Balloon goes up after idea for an ad fails

Niko Edwards and Green D - both aliases used on the Internet - had long dreamed of taking a look at Earth from above, like many teenagers.

In July, they came up with the idea of launching a camera tied to a balloon to take pictures of the ground, then collecting the balloon and the photos.

They made their preparations and launched the balloon and camera on a sunny day in Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong province. They collected the photos on Sept 3 and shared them in an electronic album on the Internet five days later.