The original recordings of the first humans landing on the moon 40 years ago were erased and re-used, but newly restored copies of the original broadcast look even better, NASA officials said on Thursday.
NASA released the first glimpses of a complete digital make-over of the original landing footage that clarifies the blurry and grainy images of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walking on the surface of the moon.
The full set of recordings, being cleaned up by Burbank, California-based Lowry Digital, will be released in September. The preview is available at www.nasa.gov.
NASA admitted in 2006 that no one could find the original video recordings of the July 20, 1969, landing.
[Editors Note: The link provided in the article takes you to the NASA homepage. This link will take you direct to the HD previews of the Apollo 11 moonwalks.]
(Score: 3, Funny) by PartTimeZombie on Thursday November 19 2015, @01:25AM
It's a bit harsh to blame NASA for wiping the tapes. This seems to have been SOP in those days. The lost Dr. Who episodes worries me more.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by nitehawk214 on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:00AM
They were aware at the time that they were doing the greatest journey in the history of mankind. One would think they could have spared a couple of shelves for the film.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 5, Funny) by isostatic on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:14AM
Sure, that's true for doctor who, but for the moon landing?
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:58AM
You mean the moon "landing" that is about as real as "the doctor" or even the "moon"? That moon "landing"?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Wootery on Thursday November 19 2015, @04:23AM
Gah, looks like even the morons have jumped-ship from /.
The most concise way to crush your absurd conspiracy-theory is this:
If the moon landing was faked, that means the Russians (who were watching closely) were playing along too, which essentially means you're claiming the entire Cold War was faked.
And if you're seriously suggesting that, you're lost beyond hope.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @03:39PM
I'm sorry you feel that way. But I personally really like this type of satire. It pokes fun of no-one really other than the poster, if you think he is genuine, and the boogey man of the all powerful shadow government, thus makes it for very light humor with no one insulted. I enjoyed such jokes at the green site, and I'm glad it has cross pollinated here as well.
Thou GPP's comment is slightly funnier.
(Score: 2) by Wootery on Saturday November 21 2015, @08:32AM
There's a fine line between satire and moronic trolling. When it's an AC, I assume it's a moron.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Tork on Thursday November 19 2015, @05:07AM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @08:19AM
Person can read and write, yet seems to doubt the existence of the moon. I would say there's a 51% chance it's satire.
(Score: 2) by The Archon V2.0 on Thursday November 19 2015, @03:25PM
I don't know, after seeing some people on Youtube who have a borderline grasp of English (thus can read and write... sort of) yet still make video after video on the moon being fake, there being multiple suns the government is hiding with chemtrails, planes being demons, 9/11 being a Satanic conspiracy theory....
But then, I should stop talking about monroee22877 and make fun of someone else.
(Score: 1) by idetuxs on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:47PM
quoting the "moon" gave it up.
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Thursday November 19 2015, @03:10PM
Do not watch this [youtube.com] if you are prone to brain aneurysms.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Thursday November 19 2015, @08:51PM
Well of course we know the moon is a liberal myth
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday November 19 2015, @03:02AM
Yeah, but the weren't erased right then, but years later lumped in with 200,000 other reels.
These days, they would have immediately been plopped in gold film cans, sealed in the presence of armed guards, and whisked off to the Smithsonian in an armored vehicle.
Those were simpler times.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Wootery on Thursday November 19 2015, @04:26AM
But storing a master copy means far less today than it did back then.
It's absurd that they didn't think to take good care of that tape.
It's a black eye for NASA, but not a huge one - the footage isn't lost forever, just the original tapes.
(Score: 5, Funny) by davester666 on Thursday November 19 2015, @03:08AM
They just went back to the original soundstage and made new master tapes...
(Score: 2) by ticho on Thursday November 19 2015, @03:34PM
They merely needed to remaster it so that Han did not shoot first anymore. Oh wait, wrong footage...
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday November 19 2015, @05:46PM
They just went back to the original soundstage and made new master tapes...
Yah! I can't wait for all the new lens flare!!
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Thursday November 19 2015, @04:47AM
Well they had to edit out the call to arms against the Silence before re-releasing the moon landing tapes.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @01:41AM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_television_Apollo_11_coverage [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiping [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 1) by xav on Thursday November 19 2015, @01:48PM
And of course : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11_missing_tapes [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VortexCortex on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:03AM
Since I was a youngling, I've always been fascinated by Cosmic Rays. With ordinary digital cameras you can pick them up hitting the CMOS here on earth. By comparing CPU output from a previously computed series of instructions you can also detect their frequency with a server rack. The ISS crew often reports seeing flashes, the effects of cosmic rays intersecting with the visual cortex and causing neurons to fire. They try to curl up and hide from them against whatever moderate shielding is available. With photographic film evidence of Cosmic Rays is even more prevalent because the film is "exposed" to them far more heavily beyond our atmosphere, and incredibly more so beyond our magnetosphere. Indeed, X-Rays were discovered by accident when some nearby film developed on its own otherwise "inexplicably".
The original airing of the Moon Landing appeared free of interference with cosmic rays, as were the photographic film rolls they brought back from the Apollo mission. There was a deal of static and interference, but no "inexplicable" bright blips as one would expect of cosmic rays. It's a shame the original video footage was lost (I'm sure it's in some rich person's collection, along with a Lunar rock or two). It's a shame VHS and Betamax TV recorders weren't invented yet and so citizens must rely on their recollection rather than their own tapes. It would be interesting to see what modern film analysis would reveal about the cosmic rays at the camera's location. Too bad this newly produced footage is "enhanced" to be even more "high quality" -- Erasing such evidence bearing "noise" from the signal. Oh well.
Now, don't get your pocketprotector in a wad, I'm not suggesting that we didn't ever go to the moon, but the last time NASA produced Lunar footage was 1972... and none of it has evidence of cosmic rays, which one expects would have been more prevalent than the events ISS experiences. I'm just wondering why that is, is all. That the original film of the Moon Landing is of little significance, IMHO, since we have copies. It's all the other lunar footage that has some scratching their heads...
There must be some reason why cosmic rays wouldn't show up on the live video camera's sensors, or the photographic film they took with them. Otherwise, when humans visit Mars they should just cover their suits and ships in 1970's era photographic equipment & film to protect themselves from cosmic rays.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Immerman on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:41AM
I'm not so sure. The camera would shielded from cosmic rays coming through the moon - that's probably more than half of the total off the top (since they landed in Mare Tranquillitatis, though I have no idea how high the basin walls would be on he horizon). Meanwhile the Earth's magnetosphere would be hovering almost directly overhead, shielding the moon from a sizable portion of cosmic rays coming from the opposite direction.
Hmm, actually the Earth's magnetosphere extends about 65,000km sunward (with the solar wind bow shock at 90,000km), and over 6,300,000 km anti-sunward. Compared to the 0.5 degrees covered by the moon's 1,737km radius, the magnetosphere would cover roughly 10 degrees sunward, and essentially to the horizon opposite. Assuming the bow shock would be fairly opaque as well, that could be increased by 50%. Incredibly impressive if it were visible, but not exactly a protective umbrella.
(Score: 5, Informative) by frojack on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:50AM
The original airing of the Moon Landing appeared free of interference with cosmic rays, as were the photographic film rolls they brought back from the Apollo mission. There was a deal of static and interference, but no "inexplicable" bright blips as one would expect of cosmic rays.
Wait, are you assuming a TV cameras of the 60s is going to show the exact same bright blips that you might experience in your brain or optic nerve?
Photographic Film from the moon is full of anomalies. But cosmic rays are small, and at most would affect one or two particles of silver halide, which in turn are much smaller perceived film grain. The effect of the cosmic ray is tiny, and localized, and disappears into film grain.
Rays impacting on the CCDs used in TV cameras of the time would still only affect one pixel. Its a time limited incident. It disappears into the smoothing algorithms.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Informative) by physicsmajor on Thursday November 19 2015, @04:13PM
Mod parent up, mod GP down.
Frojack is entirely correct about the physics here. We see blips today because we use CCD detectors, and this radiation interacts much differently with film. The GP's armchair analysis is just flat out wrong.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:04AM
The original recordings of the first humans landing on the moon 40 years ago were erased and re-used,
How could the recordings have been reused if they were erased?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @04:02AM
The magnetic tapes, upon which the recordings had been made, were erased and re-used.
(Score: 1) by xav on Thursday November 19 2015, @01:29PM
I guess next AC's question will be "what is a magnetic tape?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @06:28PM
Yeah that was the point, Admiral Aspergers. *golf clap*
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @10:33PM
I wasn't sure whether you had trouble understanding, or wanted to show your superiority. I took a chance it was the former.
(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:18AM
I want a reply.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:30AM
on "accident"
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:35AM
Cue the conspiracists:
OMG, NASA is tacitly admitting the moon landings were fake, and they're erasing the faked videos! Now they're releasing the real digital data, so we can see that the sets were actually in the deserts, right here on earth!
Oh, wait - no, the videos don't show the camera crews in the background after all.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:57AM
And the released videos are about the quality I saw on my black and white TV back in the day.
At that time, My jaw dropped at the quality. All the way from the Moon!!!
I stood there lunch pail in hand risking being late for work because was I bound and determined to see the first step on the moon.
I was a few minutes late for work, but got there 5 minutes ahead of my foreman. Wasted 30 minutes telling the prior shift all about it.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday November 19 2015, @03:27AM
July 1969 was the summer between 7th and 8th grades in junior high. I didn't watch the landing live, I had more pressing problems in my life at the time. Note my screen name . . .
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @04:11AM
Wait a second...
:)
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @03:16AM
Don't tell me we don't have any blank tapes. Get me a tape, now! Showtime is in five minutes!
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 19 2015, @07:40AM
No, it's not improved but raped. It's nothing less than falsifying history.
(Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Thursday November 19 2015, @08:24AM
You're thinking of Star Wars.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 2) by everdred on Thursday November 19 2015, @05:32PM
I'm pretty much with you here. Pressing "enhance!" involves some degree of filling in what isn't actually contained in the original image.
The cleaned up version might be interesting, but the best available unenhanced recording should still be treated as authoritative.
(Score: 1) by idetuxs on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:54PM
Thanks! I wasted a few minutes in the nasa.gov page and didn't find it, then I saw your comment. :D