How Water Moves (2004)
Collaboration with Neil Williamson Large scale DVD projection .
Filmed from visualisations of data and hydrodynamic/thermal dynamic research by scientists at Canada Centre for Inland Waters.
How Water Moves by William Schertzer:
Lakes are complex hydrological elements that respond to meteorological forcing. Principal weather influences include heating from the sun as well as mixing due to surface winds. An understanding of the lake responses such as its thermal cycle and circulation is accomplished through the study of lake hydrodynamics and thermal dynamics.
A number of systems are deployed to measure the lake condition over time. These include in situ observations on meteorological buoys (e.g. air temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, wind direction and pressure) as well as in_lake observations of water temperature and currents. Remote sensing of the lake surface is now routinely accomplished through use of satellite observations. These data measured at selected temporal and spatial scales are analysed statistically to provide a climatology of the lake characteristics. More importantly, these data are used by lake scientists to develop mathematical models to describe the lake dynamics. The models are represented by mathematical equations and have applications in understanding the basic physics of the lakes, the interaction between the lake and the atmosphere, and for forecasting potential changes such as what may occur as a result of climatic warming.
As part of this exhibit, we have incorporated a sample of visualizations that have been developed based on both data and hydrodynamic / thermal dynamic research on lakes. The visualizations selected have been set to colour to represent the various ranges in, for example, temperature and current velocities and other vectors. The interplay between the colours is the result of the laws governing lake physics and provides a modern approach to simplifying the complex physical interactions that occur in the natural world.
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