Photo of Earth and our Moon, from the Orion spacecraft
A few earlier spacecraft, on the way to Mars or Jupiter, have taken photos of the Moon and Earth from this distance, but I have never seen a shot with this much clarity. (Orion is in a much wider orbit than the Apollo craft were).
And this also gives me a chance to babble again about one of my pet peeves: the far side of the moon, which obviously is facing us in the picture, is not a "dark side". It gets as much light as the near side does.
This page is a permanent link to the reply below and its nested replies. See all post replies »
@ThaiGirl It is smaller than the earth. But the moon is close to the camera, so it looks big, and the earth is far away in the background, so it looks small.
On a night with a full moon, you can cover the entire moon with your thumb! Try it some time. That's because your thumb is closer to your eye than the moon is.
