Documentary film: Design Space for Space Design, a film based on my PhD research at the Royal College of Art, and created with my collaborator Oliver Lehtonen. Original music score by Ho-Ling Tang. Producer: Johnny Ramalho. In this documentary, we reflect on the current state of human centered design and space architecture at NASA. For over half a century, space exploration has been dominated by an engineering paradigm, leaving limited space for design and art. As NASA is planning human missions to Mars, human centered design will play increasingly relevant roles, including space habitats, humanoid robotics, and art. Our full documentary is now available on Amazon Prime Video (see: https://www.amazon.com/Design-Space-Tibor-Balint/dp/B07K8V62MQ/ref=sr_1_1?crid=6964PKVIMCYI&keywords=design+space+for+space+design&qid=1551469838&s=gateway&sprefix=design+space+for+%2Caps%2C192&sr=8-1)

Here is the trailer from Vimeo:

In this documentary, we reflect on the current state of human centered design and space architecture at NASA. For over half a century, space exploration has been dominated by an engineering paradigm, leaving limited space for design and art. As NASA is planning human missions to Mars, human centered design will play increasingly relevant roles, including space habitats, humanoid robotics, and art. Our full documentary is now available on Amazon Prime Video.

Official posters for the International Planetary Probe Workshop (IPPW), plus two at the end that we didn't use. To date, I have created 9 official posters out of the 13 conferences. The latest IPPW-13 poster was the first one where I used a physical artifact instead of computer graphics. As a boundary object, it connected design and art to the highly specialized engineering and technology fields of the workshop. 

These are NASA and ESA report covers, proposal covers, and my thesis cover, done over the past decade or so. I have participated in most of the studies from the technical side, that ended up with these reports to sponsors. Then we needed some good report cover too.... Over the years they have improved I think. I have done most with Blender3d, and Adobe CS. At times the regulations on what text and logos the covers need to contain made them quite busy.

The Titan balloon images were published in Aerospace America, where I co-authored the article with a JPL colleague, and used these images as illustrations. The Montecino Journal article written by a balloon expert colleague, who kindly used my image. An Italian coffee table book on scientific ballooning dedicated a short section to planetary ballooning, and used the same image as the one in Scientific American. It was a time when a potential Titan mission was an almost equal competitor to a Europa mission at NASA. These images were also used in presentations to sponsors, to advocate for a Montgolfier balloon mission to Titan.

Unofficial promo for the 14th International Planetary Probe Workshop (using Blender3d and After Effects).

 

The 14th International Planetary Probe Workshop (IPPW-14) brings together engineers, technologists, scientists, mission designers, space agency leaders and students from around the world for a compelling, week-long collaboration focused on exploring solar system destinations through in situ missions. For the official poster I have created a 1 second long (25 frames) splashdown simulation, using Blender3D, and then extended it to this unofficial promo video using After Effects. The conference dates are: June 12-16, 2017. The IPPW-14 website can be found here: http://esaconferencebureau.com/2017-events/ippw-14/home

Venus Flagship Mission concept video (2009)

A short video about the 2009 Venus Flagship Mission (VFM) concept study, performed by the NASA Appointed Venus Science and Technology Definition Team (STDT) and the supporting Venus Flagship Study Team. Additional analysis was performed by TeamX at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Venus Climate Mission (VCM) concept video (2009)

A brief video about the 2009 Venus Climate Mission (VCM) concept study in support of the NRC Planetary Decadal Survey.

Venus Mobile Explorer (VME) concept video (2009)

The Venus Mobile Explorer (VME) study was performed at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, in close collaboration with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and NASA's Ames Research Center. This NASA study was performed in 2009 in support of the National Research Council's Planetary Decadal Survey.

Venus Balloon concept video (2009)

European Venus Explorer (EVE) concept video (2015)

A short video about the European Venus Explorer (EVE) concepts. Carried by the strong winds at an altitude of 50 km the balloon would circumnavigate the planet. At this altitude the conditions are quite Earth-like (e.g., pressure, temperature), except for the sulfuric acid droplets in the clouds.