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MOON: A Lunar Mood Light Based Upon NASA Data

The moon has long inspired designers around the globe as muse, the latest being, MOON, a collaborative creation between designer Oscar Lhermitte and London-based design studio, Kudu.

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Using data sourced from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, the light matches in exact 3D 1/20 million scale detail the real heavenly body in miniature facsimile, including the topographic craters, elevation, and ridges of the moon. But the lunar model itself is only half of the equation. A ring of LED lights revolves around the moon model, casting light upon the correct face of the moon, in essence recreating the lunar phases as seen from Earth.

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MOON operates in 3 different modes (watch MOON in motion here):

Manual mode: Rotate the sun light yourself and set the lunar phase that you would like to see.
Demo mode: Observe a complete synodic month in just 30 seconds.
Live mode: Experience the actual lunar phase happening at a given moment. Stay in this mode and observe the globe changing phases in rhythm with the actual Moon in the sky. One full rotation (Lunar synodic month) will take approximately 29 days, 12 hours, 44 minutes and 2.80 seconds.

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MOON is currently a Kickstarter, already far exceeding the designer’s pledge goals, but still accepting project support until May 13th. Additional information here.

Gregory Han is a Senior Editor at Design Milk. A Los Angeles native with a profound love and curiosity for design, hiking, tide pools, and road trips, a selection of his adventures and musings can be found at gregoryhan.com.