{"id":578862,"date":"2026-04-12T00:41:18","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T00:41:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/578862\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T00:41:18","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T00:41:18","slug":"artemis-ii-astronauts-were-trained-by-ny-tech-school-alums-to-take-photos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/578862\/","title":{"rendered":"Artemis II astronauts were trained by NY tech school alums to take photos"},"content":{"rendered":"

Professionals from an elite New York college specially trained the Artemis II astronauts<\/a> to take the out-of-this-world photographs that captivated and educated the globe.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Rochester Institute of Technology alums Katrina Willoughby and Paul Reichart were the flight operations imagery instructors for the round-the-moon mission<\/a>, teaching two of the four Artemis II passengers how to snap critically important pics in the challenging, off-planet landscape.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMost people can use a camera and get a photo that is good enough, but good enough isn\u2019t what we\u2019re after scientifically,\u201d Willoughby, a 2004 graduate, told RIT\u2019s newspaper<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Paul Reichert (left) instructing astronauts Christina Koch and Victor Glover on how to take snaps of the moon with their Nikon cameras. NASA\/James Blair<\/p>\n

Victor Glover (left back) with Katrina Willoughby (center back) and Christina Koch (right back) outside of the mock-up Orion craft. NASA<\/p>\n

A view of Earth taken from Artemis II\u2019s window after completing the translunar injection burn on April 2, 2026. NASA via Getty Images<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are pictures we want to get, and then there are pictures that the team is depending on. The imagery is their data,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

To secure these supremely important snaps, the RIT experts used a mock-up of the Orion spacecraft<\/a> and a small, fake Moon to simulate the record-setting ride at the Johnson Space Center in Houston.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe hung a giant inflatable moon and hung it in the building and turned the lights out and we were taking real pictures,\u201d Artemis II astronaut Victor Glover said in a NASA interview<\/a> prior to launch, which was posted on X.<\/p>\n

After the rehearsals, Glover said he had a profound realization about the 45-minute stretch when Artemis II would be closest to the lunar surface.<\/p>\n

\u201cI walked out into the parking lot and it hit me while I was walking toward my car\u2026Those moments may change what we know about the Moon, what we know about our Earth<\/a>, what we know about the Solar System and the Universe,\u201d Glover said in the interview.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter that day [of photo training] I stared at the moon differently,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The Orion spacecraft is pictured on April 10, 2026. NASA<\/p>\n

Captured by the Artemis II crew during their lunar flyby on April 6, 2026, this image shows the Moon fully eclipsing the Sun.\u00a0 NASA<\/p>\n

Captured by the Artemis II crew, the heavily cratered terrain of the eastern edge of the Moon\u2019s South Pole-Aitken basin is seen with the shadowed terminator \u2013 the boundary between lunar day and night \u2013 at the top of the image.\u00a0 NASA<\/p>\n

On top of the educational value of the high-resolution photographs of the lunar surface, the starskimmers hope the photos will inspire the next generation of astronauts.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the creative side. It\u2019s telling a story. It\u2019s making sure that the photos you take share the awe and the grandeur,\u201d astronaut Christina Koch said in the interview.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd focus on the little things that you may not expect. Some of my favorite pictures from space have been of things like cloud tops. Things you just had no idea were as beautiful from above as they are below,\u201d she reflected.<\/p>\n

Midway through their lunar observation period, the Artemis II crew members \u2013 Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen \u2013 pause to turn the camera around for a selfie inside the Orion spacecraft. NASA<\/p>\n

A boat approaches the Artemis II crew capsule floating in the Pacific Ocean following splashdown in this screengrab from a livestream video after the Artemis II crew\u2019s flyby of the Moon, on April 10, 2026. via REUTERS<\/p>\n

The camera the NASA astronauts<\/a> used was an old-model Nikon, which can be bought here on Earth for about $1,000.<\/p>\n

The space agency employed Nikon D5 DSLR \u2014 a classic digital single-lens-reflex camera first released in 2016 \u2014 which was selected because of its proven track record as a workhorse space snapper.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Professionals from an elite New York college specially trained the Artemis II astronauts to take the out-of-this-world photographs…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":578863,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[42141,718,688,79,193,194],"class_list":{"0":"post-578862","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-artemis-ii","9":"tag-nasa","10":"tag-photography","11":"tag-science","12":"tag-space","13":"tag-us-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/578862","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=578862"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/578862\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/578863"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=578862"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=578862"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=578862"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}