#zero gravity indicator

On December 24, 1968, Apollo 8 astronauts Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders were coming around from the far side of the Moon on their fourth orbit. Borman began to roll the spacecraft, and as he did, the Earth rose into view over the Moon’s limb. Anders, photographing the Moon from the right side window, caught sight of the view, and exclaimed: “Oh my God, look at that picture over there! There’s the Earth comin’ up. Wow, is that pretty!”

He snapped a black and white photo (top), capturing humanity’s first view of Earth from another planetary body. A few minutes later, Anders put color film in the camera and took the iconic color photographs of a half Earth hanging over the lunar horizon.

(Reminder: sunlight shining on the Moon's surface means it's too bright to see stars — it's like trying to see a candle 50 feet away with those too-bright headlights shining in your face).

So what's that framed photo behind Rise? And why do we all remember the horizon-hugging Earth in color?

Over the years, some reproductions have taken the liberty of moving the Earth in the color version closer to the horizon, since we know it had been there, while others borrow the colors from the color film to colorize the b&w.

And in 2013, for the 45th anniversary of Apollo 8, NASA Goddard Space Center used Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter high-res scans of the Moon plus TERRA satellite data of Earth to improve the resolution and recreate this photo in color:

More importantly, they recreated what the Apollo astronauts saw as a movie.

Here's the "Earthrise revisited" explainer with the recording of Anders and Lovell's mad scramble to change the film before it's too late!