Promotional Artwork

Celebrating the Observatory's 70 years of discovery, the Palomar Science Meeting 2018 (PSM2018, 08 – 11 July 2018) was a forum for all Palomar astronomers and constituencies to share and discuss their results involving Palomar data. Events on the first day were held at Palomar, and focus on the celebrating the 70th anniversary of the Hale Telescope Dedication (03 June 1948), 70th anniversary of first light for the Samuel Oschin Telescope (24 September 1948), and the start of science operations for the Zwicky Transient Facility. The remaining three days (09 – 11 July) were held in Pasadena at the Cahill Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics, and included plenary Palomar science sessions and topical workshops of interest to the broad Palomar partnership. In particular, a focused Tuesday 10 July afternoon public event included keynote speakers Ronald Florence, author of “The Perfect Machine”, and Robert Kirshner of the Moore Foundation, and the dedication of the Zwicky Transient Facility.

Below is the promotional artwork for PSM2018.

Limited edition, available now! 18"×24" versions of these posters are available for purchase from the COO administrative office at Cahill, the Palomar gift shop and the Caltech bookstore.

“Traditions.” (Palomar/Caltech/Annie Mejía)

“Open Late” (Palomar/Caltech/Annie Mejía)

“Big Eye.” (Palomar/Caltech Archives/A. Mejía)

“Menace.” (Palomar/Caltech/Annie Mejía)

• “Big Eye” poster/image: Inspired by the covers of science fiction pulps from the 1940s and 50s, this poster uses as background a painting by J.D. Crimi that had been originaly used as cover of the January 1946 issue of Popular Science magazine. Crimi's depiction is based on a 1939 charcoal drawing by R.W. Porter. The painting was subsequently given to Caltech's John Anderson by the magazine editor, and is now part of the Caltech Archives collection.

Hale Telescope dome composite.
(Palomar/Caltech/Annie Mejía)

• “Traditions” poster/image: inspired by travel and event posters of the 1930s and 40s.
• “Menace” poster/image: inspired by mid-century science-fiction comics, where Palomar was often instrumental in discovering impending doom from outer space.
• “Open Late” poster/image: inspired by mid-century Googie architecture and drawings.
• Hale Dome 70th Anniversary "fade" image: A composite from a pastel by R.W. Porter from the 1930s, a black and white photograph from the 1940s, and a contemporary digital image meant to represent 70 years of Palomar Observatory and Hale Telescope history.

Promotional media for PSM2018 was created by Annie Mejía, former computational astronomer who now specializes in science promotion and exhibit displays. For more information about Dr. Mejía and her work please visit the acm X-eBITS website.

Images, videos and other media assets (Content) on this page may be used for educational or other non-commercial purposes with credit to Palomar/Caltech/Annie Mejía, or as otherwise designated, as long as modifications are not made to the content. All or portions of the Content may be used for news or journalistic purposes with credit to Palomar/Caltech/Annie Mejía, or as otherwise designated. Commercial uses require a separate permission from Caltech Media Relations.