Powers of 10
One of the most famous and effective tools to try and explain the scale of our universe is the series of images of something (usually a picnic in a park), each taken ten times further away than the one before. The final pictures usually shows the entire universe. This idea has been used by Carl Sagan in Cosmos, as the opening sequence of the movie contact, in astronomy textbooks and more. The first film version was called ‘Powers of 10’, and was produced in the 1960’s by Ray and Charles Eames, and has now been made available on youtube. Even with the rather dated 1960’s soundtrack, it remains a beautiful sequence.