By: Prabhanu Das
June 28 2024
Video claiming to show moon close to Earth at Arctic Circle is computer-generated
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Screenshot of viral X posts claiming that the moon appeared right next to the earth in the Arctic circle (Source: X/Modified by Logically Facts)
Fact-Check
The Verdict Fake
The video was originally created and uploaded in 2021 by a CGI and 3D graphics artist.
Claim ID 241111f9
What’s the claim?
Multiple posts on X (formerly Twitter) shared a 36-second video, of what appears to be a celestial body moving over a landscape at great speed and eclipsing the Sun for a few seconds. Captions on the post claim it was shot on the Arctic circle between the borders of Canada, Alaska and Russia, and the phenomenon is witnessed only once a year for 36 seconds. The posts further claim that during this time, which occurs only at perigee (the point where the moon is closest to the earth), the moon comes so close to the Earth that it seems like it is going to hit the Earth and this is followed by a total solar eclipse for 5 seconds when everything goes dark. Archived versions of the posts can be found here and here.
Screenshots of viral posts claiming that it shows the moon appearing extremely close to the Earth in an event that happens once a year for 36 seconds. (Source: X/Modified by Logically Facts)
However, this is an old video, created using CGI by an animation artist in 2021.
What we found
After a reverse image search of keyframes in the video, we found that similar claims with the video had surfaced in 2021 during a supermoon on May 26, 2021, and were fact-checked at the time. A supermoon is when a full moon is at, or close to perigee.
Logically Facts had also checked this claim in April 2022 and found that an X account named HoaxEye (archived here), which described itself as a “hoax fighter and fact finder,” had noted that the original video created by an animation artist named Aleksey__nx on TikTok.
We also found that the same account had posted the video on X and said, "As a creator, I sold NFT of this video to the @smaugsnft."
Taking a cue from this, we checked the artist’s Instagram and X accounts (archived here). While they appeared to have deleted all the old posts, we found the video uploaded as a YouTube Short (archived here) with the caption “Supermoon” on his YouTube channel.
Screenshots of the video from the viral posts compared to the original video by the artist which is in higher quality show that both are the same video. (Source: X/aleksey__n/Youtube/Modified by Logically Facts)
Aleksey__n’s Instagram bio only mentions him as a digital creator. However, his X bio lists his occupation as a 3D artist and he clearly mentions that some of his work is VFX and animation on his Youtube community posts.
Going through his social media accounts, we found that the author had published several such VFX videos of asteroids destroying the moon, dinosaurs, Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs), and extraterrestrial creatures.
A screenshot of the artist's Youtube channel shows that he has uploaded several CGI and animated videos. (Source: Aleksey__n/Youtube/Modified by Logically Facts)
Logically Facts has reached out to Aleksey__nx for comment on the video. This fact-check will be updated if and when we receive a response.
Basannt Raj Singh, who has been working as a visual effects supervisor since 2010 and is a member of the Visual Effects Society, told Logically Facts that the video is “without a doubt, CGI.” To explain how one can tell, he pointed out, “Firstly, any video where the camera is trained at the sun and moon would be over-exposed or have a lot of silhouettes, you cannot get such perfect lighting. Secondly, the quality of the moon is too sharp as compared to the rest of the elements which tells me that it is different layers composited on top of each other”.
He further said that one can tell the video is a CGI composition by the fact that “there is so much happening in the video, but there are no shadows on the grass throughout the video.” He added that the way the moon appears on the horizon line and moves means that the land is one layer, and the moon and the sky is another layer added to it.
The verdict
The viral video is not real and is a computer-generated video created by an animation artist and published on May 17, 2021.
