From Outer to Inner Space, Telescopic to Microscopic

Charles and Ray Eames take us on “an adventure of magnitudes” with the logarithmic scale in Powers of Ten — from life-size to cosmic then atomic. It is the design duo’s most notable film, a poetic and influential masterpiece in experimental filmmaking and visualization. The project began as early as 1961 (largely inspired by the 1957 book Cosmic View: The Universe in 40 Jumps by Kees Boeke) and was piloted in 1968 as an 8-minute, black-and-white version at the Conference on College Physics. Nine years later, the Eameses were able to revisit the film and update its look with color and new narration by Philip Morrison, a physics professor at MIT and close friend who collaborated on the 1977 version along with his wife Phylis.