Have you ever wanted to take pictures like an astronaut? Now is your chance. There’s an original Hasselblad 500EL Electric Camera kit on Ebay right now. And it’s just like the ones that were used on the Apollo Moon missions. If you act fast—and have a spare $74,950.00 laying around—it could be yours!

The camera’s listed by camera dealer Setadel Studios and is the real deal, dating back to 1969. It spent the past couple of decades in a couple different private collections, but now it’s up for grabs, with the auction ending today, in about 10 hours. There are no bids yet, so you could be first!


The actual Hasselblad 500EL Electric Camera on sale

You get everything you could need from lenses to promotional booklets, and the camera is in working order and in excellent condition. According to Setadel, less pristine versions have sold for over $100,000, so this is technically a pretty good deal.

There’s only one catch: this camera wasn’t actually on the Moon. All the ones that were are still up there, because the astronauts left them behind to make room for moon rocks. Still, it’d be an amazing gadget to own, even though you probably can’t afford it. And it probably has a good resale value too (think instant profit).

The EL in the camera name stands for “Electric Camera”. They were adopted by NASA for Apollo and flew for the first time on Apollo 8. They carried three of the cameras on Apollo 11, equipped with a Zeiss 5.6/60mm Biogon lens. Each of them had film cartridges that could take 150 to 200 exposures. They modified them heavily:

This is a specially designed version of the motorized 500EL intended for use on the surface of the moon, where the first lunar pictures were taken on 20 July 1969 by Neil Armstrong. The camera is equipped with a specially designed Biogon lens with a focal length of 60 mm, with a polarization filter mounted on the lens. A glass plate (Reseau-Plate), provided with reference crosses which are recorded on the film during exposure, is in contact with the film, and these crosses can be seen on all the pictures taken on the moon from 1969 to 1972. The 12 HEDC cameras used on the surface of the moon were left there. Only the film magazines were brought back.

So there you go, now you know why all the Moon pictures have the crosshairs all over them. After their success with these cameras, NASA has used Hasselblads in all their flights.

Filed under: Manned Space Flight