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Stellar Artemis II photos taken with old-model Nikon worth about $1,000: ‘Proven technology’

By
Alex Oliveira
Published April 7, 2026, 6:33 p.m. ET


Most of the out-of-this-world photos being beamed home from Artemis II were taken with an old-model Nikon camera that can be bought for about $1,000.
NASA traded in the legendary Hasselblad model it used on Apollo missions years ago for the Nikon D5 DSLR — a classic digital single-lens-reflex camera first released in 2016.
The Nikon was carefully selected for its proven track record as a workhorse space camera, as well as its extraordinary ability to pick up detail even in extreme darkness, Nikon’s top NASA consultant told The Post on Tuesday.
The Moon eclipses the Sun, as seen from lunar orbit with stars visible in the dark background.7
This shot of Earth over the moon’s surface was taken with a 10-year-old Nikon DSLR, worth about $1,000 used.NASA/AFP via Getty Images

“It’s been tested for years,” said Mike Corrado, the senior manager of Nikon Pro Services who has spent more than four decades training NASA astronauts how to become photographers for missions.

“It’s proven technology.”

He said the Nikon D5 has been used successfully in space since 2017 — and “is still producing amazing images for them.”
One of the camera’s top-selling points for Artemis II was its incredible low-light capabilities, Corrado said.
Christina Koch in the Orion mockup, wearing a headset and holding a camera with a large lens.
Artemis II astronaut Christina Koch works with a Nikon digital camera, one of several that were brought onboard.NASA/James Blair

The camera is able to shoot at an ISO — or light-sensitivity rating — of up to 3.2 million.
By comparison, the light sensitivity of the film run through previous Apollo missions’ Hasselblad cameras was no higher than 160 ISO.
That means the Artemis II’s astronauts who wielded the camera were able to extract as much information from the shadows of the lunar surface as almost any modern camera allows.
The mission’s stunning first photos shot from the dark side of the moon showed a blue-and-white Earth peeking out from above the lunar body’s grayish-brown cratered face.
Other snapshots included a beautiful solar eclipse and selfies of the crew with their special cardboard and plastic eclipse glasses on watching it.
The Moon eclipses the Sun, as seen from lunar orbit with stars visible in the dark background.7
This shot of moon was taken with a Nikon Z9, the camera which is expected to be taken to the lunar surface in 2028.AP
View of the Moon's surface with numerous craters and shadows, captured through the Orion spacecraft window.7
Artemis II’s crew saw clear swaths of the far side of the moon for the first time and took stunning photos.via REUTERS

The Nikon D5 also has a proven record of being resistant to the high levels of radiation constantly flying through space, which can destroy the electronics and sensors needed to make a digital camera work and which Artemis II was particularly susceptible to in the deeps of space.
NASA rigorously tests out its cameras to make sure they can handle such demands — a process which can take years to pass.
The D5 had those tests well under its belt after its time on the International Space Station.
All of that made the old D5s the obvious choice for Artemis II.
Astronaut Jeremy Hansen photographing through a camera shroud in the Orion spacecraft.7
The astronauts brought 17 handheld cameras to the moon with them on Artemis II’s 10-day space journey.Nasa/UPI/Shutterstock

“Certification happens on all different levels, like the battery has to be tested — I mean, it could take four years for the battery to be approved.” Corrado said.
“They want to check and balance everything and anything that could be a possible problem. And they they’re very, very diligent about that.”
The D5 is a long walk from the days of Apollo, when some of history’s most iconic photos were taken on medium-format Hasselblad cameras equipped with huge magazines of film.
All that film took up valuable space and weight on the spacecraft, while Artemis II is able to store just as many and more photos on memory cars about the size of a postage stamp.
Nikon began supplying digital cameras for NASA around 2000 and has been sending cameras to space since 1971, when 35mm Nikon Fs joined the Hasselblads as part of the crew’s standard photography kit.
Astronaut Alan Bean holding a container of lunar soil on the Moon.7
Apollo 12 astronaut Alan Bean had a Hasselblad film camera strapped to his chest on the lunar surface in 1969.Getty Images
A Hasselblad EL Data Camera, used during Apollo lunar missions, displayed on a glass surface.7
The Apollo missions relied on specially designed Hasselblad cameras loaded with massive magazines of film.AFP via Getty Images

But more changes are afoot.
Nikon’s most advanced camera — the Z9 — is expected to be onboard Artemis IV when its astronauts make their predicted 2028 moon landing.
One was brought onboard Artemis II to undergo its deep space certification, Corrado said.

“Reid [Wiseman] is up there testing and evaluating as we speak,’’ Corrado said of the current mission’s commander.
“A lot of what’s going to happen is the camera will come back, and we’ll evaluate what the results were,” he said. “So far, what we’re seeing are phenomenal.

“After this mission, it should be Z9. They won’t go back to the D5 after this,” he said. “Once they fully test and continue to test, the Z9 will be the camera going to the moon.”
Artemis II brought a total 32 cameras onboard for their 10-day mission.

Fifteen were mounted on the spacecraft, and 17 were handheld cameras the crew operated while peering out the cabin windows during their historic flyby of the lunar far side.
They’ve even been taking photos with their iPhones, and have logged thousands of photo files which they’ve been able to beam back to Earth almost instantly.
 
pigfarmer said:
Stellar Artemis II photos taken with old-model Nikon worth about $1,000: ‘Proven technology’

By
Alex Oliveira
Published April 7, 2026, 6:33 p.m. ET


Most of the out-of-this-world photos being beamed home from Artemis II were taken with an old-model Nikon camera that can be bought for about $1,000.
NASA traded in the legendary Hasselblad model it used on Apollo missions years ago for the Nikon D5 DSLR — a classic digital single-lens-reflex camera first released in 2016.
The Nikon was carefully selected for its proven track record as a workhorse space camera, as well as its extraordinary ability to pick up detail even in extreme darkness, Nikon’s top NASA consultant told The Post on Tuesday.
The Moon eclipses the Sun, as seen from lunar orbit with stars visible in the dark background.7
This shot of Earth over the moon’s surface was taken with a 10-year-old Nikon DSLR, worth about $1,000 used.NASA/AFP via Getty Images

“It’s been tested for years,” said Mike Corrado, the senior manager of Nikon Pro Services who has spent more than four decades training NASA astronauts how to become photographers for missions.

“It’s proven technology.”

He said the Nikon D5 has been used successfully in space since 2017 — and “is still producing amazing images for them.”
One of the camera’s top-selling points for Artemis II was its incredible low-light capabilities, Corrado said.
Christina Koch in the Orion mockup, wearing a headset and holding a camera with a large lens.
Artemis II astronaut Christina Koch works with a Nikon digital camera, one of several that were brought onboard.NASA/James Blair

The camera is able to shoot at an ISO — or light-sensitivity rating — of up to 3.2 million.
By comparison, the light sensitivity of the film run through previous Apollo missions’ Hasselblad cameras was no higher than 160 ISO.
That means the Artemis II’s astronauts who wielded the camera were able to extract as much information from the shadows of the lunar surface as almost any modern camera allows.
The mission’s stunning first photos shot from the dark side of the moon showed a blue-and-white Earth peeking out from above the lunar body’s grayish-brown cratered face.
Other snapshots included a beautiful solar eclipse and selfies of the crew with their special cardboard and plastic eclipse glasses on watching it.
The Moon eclipses the Sun, as seen from lunar orbit with stars visible in the dark background.7
This shot of moon was taken with a Nikon Z9, the camera which is expected to be taken to the lunar surface in 2028.AP
View of the Moon's surface with numerous craters and shadows, captured through the Orion spacecraft window.'s surface with numerous craters and shadows, captured through the Orion spacecraft window.7
Artemis II’s crew saw clear swaths of the far side of the moon for the first time and took stunning photos.via REUTERS

The Nikon D5 also has a proven record of being resistant to the high levels of radiation constantly flying through space, which can destroy the electronics and sensors needed to make a digital camera work and which Artemis II was particularly susceptible to in the deeps of space.
NASA rigorously tests out its cameras to make sure they can handle such demands — a process which can take years to pass.
The D5 had those tests well under its belt after its time on the International Space Station.
All of that made the old D5s the obvious choice for Artemis II.
Astronaut Jeremy Hansen photographing through a camera shroud in the Orion spacecraft.7
The astronauts brought 17 handheld cameras to the moon with them on Artemis II’s 10-day space journey.Nasa/UPI/Shutterstock

“Certification happens on all different levels, like the battery has to be tested — I mean, it could take four years for the battery to be approved.” Corrado said.
“They want to check and balance everything and anything that could be a possible problem. And they they’re very, very diligent about that.”
The D5 is a long walk from the days of Apollo, when some of history’s most iconic photos were taken on medium-format Hasselblad cameras equipped with huge magazines of film.
All that film took up valuable space and weight on the spacecraft, while Artemis II is able to store just as many and more photos on memory cars about the size of a postage stamp.
Nikon began supplying digital cameras for NASA around 2000 and has been sending cameras to space since 1971, when 35mm Nikon Fs joined the Hasselblads as part of the crew’s standard photography kit.
Astronaut Alan Bean holding a container of lunar soil on the Moon.7
Apollo 12 astronaut Alan Bean had a Hasselblad film camera strapped to his chest on the lunar surface in 1969.Getty Images
A Hasselblad EL Data Camera, used during Apollo lunar missions, displayed on a glass surface.7
The Apollo missions relied on specially designed Hasselblad cameras loaded with massive magazines of film.AFP via Getty Images

But more changes are afoot.
Nikon’s most advanced camera — the Z9 — is expected to be onboard Artemis IV when its astronauts make their predicted 2028 moon landing.
One was brought onboard Artemis II to undergo its deep space certification, Corrado said.

“Reid [Wiseman] is up there testing and evaluating as we speak,’’ Corrado said of the current mission’s commander.
“A lot of what’s going to happen is the camera will come back, and we’ll evaluate what the results were,” he said. “So far, what we’re seeing are phenomenal.

“After this mission, it should be Z9. They won’t go back to the D5 after this,” he said. “Once they fully test and continue to test, the Z9 will be the camera going to the moon.”
Artemis II brought a total 32 cameras onboard for their 10-day mission.

Fifteen were mounted on the spacecraft, and 17 were handheld cameras the crew operated while peering out the cabin windows during their historic flyby of the lunar far side.
They’ve even been taking photos with their iPhones, and have logged thousands of photo files which they’ve been able to beam back to Earth almost instantly.
Click to expand...

Its actually an awesome article. I bet that secondhand Nikon D5 DSLRs are going to shoot up in value on eBay.
 
pigfarmer said:
Is that a real image? I read that they weren't close enough for that level of resolution
Click to expand...
So what is next? Are we now going to get Artemis II lonar mission deniers?

One thing is that is strange is that obviously one must use very wide lens to capture such a wide scene, yet there is no distortion typical for wide lenses. Maybe image was post-processed to correct for wide angle distortion?
 
I think their closest approach was 2500 miles and they were using iphones and other commercial cameras to snap pics. I read somewhere they passed over Apollo 12 and 14 landing sites but lacked the resolution which is why I asked. I don't know, maybe that shot was from the LRO.
 
pigfarmer said:
I think their closest approach was 2500 miles and they were using iphones and other commercial cameras to snap pics. I read somewhere they passed over Apollo 12 and 14 landing sites but lacked the resolution which is why I asked. I don't know, maybe that shot was from the LRO.
Click to expand...
Considering the angle of the shot it looks like there is a camera on the tip of the solar pannel, so both ship and the piece of sky can be framed.
 
A company in UK is using a few grams of fuel to create and accelerate plasma with super-conducting magnets so much that it can push SpaceX' Starship all the way to the Mars in less time then anybody else.


View: https://youtu.be/RohseUoSHkM


. . . what is amazing their spaceships are very small, because they only use few grams of fuel (same as UFOs!).
 

Scientists Found an 'Impossible' Atmosphere on a Tiny World Beyond Neptune​

In the wild unknown, out beyond the orbit of Neptune, astronomers have found a tiny world that defies our understanding of skies.

This baffling object measures around 500 kilometers (310 miles) across, too small for its weak gravity to retain an atmosphere for long – yet an atmosphere it has. It's thin and tenuous, to be sure, but a world as small as (612533) 2002 XV93 shouldn't have an atmosphere at all.

It may not sound like much, but this relatively minuscule chunk of ice and rock in the cold, dark reaches of the Solar System may change what we know about atmospheric retention.

In the process of studying the icy world, astronomers have showcased cutting-edge techniques for finding faint phenomena, so far away.

2002 XV93, as it is known for short, is a type of object known as a plutino. It's a small body that shares an orbit similar to Pluto's orbital rhythm, at around 40 times Earth's distance from the Sun, in resonance with Neptune's orbit.

These small icy worlds are thought to represent a fossil record of the early Solar System, recording information about what it was made of and how things moved around in it. The resonance with Neptune, for example, shows that Neptune moved outwards, sweeping things up as it went.

But the space out beyond Neptune – the Kuiper belt – is a strange sort of no-man's-land for astronomy. It's filled with small, icy objects that are extremely difficult to find, let alone study in detail, because they're too far from the Sun to reflect much light we can detect.

Often, scientists need to rely on indirect detection methods. In the case of 2002 XV93, the method of observation relied heavily on chance: In 2024, astronomers led by Ko Arimatsu of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan were in just the right place to watch it pass in front of a distant star – an event known as a stellar occultation.

The researchers captured the occultation from three different locations in Japan, recording in minute detail as the star's light was temporarily snuffed out by the much closer plutino.

For a bare rock, the way the star's light would change over the course of the occultation is pretty stark and straightforward – suddenly winking out as 2002 XV93 slipped in front of it, and winking back as the occultation concluded.

However, that's not what the astronomers observed. The entire event lasted just 15 to 20 seconds, depending on the viewing location – and for about 1.5 seconds before and after totality, the light curve showed a gradual dimming and brightening, respectively.

This kind of gradual fading can only be explained if the starlight passed through an atmosphere, bending (refracting) as it went.

Based on this dimming and brightening, the researchers built refraction models to understand what kind of atmosphere could have produced the signal. Using Pluto's atmosphere as a basis, they assumed a specific temperature structure and a composition mainly made up of methane, nitrogen, or carbon monoxide.

Then, they simulated how dense that atmosphere would be at different altitudes, and how light would bend as it passed through.

Their closest results suggested an atmosphere of just 100 to 200 nanobars – around 5 to 10 million times thinner than the atmospheric density of Earth at sea level.

This is wild for several reasons. The first is that we now have instruments sensitive enough to detect refraction through a barely-there atmosphere from the far reaches of the Solar System.

The second is that the team's models suggest such an atmosphere would be lost in as little as a few hundred to a thousand years. The most plausible way that it could have an atmosphere now is if that atmosphere is being replenished somehow.

Given that there are many objects in the Kuiper belt, one scenario the researchers propose is that a comet smashed into 2002 XV93, releasing gas that has formed a temporary atmosphere that will soon dissipate.

The other possibility is that, like Pluto, 2002 XV93 has active cryovolcanoes, which release icy sludge and volatiles from within the plutino, replenishing a constantly leaking atmosphere.

Whatever it is, though, the object represents the first atmosphere detected in a small trans-Neptunian object (TNO), other than Pluto. The results suggest that even small bodies can host atmospheres, and, even more excitingly, with a bit of luck, we can detect them even when they are next to nonexistent.

"This discovery suggests that the traditional idea that global dense atmospheres form only around larger planets must be revised," the researchers write in their paper.

"Even a few-hundred-kilometer TNO can host, at least transiently, an atmosphere, challenging standard volatile-retention scenarios. Our findings suggest that a fraction of distant icy minor planets can exhibit atmospheres, potentially sustained by ongoing cryovolcanic activity or produced by a recent impact of a small icy object."

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Very good video about digitising and then restoring 15,000 Apollo mission images with AI. What AI was being able to do was to do, when one has lots of images of the same area, like from movie camera, was to super-impose these images on a top of each other in which way noise would cancel and real detail will reinforce. Long story short, one gets very sharp images from very blurry ones.

For example, this technique was applied to original blurry movie roll of Neil Armstrong first steps on the Moon with big improvement of sharpness, so much so, that one can see expression on his face.

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View: https://youtu.be/78sNTWkqEVo
 

An unknown substance detected on the surface of Pluto and Titan​

An astonishing discovery comes from the outer reaches of the Solar System: Pluto and Titan, two very different celestial bodies, both display an absorption line never before observed. The James Webb Space Telescope detected this signature at 5.11 micrometers, a wavelength that does not correspond to any known chemical compound elsewhere. This observation indicates that a yet-unidentified molecule exists on the surface of these two bodies.

To grasp the significance of this finding, we must recall the principle of spectroscopy. Each element or molecule absorbs specific wavelengths of light. By analyzing the light reflected by a celestial body, astronomers look for dark lines, called absorption lines, which betray the presence of a given substance. For example, molecular oxygen absorbs at 230 nanometers. This is how the composition of planets and moons is studied.

Thanks to its exceptional sensitivity, JWST was able to probe very short wavelengths, still little explored. By observing Pluto and Titan, scientists highlighted an absorption line at 5.11 micrometers. No previous publication mentions a similar line, whether for other planets in the Solar System or for exoplanets. The researchers therefore believe that this signature comes from an unknown molecule, present only on these two icy bodies.
It is remarkable that Pluto and Titan have very little in common. Titan, Saturn's largest moon, has rivers and oceans of liquid methane on its surface, and is larger than Mercury. Pluto, on the other hand, is a frozen dwarf planet, twice as small as Titan and four times farther from the Sun. Yet the two worlds share atmospheres rich in nitrogen and methane. But this unknown molecule appears to be located on their surfaces, not in their atmospheres.

On Pluto, the absorption line is about three times stronger than on Titan, indicating a higher concentration. On Titan, the distribution is uneven: the trailing hemisphere (the one opposite the direction of rotation around Saturn) shows stronger absorption than the leading hemisphere. This asymmetry intrigues researchers, who are working to understand its origin.

Several explanations have been proposed. It could be benzene, a ring-shaped hydrocarbon, mixed with another unknown molecule. Or else acetylene or ketene ice. But none of these leads are confirmed yet. The study authors note that additional work is needed to definitively identify the compound responsible for this 5.11-micrometer absorption.

The future may bring answers. NASA's Dragonfly mission, scheduled for launch after 2028, is to fly over Titan in 2034. This robotic helicopter will carry a spectrograph capable of analyzing the moon's surface. In the meantime, astronomers remain alert, hoping to solve this mystery.

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When visiting our elderly aunt in NJ I keep up a steady conversation to keep her away from politics and she seems to enjoy it, she's alone too much as it is. Sometimes I completely run out of ideas so I started showing her the UFO pics the DoW has released recently and she was literally shocked.

The other day I started talking about Artemis and how we'd sent probes around the solar system. She had no clue so I showed her some hi res pictures of Pluto, the moons of Jupiter, the surface of Mars, all sorts of stuff we tend to take for granted anymore This literally left her agape, she loved it. Sort of a Star Trek moment.

Imagine what that must have been like from her p.o.v having been born in 1936 and having it all at once.
 
pigfarmer said:
When visiting our elderly aunt in NJ I keep up a steady conversation to keep her away from politics and she seems to enjoy it, she's alone too much as it is. Sometimes I completely run out of ideas so I started showing her the UFO pics the DoW has released recently and she was literally shocked.

The other day I started talking about Artemis and how we'd sent probes around the solar system. She had no clue so I showed her some hi res pictures of Pluto, the moons of Jupiter, the surface of Mars, all sorts of stuff we tend to take for granted anymore This literally left her agape, she loved it. Sort of a Star Trek moment.

Imagine what that must have been like from her p.o.v having been born in 1936 and having it all at once.
Click to expand...
But how comes she never seen these pictures on TV or in papers?
 
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