Locations

Red-rock buttes over ochre desert, ranges stepping back into the heat haze under a huge warm sun. On a graded rise behind the buttes stands a deep-space tracking station: a giant white dish tipped up at the sky, two smaller dishes beside it, warning lamps blinking on their rims.

Rainwater on the salt turns the flat into a mirror. The moon lays a path across it, and snow-capped volcanoes line the horizon. On a mountain summit stands an observatory, four telescope enclosures in a row with their slits open, one sending an orange guide laser up into the stars.

Aurora curtains fold over snowbound ranges, and snow blows low across the ground. On a hill above the snowfield stands a research station, its windows lit: a red living block, a lab, white radomes, a dish and a red and white radio mast.

A white-sand islet under leaning palms. The lagoon runs turquoise into deep ocean blue, with surf rolling in and sun glitter on the water. Offshore, a launch platform holds a rocket in its tower beside the hangar and crane, its command ship moored off to the left.

A stony plateau under the giants, snowbound far down their faces, the wind tearing plumes off the summits. A whitewashed monastery climbs a rocky spur to its gold-roofed temple, prayer flags strung down the slope.

Golden grass rolling to a far escarpment, flat-topped acacias alone and in stands, dust hanging in the warm light. A safari lodge of thatched huts sits on a granite kopje, and hot-air balloons drift low over the plain.

Forested ranges under the moon and an active volcano: lava down its flanks, a smoke column lit from below, and an eruption every few seconds. Across the valley a Mayan temple rises out of the jungle canopy, torches burning up its stair.

A rooftop over a neon city. Towers stand in three ranks, their windows lit and flickering, the city throwing magenta into the haze. On the nearest roof a giant neon lucky cat beckons over a marquee spelling 大阪 in pink, blinking as its bulbs chase round the board.