Earth Phase Discrepancy in AS14 Images

[TrevorWeaver]

Did you look at the photograph taken the next day? I suggest you compare AS14-64-9192 with AS14-66-9227? The earth changes from waxing to waning earth. Not possible for this to happen the next day. It would take another 6 days for this to happen.

[PetersCreek]

Welcome to the CosmoQuest forums, Trevor. I have moved your post from the thread, "Venus photographed from Moon on Apollo 14" to a thread of its own. If this post is intended to dispute the Apollo record, please make that clear in your next post. Also, if you haven't already done so, please read our rules linked in my signature line below, especially rule #13, as it relates to the Conspiracy Theories subforum. Again, welcome.

[schlaugh]

The position of the Earth is different in each shot. Same Earth, same phase, different angle of the camera in relation to the Earth.

[grant hutchison]

It's the same phase, just rotated within the photo format, because the first is taken from the surface, looking up, and the second taken from orbit, looking towards the horizon.
You can produce a similar effect here on Earth, by taking photographs of the moon at different times of the night.

ETA: schlaugh posted while I was typing.

Grant Hutchison

[grant hutchison]

It's the same phase, just rotated within the photo format, because the first is taken from the surface, looking up, and the second taken from orbit, looking towards the horizon.

Just to elaborate on this. The first photograph is taken with the LM facing west shortly after local sunrise (this was the lighting condition for all the Apollo landings). So we see the crescent Earth in "boat" orientation, its illuminated portion pointing downwards towards the sun behind the LM. The second photograph is taken from orbit over a different part of the moon, with the sun high in the sky (as demonstrated by the relative lack of shadows in the landscape below), and the Earth on the horizon. So we see the crescent Earth in "arch" orientation, with its illuminated portion pointing towards the sun overhead. In other words, if you start from the first photographic position and walk about 90 degrees around the moon towards the sunrise, you'll get the second photographic orientation. (The LM, of course, moved between the two positions by orbiting around the moon.)

Grant Hutchison

[bknight]

The position of the Earth is different in each shot. Same Earth, same phase, different angle of the camera in relation to the Earth.

Of course that's the case plus an inability to spatially orient images.

[bknight]

Just to elaborate on this. The first photograph is taken with the LM facing west shortly after local sunrise (this was the lighting condition for all the Apollo landings). So we see the crescent Earth in "boat" orientation, its illuminated portion pointing downwards towards the sun behind the LM. The second photograph is taken from orbit over a different part of the moon, with the sun high in the sky (as demonstrated by the relative lack of shadows in the landscape below), and the Earth on the horizon. So we see the crescent Earth in "arch" orientation, with its illuminated portion pointing towards the sun overhead. In other words, if you start from the first photographic position and walk about 90 degrees around the moon towards the sunrise, you'll get the second photographic orientation. (The LCSM, of course, moved between the two positions by orbiting around the moon.)

Grant Hutchison

FTFY, unless the time stamp was after liftoff of the ascent stage of the LM.

[PetersCreek]

FTFY, unless the time stamp was after liftoff of the ascent stage of the LM.

The image was taken from the LM, though.

[grant hutchison]

FTFY, unless the time stamp was after liftoff of the ascent stage of the LM.

Well, thanks, but they really are both taken from the LM.
The orbital photograph is from Magazine 66, one of a series depicting "Earthrise from the LM on Rev 14"--they're a record of Acquisition Of Signal after separation from the CSM but before Powered Descent Initiation, so were actually taken before landing, and then the same magazine was used for EVA 1. Magazine 64, despite its lower number, was used later, for EVA 2. The OP seems to have the sequence reversed, perhaps because the magazines weren't used in numerical order, and I guess I perpetuated that by referring to the "first" and "second" photographs because I couldn't be bothered cutting and pasting the magazine numbers and just wanted to talk about the reason for the difference between the first and second photographs mentioned in the OP. My bad.


Grant Hutchison