iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 20/02/2026

This is the first (correctly-exposed) photograph of Earth taken by a human from space, captured 64 years ago today by NASA astronaut John Glenn from inside his Friendship 7 capsule during the Mercury-Atlas 6 orbital mission on February 20, 1962.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 25/12/2025

The detail of Earth 🌍 captured in Bill Anders’ first color photo taken from lunar orbit on #christmaseve in 1968 #OTD really is amazing. This is a crop of AS08-14-2383, in its original orientation, from a scanned 70mm @nasa film original 16-bit TIFF file by a project team at Arizona State University

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 20/12/2025

This is the silhouette of 1,122-km-wide Dione in front of Saturn—a view captured with Cassini 15 years ago on December 20, 2010. Synthesized color from a single clear-filter greyscale image.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 28/11/2025

Space Shuttle Challenger in orbit during STS-7 in June 1983

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 12/11/2025

45 years ago today we got our first closeup of the Solar System’s very own “Death Star!” Captured by Voyager 1 on November 12, 1980 as it passed Saturn, this image (PIA01968) shows the moon Mimas with its 139 km wide, 5 km deep Herschel crater making it resemble the Empire’s infamous space station.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

On November 10, 1967 #OTD NASA captured its first color picture of the entire daylit side of Earth from space using the Multicolor Spin-Scan Cloudcover Camera on the ATS-3 weather satellite from an altitude of about 22,000 miles. (More on the MSSCC here: journals.ametsoc.org/view/journal...)

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 07/11/2025

While shooting the moonrise last night (since the eastern horizon was relatively free of clouds) I did get to capture another nice green flash along the Moon's upper limb. (Really more of a wavering flicker than a flash, but it was visible through the viewfinder.) 📸🌖

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 16/10/2025

Jupiter's colorful, lava-coated moon Io imaged by NASA's Galileo spacecraft on October 16, 2001

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 11/10/2025

Dione in front of Saturn, captured by Cassini 20 years ago today on October 11, 2005 🌖🪐

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 08/10/2025

A little bit of the "green flash" captured during Sunday night's sunset

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 23/09/2025

The Moon and Earth together captured with a camera aboard the ESA European Service Module during NASA's Artemis I mission on November 28, 2022. The spacecraft was about 42,000 miles beyond the Moon when this picture was taken.🌖🌍

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 19/09/2025

The Sun eclipsed by the Moon—a photo captured in the midst of the brief period of totality during the August 21, 2017 solar eclipse.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 14/09/2025

Cassini's final full view of Saturn 🪐 a mosaic comprising 11 color-composites captured by the spacecraft in visible light filters on September 13, 2017. The following day it dove into Saturn's atmosphere, ending its mission after 13 years in orbit.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 06/09/2025

Io in front of Jupiter. This is a color-composite made from images captured by NASA's Galileo spacecraft in red, green, and violet wavelengths on September 6, 1996. Io is the most volcanically-active world in our solar system.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 02/09/2025

Tonight’s waxing gibbous Moon 🌔

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 22/06/2025

Fair enough. Look baby turkeys (yesterday) !!

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 16/04/2025

This is a closeup of the 1909 Lincoln penny that's been on Mars as part of Curiosity's MAHLI calibration target for almost 13 years

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 14/04/2025

Fun fact: all of the other planets in the Solar System—and Pluto too—lined up edge-to-edge (not including any rings) could fit between Earth and the Moon

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 02/04/2025

The crescent Moon with earthshine next to the Pleiades tonight 🌒✨

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

Saturn's moon Mimas with the 139 km wide Herschel crater positioned dead-center along the terminator, imaged by NASA's Cassini spacecraft on March 20, 2006

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 13/03/2025

Blue Ghost's landing on the Moon in Mare Crisium captured by NASA's SCALPSS (Stereo Cameras for Lunar-Plume Surface Studies) cameras Source: www.nasa.gov/general/nasa...

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 07/03/2025

"Images downlinked from Athena on the lunar surface confirmed that Athena was on her side. After landing, mission controllers were able to accelerate several program and payload milestones[...]before the lander’s batteries depleted." intuitivemachines.com/im-2 Ad luna per aspera 🫤

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 05/03/2025

NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter captured the Firefly Aerospace Blue Ghost lander on the surface from a distance of about 190 km on March 2, 2025 about 9 hours after touchdown. (Source: lroc.asu.edu/images/1406; image upscaled, my edit.)

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

On November 11, 1935, the National Geographic/Army Air Corps-operated Explorer II mission launched a balloon with a pressurized gondola to a record altitude of 72,395 ft. The two-man crew captured the first photos showing the division of the troposphere and stratosphere, and Earth's curved horizon.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 07/02/2025

41 years ago today: Bruce McCandless piloted his Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU) nearly 100 meters away from Space Shuttle Challenger during STS-41B. Iconic shuttle era moment!

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

A rare “green flash” captured above the rising full Moon on October 17, 2024. This optical effect is caused by light refracted through the atmosphere near the horizon, briefly separating the green wavelengths from the red and orange.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

How the Lunar Roving Vehicles were deployed from the quadrant 1 bay of the Apollo LMs. This is television camera video from Apollo 15 in July 1971 showing Dave Scott; Jim Irwin off frame (3 separate clips spliced together playing at 5x speed with overlaid audio at normal speed.)

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 24/01/2025

Here’s a view of Uranus’ moon Miranda, a 470 km-wide spheroid of ice and rock with some of the most contorted terrain in the Solar System. This view comprises 8 images captured by Voyager 2 on January 24, 1986 from 32,000 km away.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 21/01/2025

On the left is Earth photographed from the Apollo 11 landing site during EVA on 21 July 1969 at approximately 04:19 UTC (crop of AS11-40-5923). On the right is the @celestiaproject.bsky.social view (north: right) from the same lunar coordinates @ same time/date. Lines up very well! (As it should.) 🌏

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 21/01/2025

Thank you Dr Brock :) I suspect this was one of them (which used images from the Hope Mars Orbiter!)

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 19/01/2025

A view of Saturn's moon Atlas orbiting beyond the outer edge of the A ring in the 3,000-km-wide space between it and the F ring (the Roche Division) with Saturn's shadow falling onto the rings at the left. Captured with Cassini on January 19, 2007

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 19/01/2025

Yes, there will be a lineup of planets in the sky this month but they're not actually "aligned" in their orbits...they just happen to be on the same side of the Sun right now to all be visible from Earth between dusk and dawn.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 17/01/2025

A view of Saturn's rings made from image data captured by NASA's Cassini spacecraft on January 17, 2008

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

The view through the window of NASA's uncrewed Gemini II capsule during its suborbital test flight on January 19, 1965, captured on 16mm film and playing at 4x speed.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

I did manage to get Mars re-emerging on the opposite side, and the sky was clear by that point too! Very cool.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

Tonight's full Wolf Moon with Mars just to the left (and 59 million miles in the distance). Who saw the occultation?

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

16mm film footage of Buzz Aldrin on EVA in low-Earth orbit during the Gemini XII mission on November 11, 1966

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 13/01/2025

I went and looked for satellite weather imagery from the same time. I found a 2013 year-in-review EUMETSAT/NOAA/JAXA timelapse that seems to match what Juno saw. (Different wavelengths I assume, but the key weather patterns are apparent.)

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 12/01/2025

A view of Earth made from images captured by NASA’s Juno spacecraft from about 4000 km away during a flyby on October 9, 2013

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 07/01/2025

Columbia returning from the first space shuttle flight to land at Edwards AFB on April 14, 1981, filmed from the cockpit of a T-38 chase plane. Shown here at 2x speed. "It's an admirable handling vehicle; you couldn't ask for anything as responsive..." — Bob Crippen, STS-1

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 05/01/2025

The Apollo 17 ascent stage photographed from the CSM during rendezvous in lunar orbit. If you zoom in you can see Gene Cernan’s face through the forward window.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 05/01/2025

This is Jupiter’s moon Io in eclipse, imaged with Cassini's narrow-angle camera from a distance of 11.4 million km on January 5, 2001. The ring is the glow of Io's thin atmosphere interacting with the plasma environment around Jupiter.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 05/01/2025

Could Apollo astronauts see ✨stars✨ during their lunar missions? Yes, but only when the lighting was right—like on the Moon's night side.🌑 They mentioned stars many times, in fact.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 03/01/2025

The Moon and Venus tonight 🌒🌟

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 01/01/2025

A view of Kuiper Belt Object 486958 Arrokoth made from image data acquired by New Horizons on January 1, 2019. This is a contact binary about 36 km long; it orbits the Sun at 42-46 AU and takes 298 Earth years to complete one orbit!

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 31/12/2024

A view of Jupiter made from image data captured with NASA's Cassini spacecraft 24 years ago on December 31, 2000

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 29/12/2024

On December 26, 2024 (my birthday!) NASA's Parker Solar Probe came within 3.8 million miles of the Sun. It's the closest any human-made object has ever gotten to a star, and reaching 430,000 mph it's the fastest-moving spacecraft ever! science.nasa.gov/science-rese...

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 29/12/2024

Color-composite of Callisto (4,820 km wide) made from narrow-angle camera images planned and captured by the Cassini Imaging Team on December 29, 2000 from a distance of 8.56 million km during a gravity-assist flyby of Jupiter.

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Jason Major @jpmajor.bsky.social · 28/12/2024

While en route back from the Moon in December 1972, Apollo 17 command module pilot Ron Evans executed a 1-hour, 7-minute long EVA to retrieve film canisters from a bay located on the exterior of the Service Module. This is increased speed 16mm film footage of the EVA.

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