News & Articles

10 08, 2023

FIRST COLOR PHOTO OF EARTH FROM SPACE – THE BERG FILM IV

2023-08-10T03:43:03+00:00Categories: Apollospace Presents, Earth, Flown, News|Tags: , , , |0 Comments

First Color Photo of Earth from Space (Part IV):

Life Magazine & Aftermath

The story of the first color photographs of the Earth from space continues in Otto Berg’s own words, with light edits and editorial notes.

In this new enthusiasm over the montage, my new Boss, Dr Les Meredith, and I decided to take the photo to the National Geographic Society in the hopes that they would be sufficiently interested to reproduce the montage in professional color. They sadly declined based on the very high cost of doing that. On the return to the Lab., we passed by the Life magazine Offices and decided to see if they would print it in true color. Seconds after we entered the Life magazine offices, we were surrounded by every member of that organization, I believe even the janitors. They tried their darnedest to talk us into leaving the photo at Life overnight, but […]

10 08, 2023

FIRST COLOR PHOTO OF EARTH FROM SPACE – THE BERG FILM III

2023-08-10T03:37:31+00:00Categories: Apollospace Presents, Earth, Flown, News|Tags: , , , |0 Comments

First Color Photo of Earth from Space (Part III):

More Useful Purposes

The story of the first color photographs of the Earth from space continues in Otto Berg’s own words, with light edits and editorial notes. 

The next day, I brought the montage (actually, I simply referred to it as a mosaic until Life magazine referred to it as a montage) into the Lab and, again, my colleagues were mostly impressed by the large area of planet Earth shown and the curvature of the horizon.

Detail of the NRL-Berg Mosaic detailing the “discovery” of a tropical storm over Texas and the value of space spaced photography for weather observation

The montage occupied a humble spot on the workbench in our labs for several days as we would briefly discuss it over a cup of coffee. Eventually we began to realize that the huge white cloud glob in the picture was somewhat […]

26 02, 2023

FIRST COLOR PHOTO OF EARTH FROM SPACE – THE BERG FILM II

2023-06-06T05:42:28+00:00Categories: Apollospace Presents, Earth, Flown, News|Tags: , , , |0 Comments

First Color Photo of Earth from Space (Part II):

The Mission & the Montage

Aerobee Rocket AJ-10-24 carrying the first color film to record Earth from space with unidentified Navy personnel, October 1, 1954 (4 days before launch). Credit: Department of the Navy, courtesy White Sands Missile Range Museum

The story of the first color photographs of the Earth from space continues in Otto Berg’s own words, with light edits and editorial notes. The individual Earth photos appearing here (other than Berg’s original montage) were scanned and processed from the decades old internegatives that Otto Berg produced in order to create the Earth Montage in 1954. There was significant color fading of the negatives as compared with the 16mm film itself, which will be scanned as individual frames at the highest resolution available. For now, the images appearing here are the best versions of these images available, though when the 16mm film […]

6 02, 2023

FIRST COLOR PHOTO OF EARTH FROM SPACE – THE BERG FILM I

2023-04-10T18:17:35+00:00Categories: Apollospace Presents, Earth, Flown, News|Tags: , , , , , |0 Comments

First Color Photo of Earth from Space Unearthed!

On October 5, 1954, the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) launched an Aerobee sounding rocket from the White Sands Proving Grounds in New Mexico. On board were two 16mm movie cameras peering out small holes, one with black and white film and the other with color film.

On that color 16mm film would be recorded the very first color images of Earth from space.

Berg’s Earth Mosaic – Credit: U. S. Navy / Naval Research Laboratory

On October 5, 1954, an Aerobee rocket carrying two 16 mm movie cameras (including one with color film) captured the first color images of Earth from space, including images of a tropical storm over the state of Texas. Approximately 140 […]

4 01, 2023

WALT CUNNINGHAM – IN MEMORIAM

2023-02-28T06:03:28+00:00Categories: Astronauts|Tags: , , , |0 Comments

Remembering Apollo 7 Astronaut Walt Cunningham (March 16, 1932 – January 3, 2023)

Walt Cunningham during our “Apollo Reflections” interview, August 30, 2018

Yesterday, we lost another giant of the Apollo program, Apollo 7 Astronaut Walt Cunningham. I had the good fortune of meeting Walt on many occasions over the years – the first time at a UACC Autograph Show in Houston, Texas in 2000. Then, as always, Walt was funny, gracious, accommodating, and friendly to all.

With Walt at UACC Autograph Show, Houston, 2000

As he was in the photograph below from the same event posing with members of the Yahoo Astronauts news group I had founded a couple of years prior, with a few familiar faces to the space memorabilia collecting community including (starting 3rd from left) myself, Walt, Steve Hankow (Farthest Reaches), Apollo 14 Astronaut Ed Mitchell, and Gerry Montague (Astronaut Archives), and […]

22 03, 2022

Earth From Space V – A Distant World

2023-02-28T06:04:07+00:00Categories: Earth|Tags: , , , |0 Comments

A Distant World

Voyager I view of Earth and Moon. Credit NASA/JPL

At top is a photograph from the Cassini spacecraft at Saturn, approximately 900 million miles from Earth, showing Earth just below the rings on July 19, 2013. Above, the first full-disk picture of both the Earth and the Moon as seen by Voyager I on September 18, 1977. Voyager 1 snapped this picture approximately 7.25 million miles from Earth. This was the first image to show both the full Earth and Moon in the same frame.

Robotic spacecraft have ventured deep into space, far more distant than human beings have yet travelled, allowing a perspective that we could previously only imagine. The Voyager I spacecraft was the first to image the Earth and Moon together on its way out to Jupiter and Saturn, the first probe to visit those planets, and now exploring interstellar space. Fifteen years later, on December 16, 1992, the Galileo spacecraft took […]

17 03, 2022

Earth From Space IV – Discovering Earth

2023-02-28T06:04:38+00:00Categories: Earth, Moon|Tags: , , , |0 Comments

Discovering Earth

Earthrise from Apollo 8, AS08-14-2383. Image Credit: NASA/JSC/ASU/Apollospace

“We came all this way to explore the Moon, and the most important thing is that we discovered the Earth” – Bill Anders, Apollo 8, “Earthrise” photographer

Above, the first photograph of an Earthrise in black and white, and moments later, the first color photograph of Earthrise as seen with human eyes.

On December 21, 1968 humanity left the comforting confines of home on a journey to Earth’s nearest neighbor. On their way, the Apollo 8 astronauts came to see all that has ever been as a thumbnail in endless space. The first photograph of the whole Earth as seen by human beings appears below. Most of South America is visible at bottom center. North America (upper left) is mostly obscured by clouds, with Florida and Mexico visible. Upper right is western Africa.

First whole Earth seen by […]

15 03, 2022

Earth From Space III – The Whole Earth

2023-02-28T06:05:04+00:00Categories: Earth|Tags: , |0 Comments

The Whole Earth

ATS-1 First view of Earth and Moon from Space ATS-1 414588 (NASA)

Following the toe-dip into space provided by the early V-2 rocket photography of Earth, twenty years later, on December 7, 1966 (63 years to the day after the first flight of Kitty Hawk), the Applications Technology Satellite 1 (ATS-1) was launched – the first experimental geostationary satellite and the Earth started to take shape. The first (near) full-disk pictures of the Earth from a geostationary orbit were taken on December 11, 1966. The image above showing the Earth and Moon together in space for the first time, and below, the nearly full Earth with North America appearing upper right with the Southwest US, Mexico, and Baja California clearly visible… 

ATS-1 Nearly Full Earth from Geosynchronous Orbit Dec. 11, 1966 (NASA)

But what about […]

15 03, 2022

EARTH FROM SPACE II – IN LIVING COLOR

2023-02-28T06:05:26+00:00Categories: Earth|Tags: , , |0 Comments

On October 5, 1954, the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) launched an Aerobee sounding rocket from the White Sands Proving Grounds in New Mexico. On board were two 16mm movie cameras peering out small holes, one with black and white film and the other with color film.

On October 5, 1954, an Aerobee rocket carrying two 16 mm movie cameras (including one with color film) captured the first color images of Earth from space, including images of a tropical storm over the state of Texas. 117 images from an altitude of 100 miles were used to create this photomosaic of the Earth from space in natural color for the first time. Credit: U. S. Navy / Naval Research Laboratory

When the rocket reached its maximum height of 100 miles above the Earth, the cameras began filming at a rate of 6 frames per second as the rocket […]

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