# Moon photos

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moon-photos/713263>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [February 21, 2015, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moon-photos/713263 "2015-02-21T14:52:15Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![A\_Dodgy\_Dude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a87d85/32.png) [@A\_Dodgy\_Dude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Dodgy_Dude)\
**Post date:** [February 21, 2015, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moon-photos/713263/1 "2015-02-21T14:52:15Z")

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When I was a kid all the photos the astronauts took on the moon’s surface had these small black crosses on them. Like this:

[![](http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--mvfHCEaQ--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/syfjrrbtlb4iqsds7bwu.jpg) ](http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--mvfHCEaQ--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/syfjrrbtlb4iqsds7bwu.jpg)

What’s the point of those crosses? I assume to help the astronauts take better pictures: “Think of the crosses as the corners of the picture. Put the interesting thing at the center of four crosses.” Am I right?

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**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\
**Post date:** [February 21, 2015, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moon-photos/713263/2 "2015-02-21T15:02:47Z")

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Nope. The crosshairs (called fiducials) are not visible to the astronauts. They are only visible on the film, and are used to detect film distortion.

[http://www.clavius.org/photoret.html](http://www.clavius.org/photoret.html)

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**Author:** ![Hail\_Ants](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dc4da7/32.png) [@Hail\_Ants](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hail_Ants)\
**Post date:** [February 21, 2015, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moon-photos/713263/3 "2015-02-21T20:29:55Z")

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Not to hijack, but they’re also one of many things Moon-hoax nut-burgers use to make their ridiculous claims. The link above also does a great job explaining why the cross hairs sometimes seem to be inconsistent in their appearance across different photos and prints.