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From Above: What It’s Like To Be An Astronaut Photographer With Don Petit

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For a lot of us, travelling to space and taking photographs sounds like a dream job. For Don Pettit, it’s just another day at the office. In fact, part of his official NASA training included working with a number of professional photographers and trainers. Of course, being an astronaut photographer isn’t just taking beautiful photos from outer space. Pettit said in an interview with SmugMug, there’s actually a lot of engineering photography to be done, which Pettit says is actually quite uninteresting to the public.

“We have to take macro images of pins in an electrical connector or a bit of grunge in a hydraulic quick-disconnect fitting or little patterns that might develop on the surface of one of the windows. These things need to be documented so the images can be downlinked for engineers on the ground to assess what’s happening to the systems on space station. We get training specifically on doing these engineering images, which, for the most part, are not really interesting to the public.

Photography on the space station is more than just taking a bunch of pretty pictures. We take pictures of Earth and the surroundings of earth, and these pictures represent a scientific data set recorded now for over 14 years. About 1.2 million pictures were taken as of July 2012.”

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Astronauts Aboard The ISS Immerse A GoPro Into A Floating Sphere Of Water

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This is proof that astronauts are just the best. The team aboard the International Space Station decided to kill some time by releasing a large ball of water into the spacecraft and sticking a GoPro inside it. Because they are in space, the surface tension of the water caused it to take on a spherical shape, allowing enough room for the action camera to fit inside as it floated around in the cabin. There’s also some really cool footage of the astronauts attempting to handle the sphere. Their reaction to the experience is almost as fun to watch as the GoPro water ball itself.

As further proof that astraunts rule, NASA even filmed the entire thing in 3D for our ultimate viewing pleasure (so long as you have the appropriate 3D eyewear to make it work). But, even if you don’t have 3D glasses, the 2D version is pretty rad, too. Take a look at the awesome footage, below. It certainly puts a whole new perspective on underwater photography.[Read More…]

Buzz Aldrin On Taking Self Portraits In Space (Plus, A New Service That Let’s You Make Your Own Space Selfie?!)

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Let’s be real, space selfies are light years better than the average Instagram styled selfie. Photos taken of space from space are like the ultimate travel photos. It probably has something to do with the fact that some astronauts, like Buzz Aldrin, were orbiting earth at speeds of 17,000 mph and just casually snapped a selfie like what they’re doing is no big deal.  As Aldrin explains in the interview below, he was supposed to be photographing ultraviolet stars, but when the sun rose and he could no longer see the stars, he turned the camera on himself because he was curious to see what it would like and, you know, why not?.

Listen as Aldrin tells the story behind pioneering the space selfie, then read on to see how you can take a space selfie of your own.

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The Disposable Camera Astronauts Have Sent On A Suicide Mission To Capture Photos Of Burning Spacecraft

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The European Space Agency (ESA) is launching a camera into space via a supply ferry, the Automated Transfer Vehicle 5 (ATV-5) which headed to the International Space Station. Launching cameras into space isn’t particularly rare in itself, but this camera is kinda special. The Automated Transfer Vehicle Break-Up Camera was designed in just nine short months by team members of the ESA specifically for this mission. The Break-Up Camera is a disposable infrared camera that will photograph the reentry of the  ATV back into earth’s atmosphere where it is destined to burn up in a blaze of glory.[Read More…]

A Picture of This Week’s Meteor Shower from Space Itself

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We’ve all got that picture that we can only shoot once in a lifetime. With the upcoming meteor shower this week, that shot might even come for one of us then. So when you’re a photographer working for NASA, it’s safe to say that you’re not just limited to one once-in-a-lifetime capture.

That’s the kind of shots that Ron Garan takes, while working as a photographer for NASA. Back in 2011, he had the opportunity to capture how the Perseid Meteor Shower looks from space, onboard the International Space Station itself; in celebration of the Perseid’s return, the picture was just recently posted on NASA’s website.

“Denizens of planet Earth typically watch meteor showers by looking up. But this remarkable view, captured on August 13, 2011 by astronaut Ron Garan, caught a Perseid meteor by looking down. From Garan’s perspective onboard the International Space Station orbiting at an altitude of about 380 kilometers, the Perseid meteors streak below, swept up dust left from comet Swift-Tuttle heated to incandescence. The glowing comet dust grains are traveling at about 60 kilometers per second through the denser atmosphere around 100 kilometers above Earth’s surface. In this case, the foreshortened meteor flash is right of frame center, below the curving limb of the Earth and a layer of greenish airglow, just below bright star Arcturus.”

– A description of the photo from NASA

By the way, this isn’t an event only exclusive to North Americans or Europeans. People from all over the world will be able to witness it this week. With the Supermoon coinciding this week, you should probably check out a few articles online on how best to view it from where you live. We might not all get a change to photograph these lights from space, but we can still shoot that lifetime-worthy picture. All it takes is inspiration and the will to act on it.

And money for gear. But mostly inspiration.

[NASA via PetaPixel]

‘Saddest’ Picture From Space Shows Rockets Flying Over Gaza And Israel

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Usually when we share something from the International Space Station (ISS) it is some awesome time lapse or incredible captures of earth and stars. Today however, our share is not as happy.

German Astronaut Alexander Gerst  shows how the awful things we do on earth is seen from space, in a post and a tweet titled ‘My saddest photo yet ‘ Alexander shares a picture showing the rockets flying the the middle east skirmish (war?) in Gazza.[Read More…]

Hackers Recover NASA’s Lost Lunar Photos. Look Better Than The Originals

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Back in 1966, the US was on a hunt for landing on the moon. As part of NASA’s location scouting for a landing site, they sent five Lunar Orbiters satellites to photograph the moon. After sending those photos to earth, the Orbiters were crushed into the moon, clearing oath for Apollo, with the original film lost forever, and only a poorly rendered images remaining back here on earth.

The Lunar Orbiter Image Recovery Project (LOIRP), is a team of self-appointed hackers whose mission is to regenerate those photographs. Wired‘s  Doug Bierend wonderful shared their story with the world.[Read More…]

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