was just doing a little early research out of curiosity.

I'm familiar with the raspberry pi and thank you for the suggestion. It might be the perfect answer. It's cheap and effective.

Thanks again!

O3

Yep. You can remove the password from the PI and have it auto load a picture or program on bootup. You can capture YouTube fish or stars and use those as your backgrounds. The raspberry pi uses a lot less power than a full computer.

(I'm just adding this for the other people that might read this thread, since you said you already knew.)

ozone said:

Thank you for the replies. While aware of the effect, I was not aware of the name. The Pepper's Ghost thing is really cool.

Click to expand...

No worries, it's a really great trick. Takes up a bit of room though. You could use it with a monitor as well, for space or underwater stuff - although I guess the underwater scenes might look a bit like a hologram.

You've piqued my interest though, I'm wondering if something like the colimated displays for flight sims (not small) or a fresnel lens could be used to get a better sense of depth in a compact way.

However, if space is a premium in a workshop - I'd go for the compact alternative! I'm trying to design and price a workshop for my backyard, and it'll be full enough with benches and tools. Although I'd love to build a cockpit simulator, it'll take too much space at this point in time.

Jintosh said:

Yep. You can remove the password from the PI and have it auto load a picture or program on bootup. You can capture YouTube fish or stars and use those as your backgrounds. The raspberry pi uses a lot less power than a full computer.

(I'm just adding this for the other people that might read this thread, since you said you already knew.)

Click to expand...

Thanks for the information. When I said I was familiar with the raspberry Pi, I should have been clear. I have never actually used one, I just know a little about it. What you said definitely added to the conversation. Thank you.

McFlyte said:

No worries, it's a really great trick. Takes up a bit of room though. You could use it with a monitor as well, for space or underwater stuff - although I guess the underwater scenes might look a bit like a hologram.

You've piqued my interest though, I'm wondering if something like the colimated displays for flight sims (not small) or a fresnel lens could be used to get a better sense of depth in a compact way.

However, if space is a premium in a workshop - I'd go for the compact alternative! I'm trying to design and price a workshop for my backyard, and it'll be full enough with benches and tools. Although I'd love to build a cockpit simulator, it'll take too much space at this point in time.

Click to expand...

Ooooo! A Fresnel lens is another great idea. I might even be able to make one out of plastic on the CNC router I just got.

For your backyard workshop, you might consider a steel building. The are pretty inexpensive and can be made to look like the house. . . in case you hadn't explored that option.

Thanks again.

O3

A window to space .
I've been wanting this very thing for a long long time now. and with all the modern technology In TVs and CGI you would think it easy. my idea started out with star field in a frame when i was young. but just wasn't enough. then came the Idea of a computer monitor and screen saver. found a screensaver that looked promising long ago but needed to be purchased.


Well it never got purchased . and lost the link over time. at this point In time I'm thinking a large flatscreen TV recessed Into a wall with some sort of star ship window look going on. if I could find the right star field that satisfies the feel I want. and with smart TVs now I would just put It on a flash stick with the Tv set and loop It.

but every thing I look at falls kinda short of what I want.

This is the newest one that I would settle for. nice to know I'm not alone in my quest. and hope you create what your personally looking for...

It sounds like we are looking for exactly the same thing.

I have come to the conclusion that it will not be as good as I like, but I might be able to settle if I can change the image to some other cool images.

If you watch the show "Dark Matter" on the Syfy channel, they have a screen like this in the background. They usually have fish displayed on theirs, but still a similar idea.

I thought a big screen TV would work, just like you. The bigger the better. I don't know if I will have that much space though or if I will be willing to spend that much on a single 'window'. However, three or four smaller less expensive monitors made to look like several windows could be a possibility as well.

Thanks for the link.

O3

An alternative to the Raspberry Pi (I like the Raspberry Pi idea) would be to use a desktop computer or laptop with a Chromecast or other streaming device to send the picture or video wirelessly to the TV.

One further observation with the Raspberry Pi, you can have the video player loop any video endlessly. So a video of fish swimming by will automatically start over when it hits the end of the video.