WATCH: Dad Launches Son’s Toy Train Into Space

Nothing like a little child-like awe to brighten the week.

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=XoMN-zg7r3M]

Ron Fugelseth’s four-year-old son is a lot like Andy from Toy Story. The towheaded tot and his toy train named Stanley play together, sleep together and even make pizza together. Fugelseth, co-owner and creative director of Oxygen Productions Inc., a California-based motion graphics and film production studio, first documented the camaraderie last year in A Train and His Boy, but in August, he took their bond into the stratosphere.

With the help of a weather balloon, an HD camera and a GPS-enabled cell phone, Fugelseth filmed Stanley’s epic journey into space. He told the Oakland Tribune he was inspired by a high schooler’s video of a Lego man flying above Earth attached to a weather balloon.

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After retrieving the space-trotting train from a cornfield 27 miles away from the launch site, Fugelseth edited the high-flying footage into a short film. He added in some music and added Stanley’s facial expressions with After Effects and Photoshop to augment his son’s adorable reactions to the experiment.

For those who are getting worried about the sheer amount of stuff getting sent into space, fear not. Fugelseth addressed safety concerns on the YouTube page, stating that he’d taken precautions like following FAA instructions for weather balloons and monitoring wind conditions.

As he said on the page, “I didn’t want Stanley to be a murderer. Plus I wanted to make sure my son got Stanley back.”

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