THE ARGES COUNTY MUSEUM The first digital planetarium from Romania

1. THE ARGES COUNTY MUSEUM The first digital planetarium from Romania

2. The story of the Arges County Museum`s Planetarium started 31 years ago, in Pitesti, as soon as the first Romanian multimedia exhibition dedicated to ecology and environment protection was opened to public. Immersive and intuitive, the ceiling of the first room of this ecology exhibition offers data regarding the Solar system, Life and Earth evolution, as it is a digital Planetarium projection show sequence.

3. The Planetarium room, between 1997-2008, before installing all the equipments (power source, connections, HVAC, furniture, projection system. Diameter = 8,66 m, h = 6,40 m. primul

4. TechnicalSession.Several times, planetarium producers, HVAC representatives and museum technical and managerial team were finding managerial and technical solutions to built the first digital planetarium in a Romanian Museum.

5. Christophe Bertier, astro-physicist, RSA Cosmos trade consultant and Patrick Romeuf, inventor of important improvements on opto-electronic planetariums (1987), owner of RSA Cosmos, Sorbier, France.

6. April, 2008. The Planetarium Supply Contract Signature Ceremony.

7. Planetarium room is presented to the RSA Cosmos team, tender winner. Pitesti site was visited, in corpore or virtually, by representatives from Zeiss, Sky-Skan and Spitz, in order to evaluate the local abilities to deal such a project and to ensure the appropriate Task Book elaboration. Every Planetarium is unique, a complex multimedia equipment.

8. HVAC montage. Environment, audience and projection beam friendly: these are the characteristics of Pitesti Planetarium that ensure an optimum projection flux.

9. The Planetarium room is thermic and phonic protected. HVAC network is installed. The winch positions are marked. The screen will be hoisted soon.

10. Christmas Eve 2007. The Planetarium screen is finally in Pitesti. 22 peaces of composite and fiber glass materials, 7 meters in diameter, over 1 tone weight. Montage precision under 5 mm.

11. In trenches of…video and photo documenting the Planetarium equipment installation. 3 video cameras, 3 cameramen and photographers, over 15 hours of video recordings and several hundreds photos.

12. The screen, ready for last, special finishes. First, all screen surface is degreased with acetone. The ventilators works on full throttle. Inside, 28° Celsius , outside 38° Celsius.

13. The screen is ready for set to its final position. All 4 winches are ready to lift the screen and set on its 8 designated support poles.

14. Loyc Desfarges verifies screen slices rims.

15. The work division: one fill up the gap between the screen slices, other is filming the procedure.

16. Planetarium technical room or Planetarium hidden side! Power, HVAC, secondary heating, sound system will ensure optimum climate for 40 planetarium spectators.

17. Romanian-French Roundup… on Bricolage. The Planetarium montage requires pluri disciplinary knowledge. The team of three will install the graphical stations server. The designed connections after… they would have painted the Planetarium Screen.

18. July, 2008. In Pitesti (Romania), the packages with the projection system has arrived.In Sorbier (France), the know-how transfer is undergoing for having the first Romanian digital planetarium technician and animator.

19. Here are the projectors! Just arrived by air from Chicago, from 2008 International Planetarium Society Meeting, where the ISS 2C HD digital planetarium solution was officially worldwide presented.

20. The walls finally shape the Planetarium. We start installing the 5.1 professional sound system, dedicated to equip this type of cinematograph.

21. The Planetarium digital projectors are special video projectors, made in a small number series, with increased fiability features. The Planetarium digital projectors installation looks like a fine mechanics operation, as a watch mending procedure.

22. Benjamin Cabut, Technical Project manager, install one of the two wide angle projection lens. They are unique for the moment, and cost several thousands Euro per piece.

23. The installation timetable and the montage procedure are all time checked and revised. Each operation and procedure of this project is recorded and documented to be use later in the process of tele maintenance. The current setup are done via VPN internet connection between the Planetarium factory and the Arges County Museum.

24. Closer to the stars! Yes! On the Planetarium screen the sky is closer and always clear. We could present by simulation over 150.000 celestial bodies, from the familiar Moon to the far away unknown galaxies.

25. Our address: Pitesti, Arges, Romania, Europe, Terra, Solar System ... next year, from Planetarium we would go on the public astronomical observation platform and on the Astrorama exhibition.

26. Here it is a simulated image of the so called Oparin`s soup after Big-Bang expanse of the Universe! These is one of the starting sequences of the Journey to the Solar System, show that we present today in the Arges County Museum`s Planetarium.

27. The Planetarium is like a cinematograph able to produce also its films. It is a navigation simulator in the Universe using celestial bodies as guides and through the terrestrial world, using panoramic photography and video.

28. The Planetarium furniture is designed and specially made to ensure hemispheric screen proper visualization.

29. The Arges County Museum`s Planetarium ready for visitors! The first HD digital Planetarium installed in an European regional museum had over 4000 visitors in 2 month time, since the official opening!