Month: September 2022

NASA APOD

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I wanted the very cool images from JWST as my desktop background. And I figured that NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) would contain a lot of these and so I looked around for utilities that would modify the background by pulling new APOD images.

I found https://github.com/randomdrake/nasa-apod-desktop but decided to fork it into https://github.com/kaytat/nasa-apod-desktop. There are some minor updates for Python 3, a script usable via cron, and some small feature enhancements related to aspect ratio.

Jurassic Park

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I knew that many of the filming locations for the very first Jurassic Park were set in Hawaii. And I’ve always wondered about the location where the helicopter first approaches Isla Nublar.

Most Google searches suggest the Na Pali Coast on Kauai but I couldn’t find the little rock island that you see on the left in the video above. And by “find” I mean using the 3D view on Google maps and examining the entire Kauai coastline.

And that’s because this shot is not from Kauai, but Maui. This spot is known as Keopuka Rock or Jurassic Rock.