$148 won't even buy you a new 16GB iPod Nano. So when we found out that two MIT students were able to take that small sum and build a functional space camera, we were incredibly impressed.

Justin Lee and Oliver Yeh were able to devise a low budget mechanism for space photography using off-the-shelf components: weather balloons, helium, styrofoam cooler, handwarmers, cell phone, and camera. The space photography balloon they built was launched on September 2nd, reached an altitude of 18 miles, and captured some amazing photographs.

Project Icarus

Lee and Yeh documented their endeavor, titled Project Icarus, from start to finish on their website 1337arts. Their dream was "to see what the world looked like from the sky." And as evidenced by the photos below, they were clearly successful, though it was certainly a process that evolved through trial and error.

CNN's iReport chronicles the impressive effort and creative logic that went into the project:

"The students knew that helium-filled weather balloons were capable of reaching altitudes of 20+ miles, high enough to photograph the curvature of the earth. Weather balloons were also relatively inexpensive; a 300g latex balloon can be ordered online for $20 and can be filled with helium at a party store for $30. If they could keep their camera device light, then a 300g balloon would have enough lift to carry their device into the upper stratosphere. Temperatures in the stratosphere can get as low as -55°C, and at that temperature, batteries stop working and electronics fail. To get around this problem without resorting to the use of expensive temperature-resistant hardware or heating devices, the pair used a styrofoam cooler and handwarmers pressed tightly against operating electronics to help keep their equipment functioning throughout the camera’s flight. Locating and retrieving a camera after a near-space launch is a difficult task. Typically, weather balloons are tracked using GPS radio modems which are heavy, cost in the thousands of dollars, and often require complex hardware configurations. In lieu of purchasing a radio modem for their space-bound camera, Lee and Yeh opted to use a $50 GPS-equipped cell phone. The cell phone was secured to the camera and constantly reported its GPS location via text message."

Photos from Space











