6/5/2019 In Celebration of 50 Years Since the Moon Landing, Neil Armstrong's Spacesuit Set to Return to Public View | At the

Return to Public View | At the Smithsonian | Smithsonian

MAY 20, 2019 Follow @madsburk

In Celebration of 50 Years Since the Moon

Landing, Neil Armstrong's Spacesuit Set to
Return to Public View
|
At the Smithsonian
As Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon half a century ago and made
that historic giant leap, only one thing was shielding him from the
vacuum of space: his spacesuit. Though not exactly couture, the bulky
white coverall is a deceptively complicated work of engineering that
has also become one of the nation’s most prized artifacts.

This summer, the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum

launches the iconic artifact back into the public eye, just as the nation is
poised to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission to the
moon. With the help of cutting-edge digital imaging technology, the
museum is bringing the suit back on display in Washington, D.C., as
well as crafting physical and digital replicas for space enthusiasts the
world over.

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6/5/2019 In Celebration of 50 Years Since the Moon Landing, Neil Armstrong's Spacesuit Set to Return to Public View | At the Smithsonian | Smithsonian

After Armstrong and the rest of the Apollo 11 crew returned from their
history-making space ight, NASA brought the suit along with other
artifacts on a nationwide tour before donating it to the Smithsonian.
The National Air and Space Museum displayed Armstrong’s suit for
about 30 years before pulling it from the oor in 2006, concerned about
deterioration.

Now, after more than a decade and making use of more than $700,000
raised from the Smithsonian’s rst-ever Kickstarter campaign, the
museum has completed its multi-year conservation project and also
has digitized the historic Apollo artifact so that authentically realized
duplicates can be downloaded and distributed for study and
appreciation.

“This is Neil Armstrong's spacesuit. We could not take it apart,” says

the museum’s curator and spacesuit historian Cathleen Lewis. “We had
to nd ways that were the best available and practical solutions to
keeping the suit together and also preserving it.”

To get a full picture of the suit and its condition, curators brought in
the Smithsonian’s 3D digitization team—including Vince Rossi, one of
the “laser cowboys” who helped pioneer the process of 3D-scanning
museum artifacts. Rossi and his team have worked to produce highly
accurate digital copies of a wide range of objects, from woolly
mammoth fossils to Abraham Lincoln’s life masks.

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6/5/2019 In Celebration of 50 Years Since the Moon Landing, Neil Armstrong's Spacesuit Set to Return to Public View | At the Smithsonian | Smithsonian

The team used every tool in their tool kit (above: photogrammetry to grab
accurate color) to replicate the historic artifact. (Smithsonian 3D Program)

In most cases, the lab would use just one type of scan to recreate an
object, Rossi says. For Armstrong’s suit, however, they opted to use
four di erent techniques: laser arm scanning to capture sharp surface
detail; photogrammetry to grab accurate color; structured light
scanning to record geometry and some more color; and a CT scan using
a medical-grade machine from the National Museum of Natural
History to document the suit’s interior.

Each type of scan has its strengths and weaknesses, Rossi says—for
example, laser scans struggle to capture shiny metal surfaces that send
light beams bouncing back—so to create a “world-class 3-D model,”
the team wanted to combine all the data they could gather.
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“This object represents an incredibly important achievement in human

history,” Rossi says. “And it was just such an amazing honor for our
team to work on a project like this that we basically used every tool in
our toolbox.”

Using the information collected, conservators are dusting o

Armstrong’s suit to bring it back on display (they’re leaving the moon
dust untouched, though, Lewis says).

With a clear understanding of the internal anatomy of the suit, the

team built a customized display structure so the suit won’t su er
further damage from hanging o an ill- tting mannequin. When the
artifact returns to the museum oor on July 16—exactly 50 years after
the Apollo 11 mission launch—its display conditions, including the
customized mount and air ow maintaining a controlled climate inside
the suit, should preserve it just as well as a storage unit would, Lewis
says.

That display will also leverage additional X-rays taken of the suit to let
visitors peek inside its layers. In this way, the museum is showcasing
the suit not just as a historical icon, but as a carefully designed piece of
machinery—a “human-shaped spacecraft,” as Lewis describes it.

Smithsonian will also be bringing a piece of that experience beyond

museum walls through its upcoming Apollo at the Park project, which
will send 15 life-size statues of the Armstrong suit to Major League
Baseball stadiums. From Wrigley Field to Yankee Stadium, spectators
across the country will have “a little piece of the Smithsonian in their
backyard,” says Nick Partridge, public a airs specialist at the Air and
Space Museum.
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6/5/2019 In Celebration of 50 Years Since the Moon Landing, Neil Armstrong's Spacesuit Set to Return to Public View | At the Smithsonian | Smithsonian

Using the scan data, the museum worked with two companies in
California to rst create a 3D-printed replica of the suit and then turn
that copy into a hollow mold, project head Samia Khan says. Through a
process called rotocasting, which essentially involves splashing liquid-
hot material around the inside of the mold, they created sturdy resin
statues to withstand the outdoors. With some hand-painted nishing
touches, the replicas mirror the original suit down to the look of the
fabric, Khan says.

The rst statue is set to be unveiled June 4 at Nationals Park in D.C.,

with the rest rolling out throughout the month and remaining until the
end of the season.

The goal of the project is in part educational, Khan says—the displays

will have “content activation” capabilities so visitors can use their
devices to scan over the model and learn more about the suit and the
mission. But it’s also about building the emotional connection to the
moon landing, even for younger generations who weren’t there to
witness the historical moment and haven’t had a similar world-
stopping, collective experience in their lifetime.

Though there may not be an obvious link between space and baseball,
Partridge says the national pastime recreates some of the same
unifying and distinctly American feeling as the Apollo 11 mission once
inspired.

“It was a hot July night and everyone was gathered around TVs, and if
you had your windows open, you could hear everybody was watching
the same thing all at once. You could feel that this was something that
the whole country and the whole world was experiencing
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6/5/2019 In Celebration of 50 Years Since the Moon Landing, Neil Armstrong's Spacesuit Set to Return to Public View | At the Smithsonian | Smithsonian

Partridge says. “We thought this was a good way to capture that kind of
the energy and meaning and community of July 20, 1969.”

Finally, the suit will blast o into cyberspace as Rossi and Lewis are
collaborating to bring a digital model and virtual tour to screens all
over the world. Like they’ve done with many of their other 3-D
projects, the digitization lab will upload a virtual copy of the spacesuit
to their website for users to explore freely. Lewis is also adding
annotations so viewers can click on parts of the virtual suit to learn
more about how all the pieces t together into one functioning
machine.

“The 3-D model really o ers you a deeper experience so that you're not
just kind of frozen in one single view that a photographer has chosen
for you, but you have the complete freedom to explore any view,” Rossi
says. “You're able to look at all these new areas that you can't as a
human being in the museum.”

The challenge here for the 3-D team has been that they simply have too
much data. The resolution they’ve captured through their high-level
scans—measured in polygons, the three-dimensional equivalent of
pixels—would overwhelm a normal wireless connection, Rossi says.
Also, since some of the scans were taken at di erent times, with the
suit in di erent positions, the team had to re-align the scans to make
sure everything lined up in the nal combined model.

Once they’ve worked out the hitches, though, the team will fully open
up access to one of the nation’s most prized artifacts. Anyone with an
internet-connected device will be able to explore the suit’s nooks and
crannies through the virtual model. The team will
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6/5/2019 In Celebration of 50 Years Since the Moon Landing, Neil Armstrong's Spacesuit Set to Return to Public View | At the Smithsonian | Smithsonian

full-resolution data so tech-savvy space fanatics can use it for their

own projects, whether that means building a virtual reality experience
or even replicating their own piece of the artifact using a 3D printer,
Rossi says.

Though the process of “rebooting the suit” has demanded years of

hard work, Lewis says she’s been heartened by the public response.
Even schoolkids who are generations removed from the memory of the
moon landing were pooling their money to help support the project,
she says.

While NASA now sets its sights on bringing humans back to the moon
and beyond, space enthusiasts all over the world will get to look back
and relive the excitement of that rst giant leap for mankind.

“This spacesuit is the one really human artifact from the Apollo
program that people can identify with,” Lewis says. “That image of
Neil Armstrong stepping on the moon is something that has endured
for generations; even people who don't have a personal memory
recognize it as signi cant. This is a human being walking on another
world.”

Check out some of the National Air and Space

Museum’s events, commemorating the 50th
anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission:

Apollo 11 Artifact Case (On display)

It took much more than a spaceship to get the

Apollo 11 crew to the moon. The museum
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features a few of the smaller key pieces that

played an important part in the mission,
including Armstrong’s chronograph and waist
tether. The case also highlights the Data
Acquisition Camera that was mounted in the
lunar module, displayed alongside the lm
magazine with which it recorded Armstrong’s
rst steps on the moon.

Apollo at the Park (June 4 through September

29, 2019)

Armstrong’s suit will become a part of

America’s national pastime this summer as the
museum places 15 life-size replicas at Major
League Baseball stadiums across the country.
The statues, created using data from the
museum’s 3D scans, go up in June and will stay
in place until the end of the MLB season.

Lecture: The Future of Lunar Exploration (June

19, 8 p.m.)

NASA has announced plans to establish long-

term colonies on the moon and send humans to
Mars—but there’s a lot left to understand
before that can happen. In the last of the
museum’s “Exploring Space” lecture series,
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NASA Chief Scientist Jim Green will discuss what
6/5/2019 In Celebration of 50 Years Since the Moon Landing, Neil Armstrong's Spacesuit Set to Return to Public View | At the Smithsonian | Smithsonian

the future holds for travel to the moon and

beyond.

Armstrong Suit Goes on Display (July 16)

After years of conservation work, Neil

Armstrong’s spacesuit will go back on display at
the Air and Space Museum on the National Mall
on July 16, the 50-year anniversary of the Apollo
11 launch.

Celebration on the National Mall (July 18

through July 20, 2019)

Activities are planned for a three-day

celebration to mark the semicentennial of the
Apollo 11 moon landing.

Discover the Moon Day (July 19)

Retrace astronauts’ steps with a day of family-

friendly activities on July 19. Starting at the
Lunar Module, visitors can wind their way
through the museum for about the same
distance the Apollo 11 crew trekked across the
moon’s surface. Along the way they’ll encounter
stations where they can chat with scientists,
check out images from the Lunar
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Reconnaissance Orbiter and explore a 3D moon

model.

Moon Landing Celebration (July 20)

Fifty years after Armstrong took his historic

rst steps onto the moon’s surface, the museum
will celebrate his “giant leap for mankind” with
a day of commemorative activities. Night owls
will be able to stick around for some after-hours
exploration as the museum keeps its doors open
until 2 a.m.

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