Huygen's lands on Titan (1 Viewer)

[Lee ps]

The photographs taken while the probe was descending seem to have been shuffled, like a deck of cards, leaving the sequence of events in doubt. The well known images of the pebbles, presumably taken after the probe had landed, can be found near everywhere on ESA's website.

This is the wettest of the triplets and I'm assuming it was taken early on during the descent. As cold as Titan is, space is colder, and the liquid drops on the camera's lens or housing is probably liquid methane that condensed out of Titan's atmosphere.

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This very wide string of images, about 45 of them, appear to have been taken during the descent also, and it concludes with the well known pebble picture. It's too wide to post as a picture, so you will have to click on it. You will notice that as the probe descends, the images of Titan become clearer, like dropping out of a fog.

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Oh well, someday...

 

[Yee-Ming]

Kinda depends on which book you're referring to, eh? The first 2001: A Space Odyssey was originally written for Saturn, but they used Jupiter for the movie and IIRC Clarke therefore re-wrote it so subsequent editions referred to Jupiter as well. 2010, 2061 and 3001 (the books) have always referred to Jupiter, in particular 2010 where Ricardo's quotes come from. So IMHO the esteemed Mr Briggs is absolutely correct to say wrong planet...

 

[BrianW]

Isn't it also the case that the movie predated the book? With the book being the adaptation of the original story, not the movie, I would think that the movie would trump the book in such matters.

 

[Yee-Ming]

IIRC, Clarke and Kubrick collaborated on the story at the same time. Clarke was writing about Saturn, somewhere along the line I think Kubrick went with Jupiter (possibly because the rings made the effects too difficult?), but by the time they consulted each other again Clarke had finished his part of the work. Hence, I don't think you can say one trumps the other since they were done simultaneously; the short story from which 2001 was developed, The Sentinel, only goes as far as the discovery of the monolith on the far side of the moon.

No doubt Mr Briggs can enlighten us on the exact sequence of events?

 

[Edwin-S]

Clarke wrote a short story called The Sentinel. It predated the movie and the book. IIRC The Sentinel was the seed which inspired Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. Clarke once explained why Jupiter was substituted for Saturn in the movie, but I cannot remember the exact reason.

 

[Lee ps]

I think Kubrick went with Jupiter (possibly because the rings made the effects too difficult?)

That was the problem.

 

[Jack Briggs]

Yes, the rings and Saturn were considered "too difficult" to film in the 1960s. But, to this day, Arthur C. Clarke's novel of this film still reads "Saturn" -- it's the destination of the Discovery.

But in his novel 2010, Arthur Clarke stated in the forward that his book follows the film (and not his own original book). (As for the movie made of this book, no need to further discuss.)

And it was the film -- the real one, from 1968 -- as well as Clarke's subsequent novel to which I was referring in my post.