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Lot 141
[Apollo 4] THE FIRST COLOR PHOTOGRAPH OF THE WHOLE PLANET EARTH NASA, 9 November 1967
14 – 28 April 2025, 12:00 CEST
Paris, Avenue Hoche€3,000 - €5,000
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[Apollo 4] THE FIRST COLOR PHOTOGRAPH OF THE WHOLE PLANET EARTH
NASA, 9 November 1967
Printed 1967.
Vintage chromogenic print on fibre-based Kodak paper [NASA image AS4-1-580].
Numbered "MSC AS4-1-580" in red in the top margin, with "A KODAK PAPER" watermark on the reverse (issued by NASA Manned Spacecraft Centre, Houston, Texas).
20.3 x 25.4 cm. (10 x 8 in.)
Historical context
A Milestone in the History of Photography.
For the first time, humanity could admire a full-colour photograph of the whole Earth captured on film from deep space—offering a transformative new perspective on our home planet.
This breathtaking image was taken by an automatic 70mm Maurer 220 G camera mounted in the spacecraft window, as the Apollo 4 Command Module, still attached to the S-IVB stage of the first Saturn V rocket, reached an altitude of 9,544 miles. Earth, bathed in soft light, appears as a delicate crescent, revealing coastal Brazil, the Atlantic Ocean, West Africa, and Antarctica.
At the time, Apollo Program Director Samuel Phillips remarked, "This is a sight astronauts will see on the way to the Moon." (Cortright, p. 198)
Today, Apollo 4's ghostly image of Earth—pale and luminous, like a child in the womb awaiting its first human witness—remains hauntingly captivating. (Poole, pp. 86–87)
Printed 1967.
Vintage chromogenic print on fibre-based Kodak paper [NASA image AS4-1-580].
Numbered "MSC AS4-1-580" in red in the top margin, with "A KODAK PAPER" watermark on the reverse (issued by NASA Manned Spacecraft Centre, Houston, Texas).
20.3 x 25.4 cm. (10 x 8 in.)
Historical context
A Milestone in the History of Photography.
For the first time, humanity could admire a full-colour photograph of the whole Earth captured on film from deep space—offering a transformative new perspective on our home planet.
This breathtaking image was taken by an automatic 70mm Maurer 220 G camera mounted in the spacecraft window, as the Apollo 4 Command Module, still attached to the S-IVB stage of the first Saturn V rocket, reached an altitude of 9,544 miles. Earth, bathed in soft light, appears as a delicate crescent, revealing coastal Brazil, the Atlantic Ocean, West Africa, and Antarctica.
At the time, Apollo Program Director Samuel Phillips remarked, "This is a sight astronauts will see on the way to the Moon." (Cortright, p. 198)
Today, Apollo 4's ghostly image of Earth—pale and luminous, like a child in the womb awaiting its first human witness—remains hauntingly captivating. (Poole, pp. 86–87)
Footnotes
The primary photographic objective of Apollo 4 was to capture the highest-altitude colour imagery of Earth ever taken, made possible by the first test flight of the Saturn V, the colossal rocket designed for lunar missions. On November 9, 1967, Apollo 4 (Spacecraft 017/Saturn 501) completed two orbits before its third-stage booster fired, propelling it into a vast elliptical orbit with a peak altitude of 9,767 nautical miles—testing translunar injection motors and high-speed re-entry procedures for future crewed Moon landings. The film was recovered from the Command Module after splashdown.
Until then, the highest colour photographs of Earth captured on film had been taken by Gemini XI, which used its Agena target vehicle's rocket to boost its apogee to 741 nautical miles (1,373 km)—the highest Earth orbit ever reached by a crewed spacecraft.
Literature
The Last Whole Earth Catalog, June 1971, cover
Exploring Space with a Camera (NASA SP-168), Cortright, ed., p. 199
Watch more
CLICK HERE: THE APOLLO 4 MISSION (1967) - NASA documentary
Additional information
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