Posted by
michael
on from the closeups-of-the-sound-stage dept.
GoneGaryT writes "Wow! NASA has pulled another set of photographs, this time of Apollo 11's trip, out of the freezer and digitized them. They are glorious. I'm just checking out the first ever 'Earthrise' sequence and they are beautiful." I'll cherry-pick a few for you: 1, 2, 3.
"So why aren't they in the Apollo pictures? Pretend for a moment you are an astronaut on the surface of the Moon. You want to take a picture of your fellow space traveler. The Sun is low off the horizon, since all the lunar landings were done at local morning. How do you set your camera? The lunar landscape is brightly lit by the Sun, of course, and your friend is wearing a white spacesuit also brilliantly lit by the Sun. To take a picture of a bright object with a bright background, you need to set the exposure time to be fast, and close down the aperture setting too; that's like the pupil in your eye constricting to let less light in when you walk outside on a sunny day.
So the picture you take is set for bright objects. Stars are faint objects! In the fast exposure, they simply do not have time to register on the film. It has nothing to do with the sky being black or the lack of air, it's just a matter of exposure time. If you were to go outside here on Earth on the darkest night imaginable and take a picture with the exact same camera settings the astronauts used, you won't see any stars! "
Yeesh.
-aiabx
-- Just this guy, you know?
Pictures 1,2,3 mirrored
by
tcopeland
·
· Score: 4, Informative
You can't see them because the shutter speed is high and the aperture is small, because of the high levels of light (the sunlight shining on the lunar surface and on the astronauts). If you took a photograph on Earth during the darkest night with the same camera settings as used on the Moon during the daytime, you wouldn't see any stars either (or anything much in fact) because they are far too faint to show up with those camera settings.
Re:There is an american flag on the moon.
by
aiabx
·
· Score: 2, Informative
A common misconception. In fact, it will be 2 weeks before they flag needs to be lowered. If you take a look at the moon, you will notice that it goes dark on the side facing us every month.
-aiabx
-- Just this guy, you know?
Re:There is an american flag on the moon.
by
tverbeek
·
· Score: 3, Informative
I think it was firmly planted on the light side of the moon.
The moon does not have a "light side" and a "dark side". It has a side facing us, and a side away from us, but those sides (as anyone who looks up at the moon from time to time will notice) go through a cylcle of light and dark every month. That flag planted by Apollo 11 spends a couple weeks at a time in near darkness, with only reflected light from Earth to illuminate it.
-- http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Re:There is an american flag on the moon.
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 1, Informative
Please get off your computer sometime and look at the moon. Make illustrations if necessary. You will see:
1) The same side is always facing us. 2) That side goes dark every month.
If your education has taught you otherwise you are blind or especially gullible.
Re:There is an american flag on the moon.
by
cmpalmer
·
· Score: 2, Informative
If this is an actual quote from your science book, I would sue if I were you...
The moon is tidally locked with the *Earth*, not the sun. The dark side is the side the Earth never gets to see, but it is fully illuminated by the sun once a month.
Uh, right?
-- --
stream of did I lock the front door consciousness
Re:There is an american flag on the moon.
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 1, Informative
If you still don't believe any of the people who have told you the truth, look at this animation:
Re:Earthrise????
by
aiabx
·
· Score: 3, Informative
You are correct. The "earthrise" pictures were taken from the orbiting Command Module.
-aiabx
-- Just this guy, you know?
Re:Why the Hell not?
by
dangermouse
·
· Score: 3, Informative
What kind of revisionist crap is that?
Wernher von Braun was brought to the US, along with hundreds of his best scientists and engineers, at the end of WWII. The Army set him up in Texas and later at Huntsville, where he built the Redstone rockets-- that's "Redstone" as in "Mercury Redstone", as in "MR-3", as in the mission that put the first American into space. Had von Braun not fought to delay the attempt for reasons of additional testing, Grissom would have entered space in the MR-BD mission and beaten Gagarin by a few weeks, to become the first person in space period.
von Braun could have put the first American satellite into orbit in the IGY, months before Sputnik, but Eisenhower wanted the Navy team to do it (for a variety of excellent reasons, not least of which was that von Braun's team was a bunch of captured Nazis).
When NASA was formed, von Braun directed Marshall Space Flight Center-- where he built the Saturn V, which was the launch vehicle for every single moon shot.
Sorry, but American rocketry, and the American space program, was built by imported Germans.
Buzz's attitude...Neil's professionalism
by
droopus
·
· Score: 4, Informative
With all the hoax talk, I thought I'd mention something actually concerning the missions.
I'm a bit of a 60's/70's space nut. I read all the books recently published (Gene Kranz's "Failure is not an Option", Chris Kraft's "Flight" and Gene Cernan's "Last Man on the Moon" are all incredible) and think the boxed "From the Earth to the Moon" DVD set might be the best thing HBO ever did.
Anyway.
Did you notice there are no (or very, very few) camera shots of Neil, but loads of Buzz? That's because Buzz was a bit of a PITA about the mission. He whined for months about not being the first out of the LEM, even after Deke Slayton told him the mission schedule. He tried to take it higher, using his deep religious feelings with politicians to try and be the first man out, but failed.
He did bring along a tiny Communion set and did indeed take Communion just after landing. But he was still pissed, and this was reflected in his refusal to use his camera much, if at all. The only shots of Neil were frame grabs off the LEM mounted 16mm cam.
Neil however, took loads of pics of Buzz, using the belly mounted Hasselblads they both had. So, Buzz became immortalized because there were simply more photos of him...saluting the flag, that classic closeup, etc.
Interesting that the attitudes of the astronauts weren't discussed much till decades later, NASA wishing to preserve the "rock star" image of the men.
I highly recommend reading at least one of the above books, probably this one which has a special if you buy it with Flight, Kraft's great book.
Both show just how amazing the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs were, and just how analog their equipment was.
Sadly the books will also give you a clue why a program like Apollo will never happen again in America, unless something radically changes.
-- "The pie shall be cut in half and each man shall receive.....death. I'll eat the pie."
Looks like I started a nice debate, and have convinced several people that their inaccurate textbooks are correct. They are not. I though through the problem just far enough to get to the common (incorrect) habit of referring to the earth's side of the moon (the face, rabbit, woman, etc) as the light side. It's only light about half the time. The far side of the moon is light the other half (this of course ignores the effects of lunar eclipses, but they affect only the near side of the moon).
So, there is a light side and there is a dark side, but they change across a period of a month. If you have a textbook that says there is part of the moon that's always exposed to the sun, it's dead wrong.
Re:Earthrise????
by
Bazman
·
· Score: 2, Informative
So the first Earthrise was seen by the three astronauts of Apollo 8.
Tonight (22 July) on UKTV History is part two of the Apollo 8 story, 10pm UK time for anyone with access to UKTV History channel.
Baz
Hoax would have required Soviet cooperation
by
soldeed
·
· Score: 4, Informative
OK all you conspiracy advocates, if the moon landings were faked, then explain to me why would the soviets have let us get away with it? They had deep space tracking capability, and the glaring lack of actual spacecraft going to the moon beaming back telemetry data and voice comm would have been a dead giveaway! I grew up in the sixties, and on launch mornings the pre launch broadcasts usually included a shot of the Soviet 'fishing' trawlers hanging off the coast observing the proceedings. The spacecraft could be tracked with radar all the way to, around, and back from the moon. They sent that Luna mission to try to return samples and steal our thunder, (which we were able to track) but crashed instead. After the failure of their own manned lunar program The Soviets would not have tried such a foolish stunt themselves because they knew they would'nt have been able to fool anyone, and neither would we! To this day, no one in the soviet government or space program, has ever made any suggestion that we did'nt actually go to the moon.
Re:Why the Hell not?
by
dangermouse
·
· Score: 4, Informative
Actually it would be more accurate to say that American rocketry and the American space program was kick started by imported Germans.
I'm not saying that the United States wouldn't have eventually built a decent space program without von Braun and his team. But to say that they didn't contribute much simply because we would have gotten there eventually without them is absurd for two reasons: 1) they actually got us there, and 2) it was the Germans' use of rockets during WWII that made the US actually want to develop rocketry. The US was more or less happily ignoring Goddard til the V-2s started hitting Britain.
I have in my notes from Dr. John Krige's "History of Rocketry" course at Georgia Tech the following text of a telegram sent immediately from Germany to Washington upon the debriefing of the captured von Braun and his personnel (emphasis mine):
HAVE IN CUSTODY OVER 400 TOP RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT PERSONNEL FROM PEENEMUNDE. DEVELOPED THE V-2.
THE THINKING OF THE SCIENTIFIC DIRECTORS OF THIS GROUP 25 YRS AHEAD OF US. RECOMMEND 100 OF THE VERY BEST MEN OF THIS RESEARCH ORGANIZATION BE EVACUATED TO US IMMEDIATELY.
And the guy was right. It was a hell of a "kick start" the Germans gave us.
Re:Earthrise????
by
Saige
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Wow, you mean that somehow the moon bends light such that there isn't a single place on the moon's surface where the Earth appears partially above and partially below the horizon? Please, then, tell the astronomers about this fact, so they can determine what is special about the structure of the moon to cause this effect!
You know, just as a stopped clock is right twice a day (once if you use 24 hour time), a moon with the same side always facing the earth is still going to have regions where the Earth is partially below the horizon, thus creating an image of Earthrise, even if it's not rising/setting.
Besides, the pictures were taken before landing, while perspective was changing and giving the appearance of Earthrise.
-- "You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
Re:Why don't you do it
by
davmoo
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Technically it wouldn't be theft of NASA IP, since NASA is a government division and therefore "owned" by "the people". NASA has never restricted the use of its images for non-commercial purposes, and mostly not for commercial use either, provided that proper attribution to NASA is given in the materials. That's why there are all those wonderful CDs and DVDs of NASA material available.
-- I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
Re:Why don't you do it
by
richie2000
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Or, you could have just read the frigging notice:
No copyright is asserted for NASA photographs. If a recognizable person appears in a photo, use for commercial purposes may infringe a right of privacy or publicity. Photos may not be used to state or imply the endorsement by NASA or by any NASA employee of a commercial product, process or service, or used in any other manner that might mislead. Accordingly, it is requested that if a NASA photograph is used in advertising and other commercial promotion, layout and copy be submitted to NASA prior to release.
NASA photos reproduced from this archive should include photo credit to "NASA" or "National Aeronautics and Space Administration" and should include scanning credit to Kipp Teague or other individuals or agencies as noted.
Slashdot Mirror
Please go to http://www.badastronomy.com/ before you waste our time and bandwidth with your moon-hoax crap.
-aiabx
Just this guy, you know?
...right here.
The Army reading list
You can't see them because the shutter speed is high and the aperture is small, because of the high levels of light (the sunlight shining on the lunar surface and on the astronauts). If you took a photograph on Earth during the darkest night with the same camera settings as used on the Moon during the daytime, you wouldn't see any stars either (or anything much in fact) because they are far too faint to show up with those camera settings.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
As the site is rapidly getting slashdotted, here is a mirror of a few of the best images (more added as they become available and are awesome):
Apollo 11 Mirror (select images)
---------------
ChipotleLovers.com
Chipotle food, locations, pics, links, polls and discussion!
Yes.
English is easier said than done.
A common misconception. In fact, it will be 2 weeks before they flag needs to be lowered. If you take a look at the moon, you will notice that it goes dark on the side facing us every month.
-aiabx
Just this guy, you know?
The moon does not have a "light side" and a "dark side". It has a side facing us, and a side away from us, but those sides (as anyone who looks up at the moon from time to time will notice) go through a cylcle of light and dark every month. That flag planted by Apollo 11 spends a couple weeks at a time in near darkness, with only reflected light from Earth to illuminate it.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Please get off your computer sometime and look at the moon. Make illustrations if necessary. You will see:
1) The same side is always facing us.
2) That side goes dark every month.
If your education has taught you otherwise you are blind or especially gullible.
If this is an actual quote from your science book, I would sue if I were you...
The moon is tidally locked with the *Earth*, not the sun. The dark side is the side the Earth never gets to see, but it is fully illuminated by the sun once a month.
Uh, right?
-- stream of did I lock the front door consciousness
If you still don't believe any of the people who have told you the truth, look at this animation:
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap991108.html
You are correct. The "earthrise" pictures were taken from the orbiting Command Module.
-aiabx
Just this guy, you know?
Wernher von Braun was brought to the US, along with hundreds of his best scientists and engineers, at the end of WWII. The Army set him up in Texas and later at Huntsville, where he built the Redstone rockets-- that's "Redstone" as in "Mercury Redstone", as in "MR-3", as in the mission that put the first American into space. Had von Braun not fought to delay the attempt for reasons of additional testing, Grissom would have entered space in the MR-BD mission and beaten Gagarin by a few weeks, to become the first person in space period.
von Braun could have put the first American satellite into orbit in the IGY, months before Sputnik, but Eisenhower wanted the Navy team to do it (for a variety of excellent reasons, not least of which was that von Braun's team was a bunch of captured Nazis).
When NASA was formed, von Braun directed Marshall Space Flight Center-- where he built the Saturn V, which was the launch vehicle for every single moon shot.
Sorry, but American rocketry, and the American space program, was built by imported Germans.
With all the hoax talk, I thought I'd mention something actually concerning the missions.
I'm a bit of a 60's/70's space nut. I read all the books recently published (Gene Kranz's "Failure is not an Option", Chris Kraft's "Flight" and Gene Cernan's "Last Man on the Moon" are all incredible) and think the boxed "From the Earth to the Moon" DVD set might be the best thing HBO ever did.
Anyway.
Did you notice there are no (or very, very few) camera shots of Neil, but loads of Buzz? That's because Buzz was a bit of a PITA about the mission. He whined for months about not being the first out of the LEM, even after Deke Slayton told him the mission schedule. He tried to take it higher, using his deep religious feelings with politicians to try and be the first man out, but failed.
He did bring along a tiny Communion set and did indeed take Communion just after landing. But he was still pissed, and this was reflected in his refusal to use his camera much, if at all. The only shots of Neil were frame grabs off the LEM mounted 16mm cam.
Neil however, took loads of pics of Buzz, using the belly mounted Hasselblads they both had. So, Buzz became immortalized because there were simply more photos of him...saluting the flag, that classic closeup, etc.
Interesting that the attitudes of the astronauts weren't discussed much till decades later, NASA wishing to preserve the "rock star" image of the men.
I highly recommend reading at least one of the above books, probably this one which has a special if you buy it with Flight, Kraft's great book.
Both show just how amazing the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs were, and just how analog their equipment was.
Sadly the books will also give you a clue why a program like Apollo will never happen again in America, unless something radically changes.
"The pie shall be cut in half and each man shall receive.....death. I'll eat the pie."
Looks like I started a nice debate, and have convinced several people that their inaccurate textbooks are correct. They are not. I though through the problem just far enough to get to the common (incorrect) habit of referring to the earth's side of the moon (the face, rabbit, woman, etc) as the light side. It's only light about half the time. The far side of the moon is light the other half (this of course ignores the effects of lunar eclipses, but they affect only the near side of the moon).
So, there is a light side and there is a dark side, but they change across a period of a month. If you have a textbook that says there is part of the moon that's always exposed to the sun, it's dead wrong.
funny munging
So the first Earthrise was seen by the three astronauts of Apollo 8.
Tonight (22 July) on UKTV History is part two of the Apollo 8 story, 10pm UK time for anyone with access to UKTV History channel.
Baz
OK all you conspiracy advocates, if the moon landings were faked, then explain to me why would the soviets have let us get away with it? They had deep space tracking capability, and the glaring lack of actual spacecraft going to the moon beaming back telemetry data and voice comm would have been a dead giveaway! I grew up in the sixties, and on launch mornings the pre launch broadcasts usually included a shot of the Soviet 'fishing' trawlers hanging off the coast observing the proceedings. The spacecraft could be tracked with radar all the way to, around, and back from the moon. They sent that Luna mission to try to return samples and steal our thunder, (which we were able to track) but crashed instead. After the failure of their own manned lunar program The Soviets would not have tried such a foolish stunt themselves because they knew they would'nt have been able to fool anyone, and neither would we! To this day, no one in the soviet government or space program, has ever made any suggestion that we did'nt actually go to the moon.
I'm not saying that the United States wouldn't have eventually built a decent space program without von Braun and his team. But to say that they didn't contribute much simply because we would have gotten there eventually without them is absurd for two reasons: 1) they actually got us there, and 2) it was the Germans' use of rockets during WWII that made the US actually want to develop rocketry. The US was more or less happily ignoring Goddard til the V-2s started hitting Britain.
I have in my notes from Dr. John Krige's "History of Rocketry" course at Georgia Tech the following text of a telegram sent immediately from Germany to Washington upon the debriefing of the captured von Braun and his personnel (emphasis mine):
And the guy was right. It was a hell of a "kick start" the Germans gave us.
Wow, you mean that somehow the moon bends light such that there isn't a single place on the moon's surface where the Earth appears partially above and partially below the horizon? Please, then, tell the astronomers about this fact, so they can determine what is special about the structure of the moon to cause this effect!
You know, just as a stopped clock is right twice a day (once if you use 24 hour time), a moon with the same side always facing the earth is still going to have regions where the Earth is partially below the horizon, thus creating an image of Earthrise, even if it's not rising/setting.
Besides, the pictures were taken before landing, while perspective was changing and giving the appearance of Earthrise.
"You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
Technically it wouldn't be theft of NASA IP, since NASA is a government division and therefore "owned" by "the people". NASA has never restricted the use of its images for non-commercial purposes, and mostly not for commercial use either, provided that proper attribution to NASA is given in the materials. That's why there are all those wonderful CDs and DVDs of NASA material available.
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
Money for nothing, pix for free