Centered in the Universe

Centered in the Universe
Theatrical poster
Directed by	Don Dixon
Produced by	Ann Hassett Bill Murphy
Written by	André Bormanis Don Dixon Ed Krupp
Music by	William Ashford Alan Ett Scott Liggett
Edited by	Shawn Crosby Barrett Sanders Drew Anderson
Distributed by	Griffith Observatory
Release date	October 29, 2006 (2006-10-29)
Country	United States
Language	English

Centered in the Universe is a fulldome presentation that premiered the evening of October 29, 2006 at the "Galactic Gala" which marked the reopening of the renovated Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles. The 33-minute planetarium program utilizes a Zeiss Universarium star projector and an innovative laser video projection system developed by Evans & Sutherland to create an immersive environment. A live presenter narrates the script.

As the audience is seated, the planetarium dome is suffused with a cool blue light, with a suggestion of clouds. The presenter walks to the center of the theater and flourishes a glowing ball, representing a star, about the size of a grapefruit, which he/she alternately lights and dims to accent a description of how various cultures interpreted celestial phenomena such as the cycle of day and night. At the conclusion of the introduction, the orb fades, the theater darkens, and the audience experiences a simulated sunset projected by the laser video system. As the sunset proceeds, the star projector rises to simulate the night sky. The lecturer asks the audience to imagine how mysterious the stars must have seemed to ancient people, and then demonstrates, using the star projector, how people invented constellations in an effort to make sense of the randomly scattered stars. In accelerated time, we see the complex motions of the sun, moon, and planets.

The scene dissolves to ancient Alexandria, Egypt. We see the Great Library and the Pharos Lighthouse. In a courtyard, next to a pool surrounded by torches, we see the 2nd Century astronomer Claudius Ptolemy adjusting an armillary sphere to chart star positions. Behind Ptolemy is a small table on which rests a scroll. We approach the scroll and see that it depicts a geocentric model of the universe. Paintings on the scroll morph into 3D representations of the sun, earth, and planets, which hover above the scroll and rotate within a complex system of crystalline spheres, illustrating the earth-centered model of the universe that persisted until the Renaissance.