SpaceX and NASA Lunar HLS - Uncrewed Demo 1 Flight

This is an animation of what it may look like when SpaceX and NASA test the planned Human Landing System for the Artemis program.

From Starbase to the moon's surface, I try to show all the major milestones needed to make this a reality.

I hope for this to be entertaining and somewhat educational. This is highly speculative and will have many inaccuracies, missing or incorrect hardware, and milestones that are wrong or missed. The development of SpaceX's Starship has been at such a fast pace I could never keep up with the changes. I welcome all of your feedback and comments!

Thanks to SpaceX and NASA for dreaming big! I can not wait to see this happen soon!

Thanks to Samuel Krug for making and letting me use your beautiful Earth orbit HDRIs.
Check him out at,

Thanks to all the Artists of Spaceflight that have helped me on this project.

Thanks to the YouTubers that have helped bring excitement, passion, and knowledge to all of us on #TeamSpace.

And
Thank you so much for your support and encouragement!

And thanks to all of you for watching my animations!

[InfiniteSpaceMedia]

One of the best animations we've seen thus far, Bravo!

[MizaT]

HA! I LOVE the wheel of cheese at the end XD

Astounding work on this! Man, SpaceX really should just borrow animations from the community to demonstrate their missions. You showed it perfectly. It all feels so real and attainable too, with all the hardware we've seen. The tower, the catch arms, the QD's, the flip maneuver... We've seen them function.

Now we just need the vehicles to perform as expected. What a time to be alive.

[pawlance]

Beautiful work, all of it. Laughed out loud when the test payload was released on the lunar surface. Congratulations to you and the whole team.

[basbekjenl]

This gives me chills, I hope we can see starship flying soon, making all kinds of things possible.

[wonnnyyyy]

SpaceX should be hiring you for their visuals... so amazing. can't wait to see this happen for real

[kurtgron]

I'm simply speechless by the quality of this animation! What an exciting time to be alive!

[MpetersenTamTD]

The disconnect closeup segments are amazing! I especially like the shot from the far end of the upper stage fueling disconnect @0:44. If you didn't know it was a 3D render, you'd swear it was a real camera shot. Truly impressive work Nick, et al!

[TheAefril]

Excellent work by the Animator here.

Just inspiring, as it is so attainable with today's technology.

Each element shown can be achieved by what has almost already been demonstrated by companies such as SpaceX.

**The Future is bright! **

[danswan]

What a remarkable piece of work. Truly remarkable, and inspiring. Thanks for the incredible effort to put this together for everyone to visualize our future.

[php]

Love the squeaky rollers when Mechzilla Chopsticks lifts up and down the tower. The final test load for the exterior elevator with the Swiss cheese wheel had me laughing. Glad you injected some humor into this

[atptourfan]

Thank you for this incredible effort, Nick!

[tonys]

This is crazy well done. Perhaps 80% of what SpaceX has planned ... At least what they've shown to date. Well done.
Ending was a stroke of genius.

[liamrobins]

WOW just Wow!

No other words needed

[MrHichammohsen]

Now this is what i call a class A professional eye candy video! TEAM SPACE ALL THE WAY! And the cheese at the end was

[Muuip]

Computer animated visualization of ideals.

Amazing, inspiring and promotes creativity towards realization.

Thank you! Much appreciated!👍👍👍

👏👏👏

[freeze]

Absolutely incredible work, all the details are just amazing!

[josiahclinch]

THANK YOU! you are one of few that gets this right. 1st HLS Demo1 then Demo-2/Art-3.

[ibluap]

Awsaome! Inspiring! Great! Guess NASA and Artemis deserve you as their official animator!
Just some little improvements. Any spectator in the vacuum of space won't listen anything from the rockets when they burn... sound are gas pressure waves and where there is no gas, there is no sound... Second, Deorbiting begins at around 28, 000 Km/h and reentry ends, i certainly don't know, but very probably at supersonic speeds. So, I'd add more velocity "feel" to the scene of reentry of refuelling Starship. Ionized plasma seems to swirl as if the artificial meteorite that would be Starship was entering at merely 200 - 300 Km/h.

[digi]

He said "and you for watching". I think I teared up 🥲

[Spaceflight]

Greatest animation yet. Cant wait for more animations like these. As always keep up the outstanding work! #TeamSpace