This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American
Hands up if you think about the Moon in black and white? Yes - well, you're not alone, and there's actually good reason for you to, because the surface of the Moon is nearly devoid of strong colors in comparison to what we're used to here on Earth.
Someone (a junior member of my family) asked me about this recently, which sent me digging through the Apollo image archives - a remarkable library of photographs, many of which I'm pretty sure that most of us haven't seen very often. And here are some of those images, all of them are in full color, even if you might think otherwise.
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This first one is from Apollo 14, taken by Alan Shepard to document a set of scientific instruments deployed by the astronauts; ion detectors, a geophone, seismic monitor, lunar environment experiment and so on. Note that the only discernible color is on the devices themselves, particularly the gold blanketing and connector cables, the lunar soil is, well, gray.
This is from Apollo 16, showing Charlie Duke at the rover. Again, the only noticeable color comes from the rover, the color bar device in the lower center, and if you peek closely, the United States flag on the back of the spacesuit life support.
Apollo 16 again, a full color image...
Apollo 17, on the rover heading to Station 1.
Apollo 17 again, a boulder being studied and sampled, plus a color reference.
Apollo 17, picture taken by Gene Cernan (shadow) showing Harrison (Jack) Schmitt in the distance with the LM and rover.
Apollo 17, Earth over the LM.
Apollo 11, showing the struts of the LM and the scuffed up soil from Neil and Buzz's feet.
Apollo 15, a feather and hammer in the lunar dirt...left from the famous demonstration of Galileo's experiment that all objects are accelerated equally in the gravity field of a planet (or moon).
Apollo 16, back to the black and white, a very gray breccia (boulder) seen over the side of the rover.
Apollo 17, Harrison (Jack) Schmitt seen on the far side of the rover, the tone of this picture is amazing.
Apollo 17, West view towards the Taurus-Littrow Valley entrance.
Finally, not the blue marble that's usually shown, this is from Apollo 13. One can only imagine what this view felt like to the astronauts of the stricken mission as they tried to get back home.
