What is the key takeaway from this video?
This video is all about cosmology and answering the ultimate question, what is outside of the Universe? There are lots of rabbit holes to dive down in this video and it can get pretty complex but it should ultimately introduce the viewer to our current understanding of how the universe begun, what it’s like now and where it is going in the future at the largest scales.
For this animation we want to explain the concepts of the Hubble Sphere and the Observable Universe. The script is pretty self explanatory.
| Script segment | Description of on-screen visual |
|---|---|
| When astronomers look out to distant galaxies, they notice something strange. The further away a galaxy is, the faster it appears to be moving away from Earth! | Open on a shot of deep space, with many galaxies visible. Some closer and some farther away. Have the camera movement focus in on a close one, it appears to be moving away from us slowly. Then have the camera zoom in on one further away, it appears to be moving much quicker! |
| So what if we take it to the extreme? What if we look so far out into the Universe that one of these galaxies would be moving away from us faster than speed of light? | Talking head |
| At this distance, the light emitted by the galaxy is moving too slowly to reach Earth. Light emitted today by anything beyond this mysterious barrier will never reach us. | Show Earth on the left with the galaxy on the right shown to be moving farther and farther away, it emits a beam of light that travels towards the Earth but also moves in unison with the galaxy. It should essentially show that the light is trying to move towards Earth but ultimately it is receding away from Earth in time with the galaxy that emitted it. |
| Because the expansion of the Universe is uniform, this happens at the same distance everywhere around us. This is known as the Hubble Sphere and it’s currently found 14.4 billion light years away from us in every direction! | Now cut to a shot with the Earth at the centre and draw a line out from the Earth into space as we zoom out from Earth. Have this line essentially draw a circle around the Earth before disappearing, leaving just the Earth in the centre of the large circle. Animate text that labels the circle as the Hubble Sphere and then draw a line from the Earth to the circle, animating text with the line that reads 14.4 billion light years. |
| And here’s the amazing part, because of complex reasons relating to dark energy and the rate of expansion in the Universe, | Talking head |
| our Hubble Sphere is still growing every day and has been for billions of years! | Cut back to the scene of the Hubble Sphere and Earth, showing the Hubble sphere growing in size. |
| This means that if galaxies outside the Hubble Sphere have emitted light travelling towards us in the past, eventually the size of the Hubble Sphere will grow big enough to include this light! At which point, it begins it’s journey towards the Earth and after billions of years, we finally get to see it! | Now animate in galaxies all around the edge of the Hubble Sphere, some closer, some further away. Have them all emit light (that moves with the galaxy as we had earlier), have the expanding Hubble sphere catch up to the light wave emitted by some of the closer galaxies. As it crosses the boundary of the Hubble sphere, have the light actually start progressing towards the Earth, while the galaxies and other light beams that haven’t crossed the boundary continue to move away from the Hubble Sphere line. |
| This creates a sphere of space even bigger than the Hubble Sphere that we can still observe, this is known as the Observable Universe, the true cosmic limit for EVERYTHING we can possibly ever learn about. It is 93 billion light years wide! | Now stop the Hubble Sphere expanding and animate the galaxies and light beams outside disappearing. As I talk about the Observable Universe, zoom way out and draw a new circle around the Earth and the Hubble Sphere line. Label this as the Observable Universe and do a similar line animation showing the 93 billion light years wide (from side to side) distance. It should be about 3.5x wider than the Hubble Sphere circle. Importantly, have it be black outside the Observable Universe, no stars or galaxies. |
| But that doesn’t mean this is where space ends. Quite the opposite, there is certainly much more Universe outside this boundary. | As I say this, animate the darkness outside the Universe away, revealing more stars and galaxies, just like what we can see on the inside of the circle. |
Similar aesthetics to what we have been chasing so far, the below video is a good reference for how to illustrate certain concepts in this video. I would recommend checking it out for some references, obviously we will make them in a different style but it is good to watch.