By Shloimy Lowy, Photographer and Staff Writer
There’s an experience not unique to photographers — although often acutely felt by us — where we come across a photo that stuns us into saying, “Oh, I wish I could’ve taken that.” That was my first reaction when I came across the photo above. Then I thought about it some more, stared some more, researched some more, and this article is a result of that.
The photo, titled “Artemis II Looking Back at Earth,” is part of a collection of images released over the nine days, one hour, 32 minutes and 15 seconds that made up the recent Artemis II lunar mission. The goal of the mission was to serve as a test flight for future landings on the Moon, with the eventual goal of establishing a permanent human presence there, not unlike the International Space Station, mostly for scientific research purposes.
This was the second time NASA ever launched their newest Space Launch System (SLS), the first time being the Artemis I unmanned test flight in 2022. This flight took astronauts on a loop around the far side of the Moon, seen by human eyes for the first time ever. It also broke the record for the farthest from Earth any humans have ever been, at 252,756 miles away, a little over 4,000 more miles than Apollo 13 in 1970.
Although the mission itself is a fascinating one, it has been extensively covered by others. As a bit of a photographer myself, I want to focus on the photography that happened on that trip.
On a mission like this, practice is crucial. You do not get a second chance at photographing the far side of the Moon, Earth setting or a solar eclipse, for that matter. It was the first time humans were going to the dark side of the Moon, and the photos had to be good. The astronauts came prepared.
Before their historic flight, the astronauts received photography training from NASA photography and video trainers Paul Reichert and Katrina Willoughby. Reichert and Willoughby are both graduates of the Rochester Institute of Technology’s Photographic Sciences Program. Over a two-year period divided into around 10 sessions, the crew had access to a model of the Orion space capsule, including an inflatable moon model, inside which they could practice taking specific photos at the request of their instructors.
“We have mock-ups of the different vehicles so the crew can practice using the cameras in a flight-like environment. For training, we’ll give them a problem or a request for a certain kind of photo, and then we let them work through how they’re going to accomplish the task,” Reichart told RIT. “In the end, when they’re on their space mission, we can’t be there with them, so they need to feel confident that they can figure some of this stuff out on their own.”
The cameras they used were primarily the 10-year-old Nikon D5 DSLRs. Although modern mirrorless cameras can have superior low-light performance and significantly better autofocus technologies, in space, reliability is what matters most. “We had a lot of flight experience with it,” Reichert told Reuters. “We knew it could handle radiation, at least several years of radiation dosage on the ISS, and it didn’t have any problems with it.”
New to this trip was also the addition of an iPhone, which was used to capture some of the trip’s most iconic photos, including a wonderful selfie of Commander Reid Wiseman. A GoPro HERO 4 was also mounted on the outside of the spaceship, capturing photos from another perspective.
Our photo, “Artemis II Looking Back at Earth” was taken on April 2, after the completion of the translunar injection burn, by Mission Commander Reid Wiseman. It was taken on the aforementioned Nikon D5 with a 35 millimeter F2 lens. The photo was shot at a high aperture of F20 and a shutter speed of 1/250th of a second.
The photo depicts a sliver of Mother Earth peeking through a window of an object made on that very planet, speeding away from her in search of another world. The subject is framed by the window of the spacecraft, with the wiring and bolts visible. The dark night outside is illuminated by Earth, a light in the sparkling darkness of space. Interestingly, the photo was taken with the flash firing, presumably to compensate for the high brightness of Earth relative to the inside of the capsule.
This photo struck me as unique compared to the vast library of space photos. When we look at photos taken from Earth, we seem to be all that matters. It is a geocentric world down here. We look at photos of concerts and people and places and things, and they all seem to revolve around our planet. On the other hand, when we look at a photo like the famous “Pale Blue Dot,” taken by Voyager 1 in February of 1990 from 3.7 billion miles away from the Sun, we see Earth as utterly insignificant even within our own solar system. Let alone the vast multitudes of galaxies and possible universes.
So, are we cosmically great or cosmically insignificant? I think this photo, among others taken on this mission, holds the answer. As insignificant as the “Pale Blue Dot” suggests we are, if we go up to those rocks and craters not so far away, we can create significance. We diminish our little insignificances, our differences, our pettiness, and we shine a wonderfully bright light on our communal significance, on the difference we can make together.
That is why this photo speaks to me. Although small, Earth does not look insignificant from this view; a couple of billion miles out, and Earth is just a flicker of light. From down here, humanity seems divided; from farther away, humanity seems insignificant; from the Moon, humanity seems as one.
The late Irish poet Patrick Kavanagh wrote about the uniquely human power of seeing the soul from the outside. I think it is likewise important to consider what it means to see our civilization from the outside, both the beautiful and the ugly, and assess our future inspired by this.
Mission specialist Jermey Hanson, at a press conference shortly after crashing down in the Pacific, expressed this idea marvelously, saying, “I would suggest to you that when you look up here, you’re not looking at us; we are a mirror reflecting you.”
“If you like what you see, then just look a little deeper. This is you.”
Photo Caption: Artemis II looking back at Earth
Photo Credit: NASA