Doctored Moon Landing Photos

[aphh]

Some of the images from the moon are obvious composites, or "mosaics" (as one well-known moderator and member here likes to call a photo stitched together from multiple images) for whatever reason.

Take this image, forexample:

You can see that it is a composite of 2 separate images, the foreground and the background. They have different contrast characteristics. The foreground shows contrast typical for moon (very dark shadows), whereas the background does not have one area where the shadows would reach total darkness.

There should be black shadows in the background as dictated by laws of physics and optics, but there is not. This is a composite of foreground and background for certain.

There is no air or "haze" or anything to lessen the contrast when distance grows, so the background should have exactly the same contrast range as the foreground, but it doesn't.

Whole image here: http://www.zewg.net/dump/thumblist.php?show=rover3.jpg

When you realize that composites are presented as the real thing, you have to ask what else is being presented as real, but is in fact fabricated reality?

 

[rfoshaug]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Some of the images from the moon are obvious composites, or "mosaics" (as one well-known moderator and member here likes to call a photo stitched together from multiple images) for whatever reason.

Take this image, forexample:

You can see that it is a composite of 2 separate images, the foreground and the background. They have different contrast characteristics. The foreground shows contrast typical for moon (very dark shadows), whereas the background does not have one area where the shadows would reach total darkness.

There should be black shadows in the background as dictated by laws of physics and optics, but there is not. This is a composite of foreground and background for certain.

There is no air or "haze" or anything to lessen the contrast when distance grows, so the background should have exactly the same contrast range as the foreground, but it doesn't.

Whole image here: http://www.zewg.net/dump/thumblist.php?show=rover3.jpg

When you realize that composites are presented as the real thing, you have to ask what else is being presented as real, but is in fact fabricated reality?

I do not believe that this is a composite image.

If you look at the whole image, you can see a rock just below the astronaut's left elbow. This rock lies just on the edge of a slope as seen from the camera.


Looking at the cropped image there is a noticable shift in level of detail in the upper and the lower part. But this is not due to image stitching. This is because the lower part (where you can see pebbles and small features which have jagged edges and cast visible shadows) is much much closer to the camera than the upper part (where pebbles are way too small to see and you can only resolve larger features such as craters which have smoother shapes and don't cast shadows that can be seen from the camera).

As you say yourself, there is no atmospheric haze on the moon, so judging distances is quite difficult. On at least one occasion the astronauts drove up to a rock that looked as big as a car. But as they got closer they realized it had been farther away than they thought and was actually as big as a house!

In the cropped image you can see that the ridgeline is not perfectly straight, and some small rocks protrude from it, so it's obviously not a composite image. When looking at the image, imagine that you can see a dog sitting by the wheel of the rover in the lower part of the picture, and a house down on the plain that you can see in the upper part of the image. The dog would appear larger than the house because of its proximity to the camera.



Also, another note. Many people (especially moon hoax believers) use an often misunderstood phenomenon to claim that images are fake. They say that as the Moon has no atmosphere, you don't get a bright blue sky to "fill in the shadows". The only light source is the sun. So you should get black shadows. To some extent this is true and correct. But not always.

First of all you have Earthshine. This is light that has hit Earth (and its white clouds) and is reflected back to the lunar surface, just like moonlight here on Earth is capable of illuminating the landscape even when the sun is below the horizon. This effect is present, but not very strong, and on a lunar surface bathed in sunlight you probably wouldn't notice it.

So where does the light come from that prevents the shadows from being totally black? Surely this must be spotlights in the studio where they faked it?? No! It comes from the moon itself. If the moon in the sky down here on Earth is bright enough to let people do the harvest in the middle of the night (and the moon is only 0.5° big on the sky), what would a brightly illuminated nearby lunar mountain do on the lunar surface? Exactly the same thing! Except that it fills a part of your sky that is much, much bigger than half a degree. This goes for other objects as well. Apollo 11 landed in a very flat landscape with few mountains. How can the astronauts' suits be visible on the shadow side? They are illuminated by reflected light from the surrounding (close-by) lunar landscape as well as their own equipment. Imagine being a small creature sitting in the shadow of an astronaut while the other one is in bright sunlight with his white suit taking the photo. Would your sky be totally black or would you see a brightly illuminated space suit? You would not be in total darkness.

There are so many misconceptions and misunderstandings (and outright lies as well) regarding the alleged lunar landing hoax. Because the lack of extremely intelligent people like me ( :lol: ), this "evidence" gets to live on uncontested in many circles. It's fun to discuss the hoax theories because one gets to set a few persons straight now and then. But it's really sad that one of the greatest achievements (if not the greatest) of the 1900's is constantly tainted by false claims.

 

[aphh]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

what would a brightly illuminated nearby lunar mountain do on the lunar surface? Exactly the same thing!

You can have a look at recent Kaguya images, taken by the Japanese moon orbiter. They are real images from the Moon, not composites, and they all have black shadows in every image regardless of distance or other conditions.

 

[MeteorWayne]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Uhhh, you are comparing orbital images to ones taken on the surface. And you say you understand imaging??? :lol: :roll:

 

[aphh]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Uhhh, you are comparing orbital images to ones taken on the surface. And you say you understand imaging??? :lol: :roll:

And the difference for the contrast is... what?

 

[MeteorWayne]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

It's so obvious, I won't waste my time right now. Perhaps someone else will. I'll get around to it when I have the time.

 

[aphh]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

It's so obvious, I won't waste my time right now. Perhaps someone else will. I'll get around to it when I have the time.

If it is so obvious, why not explain it in a few words? Why does the background of the rover image lack dark shadows completely, while the foreground has them?

What limited the contrast for the background for that image so greatly, if not having a separate image with different contrast range as background?

 

[MeteorWayne]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Because it's so obvious that anyone who knew anything about imaging would already know the answer so I will have to go back to imaging 101 to explain it. And I just don't have the time right now. I have real science projects to work on at the moment, and arguing with a moon hoax believer is just not worth the time right now.

 

[SpeedFreek]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

In the foreground the only black shadows are caused by rocks, the lunar rover, the astronaut and some of the deepest ruts in the lunar rover tracks.

Show me a rock, a lunar rover, an astronaut, a deep rut, or anything that has a side that is roughly perpendicular to the moons surface and is visible in the background. Those hills on the horizon have no sharp elevations that would cause black shadows. There is nothing visible in the background that should cast a shadow, is there? If there is, what is it?

Since when should the sides of gentle inclines cast black shadows? Remember, the foreground shadows aren't very long, so the sun is not just poking over the horizon here. It looks to be at least 10 - 15 degrees above the horizon, perhaps more.

 

[Kerberos]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

It's so obvious, I won't waste my time right now. Perhaps someone else will. I'll get around to it when I have the time.

That excuse gets used a lot when people really don't have an answer. If it's really so obvious, then you should have no trouble explaining it. You're on here all the time, so don't use the weak excuse that you don't have time.

 

[MeteorWayne]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Balony. Making a quick answer is not the same as trying to teach basic imaging to someone who is supposed to be an expert on the subject.

If he can't see the fallacy, I have to do hours of research to educate him on what he already allegedly knows. It's not simple to document all the facts. One difference in our styles. He says "I think so", when challenged I have to construct a bulletproof defense that even a deliberately disingenuous person can't refute. That's much harder.

 

[Kerberos]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

No, that's an old trick I've noticed the Moon-landing True Believers using. Whenever someone shows them something they can't refute, they resort to ridicule and laugh about how obvious the answer is, but when pressed to give this obvious answer, they always claim that they don't have time or something similar.

It's obvious that you don't have a clue how to explain this clearly composite photo, but like a good little NASA apologist, you wink and suggest that the op is just not smart enough to understand.

 

[rfoshaug]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Hey, Kerberos,

Speedfreek told you what you need to know.

The sun is quite high in the sky on the Apollo photo. Only rocks and things that protrude quite sharply from the surface will cast a shadow. The craters in the upper (far) end of the image are not that steep. Yes, they too have tiny rocks that cast tiny shadows, but these are too far away to see. But there are more/bigger/longer such tiny shadows in the crater walls that are on the sun-side of the craters, as there in effect have a lower sun angle relative to local (sloped) ground. You can see that there is SHADING on these craters, partly due to these small shadows and partly due to the local sun angle being lower (ie. fewer watts sunlight per square meter lunar surface).


The Kaguya image you present is fake, aphh.

:lol:

Nah, just kidding. That would be a hoax-believer's simple answer. But seriously, if Apollo images are fake, how can you use other images of the lunar surface as evidence of something real? How do we know THAT mission took place if Apollo was faked?


I don't have any data of the sun's elevation in either of the two (Kaguya/Apollo) images (have you?), but I believe the sun is quite a bit lower and/or the mountain sides are steeper in the Kaguya image than the craters on the Apollo image.

Yes, shadows are darker than those on Earth (as Earth has haze and a blue sky that illuminates stuff that is hidden from direct sunlight) and contrasts on the lunar surface are greater. In some images they will appear almost completely dark (sometimes shadows on Earth look completely dark as well, depending on conditions). Especially in photographs as cameras are not as adaptive as the human eye (which btw is not perfect either). Just like the "shouldn't there be stars visible on the sky" argument.

But if you were down on the ground in one of those shadows you would see that it is not completely pitch black (although your eyes might adapt to darkness good enough there for you to see stars, hehe). And sometimes this effect is more visible and visible in Apollo photos and used by hoax believers to prove their case when they claim that ALL shadows should be COMPLETELY PITCH BLACK on the moon. That's just not correct at all.

If users aphh and Kerberos on space dot com's forum can easily see that images are faked, why wouldn't NASA's brightest heads (who obviously weren't busy with real lunar landings) think of this? Here we have the biggest conspiration in human history and silly simple glitches give them away in minutes? Come on...

 

[Kerberos]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

If users aphh and Kerberos on space dot com's forum can easily see that images are faked, why wouldn't NASA's brightest heads (who obviously weren't busy with real lunar landings) think of this? Here we have the biggest conspiration in human history and silly simple glitches give them away in minutes? Come on...

Thanks for the reply, rfoshaug.

Yes, that is the question, isn't it? Such obviously faked photos can't be accidents by NASA. Why did they release these photos if they have nothing to hide? If they have real, undoctored, photos, why not release them instead? Maybe it's because they never had them to release because they never landed.

 

[Kerberos]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

What I want to know is why haven't the conspiracy theorists been able to find any scientific evidence to prove their hoax claim? It's been forty years now since Apollo 11 landed on the moon. How much more time do they need?

All of the evidence I have seen certainly supports the manned landings as they happened. It seems like all the hoaxheads can do is ask questions and make assumptions based on their limited knowledge.

No, the skeptics, including the OP here, have brought up some serious issues and asked some serious questions. The burden of proof is on the True-Believers, however. They are the ones making the extraordinary claims of landing men on the Moon, and it is therefore their responsibility to answer and explain the discrepancies pointed out by the skeptics.

I would be very interested in hearing their explanations instead of their ridicule and/or excuses. Until then, I can only conclude that they are hiding something.

 

[SpeedFreek]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

You heard my explanation for that photo. Do you not agree that there is nothing in the background that should cast a black shadow, due to everything visible in the background having only shallow angles and the sun not being low on the horizon?

 

[Kerberos]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

See, now, you're doing it again. You're making excuses for avoiding the questions.

If it's really so obvious, then just explain why NASA released photos that appear to be composites. Wouldn't that be easier than all making all these excuses?

 

[aphh]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

There will always be another question, another lame fake photo, etc. that they will trot out and demand it be explained away.

Moon landings might well be true, the images from the moon not so. Let's take one more example:

Here is one more image, that has difficulties merging the background seamlessly into the foreground (these problems are very common in images with a scenic background).

Can you spot where the soundstage ends and the background plate begins? It's not really difficult:

But now comes the interesting part. Jaxa mapped the landing site of Apollo 15 and made a accurate 3D representation that we have here:

You can see that the backgrounds in both images are truly identical. Only the point where the foreground ends is different. The foreground in the NASA image is much higher. Why is this?

It's probably because they re-created the foreground of the image on a soundstage. The foreground needs to be higher to obscure the original foreground of the image. The background is actual footage from the Moon, the foreground in the NASA image may be re-created in studio.

Why NASA recreated the foregrounds of the images in many of the scenic moon images is a mystery, but I have presented my case and some pretty good analysis to back this hypothesis. You believe what you want, ofcourse, but the images from the Moon may not be true.

I challenge you to find a image from the Moon where the foreground merges seamlessly into the background.

 

[ZenGalacticore]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Come on now Kerb. We all know you don't really believe the Moon landings were faked. Stop taunting this guy. :roll:

 

[Kerberos]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Oh alright. I guess I should stop being an ass. :mrgreen:

 

[SpeedFreek]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

I challenge you to find a image from the Moon where the foreground merges seamlessly into the background.

 

[ZenGalacticore]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Good one Speedy. IIRC, that's Harrison Schmidt (my favorite astronaut and the only scientist to ever walk on the Moon) by the rock they named 'Big Joe'.

 

[Mee_n_Mac]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Good one Speedy. IIRC, that's Harrison Schmidt (my favorite astronaut and the only scientist to ever walk on the Moon) by the rock they named 'Big Joe'.

I dunno about dat. It doesn't appear to have infinite depth of feild, which is what I think some believe is required to be real. At f/5.6 and the focus set to "near" I bet it's not all that large.

 

[aphh]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Thanks for the images, they are gorgeous. I wish they were real, but they just do not convince me.

Here is why:

Once again the dividing line that separates the foreground from the background is there. Yes, you need to look a bit more closely this time, but still.

I think I spesifically asked for a seamless image. This just isn't it.

You know, this sucks. I'd like the images to be real, but so far all we've had is composites of more than just one image. This really sucks.

 

[ZenGalacticore]

Re: Moon Landings Faked?

Good one Speedy. IIRC, that's Harrison Schmidt (my favorite astronaut and the only scientist to ever walk on the Moon) by the rock they named 'Big Joe'.

I dunno about dat. It doesn't appear to have infinite depth of feild, which is what I think some believe is required to be real. At f/5.6 and the focus set to "near" I bet it's not all that large.

Large is relative. It looks like the biggest rock I've seen in the photos from the lunar surface where we have a human for scale.