Hasselblad manual for NASA astronauts

Mats_A · Sep 13, 2011

A pdf with Hasselblad's manual for the shuttle astronauts. Found the link at a Finnish photo-forum and felt like sharing.

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Selidor · Sep 13, 2011

Thats impossibly cool.
Edit - having read the whole thing its surprising how talk about shuttle operations in such a mundane way, but I suppose its just day-to-day life for Astronauts. Oh and I love the picture on p35, with the shuttle in silhouette and clouds behind. Stunning.

PS. Nasa use Nikon D2Xs these days.

Tim Gray · Sep 13, 2011

That's cool. Thanks for sharing.

olleorama · Sep 13, 2011

actually, it's a pretty good introduction book to photography.

Sirius Glass · Sep 14, 2011

Thanks, I will use it the next time I do space travel!

Steve

Kevin Caulfield · Sep 14, 2011

Very cool. Thanks for posting.

vpwphoto · Sep 14, 2011

I talked to Jerry Ross a shuttle Commander a couple times about NASA photo training... he said it was quite detailed.
He also said he thought the Hasselblad was great.

vpwphoto · Sep 14, 2011

That manual almost seems fake to me... too general, and what coin do they have to re-set the lens in space?!?!?

Bill Burk · Sep 14, 2011

Now we have to worry about finding a space shuttle to use it with...

Newt_on_Swings · Sep 14, 2011

How awesome is that, thank you dude!

Hikari · Sep 14, 2011

They even give instructions for the Minolta spot meter.

hpulley · Sep 15, 2011

Hikari said:
They even give instructions for the Minolta spot meter.

Yes, but also note there are no spare batteries on board, sunny sixteen after that

faustotesta · Sep 15, 2011

Cool. I like it. Grazie

Moopheus · Sep 15, 2011

olleorama said:
actually, it's a pretty good introduction book to photography.

How many photo books tell you this:

"2) Do not try to focus visually for earth
shots, simply set lens at infinity."

Rombo · Sep 15, 2011

Thanks for sharing.

Arthurwg · Sep 22, 2011

The NASA manual was written by Ernst Wildi. In recent years the digital photos were all downloaded to NASA immediately.

ic-racer · Sep 23, 2011

I love the part about "Balance and Composition" where they coach the user on things such as obtaining a pleasing arangement of the spaceship in relationship to the sharply curved horizon of the earth below. A mini primer on "Space Photography"

BrianL · Sep 23, 2011

As I've always been a government spending critic, I still question the need for the Hassey as the camera for these missions. There were very good cameras out there for much less; a waste of government, er, taxpayers' dollars especially where they were disposable. Want some mint ones with minimal use; just take a vacation to the moon. I suspect these costs upwards of 3 to 4 times what a consumer would pay. I remember the government purchasing agents with their clip board of purchase orders; not question on price, just fill out an order for whatever fits their fancy.

Bill Burk · Sep 23, 2011

Can you still get space shuttles for that?

Sirius Glass · Sep 23, 2011

BrianL said:
As I've always been a government spending critic, I still question the need for the Hassey as the camera for these missions. There were very good cameras out there for much less; a waste of government, er, taxpayers' dollars especially where they were disposable. Want some mint ones with minimal use; just take a vacation to the moon. I suspect these costs upwards of 3 to 4 times what a consumer would pay. I remember the government purchasing agents with their clip board of purchase orders; not question on price, just fill out an order for whatever fits their fancy.

It is always easier to criticize what one does not know about. Start with what was required for the missions and the fact that there was no space qualified equipment. Then look at the preprosal, proposal, evaluation and award of contract procedures to make sure the right contracts and specifications were requested and that nothing extra was included.

What about out-gassing? Mass reduction and yet be able to withstand the g forces and vibration of launch? Ability to handle and use the camera with the space suits and gloves? Ability of materials to withstand being put into a strong vacuum and be brought back to human tolerable pressures repeatedly so that the equipment could be taken out of the space ship more than once? The ability of the materials to handle direct cosmic radiation?

Of course since you are not an engineer and have no space qualification experience, it is much easier for you to look back fifty years as come up with completely groundless claims of waste. Will you please allow me to trash your field of expertise without any knowledge as you have just done?

BrianL · Sep 23, 2011

I was not in NASA procurement but sold to the military and had experience as a seller with their spec'ing. Also worked for government and saw first hand the so called developmet of specifications of everthing from journal paper to everything it took to buy land and develop it and build and outfit an international airport. It was interesting to see how a procurement officer would work with a company he preferred for some reason and they'd develop a set of specifications that only the company could be sourced to fullfill. I remember computer systems' specs so stacked that at the time on HP could win a bid b/c of 1 requirement that the competition could not supply and the spec though not critical was deemed as such. Later as a choef accountant working with the internal auditors we determined that government had paid some 30% more than it had to if the near meaningless spec had been eliminated.

Sorry, been there and done that from both sides of the table.

PeteZ8 · Sep 26, 2011

BrianL said:
As I've always been a government spending critic, I still question the need for the Hassey as the camera for these missions. There were very good cameras out there for much less; a waste of government, er, taxpayers' dollars especially where they were disposable. Want some mint ones with minimal use; just take a vacation to the moon. I suspect these costs upwards of 3 to 4 times what a consumer would pay. I remember the government purchasing agents with their clip board of purchase orders; not question on price, just fill out an order for whatever fits their fancy.

I think it had a lot more to do with the cost of the mission vs. the cost of failure. You DON'T take a Holga on a once in a lifetime trip to Yellowstone.

And they were left there due to the need to reduce weight as much as possible for takeoff from the moon. Every pound that can be left behind not only increased the chances of astronaut survival by reducing the amount of fuel required to safely escape lunar gravity, but bringing back more weight would require a bigger lunar launch vehicle, thus requiring an even larger rocket to get it there, etc. Just read on how much it costs to put 1# into space (about $5,000/# in current dollars) and you'll begin to understand. Also, every pound left on the moon meant another pound of moonrocks that could come back to earth. Hasselblad's can be replaced. Go find a moon rock. Of all the items left on the moon, I'm sure the Hassy's are among the cheapest.

They did however bring one back, the one that failed. It was brought back for failure analysis to prevent that from happening on a future mission (again, cost of mission vs. cost of failure). It turned out to be lunar dust in the system. The dust was cleaned out by Hasselblad and given to a local school near the factory.

BrianShaw · Sep 27, 2011

Hassleblad is likely to have been the lowest bidder no real regard for bidding the real cost of R&D and the limited/special production. The PR value has been invaluable to them and they knew that from the preproposal phase! Maybe there were contracting hijinks and maybe not... more often than not those "hijinks" are for good cause -- the need to work with proven suppliers. Delay or failure of a high-value, high-need mission results in, ummm, nothing. but skeptics are always welcomed... they keep the process honest.

Bill Burk · Sep 27, 2011

BrianShaw said:
Hassleblad is likely to have been the lowest bidder.

Even if the spec was tailored to the idea, who else could have done it for less? Hasselblads probably "already" exceeded the spec, all they had to do was change their standard connector with a NASA remote connector and add a piece of tape to the mode change knob.

BrianShaw · Sep 27, 2011

That's my point, Bill... but more direct about Hasselblad being a "natural choice". And more to my point... they may have been willing to "write off the cost" of the connector (for example) modification since they know the value of being the "moon camera" in terms of public relations and advertisment. Maybe Nikon or someone else could have done it, IDK, but it really doesn't matter now... it's done and over... any sour grapes about NASA's selection of camera gear are decades old. But I would love to see some authoritative information about the price NASA paid; that would be interesting!

Hasselblad manual for NASA astronauts

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