After some Jedi tricks from Tom Mann of Applied Defense Solutions, the Astrogator’s Guild blog is back and running. More posts soon, but for now we give you the Inspiration Mars trajectory, brought to you by both of us (and Mike’s brother Al with the Music).

The video was made with Analytical Graphics Inc.‘s software called “Systems Tool Kit” (formerly known as Satellite Tool Kit) using the Astrogator Module.

The optimized trajectory was created first using MAnE from SpaceFlight Solutions

The clips from STK were put together on a Mac using Imovie. Music clips provided from Al Loucks’ personal music archive. If you listen carefully you’ll recognize the music from the “Lobster Alice” clip found on Al’s Demo Page