A beautiful aquarium supernova

Using mostly old-school visual effects — like ink dispersing in an aquarium and poking holes in napkins (to represent stars) — Thomas Vanz created a pretty compelling representation of a dying star going supernova.

Novae is a movie about an astronomical event that occurs during the last evolutionary stages of a massive star’s life, whose dramatic and catastrophic death is marked by one final titanic explosion called supernova.

By only using an aquarium, ink and water, this film is also an attempt to represent the giant with the small without any computed generated imagery.

As a tribute to Kubrick or Nolan’s filmography, Novae is a cosmic poem that want to introduce the viewer to the nebulae’s infinite beauty.

Vanz documented his process in these two videos, which are almost as entertaining as the finished product.

• astronomy
• science
• space
• Thomas Vanz
• video