By Neeraj Bhushan

Do you know our Earth didn’t appear blue in NASA’s first satellite images! But times have changed. Look at this “Blue Marble 2012” – as NASA (US government’s National Aeronautics and Space Administration) calls it and claims it to be the most amazing high definition image of Earth so far.

Earth as a ‘Blue Marble’ was first snapped by the crew of Apollo 17 in 1972 and that image has always been one of the most famous photos ever taken, for we all then suddenly saw the world in a much different way.

In the years since, the space agency has added many blue marble laurels to its credit, of course with technology enhancing and sharpening the so difficult to take images. And as the latest photo is released, NASA says it’s the most amazing high definition image of Earth.

This latest image, being put here courtesy…

Behind Photographs is a superb project by photographer Tim Mantoani. For the past five years, he has been making portraits of noted photographers holding one of their favorite or most iconic images. Neil Leifer’s image of Muhammad Ali standing over a knocked-out Sonny Liston, Harry Benson’s epic photo of The Beatles having a pillow fight and Steve McCurry’s famed portrait of the Afghan Girl from the cover of National Geographic to name a few. At the bottom of each Polaroid, the photographer has been asked to write out a short story about their image in their own penmanship. In cases, these words are as revealing about the photographer as the image itself. This project includes over 150 photographers from a variety of specialties and has taken me across The United States, shooting in San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York and Boston.

Photographers: Neif Leifer, Harry Benson, Steve…