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For a visual of how far away Pluto really is from Earth(and really how far away everything in our solar system is from eachother) I recommend checking out Ridin

For a visual of how far away Pluto really is from Earth(and really how far away everything in our solar system is from eachother) I recommend checking out Riding Light https://vimeo.com/117815404 https://vimeo.com/117815404 "This animation illustrates, in realtime, the journey of a photon of light emitted from the surface of the sun and traveling across a portion of the solar system, from a human perspective." The video is 45 minutes long and makes it just past Jupiter. It would have to be 5.5 hours long to show Pluto.

tdkl 11y ago
Grasping that it took New Horizon about one year since launch to reach Jupiter, then about 9 years extra to reach Pluto is also a nice demonstration.
- maaku 11y ago
  And that was _with_ a gravity assist at Jupiter...
serengeti 11y ago
This is the perfect evening activity. I could have watched it for 5.5 hours.
- thangalin 11y ago
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wM0JMaM_tdQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wM0JMaM_tdQ Video I made to show distances between planets, with short stops at each one to show off its spectacular beauty. Earth was the most difficult to render due to lights on its night side; Mars proved challenging because of its atmosphere.
sp332 11y ago
New Horizons' next target is a rock about 1 billion miles beyond Pluto. It will only take 4 years to get there. https://i.imgur.com/OGKtgsq.gifv https://i.imgur.com/OGKtgsq.gifv
- sp332 11y ago
  Regarding downvotes: It's true, here's a source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_MU69#Exploration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_MU69#Exploration
gulpahum 11y ago
Another way to understand the distances is the old scroll-through solar system. If the moon is one pixel, then Pluto is pretty far away. http://joshworth.com/dev/pixelspace/pixelspace_solarsystem.html http://joshworth.com/dev/pixelspace/pixelspace_solarsystem.h...
- r3bl 11y ago
  Man, how silly does it sound that I'm struggling to travel 40 kilometres twice a week when I passed the 1 billion kilometres mark here and still haven't reached Saturn.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
VikingCoder 11y ago
I like to think of a marathon as one AU. If the start line of the marathon happens at the center of the Sun, and the finish line is at the center of the Earth... You run for 213 yards to get out of the sun. You make it to the surface of the Earth at 5 feet, 10 inches from the finish line. (If the moon was eclipsing the sun, you would have run over it 122 yards from the finish line, and it would have a diameter of 3 feet, 2 inches.) And Pluto's orbit? Well, it's 859 miles from the start line. If the marathon had been in New York? It's kind of like running to Chicago. (It's a tad further than that.) Oh, and on this scale, how fast is light travelling? 188 miles per hour. The world record human marathon speed was 13 miles per hour. So, 7% of the speed of light.
dombili 11y ago
Fantastic video. Thank you for sharing.
- jdnier 11y ago
  And Steve Reich's "Music for 18 Musicians" makes the perfect soundtrack.
lisper 11y ago
Cool! I once designed a scale model of the solar system for an elementary school class. The sun was a ping-pong ball. At this scale, earth is about three meters from the sun, and Pluto is a hundred meters away. Both earth and pluto at this scale are too small to see with the naked eye.
- nostrademons 11y ago
  I did the NSF Young Scholars Program at MIT Haystack observatory the summer after 8th grade, and one of the events was a scale model of the solar system. The sun was a basketball, Jupiter was a golf ball, Saturn was one of those little rubber bouncy balls, and all the inner planets were grains of sand chosen to mimic their colors and relative sizes. Jupiter was off at the end of the parking lot, Saturn was in the grass at the edge of the site, and Uranus/Neptune/Pluto were omitted for lack of space.
frogpelt 11y ago
Also, this guy built a scale model in the Black Rock Desert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR3Igc3Rhfg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR3Igc3Rhfg EDIT: This one doesn't include Pluto.
- lutorm 11y ago
  If you're in Europe, there's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweden_Solar_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweden_Solar_System (which goes all the way to the termination shock, apparently.)
  - fapjacks 11y ago
    Sweden is so awesome. Thanks for sharing this!
est 11y ago
It would be cooler if the background stars follow the rules of relativity.
- valarauca1 11y ago
  So disappeared? They'd blueshift up past gamma rays and become invisible. While behind you they'd redshift down to nothing.

tdkl 11y ago

Grasping that it took New Horizon about one year since launch to reach Jupiter, then about 9 years extra to reach Pluto is also a nice demonstration.

maaku 11y ago
And that was _with_ a gravity assist at Jupiter...

serengeti 11y ago

This is the perfect evening activity. I could have watched it for 5.5 hours.

thangalin 11y ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wM0JMaM_tdQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wM0JMaM_tdQ Video I made to show distances between planets, with short stops at each one to show off its spectacular beauty. Earth was the most difficult to render due to lights on its night side; Mars proved challenging because of its atmosphere.

sp332 11y ago

New Horizons' next target is a rock about 1 billion miles beyond Pluto. It will only take 4 years to get there. https://i.imgur.com/OGKtgsq.gifv https://i.imgur.com/OGKtgsq.gifv

sp332 11y ago
Regarding downvotes: It's true, here's a source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_MU69#Exploration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_MU69#Exploration

gulpahum 11y ago

Another way to understand the distances is the old scroll-through solar system. If the moon is one pixel, then Pluto is pretty far away. http://joshworth.com/dev/pixelspace/pixelspace_solarsystem.html http://joshworth.com/dev/pixelspace/pixelspace_solarsystem.h...

r3bl 11y ago
Man, how silly does it sound that I'm struggling to travel 40 kilometres twice a week when I passed the 1 billion kilometres mark here and still haven't reached Saturn.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

VikingCoder 11y ago

I like to think of a marathon as one AU. If the start line of the marathon happens at the center of the Sun, and the finish line is at the center of the Earth... You run for 213 yards to get out of the sun. You make it to the surface of the Earth at 5 feet, 10 inches from the finish line. (If the moon was eclipsing the sun, you would have run over it 122 yards from the finish line, and it would have a diameter of 3 feet, 2 inches.) And Pluto's orbit? Well, it's 859 miles from the start line. If the marathon had been in New York? It's kind of like running to Chicago. (It's a tad further than that.) Oh, and on this scale, how fast is light travelling? 188 miles per hour. The world record human marathon speed was 13 miles per hour. So, 7% of the speed of light.

dombili 11y ago

Fantastic video. Thank you for sharing.

jdnier 11y ago
And Steve Reich's "Music for 18 Musicians" makes the perfect soundtrack.

lisper 11y ago

Cool! I once designed a scale model of the solar system for an elementary school class. The sun was a ping-pong ball. At this scale, earth is about three meters from the sun, and Pluto is a hundred meters away. Both earth and pluto at this scale are too small to see with the naked eye.

nostrademons 11y ago
I did the NSF Young Scholars Program at MIT Haystack observatory the summer after 8th grade, and one of the events was a scale model of the solar system. The sun was a basketball, Jupiter was a golf ball, Saturn was one of those little rubber bouncy balls, and all the inner planets were grains of sand chosen to mimic their colors and relative sizes. Jupiter was off at the end of the parking lot, Saturn was in the grass at the edge of the site, and Uranus/Neptune/Pluto were omitted for lack of space.

frogpelt 11y ago

Also, this guy built a scale model in the Black Rock Desert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR3Igc3Rhfg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR3Igc3Rhfg EDIT: This one doesn't include Pluto.

lutorm 11y ago
If you're in Europe, there's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweden_Solar_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweden_Solar_System (which goes all the way to the termination shock, apparently.)
- fapjacks 11y ago
  Sweden is so awesome. Thanks for sharing this!

est 11y ago

It would be cooler if the background stars follow the rules of relativity.

valarauca1 11y ago
So disappeared? They'd blueshift up past gamma rays and become invisible. While behind you they'd redshift down to nothing.