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21st Annual Smithsonian Magazine Photo Contest Artistic
Light Cone Spacetime Sculpture over Boot Arch in the Alabama Hills

California's Alabama Hills at the foot of Mont Whitney served as the set for hundreds of Hollywood films, with the Eastern Sierra Mountains providing a most epic backdrop. So it is that I sculpted a Light Cone Spacetime Scultpture via long exposure capturing a spiraling drone with a light mounted on it. In addition to exalting the beauty of the landscape at night with unique light, the drone also exalts Einstein's relativity. As explained in this Smithsonian article: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/this-physicist-uses-drones-to-create-giant-light-cones-in-the-desert-180982250/ This Physicist Uses Drones to Create Giant Light Cones in the Desert Evoking a key concept in relativity, Elliot McGucken traces out hourglass-like shapes in the sky that stretch as high as a seven-story building. “The first thing you have to accomplish is a sense of beauty. You owe that to the viewer before you start giving them any sort of physics lecture,” he says. “I want people to see the desert landscape at night, and then see the light cone, and then start wondering, ‘What is that? What does it mean?’”

Photo Detail
Date Taken: 05.2023
Date Uploaded: 11.2023
Photo Location: Lone Pine, California, United States of America
Copyright: © Elliot McGucken