A movie detailing Yuri Gargarin’s flight, 50 years ago today.

Rather than being an oversight, this probably had more to do with the fact that filming technology had been left behind by our sudden leap into the Space Age, and there simply wasn’t enought room inside the cramped Vostok 1 capsule for Yuri Gagarin to wield a primitive, bulky TV or film camera.

So in early 2010, with the new giant cupola window installed on the International Space Station, and with digital filming technology now firmly in the Space Age, I began to wonder if it might be possible to trace Gagarin’s pioneering orbit around the Earth once more – and this time to film it. *

Watch it full screen!

*

More info at firstorbit.org and on the firstorbit YouTube account.