Check Out Some Of The Incredible Artemis II Moon Photographs

A new gallery from NASA offers an unusually intimate look at the moon's far side, captured during the Artemis II mission as the Integrity spacecraft circled the lunar surface and began its journey home. The photographs, taken on April 6, show Earth suspended above the cratered horizon, the 600-mile-wide Orientale basin, Orion's engines, and an unexpected solar eclipse.

The four astronauts aboard the spacecraft - commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, and mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen - spent seven hours photographing the view through one of Orion's windows. They worked with a handheld Nikon DSLR camera and two zoom lenses, documenting a landscape that, in NASA's framing, includes areas no human has previously seen directly.

Among the most striking images is a close-up of the Ohm crater, whose terraced edges and flat floor are interrupted by central peaks. Another frame was taken just before Orion passed behind the moon and lost contact with Earth for 40 minutes, a reminder of how quickly the mission moved from visual abundance to radio silence.

NASA also released a detailed view of the Orientale basin, described as one of the moon's best-preserved large impact craters, along with a photograph of the moon's terminator - the boundary between light and dark that the crew said was anything but straight. The gallery extends to Orion's solar array wings and a close look at the Grimaldi crater, building a portrait of the moon that is both scientific and unexpectedly lyrical.

For Artemis II, the images do more than document a flyby. They mark a rare moment when exploration, photography, and distance converged to make the moon feel newly legible.

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