Many of my books are text-intensive works of reference so it was a pleasant
contrast to produce a sumptuously illustrated volume such as this. It had its
origins in a request from the publisher for a book of Hubble Space Telescope
pictures. I pointed out that there already were such books on the market and,
in addition, HST had its limitations – the best wide-field views are still taken from ground-based observatories and
the spectacular images from space probes deserved consideration, too. Thus was
born this photographic tour of the Universe.
Many months were spent searching not only for the best images but also the
best-quality versions of them. NASA’s online Planetary Photojournal now contains beautifully reprocessed versions of
classic space probe pictures that had previously been seen only in garish and
grainy prints or duplicate transparencies. In addition, I was able to
incorporate the latest electronically processed versions of David Malin’s pictures taken at the Anglo–Australian Observatory, which have wider fields and improved colour fidelity
than the versions previously seen. Other images in the book, though, will look
much less familiar.
 | ||
The book first appeared as a hardback in early 2002 under the title The Times Space, it being part of a series of books produced by HarperCollins for The Times newspaper in London, which is owned by the same parent company. The cover,
designed by HarperCollins, is a particular favourite of mine (see left).
At the start of 2004 a revised paperback edition appeared under the title The Times Universe. This included some new Hubble Space Telescope pictures, such as the superb
view of the Helix Nebula on the cover, and a revised spread on cosmology
incorporating the observations of the cosmic background radiation from the
Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe.
Future plans are to produce an enlarged edition incorporating results from
recent Mars probes and the Cassini mission to Saturn.