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Far Out: A Space-Time Chronicle
In Far A Space-Time Chronicle, author and filmmaker Michael Benson assembles an outstanding collection of astronomical images from observatories around the world and in space. We live in a golden age of astronomical observation. Some of the resulting images are well known and have inspired millions of people; others, equally breathtaking, have never been published before. For this book, Benson has culled the very best, and organized them into a thrilling journey through space and time to the universe's great places, ranging from "nearby" nebulae in our own Milky Way galaxy to the light of the Hubble Deep Field that has traveled billions of light-years. Every bit as innovative and beautiful as the author's successful Visions of the Interplanetary Probes but far grander in conception, Far Out is an inspiring work of art and science on the cutting edge of human perception.
<!--StartFragment--> A Guide to the Cosmos, in Words and Images Dazzling and True –New York Times Book Review
[With Far Out] Take a good long look into space-time. –Los Angeles Times
Far out by Michael Benson proves that putting the photographable universe into a book doesn’t dampen its beauty. – Men’s Journal
An exquisite picture book of outer space. –San Diego Union Tribune
“ 2001: A Space Odyssey and Far A Space-Time Chronicle : both are inspirational moving pictures. Far Out punches deep into space, like a series of jump cuts. It is a truly cinematic experience to see these magnificent images in rapid succession. Like the Star-Child in Stanley Kubrick’s vision of a Mankind evolving to a higher level, Far Out inspires me again to imagine a Universe filled with life, and each of those billions of pinpoints being orbited by worlds and beings of breathtaking beauty. Very moving pictures.”
—Douglas Trumbull, Oscar-winning Visual Effects Supervisor, 2001: A Space Odyssey , Blade Runner , Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star Trek, The Motion Picture
“The inventive, imaginative Michael Benson here unfolds the universe in its multiple dimensions.”
—Dava Sobel, author of Longitude , Galileo’s Daughter , and The Planets
“That the images in Michael Benson’s latest book, Far Out , are completely mind-blowing goes without saying. What’s especially dazzling about this volume, though, is the way Benson’s text takes the shards of those blown minds and completely reconfigures them into such a startlingly new and fresh a trembling awe all its own.”
—Lawrence Weschler, author of Everything That Rises and Seeing Is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees
“First he gave us the beauty of our solar system’s neighbor worlds in Visions of the Interplanetary Probes , but Michael Benson hasn’t stopped there. In this spectacular new offering he gives us the universe itself, presented in such stunning and vivid detail that I am awed by every page. Open this book, take the journey, and be amazed.”
—Andrew Chaikin, author of A Man on the Moon and A Passion for Mars
<!--StartFragment--> A Guide to the Cosmos, in Words and Images Dazzling and True –New York Times Book Review
[With Far Out] Take a good long look into space-time. –Los Angeles Times
Far out by Michael Benson proves that putting the photographable universe into a book doesn’t dampen its beauty. – Men’s Journal
An exquisite picture book of outer space. –San Diego Union Tribune
“ 2001: A Space Odyssey and Far A Space-Time Chronicle : both are inspirational moving pictures. Far Out punches deep into space, like a series of jump cuts. It is a truly cinematic experience to see these magnificent images in rapid succession. Like the Star-Child in Stanley Kubrick’s vision of a Mankind evolving to a higher level, Far Out inspires me again to imagine a Universe filled with life, and each of those billions of pinpoints being orbited by worlds and beings of breathtaking beauty. Very moving pictures.”
—Douglas Trumbull, Oscar-winning Visual Effects Supervisor, 2001: A Space Odyssey , Blade Runner , Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star Trek, The Motion Picture
“The inventive, imaginative Michael Benson here unfolds the universe in its multiple dimensions.”
—Dava Sobel, author of Longitude , Galileo’s Daughter , and The Planets
“That the images in Michael Benson’s latest book, Far Out , are completely mind-blowing goes without saying. What’s especially dazzling about this volume, though, is the way Benson’s text takes the shards of those blown minds and completely reconfigures them into such a startlingly new and fresh a trembling awe all its own.”
—Lawrence Weschler, author of Everything That Rises and Seeing Is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees
“First he gave us the beauty of our solar system’s neighbor worlds in Visions of the Interplanetary Probes , but Michael Benson hasn’t stopped there. In this spectacular new offering he gives us the universe itself, presented in such stunning and vivid detail that I am awed by every page. Open this book, take the journey, and be amazed.”
—Andrew Chaikin, author of A Man on the Moon and A Passion for Mars
328 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2009
4 people are currently reading
139 people want to read
About the author
Michael Benson
8 books30 followersMichael Benson is a journalist and maker of documentary films, including the award-winning Predictions of Fire (1995). His work has been published in the New York Times, the New Yorker, and Smithsonian, among other publications, and he has been a television (CNN) and radio (NPR) reporter. He is also the author of the Abrams bestseller Beyond: Visions of the Interplanetary Probes. He lives in New York City.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
August 18, 2019
The allure of science fiction for me is its imaginative answers to so many questions: What's out there? Who's out there? What would it be like if time travel were possible?
Most of the answers seem so remote, but time travel? That we can do.
A TARDIS you can hold in your hands,
Far Out: A Space-Time Chronicle by Michael Benson (5/5)
At first, I paged through the photos of stars, skipping the text, but then I saw the Horsehead Nebula and had to know if my identification was right. It was. I started over, reading Far Out from the beginning.
Each chapter has two to three pages of text plus captions in which Benson describes the phenomena pictured, how they interrelate or were formed, and how far away they are. The text illuminates the photography without bogging it down.
The book is arranged spatially/chronologically, starting with near and recent and progressing to the farthest reaches of space and beginning of the universe. It's designed so that it can be read front to back or back to front.
Brief looks at what was going on in Earth history at the same time as the photographed light was transmitted from distant galaxies help keep the scope fathomable. Since the speed of light is finite and the photographed stars, nebulae, and galaxies are 450 to 12.8 billion light years away, all of the photos are of the past even though they were taken recently*.
When you have a bit of context (read the captions!), the multitude of photos become mind-blowingly awesome. I knew a few things about the universe going in, but in my daily life I'd lost sight of the universe's vastness. This book not only restored but deepened my understanding of it. And made me want to be an astrophotographer.
In case you're unfamiliar with my rating system, a 5 out of 5 is super rare. I reserve it for my absolute favorite books. So check out Far Out: A Space-Time Chronicle!
*Time travel, baby! I frakkin' love this stuff.
Most of the answers seem so remote, but time travel? That we can do.
A TARDIS you can hold in your hands,
Far Out: A Space-Time Chronicle by Michael Benson (5/5)
At first, I paged through the photos of stars, skipping the text, but then I saw the Horsehead Nebula and had to know if my identification was right. It was. I started over, reading Far Out from the beginning.
Each chapter has two to three pages of text plus captions in which Benson describes the phenomena pictured, how they interrelate or were formed, and how far away they are. The text illuminates the photography without bogging it down.
The book is arranged spatially/chronologically, starting with near and recent and progressing to the farthest reaches of space and beginning of the universe. It's designed so that it can be read front to back or back to front.
Brief looks at what was going on in Earth history at the same time as the photographed light was transmitted from distant galaxies help keep the scope fathomable. Since the speed of light is finite and the photographed stars, nebulae, and galaxies are 450 to 12.8 billion light years away, all of the photos are of the past even though they were taken recently*.
When you have a bit of context (read the captions!), the multitude of photos become mind-blowingly awesome. I knew a few things about the universe going in, but in my daily life I'd lost sight of the universe's vastness. This book not only restored but deepened my understanding of it. And made me want to be an astrophotographer.
In case you're unfamiliar with my rating system, a 5 out of 5 is super rare. I reserve it for my absolute favorite books. So check out Far Out: A Space-Time Chronicle!
*Time travel, baby! I frakkin' love this stuff.
December 21, 2021
Amazing photos.
December 8, 2017
Incredible compilation of real pictures of space, and the text describing them. 10/10.
December 19, 2021
Beautiful pictures but I really wish they had put the text below the pictures, even it it meant sacrificing the size just a tiny bit. Also the text was at times a bit repetitive.
April 20, 2014
Beautiful and, in many ways beyond my full comprehension. The photographs of deep space are astounding. The text is both enlightening and challenging.
For example: "As we've seen, the great depth of field of astronomical photographs readily allow objects far in the background of an image's ostensible primary subject to register. And as some pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope illustrate particularly well, if exposures are made that total many hours or even days, some of the faintest and most far-traveled photons -- the weightless, massless, extraordinary far-flung subatomic particles that light is made of -- have time to register....A degree in astrophysics isn't required to locate these dwaft galaxies; they're simply the very small red or yellow forms freckling the image. While they may seem extraordinarily ancient from our vantage point, they were actually in the full glory of youth when their light set out on long journey toward us."
For example: "As we've seen, the great depth of field of astronomical photographs readily allow objects far in the background of an image's ostensible primary subject to register. And as some pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope illustrate particularly well, if exposures are made that total many hours or even days, some of the faintest and most far-traveled photons -- the weightless, massless, extraordinary far-flung subatomic particles that light is made of -- have time to register....A degree in astrophysics isn't required to locate these dwaft galaxies; they're simply the very small red or yellow forms freckling the image. While they may seem extraordinarily ancient from our vantage point, they were actually in the full glory of youth when their light set out on long journey toward us."
December 31, 2010
Absolutely Stunning !!
SO many full colored astrophotograhies. Each photograph has also got a consice description by Benson.
The images are listedin chronical orders. Most of the images are ones that i haven't seen from common photobooks and each image is in high resolution, beautiful ! It a total eye-candy for everyone.
A must have !!
i LOVE this book SO MUCH !!
SO many full colored astrophotograhies. Each photograph has also got a consice description by Benson.
The images are listedin chronical orders. Most of the images are ones that i haven't seen from common photobooks and each image is in high resolution, beautiful ! It a total eye-candy for everyone.
A must have !!
i LOVE this book SO MUCH !!
February 21, 2010
I am not worthy to be a commentator, but I will. The pictures and the text will boggle your mind. And expand it, like the universe it explores. It might be compared to a religious experience, but it's better than that.
Want to read
January 7, 2010As heard on the Science Times podcast.
April 17, 2010
holy cow! this is just beautiful. need to get this again from library to peruse more leisurely.
July 30, 2012
More beautiful and breath-taking than words can describe.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews