NASA has just released photos of the moon’s near side that have such clarity and detail they show mountains and craters kilometres high.

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, which has been circling the moon at a low altitude since mid-2009, snapped the pictures using a special high resolution wide-angle camera. The LRO also has two other narrow angle cameras on it as well as a laser altimeter.

The narrow cameras were used earlier in the mission to take photos of the Apollo landing sites which show the paths made by astronauts during the missions.

The images have been described as jaw-dropping, showing details such as the tracks made by the Apollo rovers and other artifacts and paraphenalia left on the moon.

But the latest set of pictures are equally stunning, say NASA officials. And a similar mosaic of the far side of the moon is soon to be shot.

“I’ve looked at the moon now professionally for almost 10 years now,” said Noah Petro, a research scientist at NASA Goddard, just outside Washington, D.C. “Everytime I think God, that’s a beautiful place…Everytime you take a different picture of the moon you see something in a different light. It’s like going to your favourite art gallery and seeing your favourite painting in a different light every day.”

NASA and Arizona Statue University released the most recent set of 1,300 black and white frames last week. When assembled, they create a mosaic of the near side of the moon measuring 24,000 pixels across. The pictures were taken over a two week period in December. Each time the LRO orbited the moon it took a series of pictures.

“As the moon rotated under LRO’s orbit the ground track progressed from east to west (right to left in this mosaic)”, Arizona State University’s Mark Robinson explained to SkyTelescope.com. Robinson, a professor at ASU, and a team there are responsible for the photographs.

The images were taken at a time when the Sun was high in the lunar sky but not directly overhead, creating enough shadowing to define crater rims and other topography.

The wide-angle camera used to take these pictures weighs just under a kilogram and would fit in the palm of a hand. It has an aperture of 1.2 mm across and focal length of just 6 mm.

But because of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter’s low flight path — 30 kilometres above the moon’s surface — the camera can pick greater detail than has ever been achieved.

The pictures reflect the reality of the moon and are dark because the moon itself is dark, NASA scientists explained. It only looks bright to us because of the contrast of the black sky surrounding it.

And now anyone can look at the moon close up.

“You can sit there at your computer and zoom in anywhere on the near side and get amazing high resolution views,” Petro said.

“You can look at the image and see craters are casting shadows and think wow how rough parts of the moon really are. Many don’t appreciate the fact the moon isn’t a billiard ball. When you go to the mosaic you appreciate the roughness of the moon’s surface. The craters and mountains are kilometres high. The moon is very jagged.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

And for those moon enthusiasts who can’t wait to see more pictures Petro said NASA and Arizona State University will be releasing more photos later this year. “All of this data is publicly released.”

And for those who want to get more involved there’s International Observe the Moon Night which will take place on October 8.

Petro said: “The LRO is showing there are a lot of exciting unknowns about the moon that we’re still learning.”