Apollo Image Products., Various mosaics, composites and other imagery. Options

[Ian R]

I've decided to start a new thread dedicated to the Apollo program, and I shall start the ball rolling by posting an assortment of mosaics and other images that I have been working on during the past few months.

LM ASCENT MOSAICS:

Apollo 14:




Turtle Rock and Station H are clearly visible, as are the tracks leading up to the ALSEP. Compare to the lunar orbiter view:

[Ian R]

Apollo 15:




Apollo 16:



Apollo 17:



The LRV is visible in the Apollo 16 frame, but just out of view in both the 15 and 17 mosaics.

[Ian R]

Apollo 11:

The DAC was not started until after LM pitchover, but the first frame of film exposed did manage to capture the northern-most part of Tranquility Base, including the boulder field (not resolved) and craters visible out of Aldrin's window on the surface.

Lunar Orbiter view:


DAC frame:

[Ian R]

Apollo 11 Descent Mosaic:

This mosaic consists of two frames taken from the DAC footage of Eagle's descent to the lunar surface, just seconds prior to landing. The blue silhouette shows the final landing position of the LM, and the surface visible in this view is where Armstrong and Aldrin planted the US flag, solar wind collector and TV camera during the EVA.

[Ian R]

This two-frame mosaic shows Gene Cernan inside the LM Challenger after the end of the third Apollo 17 EVA. The stowed suits and helmets are visible on the left, on top of the ascent stage engine cover.



(Based on the original version by Erik van Meijgaarden)

[Ian R]

This multi-frame Apollo 17 mosaic shows the post-landing view out of Gene Cernan's window. The magnificent South Massif dominates the scene:

[Ian R]

This view of Surveyor 3 consists of two images that were aligned and merged to increase detail and reduce noise. The photographs were taken during the first Apollo 12 EVA, and show a surprising amount of detail, including the mast supporting the solar panels and the TV camera:

[Ian R]

This Apollo 15 composite shows how the landing site appeared in both the descent and ascent movies.



The red arrow points out the crater the LM Falcon partially landed in, giving the lander a significant tilt to the south.

[Ian R]

This is the second post-landing view from Apollo 17; this time looking out of the LMP's window:

[ilbasso]

Wow, Ian, those are amazing! Thanks for sharing. Particularly informative for me was the Apollo 11 descent mosaic, showing the silhouette of the LM's position. Despite 35+ years of looking at the LM landing movies, it has always been difficult for me to get my eyes oriented to the perspective quite right, given the angle that the DAC was mounted in the LMP's window relative to the LM's motion. You really helped put it in context. I also appreciated your enhancing the frames from the liftoffs so we could get a good view of the landing sites.

[dilo]

Great works, Ian! Thanks...

[christian_d]

Great stuff! I appreciate you work. It still seems so unreal to me that men walked around there... Indeed, Apollo is what made me interested in space exploration when I was a kid. I'm more in the unmanned camp now, since it is more reasonable for getting science bang for the buck. But nonetheless, the thought of actually being on another celestial body is ineffable - makes me shiver, literally

MODERATOR: reminder to the new members to check the Forum Guidelines. We won't be getting into that debate here.

[dvandorn]

Apollo 14:




Turtle Rock and Station H are clearly visible, as are the tracks leading up to the ALSEP. Compare to the lunar orbiter view:

Excellent thread, Ian! One minor nit, here -- I don't know where you got the overlay on the second image above, but it has a factual error in it. It labels the south rim of North Triplet as the south rim of Doublet. Doublet lies west of the ALSEP site, which is itself west of the LM. Doublet is off frame to the left.

But this is a truly fun thread. Thanks for starting it!

-the other Doug

[dvandorn]

Apollo 15:

This can be contrasted to the following image taken by Dave Scott from the slope of Hadley Delta with the 500mm lens:

http://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a15/AS15-84-11324HR.jpg

Granted, this image is a little harder to use in picking out individual craters and landmarks, but it sure puts the landing site in true perspective, doesn't it?

BTW -- that huge hill beyond the LM isn't the side of Hadley Rille, it's Pluton Crater with the smaller Icarus Crater beyond, the North Complex of domes topped by large craters that just might have been calderas. Problems with the drill, of course, cut short the third EVA and canceled planned sampling stops up along those impressively rocky rims.

-the other Doug

[DDAVIS]

I have taken my unusually 'clean' VHS Apollo 11 video copy, recorded during a 20 year anniversary broadcast of the NBC coverage, and merged sets of similar frames together to reduce the video noise, horizontal wavering of detail etc. The resulting frames were then mosaiced into a panorama from near the final camera position with added black sky. A moment when the TV camera exposure dropped dramatically as a white space suit passed nearby allowed a peek at the overexposed sunlit LM details, which were composited in. This provides a modest sample of what could be done with the original data, if it exists.