Powers of Ten™ (1977)

Eames Office
8 HN recommenders · recommended in 11 months, 2012–2025
YouTube
9.5M views · 16 years ago · explainer · historical

Powers of Ten is the 1977 short film by Charles and Ray Eames, made with physicist Philip Morrison. It starts on a picnic blanket, zooms out by a factor of ten every few seconds to the edge of the known universe, then zooms back in to the scale of a proton. It runs about nine minutes.

HN points to it as a classic of visual explanation, the one to see if you care about data visualization or a sense of scale.

“If you're a fan of data visualization you MUST see The Powers of Ten if you've never seen it before”
Explorable explanations & visual explanationData visualization
#eames#scale#visualexplanation#powersoften#shortfilm#informationdesign

25 comments from Hacker News

m
@michaelpinto2015 · in “The Vision of Charles and Ray Eames”
If you want to see their amazing film work (and they made quite a few cool films on computing thanks to IBM) take a look at this: link If you want to be inspired by an amazing product roll out take a look at their video for the SX 70 (this is one of the amazing products that Steve Jobs admired Edwin H. Land for): link If you're a fan of data visualization you MUST see The Powers of Ten if you've never seen it before: ▶ this video
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v
@vee-kay2025 · in “Voyager 1 is about to reach one light-day from Earth”
I think the video I have linked above is Google's tribute to this Power Of Ten video (linked below, thanks to user dtgriscom for sharing the link in another comment), a classic video that demonstrates the scale of the Universe from the micro to the macro perspectives in a scaling increase by a factor of ten for each scene. Power of 10: ▶ this video Another relevant video (thanks to user christev for sharing the link): A Brief History of Geologic Time: link Absolutely humbling to realise how infinitesimally small and irrelevant our existence is, in the grand scheme of theme. Nature and science are amazing.
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p
@photochemsyn2023 · in “A Bad Trip to Infinity”
The 1977 film Powers of Ten is short and simple but gives one a better feeling for what infinity represents (40 orders of magnitude isn't much in contrast to infinity, but is very large): ▶ this video There's also an hour-long talk by Prof. Raymond Flood on Cantor's Infinities on YT that covers all the mathematical history.
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@_Microft2023 · in “Metric Paper [video]”
The video that this one is alluding to (or paying tribute to?) is called "Powers of Ten" from 1977. If that does not sound familiar, I recommend you watch it as well. It's a gem. ▶ this video
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c
@coastflow2022 · in “Show HN: I Made a Stupid Game”
To build intuition on scaling, the 1997 "Powers of Ten" video is an excellent resource that is still shown in introductory university physics lectures: ▶ this video
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@_Microft2022 · in “Powers of 10”
> Several years later, in 1968, architect Charles Eames, along with his wife Ray, directed a "rough sketch" film of the same concept and finally completed the work (entitled the "Powers of Ten") with the assistance of Philip Morrison in 1977. The video they talk about here is available on Youtube and is still quite interesting, despite looking a bit dated now. ▶ this video
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o
@okhobb2022 · in “The Demise of Scientific American”
I really liked the Powers of Ten article / film / book originated within SA which certainly doesn't justify any current editorial choices, but is I hope a fun video for anyone who hasn't seen it: ▶ this video
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@_Microft2021 · in “If the Moon Were Only 1 Pixel (2014)”
This one is really driving home the scale of the solar system. Another amazing visualization of distances is the video "Powers of Ten" that goes to the largest and smallest distances. It was filmed in 1977 already but that only adds to its charme: ▶ this video
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@_Microft2020 · in “A New Map of All the Particles and Forces”
If you don't mind watching a nearly 50 year old video then I can recommend "Powers of Ten" [0], attempting to visualize the different scales on which things are happening in the universe we know of. It is a very short video, just 9 minutes long. [0] ▶ this video
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c
@cam_l2018 · in “Google Maps is no longer a flat map”
It is, i remember being captivated by this film in the (mid? late?) 90s.. (from the late 70s, pieced together by hand). Never imagined it would be (partly) possible in realtime.. some 10 years later. (eagerly hanging out for orbit view milky way, but probably not in my lifetime) ▶ this video
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j
@jacquesm2015 · in “The Benefits of a Quiet Ego”
The base of that goes back to a very simple realization: On a cosmic scale nothing that we do is of great importance. This planet likely is not as special as we would like to think it is and we are not as special as we like to think we are. We are to the universe as a single bacterium is to us. ▶ this video Is a nice recap of just how vast the universe really is and how utterly insignificant we are within it, in spite of all we're figured out and have achieved collectively. It certainly humbles me.
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m
@modeless2025 · in “Size of Life”
Reminds me of the classic "powers of 10" video: ▶ this video Someone ought to remake that but as a gaussian splat reconstruction, so you can freely move the camera as well as zoom.
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