It's kind of wild how every generation gets its own "Blue Marble" moment. Technically we've seen Earth from space a million times by now, but every new human perspective still hits differently
Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
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Re: Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
#362I was confused when I first saw this photo, as I don't think I've ever before seen a nightside, moonlit Earth, exposed so that it looks like the dayside at a first glance. I wonder how many casual viewers actually realize it's the night side. A nice demonstration of how moonlight is pretty much exactly like sunlight, just much much dimmer. In particular it has the same color, even though moonlight is often thought of…
The camera is compensating for extremely low light, so you end up with something that looks closer to a daylight exposure
Re: Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
#363Dear some very-rich person, please send a selfie-camera to the space! Yes, all that effort so we can keep looking at ourselves on a planet scale.
It sounds trivial, but perspective shots like this are part of why public support for space programs exists at all
Re: Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
#364There's something a bit weird having these digital photos and crisp digital audio and video of the astronauts, and seeing pictures of mission control with flat screens after having grown up on grainy analogue video, crackly audio with lots of beeps, and mission control being choc full of CRTs being watch by men in short sleeve shirts with black ties and cigarettes.
I get that feeling, but I think a lot of the "texture" we remember is really just the limitations of the tech at the time
Re: Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
#365I love the fact that you can see the aurora at both poles!
It almost looks like the Earth has a subtle glow around it
Re: Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
#366Nothing spectacular about it.
Except for the obvious degradation of our planet, there isnt anything
special about it. Its just our home.
Re: Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
#367Dear some very-rich person, please send a selfie-camera to the space! Yes, all that effort so we can keep looking at ourselves on a planet scale.
Good news! We already have that! If you pay taxes to the US that's one of the thing you've helped pay for: https://www.nesdis.noaa.gov/imagery/satellite-maps For reasons that are unexplainable if you're the NYTimes, polluting industries have been trying to kill these missions for decades.
I'm not a US resident but I'm immensely disappointed in myself because I didn't know this existed.
I guess the rich person who was just planning to respond to my request needs to find another thing to spend their money on :)
Re: Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
#368Earlier quoted context omitted.
One would hope they’re still in Earth’s orbit - if they’ve achieved escape velocity they’re not coming back.
So if we’re being technical I think they did achieve escape velocity? But the moon’s gravity and some timed burns will slingshot them back.
But one could imagine, as a failsafe, arranging things so that Integrity was in fact still in orbit around the Earth, as a sort of "backup" in the event that they somehow missed the moon's slingshot effect.
Re: Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
#369Earlier quoted context omitted.
> So clocks on the ISS, for example, tick slower than Earth clocks; but clocks on the GPS satellites (orbiting at 4.2 Earth radii) tick faster (and there is an adjustment made for this on each satellite so that the time signals they send out match Earth clock rates) I'm curious, and hope you or somebody else might be able to answer this: is it a single adjustment for each thing, where they just set it to always adjus…
The exact difference in clock rates is not constant, because the orbits are not perfectly circular and the Earth is not a perfect sphere. So both the altitude and speed of the satellite, and the Earth's gravitational potential, are varying with time, and that means the clock adjustments will vary with time as well. For the GPS satellites, their time signals are constantly compared with ground clocks, and adjustment s…
Thanks! I figured the orbital paths not being exact circles meant they'd be slight variance in the difference, just wasn't sure if it was enough to matter or if they could treat it as if it was exactly the same all the way around without it mattering.
Re: Artemis II crew take “spectacular” image of Earth
#370Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, the D5s are the 'official' Handheld Universal Lunar Cameras (HULCs), but (a?) Z9 also got on-board at the 'last minute' (which means two years ago): * https://petapixel.com/2026/04/02/a-nikon-z9-made-it-aboard-t... They have a thermal blanket for exterior work: * https://petapixel.com/2026/02/24/artemis-ii-astronauts-will-... * https://petapixel.com/2025/01/10/the-custom-nikon-z9-and-the... * Various stories wit…
the morning after the launch i just randomly went onto their livestream and one of the astronauts was asking mission control for help on also using the gopros and iPhone cameras. i guess they have some. and he was struggling at getting a properly exposed photo with those. he said they were coming out super over exposed. but the D5 was working nominally. mission control said they'd get back to them about ideas on adju…
> ... 2005 D5...
About 11 years too far back:
> The Nikon D5 is a full frame professional DSLR camera announced by Nikon Corporation on 6 January 2016 to succeed the D4S as its flagship DSLR.