Talk:NASA insignia

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Worm logo use in The Martian film

Did I see that the worm logo was used in several places in the trailers for the Matt Damon film The Martian? Perhaps there should be a cultural references section. 104.228.82.126 (talk) 01:20, 23 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Two or three NASA logos?

The article says that the Seal and the Insignia (according to the text the insignia is the original "meatball", not the "worm") are optically incompatible. How can this be if they are identical ("The original design and now official NASA Seal")? Are we actually talking about three logos (of which only two are shown by image)? And why is the original design called "meatball"? If it were just "ball", ok. But "meat"...?--SiriusB 17:20, 29 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There are three insignia. I have added the NASA seal. Calwatch 06:57, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL Addhoc 13:25, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

~* Why does the Insignia say meatball and thus the seal says worm? *~*

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL [User:me|me]]

~* you shouldn't name em *~*

Sphere?

I don't see a sphere in the NASA Insignia yet the description describes one. Am I missing something or have they confused their description with the NASA Seal? Clan-destine 17:18, 5 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The blue ball background of the logo is the sphere mentioned. jtowns 06:20, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Worm

I'd heard that the 'A' and the 'S' in 'NASA' are conjoined to emphasize the union of aeronautics and space. I am unable to find reference material on this, however. LorenzoB 04:13, 13 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Order of images

Perhaps they could be placed in order of their design and then listed that way in the article? --12.217.237.175 (talk) 16:45, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Its OK. Extra999 06:20, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

public domain

The article claims that the NASA insignia and other logos are in the "public domain" and references Code of Federal Regulations 14 CFR 1221. This regulation mentions nothing about public domain. NASA's insignia, seal, and other logos are the few things that NASA does have usage controls on, particularly on advertising and souvenir products. "Public Domain" doesn't seem to fit here. Is there a reference that spells out the status of these logos? Is there that calls it "public domain" or is that being assumed here?--RadioFan (talk) 11:56, 19 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

They are in fact not in the public domain, and the linked ref now explicitly says that. I've updated it. Janitor28 (talk) 21:47, 29 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

There are no better images of an insignia on a vehicle?

It's a lovely picture of an X-15, but you can't see the insignia on it even at the largest resolution. Tastyslowcooker (talk) 21:44, 7 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Surprisingly, there aren't all that many NASA images of spacecraft that prominently display the logo. I'm not sure if the intention with the X-15 image was to show the non-standard NASA logotype on the tail. -Ashley Pomeroy (talk) 17:44, 10 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Color

The RGB values of the colors in the insignia ([[1]]) don't match the RGB values mentioned in the article itself. The article lists the red as having values 252R, 61G, 33B however the values in the image are 236R, 28G, 36B, and the article listst the blue as having values 11R, 61G, 145B however the values in the image are 0R, 102G, 178B. They can't both be "official"...can they? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.103.193.191 (talk) 23:25, 28 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The graphic at Wikimedia Commons was apparently lifted straight out of the PDF document listed as its source without checking the RGB values before it was transferred to Wikipedia. Moreover, there's an external link to the "official" graphics from NASA's Glenn Research Center in Encapsulated PostScript format, and when I import the insignia into Inkscape, it shows an RGBA value of #ee293dff (238,41,61) for the red vector and #1a5dadff (26,93,173) for the blue disc, which do not match the RGBA values given in the "Usage" section, #fc3d21ff (252,61,33) and #0b3d91ff (11,61,145), respectively. (The "ff" value at the end of the Inkscape color hex codes stands for "alpha", or transparency; a value of "ff" means solid, with no transparency.)

Since the Glenn Research Center files are offered as "official", I'd tend to trust them more than the numbers given in the Wikipedia article or the NASA PDF document. Accordingly, I've tagged the color list in the article with a "citation needed" template. I'm not sure if Inkscape preserves RGB values exactly when images are imported from PostScript. The thumbnails of the EPS and SVG files in the file manager certainly look different on my monitor, although this could have more to do with the way the thumbnails are generated by the operating system or how raster thumbnails might be embedded in EPS files than with differences in color encoding.

I've inserted an HTML table below with the cell backgrounds colored according to the codes, and even on a cheap 24-bit LCD monitor with a color gamut less than 16.7 million colors the difference is readily apparent. It is likely that the colors in the PDF publication were adjusted for a specific printing process, not with the intention of the insignia therein being used for fabrication. — Quicksilver^{T @} 18:25, 30 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

NASA PDF publication blue #0066b2ff (0,102,178)	NASA PDF publication red #ec1c24ff (236,28,36)
NASA Glenn Research Center blue "official" #1a5dadff (26,93,173)	NASA Glenn Research Center red "official" #ee293dff (238,41,61)
Wikipedia "Usage" blue #0b3d91ff (11,61,145)	Wikipedia "Usage" red #fc3d21ff (252,61,33)

I'm very confused about the correct colours of the logo. The colours listed on the page (which are copied directly from the NASA document^[1]) are all different. The Pantone listed is different from the CMYK listed, which is different again from the RGB listed. Same for both the blue and the red. Again, the NASA document makes the same mistake. If we go by the Pantone colours, the CMYK and RGB values should be as follows:

Red: 185C; RGB 228 0 43; CMYK 0 93 79 0^[2]

Blue: 286C; RGB 0 51 160; CMYK 100 75 0 0^[3]

Another hitch is that the NASA document for the Worm logo from 1976^[4] lists the NASA red as being "solid red plus solid yellow". Which means the CMYK should be 0 100 100 0, which is what is listed in the article (and the current NASA document). But that colour doesn't match at all what Pantone 185 is.

So apparently we have some conflicting information about the colours, even from the official sources. Greenleaf547 (talk) 03:22, 4 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

References

None of the logos show the NASA meatball

Get an old picture of the vehicle assembly building. The Star with the red & blue lines going around it is the NASA meatball. Called a meatball because the lines around it look like spaghetti. REALLY!!--66.41.154.0 (talk) 18:34, 18 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Isn't that the Bicentennial logo? See for instance <http://research.archives.gov/description/2108434>. The "NASA Meatball" definitely refers to the blue disc logo. (Google Books) 67.188.212.42 (talk) 05:25, 21 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Plagiarism?

The first two paragraphs of the the "History" section seem to be lifted word-for-word from NASA's history page for the "meatball" logo, and parts of this section date from this article's creation in 2005. I have referred the section to the correct source, but the paragraphs will likely need to be rewritten at some point. pwnzor.ak (talk) 03:10, 29 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Since official works of Nasa employees (like all US government agencies) are not subject to copy write, text from their webpage can be lifted verbatim and used in Wikipedia without issue. It is a good idea to attribute the text. Dspark76 (talk) 14:45, 16 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, all right then. Good to know. pwnzor.ak (talk) 22:12, 16 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Who drove the changes

The Daniel Goldin article has

On Friday 22 May 1992, [NASA Administrator] Daniel Goldin announced unexpectedly that the "worm" logo would be replaced by the traditional NASA blue "meatball" logo. It had been replaced in 1975 by the NASA red "worm" logo. By 1997, Goldin had started a largely successful campaign within NASA to eradicate the "worm". He would become infuriated and vulgar whenever he would see a "worm" logo that was not replaced.[2] By 1998 the "worm" logo had entirely disappeared from use both in uniforms and in equipment.

Should we not mention that in this article ? Did DG ever say why he wanted the logo changed ? And why the change in 1975 ? - Rod57 (talk) 12:29, 26 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

[1] ttps://users.cs.jmu.edu/bernstdh/web/common/policies/NASA_StyleGuide_Nov06.pdf

[2] ttps://www.pantone.com/color-finder/185-C

[3] ttps://www.pantone.com/color-finder/286-C

[4] ttps://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/nasa_graphics_manual_nhb_1430-2_jan_1976.pdf

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