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FUTURES:
Winner of Sir Arthur Clarke Award for 'Best Written
Presentation', 2005
FUTURES : 1 
2004 was the 50th anniversary of my first collaboration with Sir Patrick Moore (no, I don't believe it!).
In 1954 we planned a book to be called The Challenge of the Stars, but it failed to find a publisher at the time ("too speculative"!), and it was 1972 before a book with this title was finally published, with a revised edition in 1978. These have been very successful, with many foreign editions.
So in late 2004 a new version waspublished by AAPPL(UK)/HarperCollins(USA), entitled FUTURES: 50 YEARS IN SPACE The Challenge of the Stars. In 2005 this won the Sir Arthur Clarke for 'Best Written Presentation', and it was nominated for the Hugo (SF's Oscars) in the 'Best related Book' category.
Once again with text by both Patrick and myself, and containing some of my original 1970s illustrations, but this time compared with 'modern' interpretations, this book looks not only at the ways in which our views of the universe and space exploration have changed in that 50 years ~ there are no bases on the Moon or Mars :-( ~ but also at all the amazing new discoveries by space probes such as Viking, Voyager and Galileo, plus the Hubble Space Telescope. It contains many brand new paintings (many digital) of objects of which we did not even know the existence in 1954 ~ or even 1972 ~ such as pulsars, neutron stars, black holes and jetting galaxies. Now revised and reissued in paperback as simply 50 YEARS IN SPACE (2006), this is now out of print, but may be found on Amazon. Bookplates signed by both artist and author are also available – please e-mail the artist for details. Here are four pages containing just a few samples of the art (click for zoomed versions): |
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| An asteroid (but not Davidhardy!) approaches the Earth, which is eclipsing the Sun, its atmosphere forming a ring of red light. The Moon is on the right. |
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| The surface of Venus, hidden from space by dense cloud-layers, in which lightning flashes. In the foreground is an extinct volcano, but fumaroles suggest that there could still be some activity. | ) |
| Eventually humans will visit Mars, building upon the knowledge we already have from unmanned probes and rovers. Their eyes and expertise will allow them to investigate objects and phenomena which robots would miss. |
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| A Martian canyon, filled with early-morning fog. Cirrus clouds are in the sky, and ice crystals form a 'sun-dog'. | ) |
| A volcanic plume erupts on Jupiter's turbulent moon Io. | ) |
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