The crew of the Artemis II mission is making history almost by the minute, and as it prepares for its flight path around the moon, the Orion spacecraft has shared some photos, including a side of the moon that humans have never seen directly before.
The image, currently posted to social media but likely to be added to NASA’s media library soon, is of a moon we both know and, well, don’t.
This stunning image comes just a day after Artemis II astronauts delivered the first-ever space photos on iPhone – taken with the selfie camera, no less.
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Make new friends, but keep the old ones. A new photo captures the Moon’s near side on the right (the side we see from Earth, identifiable by its dark spots) and its far side on the left. The crew of Artemis II are the first to see the dark side with human eyes. pic.twitter.com/Z8QaZ6J9iAApril 6, 2026
At first glance, you might say, “Yes, that’s the moon I know.” » But even a casual viewer knows something is wrong. As NASA’s post explains, the right side of the image faces Earth and the left side is something no human has seen with their own eyes before.
Previous Apollo missions were actually too close to the Moon to obtain this view (158 miles in 1970). The Artemis crew will fly approximately 4,070 miles above the surface, giving them a full view of Earth’s only natural satellite.
I spent years photographing the Moon with various digital cameras, including a pair of Sony Alphas. First, I used the NEX-5 with a 150mm lens. Then I moved on to my Sony Alpha A6000 and a 200mm lens backed by a 24MP sensor.
Look closely and see the Moon again
Picture 1 of 2
I wanted to understand how different our perspective was from that captured by NASA and the Artemis crew on Monday, April 6.
As you can see in the side-by-side photo above, which I created in Photoshop 2026, the differences are obvious.
On the left is the Orion photo, which I only adjusted for brightness. On the right, a photo I took with the Sony Alpha A6000 in 2020.
In my photo on the right you can see the characteristic dark spots which, from the ground, often transform into the “man in the moon”, a surprised face that says: “How did I get here?”
Towards the left side of my image is a bright spot, probably a meteor strike. If you use that as a reference point and then look at the image of the Artemis II mission on the left, you can see that the bright spot is now in the upper right.
Now, if your eye moves to the left on the image of the Artemis II mission, you quickly realize that you are seeing things you have never seen before,
What strikes me is what looks like a huge crater in the lower left quadrant. This is a feature we’ve never seen before.
If you have images of the Moon or have spent a lot of time looking at it through a telescope, I encourage you to compare your views with this image. It is magnificent and unforgettable.
What’s even crazier is that the crew of Artemis II is just getting started. What a great time for fans of astronomy, space and photography.
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