art in space

Stunning or Failures? We Chose 30 Imperfect Photographs from the Apollo Archive.

Phogotraphy8 Comments

When NASA went to the Moon, digital cameras didn’t exist and therefore exposures of the Lunar landscape had to be caught on film. Recently a team tasked with the preservation of the Apollo mission films uploaded the entire collection of images to Flickr. Among the 2400+ images are a surprisingly large amount of failed frames consisting of light leaks, over exposures, sticky labels and motion blur. Despite being redundancies, they carry with them an abstract beauty and a feeling of realness. NASA didn’t send photographers to the Moon, they sent astronauts and the vernacular feel to the plethora of pictures they brought back works as a surprising twist to a journey that is drifting further into our past.

Phogotraphy spent some time picking through the archive and choosing the thirty best ‘Imperfect Apollo’ frames we could find to share with you. We hope you enjoy them as much as we did.

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NASA Releases Stunning Treble Crescent Moons of Saturn

Phogotraphy3 Comments

Have you ever heard how the location of a photograph can automatically give you the WOW factor? Well in Cassini’s case, the far flung spacecraft that’s been exploring Saturn for the best part of a decade has just that. It is absolutely relentless at sending back images home across 80 minutes of Space. Take a look at this universally stunning abstract NASA released on June 22nd.

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Although the image speaks for itself, NASA as usual gives some great scientific details about the supposed conjunction occurring:

The three moons shown here — Titan (3,200 miles or 5,150 kilometers across), Mimas (246 miles or 396 kilometers across), and Rhea (949 miles or 1,527 kilometers across) — show marked contrasts. Titan, the largest moon in this image, appears fuzzy because we only see its cloud layers. And because Titan’s atmosphere refracts light around the moon, its crescent “wraps” just a little further around the moon than it would on an airless body. Rhea (upper left) appears rough because its icy surface is heavily cratered. And a close inspection of Mimas (center bottom), though difficult to see at this scale, shows surface irregularities due to its own violent history.

Cassini is no stranger to mixing science and art. Four years ago Chris Abbas compiled all of the travelling photographic Spacecraft into a masterful time lapse. It’s certainly worth watching again.

Via 500PX ISO. Image credit NASA.