The Asteroids, edge-on view

You can see a high resolution, mp4 version, by clicking here.
For the best experience view the high resolution version in full screen mode.

This video should be viewed in conjunction with Asteroid Discovery from 1980 to 2010.

The video was created by Scott Manley.

Scott Manley

View of the inner solar system showing the locations of all the asteroids.
The colour of an asteroid indicates how closely it comes to the inner solar system.

Earth Crossers are Red
Earth Approachers (Perihelion less than 1.3AU) are Yellow
All Others are Green

Currently we have observed over half a million minor planets, and the discovery rates show no sign that we're running out of undiscovered objects.
Orbital elements were taken from the 'astorb.dat' data created by Ted Bowell and associates at www.naic.edu.
Music is 'Transgenic' by Trifonic: Amazon link.
Quite a few journalists, bloggers and tweeters are attributing this to NASA or Arecibo Observatory - while they do fine work they had nothing to do with this. If you write a story you can credit it to Scott Manley.