
Earliest images of the moon were better than people realised - theindieg
http://www.worldofindie.co.uk/?p=682
======
aaronbrethorst
I wish the article got into more of the technical details behind how this
actually worked. I find it absolutely jaw-droopingly incredible that they were
able to shoot gigabytes of essentially IMAX-quality negatives, develop them in
flight (which requires temperatures of around 20ºC for all of the materials
involved—Edit: they didn't do this because it would've been too difficult, and
ended up using a mostly dry development process. See _Edit_ link), scan
them(!!!), and then radio them back to the earth. I would find this amazing
today, and all of this happened in the 1960s!

 _Edit_ here's a little more information:
[http://www.moonviews.com/2012/06/lunar-orbiters-
classified-h...](http://www.moonviews.com/2012/06/lunar-orbiters-classified-
heritage.html), and the link from there to
[http://www.nro.gov/history/csnr/programs/docs/prog-
hist-01.p...](http://www.nro.gov/history/csnr/programs/docs/prog-hist-01.pdf)
contains the technical details on the camera I was after. Amazing stuff.

~~~
StevePerkins
> " _I would find this amazing today, and all of this happened in the 1960s!_
> "

If bowling alleys didn't already exist... and you pitched me the idea of fully
automated systems to collect and re-rack pins and return 15-lb balls to the
player after each and every throw... I would probably say that's either
impossible or at least impractical at scale.

19th and 20th century engineering is amazing. Today, if I can't conceive of
writing it as a mobile app than I just shrug.

~~~
dxbydt
> 19th and 20th century engineering is amazing. Today, if I can't conceive of
> writing it as a mobile app than I just shrug.

Skills thrive only if there is an incentive, monetary or otherwise, to
practice them. Otherwise they atrophy.

In my past 6 years in Silicon Valley, I worked mostly alongside PhDs in
physics, math, comp sci, EE, quantum physics even. This is a metric TON of
talent. Do you know what you can do with that kind of talent? You can like
literally get a man to moon etc. Every one of these guys ( sadly including
myself ) was working on some throwaway nonsense- ETL jobs, frontend js,
distributed backend code that got rm -rfed and rewritten periodically,
messaging systems replaced every year with messaging systems in latest
language fad, all kinds of ultimate software crap manned by the jira monster
with never ending tickets & feature requests.

So I just saved up the breadcrumbs & headed back to academia when I couldn’t
take it anymore. Better to work on serious stuff, even if it were ill
monetized. You only have one life.

~~~
bonniemuffin
Truly, the greatest minds of our generation are hard at work coming up with
new ways to trick people into clicking ads.

~~~
HankB99
Or developing trading algorithms. AKA Financial Engineering.

------
cantrevealname
> _images were locked away from the public as they would have revealed the
> superior technology of the USA’s spy satellite cameras_

Whenever I read about 50-year-old government secrets being revealed, I wonder
about all the things happening today we're not being told about -- that we'll
learn about 50 years from today.

Looking at the Earthrise image, as another commenter pointed out, they didn't
simply degrade the image, but they _deliberately_ added vertical lines with
differing brightness and gain, so it would appear that the film scanners on
the Lunar Orbiter could scan only at a very low resolution.

To use an analogy: Suppose you request a secret document from the government
under the Freedom of Information Act. They decide to give it to you, but they
redact 99% of the material with black markers. Oh, but they also retype the
entire document, without the blacked-out portions, so you think you received
the whole thing. They even add staples, 3-hole punches, coffee cup stains, and
creases to the paper before photocopying it. You get 1% of material, but you
are convinced that you got the complete unaltered original.

~~~
jaypeg25
I recently visited the FBI Museum/Tour at the FBI HQ in DC. There's a section
where they talk about tech the FBI had in the 80s, including a camera they
used for an undercover operation where they recorded some illegal shit going
on in a hotel room.

You walk into a mock hotel room and even knowing the general vicinity of where
the camera should be, struggle to find it. I flat out couldn't until a friend
who works at the FBI told me - it was in the period on the artists signature
of a piece of artwork in the room. A literal pinhole camera recording
everything in the room more than 3 decades ago with pretty great quality.

I can't even fathom the technology they have today - there's no chance that'd
be on the tour.

~~~
mixmastamyk
We've gone backwards from the 60's in some areas. For example, there are no
planes as good as the SR-71 any more due to their incredible costs, cheaper to
use satellites over the long run.

Commitment to manned space exploration is another.

~~~
frockington
It's also pretty irrelevant today. I'm sure out messenger pigeon technology
has also dropped off

~~~
TeMPOraL
Not sure what you're aiming at.

Messenger pigeons were superseded by better ways of delivering messages,
covering all the use cases and then some. With SR-71 and the space program,
we've lost _capabilities_ we had before. In the latter space, it's slowly
getting fixed thanks to Musk & co., but we're still behind the 1970s,
capability-wise.

------
pietroglyph
> The Lunar Orbiters never returned to Earth with the imagery. Instead, the
> Orbiter developed the 70mm film (yes film) and then raster scanned the
> negatives with a 5 micron spot (200 lines/mm resolution) and beamed the data
> back to Earth using lossless analog compression, which was yet to actually
> be patented by anyone.

Absolutely incredible! The level of complexity involved involved in space
flight, along with the tight tolerances, continually impresses me when I
consider the relative success of these missions.

~~~
pjc50
> lossless analog compression

Are there any details of this? Some of the documents imply it's simply FM
modulated, no different from passing a tightly-focused B&W TV camera over the
film.

~~~
Implicated
> It used a method called vestigial sideband where a precise (1hz) people lot
> tone was used as a means to allow the stripping away of one half the
> waveform and then using that tone on the other end to reconstitute the
> missing side band. It is still used in communications today.

Quoted from Dennis Wingo, co-founder of the Lunar Orbiter Image Recovery
Project, who has been commenting on the linked article.

~~~
biggieshellz
"people lot tone" -> "pilot tone", I think.

------
ehead
I used to work at Ames in a facility a stone's throw from McMoon's (not
singularity University hah).

Heard that the guys who worked on this stuff in there were super crochety. I
went over there once to check out some old aerospace equipment they had
hanging out in the back (I think it was some decrepit rocket engine), and they
gave me a classic 'you kids get off my lawn speech' \- until they found out
that the friend I went with had a PhD in aeronotical engineering. They
lightened up after that and we had a great conversation after that. What a
wacky group.

~~~
beamatronic
The NUMU museum in Los Gatos had an exhibit about this too

[http://www.numulosgatos.org/exhibitions-2/2016/9/23/mcmoons-...](http://www.numulosgatos.org/exhibitions-2/2016/9/23/mcmoons-
how-a-band-of-scientists-saved-lunar-image-history)

------
earenndil
I wanted to look at the actual files in question, they're purported to be at
[1]. However, that just displays a 'file being migrated' message[2], and
according to the internet archive it's been that way since 2016[3]...were the
images lost after all?

1:
[https://loirp.arc.nasa.gov/loirp_gallery/](https://loirp.arc.nasa.gov/loirp_gallery/)

2:
[https://loirp.arc.nasa.gov/loirp/tiff/1101_H2.tif](https://loirp.arc.nasa.gov/loirp/tiff/1101_H2.tif)

3:
[https://web.archive.org/web/20161231201417/https://loirp.arc...](https://web.archive.org/web/20161231201417/https://loirp.arc.nasa.gov/loirp/tiff/1101_H2.tif)

~~~
ajnin
The raw recovered files seems to be available here, in any case :
[https://pds-imaging.jpl.nasa.gov/data/lo/LO_1001/DATA/](https://pds-
imaging.jpl.nasa.gov/data/lo/LO_1001/DATA/)

~~~
state
Were you (or anyone) able to open any of those .img files?

~~~
LeoPanthera
They're raw greyscale pixel values. I was able to convert one with
imagemagick:

convert -size 19992x16500 -depth 16 gray:FRAME_1005_H1.IMG out.png

The dimensions are specified in the .LBL files in the same directory, right at
the end of the file.

~~~
JorgeGT
Alternatively, NASA help links to IMG2PNG for windows:
[http://bjj.mmedia.is/utils/img2png/](http://bjj.mmedia.is/utils/img2png/)

------
Gibbon1
Link to a talk about the camera.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HRF8rQD1Vw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HRF8rQD1Vw)

Short bit about the film. (cia.gov)

[https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-
RDP33-02415...](https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-
RDP33-02415A000500120032-7.pdf)

~~~
theindieg
Thanks, these links are super useful and interesting!

------
Cofike
Is there any instances of people claiming the government purposely edited the
original images to make them lower quality back when they were first released?

I’m curious if anyone realized the government may be hiding their true
capabilities.

~~~
Cthulhu_
I'd like to know more about that too. I can imagine that since the space race
and cold war was in full fledge at the time, they neither wanted to give the
Russians intel on the moon, nor let them in on their camera quality.

~~~
abecedarius
It surprises me they could transmit an analog signal back while keeping its
quality secret from the Soviets. I wonder if they did succeed at that, or just
at keeping the rest of us in the dark.

~~~
yosito
It wasn't like the Soviets could just turn their TVs to the right channel. I
doubt the Soviets knew what frequency they were using, and analog video is
still "encoded" in the radio waves. These signals still required that
specialized $300,000 equipment (which I'm sure was top secret at the time) to
make sense of.

~~~
slededit
The height of the antenna would give away the frequency. But the soviets had
good spy penetration into the US industrial base so it's likely they already
knew anyways.

------
thelastidiot
>>> "They set up shop in an abandoned McDonalds, offered to them as free
space."

I didn't realize there were such a thing as an abandoned McDonalds.

~~~
rangibaby
This person documents abandoned buildings:
[https://www.flickr.com/photos/25165196@N08/albums/7215769101...](https://www.flickr.com/photos/25165196@N08/albums/72157691015994841)

This blog is what it says on the tin (pizza box?):
[http://usedtobeapizzahut.blogspot.com](http://usedtobeapizzahut.blogspot.com)

~~~
LambdaComplex
Related subreddit:
[https://old.reddit.com/r/NotFoolingAnybody/](https://old.reddit.com/r/NotFoolingAnybody/)

------
LiamPa
> After their use, the images were locked away from the public, as at the time
> they would have revealed the superior technology of the USA’s spy satellite
> cameras, which the orbiters cameras were designed from. Instead the images
> from that time were grainy and low resolution, made to be so by NASA.

Brilliant!

It states they used 70mm film which according to google is used for motion
pictures, I assume a custom camera?

~~~
toomanybeersies
I'm not certain about the film used for the Lunar Orbiter probes, but the
cameras that were used by the Apollo astronauts used 70mm film, rather than
the 60mm 120 format that was standard for the Hasselblad cameras they used.

The size of the frame is the same, but 70mm film is wider because it has
sprocket holes that 120 format film lacks.

I would imagine that for the Lunar Orbiter probes they did use a custom
camera, and didn't just bolt on an off the shelf camera.

~~~
Gibbon1
What I find amazing is a film camera in a hard vacuum. I could be wrong but
two things. Designing mechanical things that work in a hard vacuum is
difficult. I'm assuming bad things would happen to film in a vacuum. So
assuming they were sealed under argon or nitrogen.

~~~
jacobush
Nope.

~~~
jacobush
"Lubricants had to be chosen with utmost care because of the risk that
conventional lubricants could boil off in vacuum and condense all over the
optical surfaces of the lens."

[http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/hardwares/moon/2.htm](http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/hardwares/moon/2.htm)

------
salgernon
Reading about the equipment that they had to cobble together and keep running
- reminds me that we keep losing the surplus places in the Bay Area where it
would have conceivably been possible to find vintage parts.. weird stuff
closed suddenly a few weeks sho, and I fear Halted is on its way out...

~~~
Cthulhu_
Those places should receive government support (as national heritage museums)
or like the internet archive, big corporate sponsors (e.g. google and facebook
and co can easily afford to keep those places around as a charity)

------
therealmarv
Great article. Digital is not always better, the technology was not there to
outperform analogue tech. I even wonder if a digital camera system nowadays
can outperform this 2GB images, I mean how do you transfer that amount of data
at this long range without loss?! Is that even possible?

Maybe this analogue picture compression is something which is still usable and
valuable in long distance space transmission?

~~~
setquk
“Lossless” analogue transmission isn’t lossless. It’s just less lossy than the
lossy forms of analogue transmission. As a very simplified example it’s really
easy to modulate an analogue value in the frequency domain and maintain
accuracy and dynamic range. Hence why FM stereo usually sounds pretty amazing
still. It’s not terribly sensitive to environmental factors. However
conversely AM sounds like crap.

Now we have digital protocols which are still sent on top of analogue signals
(everything is analogue down at the bottom, even your CPU). We lose a tiny bit
of dynamic range through compression in some circumstances but gain error
correction, speed and the ability to recover signals from below the noise
floor which means less power and more distance for the same power.

So no, digital is definitely the way.

As an amateur radio operator, some of us at least tend to play with very low
powers. You can have a two way conversation 3000km+ with no more more than a
watt but only if you use digital modes. One reason why Morse/CW is still
popular; it’s a digital encoding.

~~~
eesmith
To add to that, some amateur radio operators bounce their signal off the Moon.
Quoting
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%E2%80%93Moon%E2%80%93Ear...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%E2%80%93Moon%E2%80%93Earth_communication)
:

> Recent advances in digital signal processing have allowed EME contacts,
> admittedly with low data rate, to take place with powers in the order of 100
> Watts and a single Yagi antenna.

~~~
JanisL
Thanks for sharing this, fascinating.

------
jedberg
So in theory if someone built a robot and spacecraft, the original 70mm
negatives could be retrieved from the moon and provide even higher resolution
images?

~~~
jl6
Sadly, all the Lunar Orbiter missions ended in an (intentional) impact with
the moon. Seems unlikely the film would have survived.

~~~
adrianN
Even if the orbiters were still orbiting, the film would have degraded due to
radiation, I think.

~~~
hornetblack
It's really hard to orbit the moon anyway, it's not very spherical compared
with the earth.

~~~
eesmith
Pointers for those interested -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_concentration_(astronomy)...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_concentration_\(astronomy\)#Effect_of_lunar_mascons_on_satellite_orbits)
and
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frozen_orbit#Lunar_frozen_orbi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frozen_orbit#Lunar_frozen_orbits)
. The "not very spherical" refers to the shape of the gravitational field, and
not simply the physical shape of the Moon.

------
mschuster91
One can simply wonder how much progress is being kept secret from the world
due to nationalistic bullshit. To be honest, I'd not be surprised when in
2060, someone says "we had all the stuff in the Avengers movies as actual,
real technology back then".

And one can only wonder if the hundreds of billions sunk into programs like
the F35 or the European A400M program haven't simply been used to fund skunk
works projects instead.

------
ggm
Description of dry developing needed!

Also that 200pixel/line scanner... Awesome. Basically a fax machine in space.

~~~
pilsetnieks
Actually 200 lines/mm - that would be about 5080 dpi, which would impressive
for a modern day scanner as well.

~~~
4ad
What most people don't realise is that can make film that can record at
whatever resolution we need, and we have known how to do this for over a
century. It's simply a tradeoff between grain size and sensitivity. For most
consumer film sensitivity is usually the more favorable trait. But for special
applications we might value smaller grain size. For holographic film we can
make it record better than 10000 lines/mm. This is essential because we are
recording diffraction patterns.

------
tome
"Earliest images of the moon _taken from space_ ", I guess?

------
ComputerGuru
s/realized/were lead to believe/

------
spyder
A short video from when they got the tape machines working in McMoon:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Awc6dm_kvV8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Awc6dm_kvV8)

There are more videos on the same YouTube channel.

------
NietTim
This is by far one of my favorite projects I've read about

------
inamberclad
Interestingly enough, McMoon's has come sorta full circle. As of only a few
weeks ago, it was turned into a convenience store named MoonMart.

------
Spooky23
Makes me wonder how good the spy satellite pictures of the era were.

Wasn’t the technology behind the Corona satellites based on this tech? I
wonder if the declassified pictures they release are the lower quality
versions?

------
gumby
I'm pretty wowed by the developing as most of chemistry assumes certain
earthly constraints (e.g. gravity, convection at the surface of a vessel etc).

Nice to be able to use 'earthly' in a non-mystical sense!

------
orjan
The "NASA technician" in the second to last image appears to be airbrushing a
large scale version, does anyone know if there are more pictures of this
somewhere?

------
NamTaf
I remember the original articles about building the team to do this
recovery/restoration project. I'm so glad to see the results of their efforts!

------
Teknoman117
Makes you wonder what things we're capable of today that the public has no
idea about...

------
sandworm101
Wow. Nobody had bothered to take images of the moon until 1966? All those
cameras and telescopes. You would think someone somewhere would have taken a
few pictures prior to sending the rocket. Perhaps the article meant that these
were the first images _from_ the moon.

By the title, I was expecting an article about the first photos _of_ the moon.

------
mchahn
> using lossless analog compression

What does this mean? Analog is inherently lossy to begin with.

~~~
omeid2
I think you have got that backwards.

A digital signal is inherently lossy as it takes only finite number of values
because digital is discrete (0 and 1), whereas analog is continuous and in
theory it can encode an infinite number of values, subject to your codec
apparatuses limits.

~~~
mchahn
I was referring to the fact that an "exact value" doesn't even exist. There is
noise on every analog signal. If there is no exact value then lossless becomes
a meaningless term.

------
debt
I prefer the unrestored version of the images. They feel more real for some
reason.

------
bitcoinisqueen
Lookup "apollo moon takeoff" on youtube.

Watch it a couple of times, I strongly encourage this.

