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Apollo 11 Moon Landing Revisited: Hoax ~vs~ Debunk

Thermal said:
My bad, I thought I saw a 2026 release date on it, presumably with older work incorporated.
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The filmmakers (Zig Zag Productions, U.K.) don't have it in their online catalog on their web site, but they do have a trailer to it.

In addition to making a U.K. version with U.K. experts, they seem to have updated the film to report on orbital photography with probes that weren't there in 2003. This is important overall because Bill Kaysing said he would recant if orbital photography showed there to be Apollo artifacts on the Moon. It happened and he did not recant.

NASA Scientific Visualization Studio | New LRO Images Offer Sharper Views of Apollo 12, 14, and 17 Sites

NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has captured the sharpest images ever taken from space of the Apollo 12, 14 and 17 sites, revealing the twists and turns of the paths made when the astronauts explored these areas. ||
svs.gsfc.nasa.gov svs.gsfc.nasa.gov

China, Japan, and India have all photographed the Apollo landing sites from lunar orbit.
 
JesseCuster said:
I'm smiling at the fact that Vixen was so ignorant of the topic when she started this thread, she didn't know Michael Collins' name and referred to him as "the third guy who stayed inside the capsule". How is it possible to have any sort of interest in or curiosity about the moon landings, yet think of Michael Collins as "the third guy" and not know his name? How incurious to not even Google his name before going online and calling him "the third guy"?
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One of the reasons Collins is one of my favorite astronauts was his sense of humor. As I recall, he once reportedly did a great imitation of Walter Cronkite saying "Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and what's his name...".
 
JesseCuster said:
I'm smiling at the fact that Vixen was so ignorant of the topic when she started this thread, she didn't know Michael Collins' name and referred to him as "the third guy who stayed inside the capsule". How is it possible to have any sort of interest in or curiosity about the moon landings, yet think of Michael Collins as "the third guy" and not know his name? How incurious to not even Google his name before going online and calling him "the third guy"?
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One of the reasons Collins is one of my favorite astronauts was his sense of humor. As I recall, he once reportedly did a great imitation of Walter Cronkite saying "Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and what's his name...".
 
Foster Zygote said:
Then there was the 500 mm lens option, equipped with a good ol' "iron sight" for aiming.
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Among other things, this lens was used in the "stand-up EVA." This was when the astronauts opened the top hatch, stood on the ascent engine cover, and took pictures from six or seven meters up above the surface. Also, if you look carefully in this and Andy's pictures, you can see that the trigger on the pistol grip is connected to the shutter release. Point and shoot.
 
Foster Zygote said:
One of the reasons Collins is one of my favorite astronauts was his sense of humor. As I recall, he once reportedly did a great imitation of Walter Cronkite saying "Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and what's his name...".
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Collins' memoir Carrying the Fire is one of the better-written astronaut memoirs.
 
JayUtah said:
Among other things, this lens was used in the "stand-up EVA." This was when the astronauts opened the top hatch, stood on the ascent engine cover, and took pictures from six or seven meters up above the surface. Also, if you look carefully in this and Andy's pictures, you can see that the trigger on the pistol grip is connected to the shutter release. Point and shoot.
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I love those stand-up panoramas from the J-Missions.

We may yet see the "how did they shoot pictures without a viewfinder?" argument from personal incredulity in this thread. The 500 mm lens was the only one that really needed some sort of aiming device, as I recall. The regular Zeiss Biogon had such a wide field of view it would be hard to miss the subject while taking a photo. As I've pointed out to conspiracy theorists before, that lens precluded the use of the through-lens viewfinder because the lens assembly protruded too far into the body of the camera. Why would they market something like that if it was impossible to use?
 
Vixen said:
The Hasselblad shutter speed is 1.5 sec, for the shutter to open and shut and auto-wind on to the next frame. Apollo 11 took 123 surface pics in 151 minutes does the maths work?
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I know many others have addressed this inane minute/second confusion already, but it really does stand as a totem for this thread (and also for several other threads with the same antagonist).
 
Foster Zygote said:
We may yet see the "how did they shoot pictures without a viewfinder?" argument from personal incredulity in this thread.
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It's kind of in the Allen claims, although he treats it a little differently than other conspiracy theorists. He cherry-picks some badly composed frames and insists they are the best you could expect under the circumstances. Then he claims the better photos are suspiciously good. Other claimants ignore the badly framed shots altogether and just say the good photos are too good based on the supposed problems with aiming.

Foster Zygote said:
The regular Zeiss Biogon had such a wide field of view it would be hard to miss the subject while taking a photo.
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Right around 45°. For left-and-right alignment you really can't miss. You just point the camera in the vague direction of the subject. Vertical framing turned out to be harder than I thought, but only because I made it so. I was trying not to cheat by having the camera at eye level and sighting along an edge or something. I kept the camera at about chest level where it would have been on the RCU mount. In real life the astronauts used it mostly handheld with it higher up for sighting.

Foster Zygote said:
As I've pointed out to conspiracy theorists before, that lens precluded the use of the through-lens viewfinder because the lens assembly protruded too far into the body of the camera. Why would they market something like that if it was impossible to use?
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Not quite.

The Planar lens certainly had that problem, but I don't recall that the Biogon did. The mechanical problem was the reseau plate, the glass plate in front of the gate that imprinted the little crosshairs for photogrammetry. That's not a standard feature on 500/EL models; it was part of the NASA-requested modifications. It occupies the place where the reflex mirror uplift mechanism would be and also where the magazine darkslide would ordinarily go.

Besides, it's nearly impossible to use the standard Hasselblad reflex viewfinder in a space suit anyway. That ordinarily requires you to put the camera at waist level and look straight down. Now you can certainly look down in a space helmet, but you'll be looking at the inside of the helmet ring. The thing about a space helmet is that it doesn't move with your head. It's attached basically at the shoulders. So if you can't use it anyway, and it's in the way of equipment you'd rather have instead, and you're shaving even ounces of the LM payload, then yes, you delete the viewfinder.
 
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May as well ask this question in this thread, I'm sure Jay has the answer. What's illuminating Aldrin in this photo, given that the sun is clearly behind him?
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JayUtah said:
Collins shot a roll of color 70 mm film and two rolls of black-and-white 70 mm film. On other missions, other CMPs took many more photos. And in the J-type missions, a bay of the service module was fitted with a spy camera borrowed from the CIA to take ultra high resolution photos of the lunar surface for mapping purposes. During the trip back, the CMP did an EVA with one of the lunar surface OPSes (the backup to the PLSS) to retrieve the film magazine.

Because Apollo 11 was quick, only one surface-modified Hasselblad was provided, and only one magazine. They didn't want to bother with sending multiple cameras out through the hatch on the rather hacky rope conveyor, nor did they want to mess with changing magazines. Armstrong was assigned most of the photo duties because he was the most skilled photographer. Another regular Hasselblad was in the LM, but it was only used inside the spaceship. Both Aldrin and Armstrong used this camera while inside the LM cabin.

In all later missions, both the commander and LMP had a surface-modified Hasselblad and several additional magazines and battery packs. In the J-type mission a 500 mm telephoto lens was included. This was the only time the lenses were changed. All the rest of the 70 mm photography used the 50 mm f/5.6 Zeiss Biogon.
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A Carl Zeiss 40mm f/4 Distagon is far better. 😛
 
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