7 ms·
Looking at the EXIF (with exiftool) for the image uploaded by NASA (https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/art002e000192.jpg https://www.nasa.gov/wp-co
by hannesfur 6mo ago
Looking at the EXIF (with exiftool) for the image uploaded by NASA (https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/art002e000192.jpg https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/art002e00019...), apparently this was taken by a Nikon D5 with an AF-S Zoom-Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8G ED and developed with Lightroom. It also seems like very little was done in Lightroom. Amazing...
I dumped the whole EXIF here: https://gist.github.com/umgefahren/a6f555e6588a98adb74eed79d734012c https://gist.github.com/umgefahren/a6f555e6588a98adb74eed79d...
- consumer451 6mo agoThanks! This was my first question.
- pants2 6mo agoWhile the D5 is a great camera it's ~10 years old. Wonder why they didn't go for the Z9 which is its modern mirrorless equivalent.
- reactordev 6mo agoGovernment budgets man…
- zimpenfish 6mo ago> Wonder why they didn't go for the Z9 which is its modern mirrorless equivalent. From [0], "The D5 was chosen for its radiation resistance, extreme ISO range (up to 3,280,000), and proven reliability in space." ( [0] https://www.photoworkout.com/artemis-ii-nikon-d5-moon/ https://www.photoworkout.com/artemis-ii-nikon-d5-moon/
- loloquwowndueo 6mo agoZero point in measuring camera sizes (or other sizes haha) when JWST is floating there.
- jimbosis 6mo ago"The Nikon D5 remains the camera of choice for the Artemis II mission and will be assigned primary photographic duties. It is a proven, highly-tested camera that the Artemis II team knows will excel in the high-radiation environment of space. However, as Artemis II Commander Reid Wiseman explained ahead of yesterday’s launch, he successfully fought to have a single Nikon Z9 added to Artemis II’s manifest." https://petapixel.com/2026/04/02/a-nikon-z9-made-it-aboard-the-artemis-ii-moon-mission-at-the-last-minute/ https://petapixel.com/2026/04/02/a-nikon-z9-made-it-aboard-t... There are more interesting details in the PetaPixel article, such as: "'That’s the camera that they’ll be using, the crew will be using on Artemis III plus, so we were fighting really hard to get that on the vehicle to test out in a high-radiation environment in deep space,' Wiseman said." H/t to "SiliconEagle73" who linked to that PetaPixel article in the thread linked below. https://old.reddit.com/r/nasa/comments/1sbfevm/new_high_resolution_image_of_the_earth_taken_by/ https://old.reddit.com/r/nasa/comments/1sbfevm/new_high_reso...
- porphyra 6mo agoThey did bring the Z9: https://petapixel.com/2026/04/02/a-nikon-z9-made-it-aboard-the-artemis-ii-moon-mission-at-the-last-minute/ https://petapixel.com/2026/04/02/a-nikon-z9-made-it-aboard-t... But yeah the grainy photo of the Earth with the D5 at ISO 51200 shows the shortcomings of the ancient DSLR. Still, great shot.
- hypercube33 6mo agoI'd argue the D4s and D5 may be some of the best high ISO cameras I'm aware of maybe surpassed by that one canon video camera that can seemingly see in the dark (sorry I'm mobile) and the D3s. I think the lower numbers produce nicer looking max ISO noise but that's all preference. Sony has the A7s as well but as with some of these the overall resolution isn't extreme.
- jeffreygoesto 6mo agoHow does the age of the camera influence physics? The only thing that really helps would be increasing the aperture.
- pants2 6mo agoLower noise sensors and better image stabilization for longer exposures
- porphyra 6mo agoNewer backside illuminated sensors have better quantum efficiency and are sensitive to a greater fraction of the light hitting the sensor thanks to the lack of electronics physically blocking the photosites. Not to mention advances in read noise and other stuff (less relevant for high end CMOS sensors for short exposures, which are shot noise dominated, but still).
- apitman 6mo agoIt might be the newest thing on the ship.
- miladyincontrol 6mo agoFrom what I recall reading its more or less, "we have established and validated processes for using the D5." Its less about getting the best possible photo, more about making sure what they do take looks fine and doesnt waste a ton of time.
- ericcumbee 6mo agoThe D5 has flight heritage to use the industry term.
- layer8 6mo agoBefore Lightroom it might have looked closer to this: https://images-assets.nasa.gov/image/art002e000193/art002e000193~large.jpg https://images-assets.nasa.gov/image/art002e000193/art002e00...
- consumer451 6mo agoMight I ask, what was your path to finding this image?
- rafram 6mo agohttps://www.nasa.gov/gallery/journey-to-the-moon/ https://www.nasa.gov/gallery/journey-to-the-moon/
- consumer451 6mo agoThanks so much. Sending this link to my nerdy nephews immediately.
- hannesfur 6mo agoFrom the EXIF we can infer that every setting was left at the default. No exposure comp, no contrast, no HSL, no lens correction and a linear tone curve. Just the default Adobe Color profile at 5400K.
- ranie93 6mo agoMaybe it’s because I (like many) have experienced taking pictures at night and seeing the grainy result that _this_ image struck me as incredibly realistic. Almost like I ran the grainy-to-real conversion in my mind and I felt like I was imagining seeing this in person. Beautiful image!
- divbzero 6mo agoThe photograph appears to show nightime on Earth with just a sliver of daytime. Beyond cities in Iberia and along the coast of Africa, most of what we can see would be reflected light from the Moon? We are just past full moon on April 1.
- SMAAART 6mo agohttps://exifinfo.org/detail/RjJtDLtCfS5kpq0fM2e7yA https://exifinfo.org/detail/RjJtDLtCfS5kpq0fM2e7yA
- to11mtm 6mo ago... My only curiosity, and yeah I know orders of significance etc... Buuuuut I wonder why they didn't consider a Z5[0][1] and the Z mount 14-24, or the Z5 with an adapter for the F mount 14-24.... There's at least a pound of weight savings on the table. Specifically, I wonder if it's a fun reason? i.e. it would be interesting if there was a technical reason like 'IBIS fails miserbly' or 'increased sensor resolution adds too much noise' (even at that ISO you gave from the EXIF...) [0] I'm really more of a Sony person but am thus keenly aware about importance of UX feel, so I tried to keep the question apples to apples here. Edited to add: [1] Per [0] I may be stupid in thinking the Z5 is a 'at least minimal' substitute so happy to learn something here.
- geerlingguy 6mo agoThey have a Z9 on board for radiation testing, but the D5 is the primary body for imaging on this mission IIRC
- to11mtm 6mo agoYeah other folks gave better insight while I was writing my comment, oops...
- throw0101d 6mo agoThe D5 has been used on the ISS since 2017, including EVAs: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cameras_on_the_International_Space_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cameras_on_the_Interna... The ISS now (also?) has Z9s. So they're both generally known-quantities.
- rafram 6mo agoWhen you're riding a rocket that weighs 3.5 million pounds...
- to11mtm 6mo agoIs that the Rocket or the Craft+Mission payload? My understanding is it's on the order of 5-10 pounds of rocket juice to get one pound of something to LEO, thus the question.
- atentaten 6mo agoNice. It would've been cool to see what the location information in the EXIF looked like, if it were there.
- Kye 6mo agoThe D5 doesn't have built in GPS, and adding it requires an attachment. I don't know if the smartphone app works on that model, but it is from the same year as my D5600 which does support it. The app provides GPS but also drains the battery fast. I turned airplane mode on after the first dead battery. GPS might work out there though: https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/somd/space-communications-navigation-program/nasa-successfully-acquires-gps-signals-on-moon/ https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/somd/space-communications-...
- echoangle 6mo agoIf you use a regular smartphone in space (or technically in orbit for this argument), it’s probably not going to get a fix because GPS receivers are required to stop locating when reaching some speed to not be export controlled. And that speed is picked so people don’t build missiles, orbital speed will be higher.
- porphyra 6mo agoI'd have probably shot it wide open at f/2.8 rather than cranking the ISO up to 51200. Incredibly impressed at the steady hands for a sharp image at 1/4 s shutter speed though! Maybe they just let the camera float in space with the mirror up, triggering it remotely.
- treis 6mo agoThey're in space so they only sort of need to hold the camera.
- sdenton4 6mo agoOr maybe press the timer and let it float...
- plaguuuuuu 6mo agoor sticky-tape it to the window. d5 has an actual shutter yeah? not mirrorless? I think the shutter moving will spin the camera.
- hackerdood 6mo agoI haven’t looked at the manual but it likely has the ability to flip and keep the mirror up for direct capture on the sensor without the mirror flipping up and down between exposures.
- cloudfudge 6mo agoI would love to see the effect of the mirror's effect on the motion of the camera in a weightless environment. I bet it's enough to measurably affect the picture, especially on a long exposure. Net torque of it opening and then closing should be near (but probably not exactly) zero, but while it's open the camera should spin a tiny amount.
- embedding-shape 6mo agoBad idea, shutter speed was 1/4 apparently (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47632457 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47632457), even the small rotational inertia everything in zero gravity gets from a human "dropping" it would probably be enough to be annoying, you'd get a better shot holding it.
- g-mork 6mo ago250 ms f/4 ISO 512000 in case anyone was wondering. I wonder if they applied any denoise, it looks great for such high ISO
- deleted 6mo ago[deleted]
- HPsquared 6mo agoAny GPS data? I wonder if it would pick anything up. Altitude reading would be interesting!
- throw0101d 6mo agoYes, the D5s are the 'official' Handheld Universal Lunar Cameras (HULCs), but (a?) Z9 also got on-board at the 'last minute' (which means two years ago): * https://petapixel.com/2026/04/02/a-nikon-z9-made-it-aboard-the-artemis-ii-moon-mission-at-the-last-minute/ https://petapixel.com/2026/04/02/a-nikon-z9-made-it-aboard-t... They have a thermal blanket for exterior work: * https://petapixel.com/2026/02/24/artemis-ii-astronauts-will-bring-10-year-old-dslrs-with-them-to-the-moon/ https://petapixel.com/2026/02/24/artemis-ii-astronauts-will-... * https://petapixel.com/2025/01/10/the-custom-nikon-z9-and-thermal-blanket-headed-to-the-moon/ https://petapixel.com/2025/01/10/the-custom-nikon-z9-and-the... * Various stories with the "Artemis" tag: https://petapixel.com/tag/artemis/ https://petapixel.com/tag/artemis/ The D5 has been used on the ISS, including EVAs, since 2017, so they're a known quantity: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cameras_on_the_International_Space_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cameras_on_the_Interna... The Mercury and Apollo missions used Hasselblad 500-series-based cameras (modified): * https://www.hasselblad.com/about/history/hasselblad-in-space/ https://www.hasselblad.com/about/history/hasselblad-in-space...
- keyle 6mo agoas a Hassie lover it made me a bit sad that they went with a D5 but hey, who cares about the camera, the picture was worth a billion bucks and it delivered. It's so refreshing to be mesmorised by a picture in the age of shorts and reels.
- retroformat 6mo agoNot only that, but you couldn't have gotten this image on film with a Hasselblad. (pushing film to 25,600 ASA maybe... not likely) I still shoot MF film and love it for what it does, but I think this extremely cool image of the night-side Earth is not something wet-process film could ever have captured.
- nate 6mo agothe morning after the launch i just randomly went onto their livestream and one of the astronauts was asking mission control for help on also using the gopros and iPhone cameras. i guess they have some. and he was struggling at getting a properly exposed photo with those. he said they were coming out super over exposed. but the D5 was working nominally. mission control said they'd get back to them about ideas on adjusting the gopros and iPhones. but it was funny to hear they're trying "new" tech and struggling with it up in space, and that 2005 D5 is still the champ :)
- brudgers 6mo agoIt also seems like very little was done in Lightroom. This is consistent with good photographic technique that prioritizes "getting it right in the camera."
- hypercube33 6mo agoWild. I saw a quick glance and assumed the Z9 but the D5 is near the peak of the DSLR world so I guess.
- didgetmaster 6mo agoThe EXIF data says that the picture was taken with the flash off! How did they get the Earth to light up when it is obviously dark outside? Is this fake?
- jstanley 6mo agoPossibly you're just joking, but it's pretty obvious that the flash would not appreciably illuminate the entire earth.
- didgetmaster 6mo agoObviously. It was a joke.
- anjel 6mo agoAlmost 6 decades later, Omega still has a firm hold on NASA by the wrist. https://www.gearpatrol.com/watches/omega-speedmaster-artemis-ii/ https://www.gearpatrol.com/watches/omega-speedmaster-artemis...
- dddw 6mo agoX33 Gen2 certainly looks better than gen1
- kingforaday 6mo agoIt's fun to think about tile dilation per the exif captured Create Date: "2026:04:03 00:27:39.26". I know it's negligible over the trip, but when they took it, was their time really "2026:04:03 00:27:39.25"?
- walrus01 6mo agoThe ISO 51200 would certainly explain the grain when viewing the image at 1:1 scale.