VSP Case Study:
Science in Action
NSF Researcher at South Pole Informs Colleagues Around World by
Sending Back Real-Time Video Clips Captured and Transmitted by Video Sphinx Pro (VSP)
A National Science Foundation (NSF) researcher tracking environmental pollution at
the South Pole has just arrived for a second expedition, this time armed with a new
communications tool: the Video Sphinx Pro from FutureTel. Traveling to the South
Pole for the first time in 1997 to install pollution measuring instruments called
"aethalometers", Dr. Tony Hansen discovered a world divided -- snow-blanket
beauty accomodating top-notch scientific missions on the one hand, an environment
increasingly smothered in exhaust fumes on the other.
Tony Hansen's primary mission is to collect evidence regarding the degree of pollution,
specifically aerosal black carbon, that workers are exposed to -- helping the NSF
to make proper regulatory determinations in the future. His other goal is to educate
friends, colleagues, and the public about the region and the NSF's work there.
On his first expedition Hansen took still pictures with a digital camera and sent
them back by email; this time he is sending video clips around the world. Taking
maximum advantage of Video Sphinx Pro's power and portability, Hansen simply plugs
the peripheral into his laptop's parallel port to capture in real-time the video
he is shooting, which he then might edit and remix before posting to his web site
and sending out video e-mails.
"People are amazed by the broadcast quality of video that VSP generates, but
in a tiny workspace in Antarctica what I really care about is ease-of-use. If I'm
in a hurry it takes almost no extra time to plug this in and send the video I'm recording
-- and I will always be able to find it later in the VSP's media database if I want
to make some edits."
Hansen has been sending accounts of this expedition to his web site (http:www.mageesci.com/antarctic)
as well as to his colleagues at the lawrence berkeley national laboratory, to collaborating
scientists at government and university research institutions both in the U.S.. and
in European countries, and also to schoolteachers.
The immediacy of video illustrates the objectives, the methods and the nature of
scientific research in an attention-grabbing, "cinema-verite-live-from-antarctica"
manner. This has particularly caught the attention of educators who are battling
the draw of television on the nation's children.
"As an educational tool, the VSP can really work wonders because
video is simply a superior communications tool. students will fall asleep in lectures,
and may or may not look at a still picture, but are immediately drawn to video.
It's got to be the communications tool for scientists in the future."
David McHale Account Executive dmchale@horizonpr.com
Horizon Communications -- 408-969-4888
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