Solar System: Neptune

And I'm done! I'll include a photo of the assembled mobile after Christmas when I hang it up. Neptune was frustrating at first to paint, but then I did some crazy stuff. I did a wash of blue on it, which I started to not like while it was still wet, so I dunked it in my rinse water. After adding some whooshing clouds (technical term) it ended up pretty good I think. Not bad for averaging under an hour of painting time per planet.

• Neptune, like Uranus, has only been visited by one spacecraft: Voyager 2 in 1989.
• Neptune was discovered in 1846.
• Even though you couldn't stand on the surface of Neptune (since it's a gas giant), if you could you would experience nearly identical gravity as on Earth.
• Neptune's planet Triton was probably a captured satellite, inferred by it's retrograde orbit.
• The winds on Neptune can reach a ridiculous 2,100 km/hr.

References:
The Nine Planets
Universe Today

Solar System: Uranus

I'm getting close to done, and just in time for Christmas!

• Uranus wasn't discovered to be a planet until March 13, 1781.
• Uranus has only been visited by a single spacecraft: Voyager 2 in 1986.
• Uranus spins on an axis nearly perpendicular with its axis of rotation around the sun. When visited by Voyager 2, its south pole was pointed towards the Sun.
• There are rings around Uranus, but they, like its axis of rotation, are nearly perpendicular to its orbit around the Sun.
• Even though it isn't the farthest planet out, it is the coldest planet in our solar system (below -200 C).

References:
The Nine Planets
Universe Today

Solar System: Saturn

And now the famous Saturn. Interestingly Saturn is similar in composition to Jupiter. If it wasn't for Saturn's famous rings, it would probably be quite forgotten as a result of being so similar to Jupiter. However I found that I enjoyed painting Saturn far more than Jupiter.

• Saturn was first visited by Pioneer 11 in 1979.
• Saturn's specific gravity is 0.7, which means it would float in water (assuming you could find a big enough pond to put it in.
• Despite spanning a diameter of over a quarter million kilometers, the rings of Saturn are less than 1000 meters thick. Those rings are made primarily of water in ice form.
• Always overshadowed by Jupiter, Saturn has the second most satellites, currently counting at 62.
• Saturn's day is a mere 10.5 hours, and that rapid spin actually translates to forces that cause the planet to shape into a flattened ball (wider than it is tall).
• One of Saturn's moons (Enceladus) has ice geysers, which has the implication of potentially being the home of some form of life.

References:
The Nine Planets
Universe Today

Solar System: Jupiter

Jupiter was not my favorite planet to paint. It's big, and the patterns were really hard to replicate. I also had trouble finding consistent photos. In the end I just decided to paint it interestingly and move on.

• Jupiter was first visited by Pioneer 10 in 1973.
• Although the 4 larger moons are fairly well known (Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto), there are at least 59 other smaller moons.
• Jupiter's Great Red Spot is a swirling storm 26,000 km across. To put that in perspective, that's more than twice the diameter of the Earth.
• Jupiter is approximately 90% hydrogen and 10% helium.
• Despite only having "trace" amounts of rock by mass and volume, Jupiter's core is probably rock consisting of 10 to 15 "Earths" worth of mass. Trace apparently means ~2% or less (by mass).
• Outside of the core is the main bulk of the planet, consisting of (get this) liquid metallic hydrogen.
• The different bands that surround the surface of Jupiter are clouds. Each band is actually blowing in opposite directions from its adjacent bands.
• As gas giants go, Jupiter is about as big as it gets. Adding more material wouldn't significantly increase its size due to the gravitational compression.
• Jupiter has dark rings, a huge magnetic field, emits more energy outward than it receives from the Sun, and generally just has a lot going on.

References:
The Nine Planets

Solar System: Mars

I'm playing catch up now. I actually did Mars after painting Jupiter, but I am determined to post them in order. For painting Mars I decided to try and simulate the canals that run over the surface, so I used a stippling technique with some slightly thinned paint to create an irregular streaked pattern. It sort of worked. Good enough for galactic work at least.

• The first spacecraft to visit Mars was Mariner 4 in 1965. Mars has been the destination for many spacecraft and landers for over 45 years now.
• Despite being half the diameter of Earth, Mars has twice as many moons (Phobos and Deimos) and a volcano (Olympus Mons) which is 4 times has tall as Everest, which also happens to be the largest mountain in the entire solar system.
• Mars has a very thin atmosphere with about 1% the atmospheric pressure of Earth. It is composed of mostly carbon dioxide.
• Despite the thin atmosphere, strong winds can cause dust storms that engulf the entire surface of the planet for up to a month at a time.
• Mars has polar ice caps at both poles, composed of both water and carbon dioxide (dry ice)

References:
The Nine Planets

Solar System: Earth

Earth was probably the most fun to paint so far. There's tons of reference photos for it. Oh, and in answer to a question that was posted in one of the comments, these planet "models" are not smooth. The "sculpts" have raised sections on them to represent the patterned surfaces of the planets. The intention of the kit is to do a paint-by-numbers type of thing. I of course have abandoned the simple and added more personal fun to the project. The raised sections for Earth come in handy for obvious reasons. Anyway, without further ado, here's some little known facts about our home planet...

• Due to erosion and tectonic activity, the Earth literally replaces its crust every half billion years, erasing any past geological history such as crater impacts.
• The Earth's composition (by mass) is approximately 1/3 iron and 1/3 oxygen.
• Earth is the only planet in the solar system where water can exist in liquid form on the surface.
• The Moon's gravitation is actually causing the Earth's rotation to slow very gradually (2 milliseconds per century). That means in another 180 million years, we'll get an extra hour in each day for painting and playing!

References:
The Nine Planets

Solar System: Venus

For all of those on the IABN feed wondering why you're getting these posts: I'm sorry. I'm not sure why these are showing up. It's only supposed to pick up posts from my blog with IABN tags.

Venus! Talk about an unpleasant place to visit. It's probably the most inhospitable planet in our solar system. I actually really enjoyed painting this one. I used a combination of washes and streaking and stippling to create the look of the whirling clouds that cover the entire surface of the planet. Speaking of which, let's take a look at some fun Venus facts...

• Venus is the brightest object in Earth's sky after the Sun and Moon.
• The surface of Venus is not visible through the complete cloud cover. These clouds are droplets of sulfuric acid, and they are pushed around constantly by permanent hurricane force winds.
• Venus' atmosphere is crushing at 90 atmospheres of pressure. That's the equivalent of being half a mile underwater on earth.
• It takes Venus 243 Earth days for it to complete one of its own days. In addition, it rotates backwards from Earth and has no magnetic field.
• Venus is a mere 5% smaller than Earth, and has a similar composition as Earth.
• Venus was first visited in 1962 by the Mariner 2 spacecraft.

References:
The Nine Planets

Solar System: Mercury

Mercury! The first planet in our solar system. Researching pictures for Mercury had me suspicious for a while since they all appeared to be black and white. Then I discovered that's because it's just a big rock! Let's learn more...

• Mercury's day lasts for a Mercury year and a half. Alaska's got nothing on these long days.
• Mercury has no atmosphere because it all got boiled away from being so close to the Sun.
• One side of Mercury is 430 C, and the other is -180 C. The slow rotation keeps the hot side hot, and the cold side cold. This makes for the most extreme temperature variations of any planet in our solar system.
• If it wasn't for the gravitational compression that the Earth exerts on itself, Mercury would be the densest planet in our solar system.
• Mercury was first visited by the Mariner 10 spacecraft in 1974.

References:
The Nine Planets
Universe Today
National Geographic

Solar System: The Sun

Here's the first solar body for the mobile project for my son. I figured for my own education I'd spend a little time learning about each one as I went along, so rather than the normal painting type of post, these will be mini-educational posts! I'm sure most of you have already closed the window now, but for those of you still interested, here are fun facts I learned about the Sun!

• The sun accounts for 99.8% of the mass in our solar system.
• It's approximately 4.5 billion years old, which is about middle aged for its expected lifespan.
• It's composed of about 70% hydrogren, 28% helium, and the rest is assorted metals. If you do the math, there's more than 10 times more metal in the Sun than in the entire rest of our solar system.
• The Sun's light comes from the fusion reactions taking place, where hydrogen is turned into helium.
• The Sun's output isn't constant. During a period of time in the 17th century, the Sun was less "active" and it caused a mini ice age on Earth.

References:
The Nine Planets

From the Desk: Project Solar System

I'm starting a different sort of painting project now. My wife got a solar system kit for my son. He is of course too young to put it together himself, so I've been tasked with assembling and painting it. So rather than taking a quick and dirty approach to it using the very low quality craft paints and terrible brush, I figured I would use it as an opportunity to learn more about the planets and to paint something a little different. I'll be posting progress as I work my way through the planets.