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posted by n1 on Monday September 22 2014, @11:53PM   Printer-friendly
from the co-conspirators dept.

For years Moon landing conspiracy theories have claimed that some or all elements of the Moon landings were hoaxes staged by NASA with the aid of other organizations. Now Rob Crossley reports that Graphics card vendor Nvidia says that one of the photos used to bolster the moon landing conspiracy theory can be explained with new lighting technology. The photo taken during the 1969 mission, shows astronaut Buzz Aldrin illuminated despite standing in the shadow of the Lunar module with conspiracy theorists claiming the photo would not have been possible unless there was an additional light source--such as a studio light.

Nvidia recreated the scene in Unreal Engine 4 and--using its global illumination technology--was successfully able to recreate the image with only the sun as a light source. Nvidia discovered that there were two key factors, both of which could be addressed using voxel global illumination. First, the moon's surface is comprised of what are essentially thousands of tiny mirrors -- moon dust if you will -- that bounce light back at a viewer. Yet that didn't account for the necessary level of brightness to light up Aldrin. The second factor was Neil Armstrong -- who was off to the side of Aldrin in full view of the Sun -- wearing a 85 percent reflective spacesuit that contained five layers of the highly reflective fabric Mylar blended with four layers of the flexible yet durable material Dacron on top of an additional two layers of heat resistant Kapton. Of course, further evidence supporting the Apollo moon landings has been released many times over the years, including high-def shots taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter showing lander tracks and footprints, and 2012 images showing five out of the six Apollo mission American flags.

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  • (Score: 4, Funny) by jackb_guppy on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:03AM

    by jackb_guppy (3560) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:03AM (#96967)

    They proved it!

    They recreated all the pictures and claimed that was proof it was not faked! It proves it was!

    NASA claims in "Apollo 13" movie that the a computer was the size of house!! We all know better look on your desks! IS that the size of house?

    We all know that MIB has had the tech for years to do this, they are just now letting it out to the "real world", because they knew we could not handle it!

    Get your foil hats, block the mind control rays!

    • (Score: 2) by el_oscuro on Tuesday September 23 2014, @01:05AM

      by el_oscuro (1711) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @01:05AM (#96985)

      Did you use that flashy-thingie on me?

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  • (Score: 4, Funny) by cmn32480 on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:06AM

    by cmn32480 (443) <reversethis-{moc.liamg} {ta} {08423nmc}> on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:06AM (#96969) Journal

    With actual studio lights and complete and total realism. You know... for two special effects guys. http://mythbustersresults.com/nasa-moon-landing [mythbustersresults.com]

    HEY!!!! Those are just the kind of people who might fake the moon landing. I smell a conspiracy....

    --
    "It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by digitalaudiorock on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:21AM

    by digitalaudiorock (688) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:21AM (#96972) Journal

    What amazes me about the folks who actually believe this was a hoax is the idea that over 30,000 NASA employees at the time:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_NASA [wikipedia.org]

    ...were all in on it, and that none have ever come forward. That takes a real special breed of idiot...

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:25AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:25AM (#96974)

      Talk to CIA and NSA about LSD. They were brainwashed!!

      I hear the spin-cycle is a bitch!

    • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Darth Turbogeek on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:33AM

      by Darth Turbogeek (1073) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:33AM (#96977)

      What amazes me is that anyone engages with these fucking idiots. Just the first bit of skeptical thinking easily knocks down any argument from a moon conspirator theorist and it's not like the wider public does more than laugh at how stupid they are.

      Those that arent wrapped in this stupidity have exactly nothing to defend and no argument is going to sway these idiots. So frankly the correct response to a moony is to just tell em to fuck off and ignore those pathetic idiots - and instead turn our time to debunking anti-vaxxers and making sure their nonsense stops getting traction. Moonys are just idiots and society sees them for what they are. Anti-vaxxers on the other hand...... they are dangerous idiots and we need to fight them because there's actually a large group in society that buys into anti-vax crap.

    • (Score: 4, Insightful) by gman003 on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:40AM

      by gman003 (4155) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @12:40AM (#96979)

      Not just them - there's the thousands who saw the launches in-person, the thousands of contractors working on the program, and oh yeah, the Soviets, who tracked the missions themselves (using the same tech they used for their own unmanned lunar missions). Maybe you could convince half a million Americans to keep quiet, in the name of liberty and freedom and beating those damn commies, but once your conspiracy requires both sides of the Cold War to be in on it, in a conspiracy specifically to make one of those sides look bad, it all falls apart.

      So any fake landing would have required essentially doing the missions, but with drones instead of people, and broadcasting all the prerecorded hoax transmissions and video recordings. At which point you really have to question why they faked it instead of just doing it, since they would have had to have all the technology.

      That's not to mention that the technology to fake the landings so expertly didn't exist until decades later. Or that, if they were willing to fake things then, why haven't we fake-gone back to the Moon? Those are fundamental problems with the theories that they never really explain.

      • (Score: 2) by jackb_guppy on Tuesday September 23 2014, @01:16AM

        by jackb_guppy (3560) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @01:16AM (#96988)

        That is so "Capricorn One".

        OJ was great in that movie!

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by frojack on Tuesday September 23 2014, @01:15AM

      by frojack (1554) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @01:15AM (#96987) Journal

      Same idiots deny the existence of airplanes flying into buildings, in spite of the fact that thousands of people standing in the street and hundreds of cameras saw it happen.

      You wonder what drives these people?
      The US can't keep a scandal secret no matter how hard we try.
      What is the motivation for NASA even trying to fake this and keep is secret when everything leaks out eventually?

      Check List for hollering Hoax:
      1) Inaccessible location.
      2) Many years after the fact.
      3) No plans for anyone to visit the location any time soon.
      4) No reputation to risk.
      5) No scientific credentials necessary

      Work Flow
      Put up a website, let it fester for a while, talk it up on the web.
      Recycle rumors and photo shopped pictures.
      Write hack-job book.
      Book some speaking tours
      Pocket the cash

      Profit? Highly unlikely.

      --
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    • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 23 2014, @02:36AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 23 2014, @02:36AM (#97006)

      NASA employees? Don't forget the Russians. USSR was going to send their own cosmonauts in a race to the Moon. If Apollo was "fake" and "staged", I'm quite certain USSR would quickly show how USA never left Earth orbit. When you are tracking things with some of the most powerful radar systems in human history, I think you can track if something is going to the moon or not. Never mind listening in to the transmissions.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_manned_lunar_programs#Moon_landing_N1.2FL3_program [wikipedia.org]

      Or maybe *they* bought the Russians too! :)

    • (Score: 2) by Bot on Tuesday September 23 2014, @07:38AM

      by Bot (3902) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @07:38AM (#97062) Journal

      If A then B, B is not possible, then A is not possible.
      What's wrong with the above?

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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by frojack on Tuesday September 23 2014, @01:29AM

    by frojack (1554) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @01:29AM (#96989) Journal

    LRO also found the Russian Lunokhod rovers [popfi.com], which appear to have driven no further than in a circle. El-Reg [theregister.co.uk] covered it too.

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