In the footsteps of Cousteau, or the New Odyssey for Russian crowdfunding
Dear friends! We continue to talk about the most interesting Russian crowdfunding projects. This time we met (and want to acquaint you) with the expedition “Aquatiles”, which also received the name “New Odyssey”. As you can see, the project needs to collect 1.5 million rubles until October 31 . In general, meet the author, whom we call “Cousteau” on the channel “Simple Science”
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About expedition
Hi, Habr! My name is Alexander Semenov, I am an underwater photographer and a marine biologist. Together with my team, I am working on a popular science project of incredible beauty, which, we think, will be interesting and more than useful in various circles. Scientific research and discoveries could never be presented so easily and beautifully as it can be done today, using the full power of media platforms and social networks. Now you can bring any content directly to the interested audience with just one click. And we can show people the ocean. Show the way no one has ever seen him. Since the days of Captain Cousteau, no one has tried to start a new odyssey, armed with modern technology and keeping up with progress. And the ocean, meanwhile, as it was, and remains virtually unexplored.
Therefore, we decided to organize our expedition, an underwater odyssey of the 21st century, equipped with the most advanced photo and video equipment, controlled by deep-sea robots and with the Internet on board. In the most pleasant way you can read about it directly on the boomstarter. There is quite a lot of text, but I will be glad if you read it. Nobody has done this in Russia (and in the world), and hardly anyone will meet, because besides simple desire, a combination of very many factors is necessary. I will tell some details beyond what was written on the bumstarter, explain in detail the reasons and my vision of the goals of the expedition.
The scientific leitmotif of the expedition is the study of yellow plankton: jellyfish, ctenophores, salpas, siphonophores, and other extremely delicate oceanic living creatures that can collapse (and most often it does) even from a single touch. Watching such creatures is possible only under water, in their natural habitat. And this is either diving in open water, when divers dive into the bottomless blue space on a special rope system, or controlled habitable and uninhabited vehicles. Due to the mass of technical difficulties of expeditions, the soft science of plankton in the history of science was catastrophically low, and a decent piece of our knowledge of the ocean soars unhurriedly somewhere in its depths.
We have a team of young scientists, divers and real sailors, a reliable yacht and vast experience of underwater surveys and marine research. And we want to share all that we know now, and so surprising that we will see there, in the depths. We can literally show that studying the ocean and the strange creatures that inhabit it is truly interesting and exciting. This expedition is organized by people with skills that practically no one else in the world has - this is scientific macro photography and video filming, and underwater, which greatly complicates the task. We are able to shoot a half-centimeter almost invisible living creature that hangs in the water column, with such quality and detail that no figure can be compared. That is, we produce scientific illustrative material of the highest quality. Since the time of Haeckel’s drawings, few have been able to do something better, but there is a need. From the textbook to the textbook, from the poster to the poster ancient schemes and drawings, blurry photos of shaggy years, and publications and books often illustrate with pictures taken on a soap box through the eyepiece of the microscope. And no one is trying to do better.
Project Goals
We want (and can) raise the bar for the quality of scientific illustration, show what “beautiful” science is and generally let people understand that scientists are smart, vigorous and tough guys who can explain with normal language what they do and why. And, in our case, great luck - to show it. Because the photo and video is something that you can practically “touch”, see the result of the work. And the quality of these results right now is such that the whole world is surprised.
Illustrations by illustrations, but science itself? Quite often they ask what kind of results we expect to get from this expedition, and how this will be useful for the field of science in which we are doing. The answer is: with the science that goes through the camera viewfinder, everything is fine. At the White Sea Biological Station of Moscow State University, we have more than one year been using scientific methods of photo and video surveillance under water more than productively. And in the latest publications by Stephen Haddock (the world's coolest planktonologist), the idea is being advanced that observations in natural habitat using high-resolution cameras are the future of studying yellow plankton. And there is.
In photographs of 20-30 megapixels, you can see such details that you can not always see under the binocular, examine the structure of the captured objects, fix certain moments of behavior. In the video, it all comes out also in the dynamics, albeit with less detail. At the exit, the scientific world receives several thousand photographs and rollers of the highest quality with reference to coordinates and other parameters, can understand the structure, can illustrate textbooks and articles, can study behavior and food links. Yes, and simply receives images of animals, which have seen only a few people in the world, and many have not yet seen at all. If you go to Google and search for photos of plankton there, you will be surprised how bad everything is. This is a gap that needs to be filled. And we can do it better than most scientific groups in the world.
The second point is the new species. There is a very different chance that we will discover new species. A little more than 7060 species of plankton organisms have now been described, of which 1,180 species are plankton yellowed. What is the use of the fact that after the expedition there will be, for example, 7082 and 1189? How will the discovery of these species affect humanity as a whole?
The fact that we are likely to find and describe new species is just great! Twenty-five people in the world who do this will be just happy. The rest will say: "Cool, yes," they will admire the photos from the video and forget. For science, this is very important, because the discovery of new species and a detailed study of the life of each Medoze is the deepening of our knowledge of the world. Without separate fragments, the puzzle of the world scientific picture does not add up.
The scientific results that we can get will be a weighty and pleasant addition to the main program, because our expedition is not a science for the sake of science. Our goal is to open the underwater world for everyone and make knowledge more accessible. Enlightenment, expanding horizons, popularization of science - this is our main goal. We are in love with the sea and we want the next generation, as we once did, to grow with the dream of the sea and about traveling to the unknown, so that people learn new things, take an interest in the world and grow smart. We want to show that several people can do the impossible and change the concept of modern science.
I recently made a small presentation in my own biofake of Moscow State University, I was a little worried because I first talked about something very important for myself, but I managed to convey the essence. An hour and a half of answers to the questions we did not embed :)
This dream, as it turned out, is shared by many. More than 800 people have already joined the crowd, bringing together more than a million. Now we have the last frontier when it is necessary to collect the remaining 400 thousand. And here we turn to the collective conscious.
Financing needs
Crowdfunding on a boomstarter is just the beginning, the first step to speed up expedition preparation. We still have a lot to do before we go on a trip. 1.5 million is 1% of the total cost of the expedition. We need this percentage to do some urgent and important things, without which we are sad now: register and open our company (NPO), through which we can work with sponsors and carry out all purchases, approximate the start of repair of the yacht, filling out all the necessary documents and permits, and to prepare an English-language project at a very serious level in collaboration with professionals, in order to establish relationships with major sponsors. Plus, a whole heap of small cases, which all cost a little bit, but in the end add up to a decent amount.
Since the amount is not very small, we will launch another crowd on the kickstarter / indigo, but for the western market you need to prepare very well. Now, at the “preparation for preparation” stage, our project looks a bit blurred, it's silly to argue, just an expedition of this magnitude is very difficult to stick into a rigid framework and designate monosyllabic goals. We work with the best specialists in scientific and technical areas related to the expedition, we define and specify the range of tasks and the possibilities of their solution, therefore in the next six months the project will become much more formalized. I can summarize what is now:
Scientific tasks:
Social tasks:
Common tasks:
In fact, I can still talk for a long time about all the technical details, methods, route, yacht and other details of the expedition, but then the post will stretch to an unperceivable size. Therefore, I will be happy to answer all questions regarding the expedition in the comments and I will be glad if you join the sponsors of our project!
Expedition Aquatilis on the Internet:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/a_semenov/
http://clione.ru/
http://shilovpope.livejournal.com/
http://vk.com/aquatilis
**
Taking this opportunity, we remind you that our book for children with simple experiments is already nearing printing. Pre-order the book is still open.
')
About expedition
Hi, Habr! My name is Alexander Semenov, I am an underwater photographer and a marine biologist. Together with my team, I am working on a popular science project of incredible beauty, which, we think, will be interesting and more than useful in various circles. Scientific research and discoveries could never be presented so easily and beautifully as it can be done today, using the full power of media platforms and social networks. Now you can bring any content directly to the interested audience with just one click. And we can show people the ocean. Show the way no one has ever seen him. Since the days of Captain Cousteau, no one has tried to start a new odyssey, armed with modern technology and keeping up with progress. And the ocean, meanwhile, as it was, and remains virtually unexplored.
Therefore, we decided to organize our expedition, an underwater odyssey of the 21st century, equipped with the most advanced photo and video equipment, controlled by deep-sea robots and with the Internet on board. In the most pleasant way you can read about it directly on the boomstarter. There is quite a lot of text, but I will be glad if you read it. Nobody has done this in Russia (and in the world), and hardly anyone will meet, because besides simple desire, a combination of very many factors is necessary. I will tell some details beyond what was written on the bumstarter, explain in detail the reasons and my vision of the goals of the expedition.
The scientific leitmotif of the expedition is the study of yellow plankton: jellyfish, ctenophores, salpas, siphonophores, and other extremely delicate oceanic living creatures that can collapse (and most often it does) even from a single touch. Watching such creatures is possible only under water, in their natural habitat. And this is either diving in open water, when divers dive into the bottomless blue space on a special rope system, or controlled habitable and uninhabited vehicles. Due to the mass of technical difficulties of expeditions, the soft science of plankton in the history of science was catastrophically low, and a decent piece of our knowledge of the ocean soars unhurriedly somewhere in its depths.
We have a team of young scientists, divers and real sailors, a reliable yacht and vast experience of underwater surveys and marine research. And we want to share all that we know now, and so surprising that we will see there, in the depths. We can literally show that studying the ocean and the strange creatures that inhabit it is truly interesting and exciting. This expedition is organized by people with skills that practically no one else in the world has - this is scientific macro photography and video filming, and underwater, which greatly complicates the task. We are able to shoot a half-centimeter almost invisible living creature that hangs in the water column, with such quality and detail that no figure can be compared. That is, we produce scientific illustrative material of the highest quality. Since the time of Haeckel’s drawings, few have been able to do something better, but there is a need. From the textbook to the textbook, from the poster to the poster ancient schemes and drawings, blurry photos of shaggy years, and publications and books often illustrate with pictures taken on a soap box through the eyepiece of the microscope. And no one is trying to do better.
Project Goals
We want (and can) raise the bar for the quality of scientific illustration, show what “beautiful” science is and generally let people understand that scientists are smart, vigorous and tough guys who can explain with normal language what they do and why. And, in our case, great luck - to show it. Because the photo and video is something that you can practically “touch”, see the result of the work. And the quality of these results right now is such that the whole world is surprised.
Illustrations by illustrations, but science itself? Quite often they ask what kind of results we expect to get from this expedition, and how this will be useful for the field of science in which we are doing. The answer is: with the science that goes through the camera viewfinder, everything is fine. At the White Sea Biological Station of Moscow State University, we have more than one year been using scientific methods of photo and video surveillance under water more than productively. And in the latest publications by Stephen Haddock (the world's coolest planktonologist), the idea is being advanced that observations in natural habitat using high-resolution cameras are the future of studying yellow plankton. And there is.
In photographs of 20-30 megapixels, you can see such details that you can not always see under the binocular, examine the structure of the captured objects, fix certain moments of behavior. In the video, it all comes out also in the dynamics, albeit with less detail. At the exit, the scientific world receives several thousand photographs and rollers of the highest quality with reference to coordinates and other parameters, can understand the structure, can illustrate textbooks and articles, can study behavior and food links. Yes, and simply receives images of animals, which have seen only a few people in the world, and many have not yet seen at all. If you go to Google and search for photos of plankton there, you will be surprised how bad everything is. This is a gap that needs to be filled. And we can do it better than most scientific groups in the world.
The second point is the new species. There is a very different chance that we will discover new species. A little more than 7060 species of plankton organisms have now been described, of which 1,180 species are plankton yellowed. What is the use of the fact that after the expedition there will be, for example, 7082 and 1189? How will the discovery of these species affect humanity as a whole?
The fact that we are likely to find and describe new species is just great! Twenty-five people in the world who do this will be just happy. The rest will say: "Cool, yes," they will admire the photos from the video and forget. For science, this is very important, because the discovery of new species and a detailed study of the life of each Medoze is the deepening of our knowledge of the world. Without separate fragments, the puzzle of the world scientific picture does not add up.
The scientific results that we can get will be a weighty and pleasant addition to the main program, because our expedition is not a science for the sake of science. Our goal is to open the underwater world for everyone and make knowledge more accessible. Enlightenment, expanding horizons, popularization of science - this is our main goal. We are in love with the sea and we want the next generation, as we once did, to grow with the dream of the sea and about traveling to the unknown, so that people learn new things, take an interest in the world and grow smart. We want to show that several people can do the impossible and change the concept of modern science.
I recently made a small presentation in my own biofake of Moscow State University, I was a little worried because I first talked about something very important for myself, but I managed to convey the essence. An hour and a half of answers to the questions we did not embed :)
This dream, as it turned out, is shared by many. More than 800 people have already joined the crowd, bringing together more than a million. Now we have the last frontier when it is necessary to collect the remaining 400 thousand. And here we turn to the collective conscious.
Financing needs
Crowdfunding on a boomstarter is just the beginning, the first step to speed up expedition preparation. We still have a lot to do before we go on a trip. 1.5 million is 1% of the total cost of the expedition. We need this percentage to do some urgent and important things, without which we are sad now: register and open our company (NPO), through which we can work with sponsors and carry out all purchases, approximate the start of repair of the yacht, filling out all the necessary documents and permits, and to prepare an English-language project at a very serious level in collaboration with professionals, in order to establish relationships with major sponsors. Plus, a whole heap of small cases, which all cost a little bit, but in the end add up to a decent amount.
Since the amount is not very small, we will launch another crowd on the kickstarter / indigo, but for the western market you need to prepare very well. Now, at the “preparation for preparation” stage, our project looks a bit blurred, it's silly to argue, just an expedition of this magnitude is very difficult to stick into a rigid framework and designate monosyllabic goals. We work with the best specialists in scientific and technical areas related to the expedition, we define and specify the range of tasks and the possibilities of their solution, therefore in the next six months the project will become much more formalized. I can summarize what is now:
Scientific tasks:
- filling significant gaps in knowledge of yellow zooplankton, one of the main links in the ocean's food chain, by studying animals in their natural habitat;
- search and description of new species;
- collection and fixation of plankton organisms for DNA and RNA analysis;
- creating a database on zoogeography: photographs and videos of certain species of animals with reference to coordinates, depth, temperature, salinity and time;
- the creation of a voluminous bank of photographic and video materials about the world ocean, which can be used for scientific and educational purposes;
- working out methods of underwater scientific observations, developing and testing methods for studying bioluminescence and fluorescence;
- development of methods for satellite mapping of “garbage islands” and giant clusters of plankton;
- search and development of new / promising dive sites in the world ocean;
- implementation of local research projects in conjunction with laboratories and researchers from around the world;
Social tasks:
- familiarity of millions of people around the world with the unknown, little-studied life of the world ocean;
- popularization of science through adventure shows: living science in business, real research, understandable and accessible to everyone;
- creating an image of a modern researcher using the latest technology and modern technology, ready for discoveries, to communicate with the world and to work in extreme conditions;
- drawing people's attention to the environmental problems of the ocean;
Common tasks:
- the launch of the new “Underwater Odyssey”, which continues the work of the great researchers of the past on a fundamentally different level;
- raising the quality of scientific illustration;
- bringing adventure romance into our prosaic world;
In fact, I can still talk for a long time about all the technical details, methods, route, yacht and other details of the expedition, but then the post will stretch to an unperceivable size. Therefore, I will be happy to answer all questions regarding the expedition in the comments and I will be glad if you join the sponsors of our project!
Expedition Aquatilis on the Internet:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/a_semenov/
http://clione.ru/
http://shilovpope.livejournal.com/
http://vk.com/aquatilis
**
Taking this opportunity, we remind you that our book for children with simple experiments is already nearing printing. Pre-order the book is still open.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/198512/
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