NASA Refurbishes Video of Moon Landing

(AP)  With the help of Hollywood, those historic, grainy images of the first men on the moon never looked better. NASA unveiled refurbished video Thursday of the July 20, 1969, moonwalk restored by the same company that sharpened up the movie "Casablanca."

NASA lost its original moon landing videotapes and after a three-year search, officials have concluded they were probably erased. That original live video was ghostlike and grainy.

NASA and a Hollywood film restoration company took television video copies of what Apollo 11 beamed to Earth 40 years ago and made the pictures look sharper.

NASA emphasized the video isn't "new" - just better quality.

"There's nothing being created; there's nothing being manufactured," said NASA senior engineer Dick Nafzger, who's in charge of the project.

But some details seem new because of their sharpness. Originally, Armstrong's face visor was too fuzzy to be seen clearly. The refurbished video shows his visor and a reflection in it.

The $230,000 refurbishing effort is only three weeks into a months-long project, and only 40 percent of the work has been done. But it does show improvements in four snippets: Armstrong walking down the ladder, which includes the face visor image; Buzz Aldrin walking down the ladder; the two astronauts reading a plaque they left on the moon; the planting of the flag on the moon.

The original videos beamed to earth were stored on giant reels of tapes that each contained 15 minutes of video, along with 13 other channels of live data from the moon. In the 1970s and 1980s, NASA had a shortage of the tapes and erased about 200,000 of those tapes and reused them. That's apparently what happened to the famous moon landing footage.

Nafzger praised the restored work for its crispness. The restoration company, Lowry Digital of Burbank, California, also refurbished "Star Wars" and James Bond films, along with "Casablanca."

The company noted that the latter film had a pixel count 10 times higher than the moon video, meaning the moon footage was fuzzier than that vintage movie and more of a challenge in one sense.

But the moon video also was three continuous hours, not chopped up like movies are, which made some of the work easier, said Lowry president Mike Inchalik.

Of all the video the company has dealt with, he said, "This is by far and away the lowest quality."

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 looking at a TV monitor.

Both Nafzger and Inchalik said they went to extremes to enhance the video as conservatively as possible.

[proudmilvet]

I wish we could send Rush Limbaugh to the Moon, but no Rocket would be that powerful to lift that heavy a payload!

[mary-miami]

I am old enough to remember having seen the moon landing on television as it took place. It was one of those historical moments that we never forget. I was just a kid then, but I felt proud for the United States having accomplished that before any other country.

[grabandgo]

Now I can sleep better at night.
Our tax dollars, hard at work!

[ianlou]

Money well spent.
How could NASA lose the film evidence to one of America's proudest moments? Are they that short sighted?

[mightyh]

MASA lost the moonlanding tape or it probably got erased. That's kinda hard to swallow. Do they really believe that the public is too gullible to believe that a very important historic tape like this was "lost"? These tapes are still very much in existence in some "very private hands." I wonder how much in terms of dollars will these tapes amount to in a private collection? Why were these tapes not deposited in the National Archives? With all the millions of public funds that the NASA has wasted, are we really supposed to believe that the moonlanding tapes were probably erased and recycled to save NASA some money? That's a lame duck alibi. Somebody should investigate higher up because those tapes are still very much in existence and their value will never decrease in time. We may have a better resolution of these event now but somebody still got the real McCoy.

[johninpennsyl]

Who's starring in the new moon landing tapes? Billy Bob Thornton was excellent as a NASA guy in Armageddon.
They erased the tapes? C'mon.
Some people might be suspicous of a boo-boo like that,but I love a good movie.Real or otherwise.

[txlakeside]

Nasa was very instrumental in your "modern day" moaning and groaning on the "INTERNET". Some are just dumb as dirt!

[rushlimpdrug]

Really?
Does this mean they've saved my life Mr Taxlakeside?

They actually invented the internet? Wow!

I'm thinking the article is about something other than
NASA inventing the internet, so I commented about something
the article mentioned.

But then you being an expert on everything can expertly
comment on anything.

Thanks for the clarification.

Think I'll have a donut now.
I wonder, did NASA also invent the donut?

[rushlimpdrug]

"NASA lost its original moon landing videotapes"

Yeah, well perhaps NASA needs to get lost.

Many Americans have had it from these reetarded
"rocket scientists".

They are looking more like a "bomb happy squad".

The ONE thing they should be most proud of, and
the loose or "erase" the record of the event.

Way to go losers.

[grabandgo]

You are right on the money!

[quaso]

Erased tapes?? Further evidence of a faked moon landing plot!

[gold_standard]

My Father worked on the space program for two decades, and I personally knew dozens of people involved with all aspects of NASA (including astronauts). If anyone is seriously wondering whether we actually landed on the moon, I assure you that we did. In all the years and all the associations I have had around NASA, there has never been one hint that the moon landings were anything less than fact.

Imaginative people can cobble together amazing theories based upon anomalies and contradictions. The problem is that it would be easier to put a man on the moon than to create and maintain the hoax of a moon landing. I find conspiracy theories entertaining, but I would not place much stock in any idea that requires massive conspiracy. The bigger the lie, the harder it is to keep it all straight.

[quaso]

OK, from where you were sitting you probably couldn't see my tongue firmly planted in my cheek as I typed. But you have to admit that this article is news for the very reason that it hints at that premise.

[tunaatlast]

how many billions of dollars,total, are in research, developement, and design do we have in the space shuttle. And still, they can not keep the shuttle together.

[taxchurches]

It seemed to hold together pretty well when it was launched Wednesday.

I grant you, with 2 of the things having exploded in such a spectacular fashion, I wouldn't go up in it, but they should have been retired long ago. This is dangerous luck-pushing. NASA's space exploration is the single most important project on Earth, and I fully support them. I'd much rather give them my tax dollars than mismanaged financial institutions.