Shark.
Active member
I posted this in one of the threads, but I think it deserves its own.
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20090717/D99FSAKG0.html
WASHINGTON (AP) - NASA could put a man on the moon but didn't have the
sense to keep the original video of the live TV transmission.
In an embarrassing acknowledgment, the space agency said Thursday that
it must have erased the Apollo 11 moon footage years ago so that it
could reuse the videotape.
But now Hollywood is coming to the rescue.
The studio wizards who restored "Casablanca" are digitally sharpening
and cleaning up the ghostly, grainy footage of the moon landing, making
it even better than what TV viewers saw on July 20, 1969. They are
doing it by working from four copies that NASA scrounged from around
the world.
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"There's nothing being created; there's nothing being manufactured,"
said NASA senior engineer Dick Nafzger, who is in charge of the
project. "You can now see the detail that's coming out."
The first batch of restored footage was released just in time for the
40th anniversary of the "one giant leap for mankind," and some of the
details seem new because of their sharpness. Originally, astronaut Neil
Armstrong's face visor was too fuzzy to be seen clearly. The upgraded
video of Earth's first moonwalker shows the visor and a reflection in
it.
The $230,000 refurbishing effort is only three weeks into a monthslong
project, and only 40 percent of the work has been done. But it does
show improvements in four snippets: Armstrong walking down the ladder;
Buzz Aldrin following him; the two astronauts reading a plaque they
left on the moon; and the planting of the flag on the lunar surface.
Nafzger said a huge search that began three years ago for the old moon
tapes led to the "inescapable conclusion" that 45 tapes of Apollo 11
video were erased and reused. His report on that will come out in a few
weeks.
The original videos beamed to Earth were stored on giant reels of tape
that each contained 15 minutes of video, along with other data from the
moon. In the 1970s and '80s, NASA had a shortage of the tapes, so it
erased about 200,000 of them and reused them.
How did NASA end up looking like a bumbling husband taping over his wedding video with the Super Bowl?
Nafzger, who was in charge of the live TV recordings back in the Apollo
years, said they were mostly thought of as data tapes. It wasn't his
job to preserve history, he said, just to make sure the footage worked.
In retrospect, he said he wished NASA hadn't reused the tapes.
Outside historians were aghast.
"It's surprising to me that NASA didn't have the common sense to save
perhaps the most important historical footage of the 20th century,"
said Rice University historian and author Douglas Brinkley. He noted
that NASA saved all sorts of data and artifacts from Apollo 11, and it
is "mind-boggling that the tapes just disappeared."
The remastered copies may look good, but "when dealing with historical
film footage, you always want the original to study," Brinkley said.
Smithsonian Institution space curator Roger Launius, a former NASA
chief historian, said the loss of the original video "doesn't surprise
me that much."
"It was a mistake, no doubt about that," Launius said. "This is a
problem inside the entire federal government. ... They don't think that
preservation is all that important."
Launius said federal warehouses where historical artifacts are saved
are "kind of like the last scene of 'Raiders of the Lost Ark.' It just
goes away in this place with other big boxes."
The company that restored all the Indiana Jones movies, including "Raiders," is the one bailing out NASA.
Lowry Digital of Burbank, Calif., noted that "Casablanca" had a pixel
count 10 times higher than the moon video, meaning the Apollo 11
footage was fuzzier than that vintage movie and more of a challenge in
one sense.
Of all the video the company has dealt with, "this is by far and away the lowest quality," said Lowry president Mike Inchalik.
Nafzger praised Lowry for restoring "crispness" to the Apollo video. Historian Launius wasn't as blown away.
"It's certainly a little better than the original," Launius said. "It's not a lot better."
The Apollo 11 video remains in black and white. Inchalik said he would
never consider colorizing it, as has been done to black-and-white
classic films. And the moon is mostly gray anyway.
The restoration used four video sources: CBS News originals; kinescopes
from the National Archives; a video from Australia that received the
transmission of the original moon video; and camera shots of a TV
monitor.
Both Nafzger and Inchalik acknowledged that digitally remastering the
video could further encourage conspiracy theorists who believe NASA
faked the entire moon landing on a Hollywood set. But they said they
enhanced the video as conservatively as possible.
Besides, Inchalik said that if there had been a conspiracy to fake a
moon landing, NASA surely would have created higher-quality film.
Back in 1969, nearly 40 percent of the picture quality was lost
converting from one video format used on the moon - called slow scan -
to something that could be played on TVs on Earth, Nafzger said.
NASA did not lose other Apollo missions' videos because they weren't
stored on the type of tape that needed to be reused, Nafzger said.
As part of the moon landing's 40th anniversary, the space agency has
been trotting out archival material. NASA has a Web site with audio
from private conversations in the lunar module and command capsule. The
agency is also webcasting radio from Apollo 11 as if the mission were
taking place today.
The video restoration project did not involve improving the sound.
Inchalik said he listened to Armstrong's famous first words from the
surface of the moon, trying to hear if he said "one small step for man"
or "one small step for A man," but couldn't tell.
Through a letter read at a news conference Thursday, Armstrong had the
last word about the video from the moon: "I was just amazed that there
was any picture at all."
spark notes: Nasa deleted the original video of the Apollo 11 mission but it was digitally restored by Hollywood
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20090717/D99FSAKG0.html
WASHINGTON (AP) - NASA could put a man on the moon but didn't have the
sense to keep the original video of the live TV transmission.
In an embarrassing acknowledgment, the space agency said Thursday that
it must have erased the Apollo 11 moon footage years ago so that it
could reuse the videotape.
But now Hollywood is coming to the rescue.
The studio wizards who restored "Casablanca" are digitally sharpening
and cleaning up the ghostly, grainy footage of the moon landing, making
it even better than what TV viewers saw on July 20, 1969. They are
doing it by working from four copies that NASA scrounged from around
the world.
if (typeof(AAMB2) != 'undefined') document.writeln(AAMB2);
admeld_publisher = 34;
admeld_site = 'excite';
admeld_size = '300x250';
admeld_placement = 'above-fold';
"There's nothing being created; there's nothing being manufactured,"
said NASA senior engineer Dick Nafzger, who is in charge of the
project. "You can now see the detail that's coming out."
The first batch of restored footage was released just in time for the
40th anniversary of the "one giant leap for mankind," and some of the
details seem new because of their sharpness. Originally, astronaut Neil
Armstrong's face visor was too fuzzy to be seen clearly. The upgraded
video of Earth's first moonwalker shows the visor and a reflection in
it.
The $230,000 refurbishing effort is only three weeks into a monthslong
project, and only 40 percent of the work has been done. But it does
show improvements in four snippets: Armstrong walking down the ladder;
Buzz Aldrin following him; the two astronauts reading a plaque they
left on the moon; and the planting of the flag on the lunar surface.
Nafzger said a huge search that began three years ago for the old moon
tapes led to the "inescapable conclusion" that 45 tapes of Apollo 11
video were erased and reused. His report on that will come out in a few
weeks.
The original videos beamed to Earth were stored on giant reels of tape
that each contained 15 minutes of video, along with other data from the
moon. In the 1970s and '80s, NASA had a shortage of the tapes, so it
erased about 200,000 of them and reused them.
How did NASA end up looking like a bumbling husband taping over his wedding video with the Super Bowl?
Nafzger, who was in charge of the live TV recordings back in the Apollo
years, said they were mostly thought of as data tapes. It wasn't his
job to preserve history, he said, just to make sure the footage worked.
In retrospect, he said he wished NASA hadn't reused the tapes.
Outside historians were aghast.
"It's surprising to me that NASA didn't have the common sense to save
perhaps the most important historical footage of the 20th century,"
said Rice University historian and author Douglas Brinkley. He noted
that NASA saved all sorts of data and artifacts from Apollo 11, and it
is "mind-boggling that the tapes just disappeared."
The remastered copies may look good, but "when dealing with historical
film footage, you always want the original to study," Brinkley said.
Smithsonian Institution space curator Roger Launius, a former NASA
chief historian, said the loss of the original video "doesn't surprise
me that much."
"It was a mistake, no doubt about that," Launius said. "This is a
problem inside the entire federal government. ... They don't think that
preservation is all that important."
Launius said federal warehouses where historical artifacts are saved
are "kind of like the last scene of 'Raiders of the Lost Ark.' It just
goes away in this place with other big boxes."
The company that restored all the Indiana Jones movies, including "Raiders," is the one bailing out NASA.
Lowry Digital of Burbank, Calif., noted that "Casablanca" had a pixel
count 10 times higher than the moon video, meaning the Apollo 11
footage was fuzzier than that vintage movie and more of a challenge in
one sense.
Of all the video the company has dealt with, "this is by far and away the lowest quality," said Lowry president Mike Inchalik.
Nafzger praised Lowry for restoring "crispness" to the Apollo video. Historian Launius wasn't as blown away.
"It's certainly a little better than the original," Launius said. "It's not a lot better."
The Apollo 11 video remains in black and white. Inchalik said he would
never consider colorizing it, as has been done to black-and-white
classic films. And the moon is mostly gray anyway.
The restoration used four video sources: CBS News originals; kinescopes
from the National Archives; a video from Australia that received the
transmission of the original moon video; and camera shots of a TV
monitor.
Both Nafzger and Inchalik acknowledged that digitally remastering the
video could further encourage conspiracy theorists who believe NASA
faked the entire moon landing on a Hollywood set. But they said they
enhanced the video as conservatively as possible.
Besides, Inchalik said that if there had been a conspiracy to fake a
moon landing, NASA surely would have created higher-quality film.
Back in 1969, nearly 40 percent of the picture quality was lost
converting from one video format used on the moon - called slow scan -
to something that could be played on TVs on Earth, Nafzger said.
NASA did not lose other Apollo missions' videos because they weren't
stored on the type of tape that needed to be reused, Nafzger said.
As part of the moon landing's 40th anniversary, the space agency has
been trotting out archival material. NASA has a Web site with audio
from private conversations in the lunar module and command capsule. The
agency is also webcasting radio from Apollo 11 as if the mission were
taking place today.
The video restoration project did not involve improving the sound.
Inchalik said he listened to Armstrong's famous first words from the
surface of the moon, trying to hear if he said "one small step for man"
or "one small step for A man," but couldn't tell.
Through a letter read at a news conference Thursday, Armstrong had the
last word about the video from the moon: "I was just amazed that there
was any picture at all."
spark notes: Nasa deleted the original video of the Apollo 11 mission but it was digitally restored by Hollywood
