New High-Def Home Video From The Edge Of Space

This amazing video was shot by a Canon Vixio-HF camcorder attached to a hydrogen balloon launched by a small group of Edmonton radio enthusiasts on August 24. It’s believed to be the first amateur video from about 32,658 metres.

The mission was dubbed BEAR-4 (Balloon Experiments with Amateur Radio), and used an 1800g balloon for a total weight of about 1.74kg.

The camera was kept in place by foam blocks, and hooked up to five AAA Lithium L91 battery cells. With the extra legs, it captured almost 4.5 hours of footage. Mercifully, they’ve edited that down for the results you see below. [via BEAR]

Bonus: Remember those kids who photographed space for $US150? They’ve now put together a time lapse video of all the photos their rig took during its flight. Not quite as cool (or expensive) as the video above, though. [via L337arts]