European Space Agency (ESA) CHEOPS Competition

I entered a European Space Agency (ESA) competition giving graphic designers the opportunity to feature their work on the rocket that will launch on the Cheops mission (CHaracterising ExOplanets Satellite) – into Earth orbit.

'An initial jury of Cheops experts, a representative of the Cheops consortium, ESA communicators and graphic designers – including guest jury member Joost Grootens, head of the Information Design master’s programme at the Design Academy Eindhoven in the Netherlands – met to short-list candidates.

The second and final round of judging included the Cheops project scientist and project manager, a representative of the Cheops consortium, the Head of ESA’s Future Missions Department, and ESA’s Senior Advisor for Science & Exploration.'

I found out I was a runner-up and my work was chosen as 1 of 16 highly commended designs (see right) to be published on the ESA website and printed and exhibited during the launch event.

CHEOPS launched successfully in December 2019. More competition info here.

Info on CHEOPS:

Cheops is a partnership between ESA and Switzerland, will observe bright stars known to host planets. Scientists will use high-precision monitoring of a star’s brightness to examine the transit of a planet as it passes briefly across the bright face.

The information will help to reveal the structure of planets circling other stars, especially those in the Earth-to-Neptune mass range. The mission will also contribute to our understanding of how planets change orbits during their formation and evolution.