Peterson Planetarium Shows

Planetarium Shows

ASTRONOMY

DANCING AMONG THE STARS [2020]

A beautiful, animated look at the motions of the Earth in space that lead to the cycles of the day and night and the parade of the seasons throughout the year as well as the turning of the stars in the sky at night. Subjects that can be challenging and complex, yet important to understand, are made colorful and clear.(20min)
(Grades 1 and up, General Audience)

Exoplanets – Discovering New Worlds

The modern hunt for exoplanets is an adventure that began in the 20th century. It continues today as astronomers use both ground- and space-based observatories to find planets around other stars. This show tells the story of our search for alien worlds and the methods astronomers use to detect these planets. No extraterrestrial life has been found anywhere else – yet. The possibility of finding life drives our extrasolar planet searches. What if that life is intelligent? Has it tried to contact us? Recommended for ages 12 and up, Running time: 29 minutes

FITO GATO EN EL ESPACIO [2005]

Fito Gato en el Espacio es una presentacion de caricatura juguetona e imaginativa sobre un gato muy curioso. Desde los ojos de Fito, observamos su familia humana, un grupo de fanaticos observantes del cielo nocturno. Fito toma en cuenta como el tiempo humano es distinto al tiempo de un gato. 

Diana (la humana de Fito) acepta un trabajo en la Luna y tristemente deja a Fito atras. Fito encuentra un manera de esconderse en un baul lleno de ropa. El baul y Fito abordaron el Avion Espacial, que los llevaria a la estacion espacial Freedom.

De ahi, el es transladado a la Nave Espacial. Durante el periodo en donde no existe la gravedad, el baul se abre. Fito flota afuera a la cabina y mira hacia afuera. Cuando Diana descubre a Fito el brinca para saludarla, pero vuela sobre su cabeza, con eso de que el solo pesa dos libras en la gravedad Lunar. El conoce el resto de los habitantes del Imbrium Village, incluso al malvado Comandante Stone, quien ordena a Diana que regrese a Fito a la Tierra. La tripulacion Lunar hace una peticion para mantener a Fito con ellos y el Comandante Stone acepta. Hasta le hace un traje espacial a Fito. Cuando Fito explora afuera, el ve la Tierra, casi igual como cuando el miraba la Luna desde la terraza de su casa. (30min)
(Pre-K to Grade 2, General Audience)

Max Goes to the Moon

Based on the award-winning children's book, “Max Goes to the Moon” by Dr. Jeffrey Bennett, Max (the dog) and a young girl named Tori take the first trip to the Moon since the Apollo era. Along the way, the story covers topics including “Phases of the Moon,” “Wings in Space,” and “Frisbees and Curve Balls on the Moon” — all thoughtfully explained so that grownups and children can learn together about science. Toward the end of the story, Max and Tori’s trip proves so inspiring to people back on Earth that all the nations of the world come together to build a great Moon colony from which “the beautiful views of Earth from the Moon made everyone realize that we all share a small and precious planet.” Recommend for ages 4-8, grades K-4,

Running Time: 35 minutes

THE LITTLE STAR THAT COULD [2009]

"The Little Star That Could” is a story about Little Star, an average yellow star in search for planets of his own to protect and warm. Along the way, he meets other stars, learns what makes each star special, and discovers that stars combine to form star clusters and galaxies. Eventually, Little Star finds his planets. Each planet is introduced to your audiences with basic information about our Solar System. (36min)
(Pre-K to Grade 4, General Audience)

EARTH, MOON, & SUN [2009]

This planetarium show strikes curiosity in the viewer as Coyote’s misconceptions of the Earth, Moon, and Sun are brought to their attention. Coyote is adapted from Native American oral traditions.  Questions such as why the moon can sometimes be seen in the daytime, why the sun does not rise and set in the same place, and why the moon sometimes changes shape are answered. This helps the viewer understand how the Earth, Moon, and Sun work as a system. (29min)
(Grades 1 through 8, General Audience)

CHRONICLE OF A JOURNEY TO EARTH [2010]

Travel to a unique planet — to call your home! Imagine that you are a traveler from the depths of interstellar space. As you approach our solar system, what will you find? Long before you reach the Sun, you traverse the Oort cloud, the deep freeze at the outermost reaches. You pass by the gas giants and their families of moons and rings. Finally, you reach the inner solar system, and the rocky worlds of Mars, Earth, Venus and Mercury. (20min)
(Grades 6 and up, General Audience)

THE HOT AND ENERGETIC UNIVERSE [2016]

High Energy Astrophysics plays a key role in understanding the universe. These radiations reveal the processes in the hot and violent universe.

High Energy Astrophysics probes hot gas in clusters of galaxies, which are the most massive objects in the universe. It also probes hot gas accreting around supermassive black holes in the centers of galaxies.

Finally, high energy radiation provides important information about our own galaxy, neutron stars, supernova remnants and stars like our Sun which emit copious amounts of high energy radiation. Europe plays a leading role in high energy astrophysics research. (30min)
(Grades 6 and up, General Audience)

SUNSTRUCK! [2014]

Heliophysics is the main component of the Sunstruck! planetarium show. It includes information on the sun, parts/layers, space weather and its impact on Earth. We used several NASA heliophysics missions including SOHO, IRIS, and SDO. The audience should gain an enhanced understanding of the Sun and how it impacts our world. This product is to be used in full dome planetariums. (21min)
(Grades 1 and up, General Audience)

IBEX: INTERSTELLAR BOUNDARY EXPLORER [2009]

Join scientists who are investigating the boundary between our Solar System and the rest of our galaxy in IBEX: Search for the Edge of the Solar System.  Designed for visitors with an appreciation for the challenges of space science and a desire to learn more about science research, the show follows the creation of NASA’s Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX). Audiences will get an in-depth look at the mission and how IBEX is collecting high-speed atoms to create a map of our Solar System’s boundary.  Narrated by two inquisitive teenagers, audiences will hear from the scientists and engineers that developed the IBEX mission and created the spacecraft, and get the latest updates on the mission’s discoveries. (29min)
(Grades 4 and up, General Audience)

DARK [2012]

DARK is a fulldome movie that explains and explores the nature of dark matter, the missing 80% of the mass of the Universe.  The search for dark matter is the most pressing astrophysical problem of our time – the solution to which will help us understand why the Universe is as it is, where it came from, and how it has evolved over billions of years – the unimaginable depths of deep time, of which a human life is but a flickering instant. But in that instant, we can grasp its immensity and, through science, we can attempt to understand it. (20min)
(Grades 6 and up, General Audience)

A PLANET FOR GOLDILOCKS [2012]

The search for a planet like Earth – one with temperatures, oceans, and an atmosphere suitable for life has been a little like Goldilocks’ search for a decent bowl of porridge: some are too hot, some are too cold, but some are “just right.”  Learn the techniques astronomers have already used to find more than 2,000 tiny, dark worlds in orbit around distant stars – some in the Goldilocks Zone.  As we add exploration tools like the Thirty Meter Telescope atop Hawaii’s Mauna Kea, we will undoubtedly find thousands more! (26min)
(Grades 5 and up, General Audience)

TWO SMALL PIECES OF GLASS [2008]

Two Small Pieces of Glass follows two teenage students while they learn about the history of the telescope.  They learn how Galileo modified a child's spyglass with two small pieces of glass to peer into the heavens.  While looking through the telescopes the students observe many of the beauties in our solar system and learn how NASA is using the same ideas to peer even further into space. (23min)
(Grades 2 and up, General Audience)

ASTRONOMY 3000 YEARS OF STARGAZING [2010]

The sky, and everything that happens in it, has always piqued our curiosity. The regular cycle of the seasons and the motion of the stars have fascinated us since our earliest ancestors looked up to the sky. In the learned company of a cartoon Einstein, this show takes audiences on a tour of the major astronomical milestones of the last 3,000 years – from the cosmological models of antiquity, through the Ptolemaic system of epicycles, to the contributions of Copernicus, Newton, Hubble and many others.

We explore the discoveries made possible by the use of technology – from the first telescope used by Galileo – to modern ones in use on Earth and in space. All have revealed the beauty of the cosmos. Come along for an exploration of nebulae, pulsars, and black holes and 3,000 years of astronomy exploration. (34min)
(Grades 4 and up, General Audience)

EARTH SCIENCE

OUR VIOLENT PLANET [2018]

We live out our lives on our planet’s fractured crust, “plates” that pull apart, collide, grind past each other, and even sink below one another, producing violent earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and catastrophic walls of water known as tsunamis. A full dome presentation about earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, earth, geology, and continental drift. (28min)
(Grades 3 and up, General Audience)

SOLAR QUEST [2013]

Solar Quest is a planetarium short feature that demonstrates and provides an overview of the Sun – Earth environment.  Detailed and high quality animations and videos demonstrate various solar phenomena such as fusion, light energy and solar surface features and phenomena.  The show also discusses the impacts that space weather may have and how the Earth’s atmosphere and magnetic field protects all life on Earth.  Highlighted in the show is the role of the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) and how scientists have begun to use it as a way to help identify and predict severe space weather. (12min)
(Grades 3 and up, General Audience)

EARTHQUAKES: EVIDENCE OF A RESTLESS PLANET [2012]

Fly along the San Andreas Fault before diving into the planet’s interior, travel back in time to witness the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and the break-up of Pangaea 200 million years ago, visit the sites of historical earthquakes in India, China and Japan, and learn how scientists and engineers collaborate to build a safer environment. Along the way, you’ll discover how earthquakes fit into the larger story of our restless planet. (23min)
(Grades 6 and up, General Audience)

SUPER VOLCANOES [2012]

The scene was 74,000 years ago, on the island of Sumatra. A volcanic eruption triggered the sudden and violent collapse of a vast regional plateau. Toba, as the volcano is known today, was the largest volcanic eruption in the last 25 million years. But Earth has seen far larger. 250 million years ago, an eruption in what’s now Siberia lasted a million years and was probably responsible for the greatest episode of mass extinction in Earth’s history.

Super volcanoes is an immersive planetarium show that looks back at rare classes of eruptions that have marshaled the energy that lurks, like a sleeping dragon, beneath the surface of planet Earth. The program moves beyond Earth to explore the impact of giant volcanic eruptions around our solar system. Audiences will fly down to Neptune’s frigid moon Triton, and onto the ultimate volcanic world: Jupiter’s moon Io. On a visit to a legendary North American hot spot, Yellowstone National Park, the film asks: can a super volcano erupt in our time? (25min)
(Grades 4 and up, General Audience)

Incoming!

Narrated by George Takei, “Incoming!” explores the past, present and future of our Solar System and the landmark discoveries scientists have made by sending spacecraft to visit tiny worlds. Audiences will discover how asteroids and comets collided with our planet throughout history, changing the course of life on Earth and shaping the world we know today. Recommended for ages 6 and up, Running time: 25 minutes

Climate Change in Our Backyard

As humans develop a much larger picture about our Earth as a whole, we are beginning to see it as a complex, interconnected, remarkable world that people have impacted directly. Explore the role of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere, the natural temperature variations that the Earth has experienced over millions of years and how humans are affecting our planet today. Recommended for ages 12 and up, Running Time: 30 minutes

LIFE SCIENCE

WE ARE STARS [2015]

We are Stars is an immersive science documentary. It will seek to answer some of the biggest questions of all time. What are we made of? Where did it all come from? The film explores the secrets of our cosmic chemistry, our explosive origins and connects life on Earth to the evolution of the Universe.NSC Creative applies its trademark approach of taking complex scientific concepts and making them accessible to all ages by using stylized and fun visualizations. 

We join the Time Master narrated by Hollywood superstar Andy Serkis and his audience of Victorian time traveling “2.0” characters on a 13.8-billion-year adventure through time and space. The film features supercomputer simulation data of the formation of the early Universe contributed from the Institute for Computational Cosmology, Durham University. (26min)
(Grades 3 and up, General Audience)

ORIGINS OF LIFE [2006]

Origins of Life deals with some of the most profound questions of life science: the origins of life and the human search for life beyond Earth.  Starting with the Big Bang, in chronological order, the show deals with the prebiotic chemistry in the Universe, the formation of stars, formation of solar systems, and the first life on Earth.  Furthermore Origins of Life covers the great extinctions as well as our search for (primitive) life beyond planet Earth.  This show is a inspirational journey through time and a celebration of life on Earth.  It features many recent discoveries related to life science, demonstrating that if there was ever a time that science made its greatest advances, it’s right now! (29min)
(Grades 4 and up, General Audience)

SEEING! [2016]

Funded through a generous grant by Zeiss, “SEEING!” will bring the story of sight and vision to planetariums worldwide. Produced by Mirage3D and Koenig Films, “SEEING!” follows a photon’s creation and journey across the galaxy to a young stargazer’s eye. The viewer follows the photon into the girl’s eye, learning the structures of the eye and their functions, prior to taking a ride on the optic nerve. “Seeing!” was directed by Robin Sip, written by Emmy Award© winning writer Kris Koenig and narrated by Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson, American astrophysicist, cosmologist, author, science communicator and the Frederick P. Rose Director of the Hayden Planetarium at the Rose Center for Earth and Space in New York City. (28min)
(Grades 5 and up, General Audience)

CELL! CELL! CELL! [2012]

This is the story of the trillions of cells that form our bodies, from our beginnings as a single cell to the complexity of a whole body: it’s the story of who we are. Join Raj and Sooki on a totally ex-CELL-ent immersive journey. Get shrunk down by the Shrink-a-tron, go back in time with the Retroscope and see an exploded view of all the body systems courtesy of the cell-o-tron. (24min)
(Grades 6 and up, General Audience)

MATHEMATICS

ESCHER'S UNIVERSE [2012]

Escher’s Universe is based on the life and work of the multifaceted Maurits Cornelis Escher. Was he an artist, an astronomer, a mathematician, a traveler? This show will take us to the artist’s studio where his most iconic works are displayed. From this intimate and emotional place, we’ll visit Escher’s particular universe and we will be surprised by his ability to join Science and Art. He uses mathematics, astronomy, optics, crystallography and geometry in his creations to artistically explain very complex concepts addressed by Cosmology. Escher’s shapes, three-dimensional reconstructions, dual worlds, unreal buildings or impossible continuities reveal his passion for knowledge. This show was produced in Spain by Parque de las Ciencias de Granada” and developed by El EXilio. (25min)
(Grades 4 and up, General Audience)

PHYSICAL SCIENCE

FLIGHT ADVENTURES [2012]

Dreams of flying, model aircraft, and a young girl and her grandfather come together in this multi-media planetarium show about the science of aeronautics. Learn about famous inventors and aviators of the past and the pioneers who first revealed the four forces of flight. See images of aircraft past, present, and future and imagine where flight might take us. (20min)
(Grades 4 through 6, General Audience)

COSMIC COLORS - AN ADVENTURE ALONG THE SPECTRUM [2011]

Enjoy a wondrous journey through the world of color and beyond! Discover why the sky is blue, why Mars is red, and the reason why many things are the color that they are. Tour the interior of a plant leaf, voyage through a human eye, then step into the invisible universe as you investigate x-rays by taking on a monstrous black hole. Explore the world of infrared in a roaring fire, and even discover what may have been the actual color of a dinosaur. Explore the amazing rainbow of cosmic light through COSMIC COLORS, an original production of the Daniel M. Soref Planetarium in cooperation with the Great Lakes Planetarium Association. (33min)
(Grades 5 and up, General Audience)

SPACE SCIENCE & ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY

Space Explorers: The ISS Experience

The largest production ever filmed in space, Space Explorers: The ISS Experience is an immersive four-part series that follows eight astronauts as they draw on years of training to overcome disorientation from microgravity, respond to potential catastrophic emergencies and learn to operate as a close-knit team. Episode one, ADAPT, follows a new crew of astronauts as they arrive aboard the International Space Station and discover the joy of living, working and eating in space. Astronauts Anne McClain, David Saint-Jacques, Nick Hague and Christina Koch, a five-time Space Camp alumna, serve as cast, film crew and narrators in the first episode. Recommended for ages 10 and up, Running time: 30 minutes

LOSING THE DARK [2013]

Starry skies are a vanishing treasure because light pollution is washing away our view of the cosmos. It not only threatens astronomy, it disrupts wildlife, and affects human health. The yellow glows over cities and towns — seen so clearly from space — are testament to the billions spent in wasted energy from lighting up the sky. Losing the Dark is a “public service announcement” planetarium show, a collaboration of Loch Ness Productions and the International Dark-Sky Association. It introduces and illustrates some of the issues regarding light pollution, and suggests three simple actions people can take to help mitigate it. The show gives planetarium professionals a tool to help educate the public about the problems of light pollution. Planetariums are uniquely positioned to teach audiences ways we can all work together to implement responsible use of lighting. (7min)
(Grades 1 and up, General Audience)

Voyager: The Never-Ending Journey

This all-dome presentation tells the thrilling story of the most remarkable space mission in human history. In 1977 two space probes were launched to explore the farthest planets of the Solar system: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune along with their moons. These spacecrafts greatly enriched our knowledge of the distant worlds. Now after nearly five decades they are exploring interstellar space. Like two bottles launched into the cosmic ocean, both probes carry an interstellar message – the Golden Record, intended for any alien civilization. Recommended for ages 6 and up, Running time: 27 minutes