In 2019 Andy produced the only clear, recognisable image of Neil Armstrong on the Moon, for the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11. He went on to reveal life on board the stricken Apollo 13 mission, and in 2021 found Alan Shepard’s golf ball on the lunar surface - finally revealing how far the “miles and miles” shot went, half a century after the event. Later the same year his imaging work and analysis helped to solve one of NASA’s most enduring mysteries, by determining the most likely cause of the sinking of Gus Grissom’s Liberty Bell 7 spacecraft, 60 years after the world’s 3rd spaceflight; finally vindicating Grissom.
His debut book, Apollo Remastered was a record breaking Sunday Times Bestseller and was shortlisted for Barnes & Noble's Book of the Year. It was awarded Book of the Year in 2022 from Space Hipsters and in 2023 Andy became the third British recipient of the coveted Royal Photographic Society international Award For Scientific Imaging. The RPS said, “In their 145th year, the awards are the world’s longest-running and most prestigious photography honours, recognising individuals who are making significant contributions across still and moving image. Science has been at the heart of the Society since it was founded in 1853. Its mission to ‘promote the art and science of photography’ has been underpinned more recently by its pledge to make ‘photography for everyone’. The work of Andy Saunders unites both those aims - a body of work that is a giant leap in the world of scientific imaging, with his stunning restoration efforts on the photographs taken during the Apollo missions. His major innovation, a complex stacking technique, to allow him to produce images from sequences with a moving ‘movie’ camera, and even subjects moving within the scene, allowed Saunders to reveal previously unseen elements of historic events.”
Also in 2023, Andy collaborated with Tom Hanks, Chris Riley and 59 Productions to produce the critically acclaimed immersive show, The Moonwalkers: A Journey with Tom Hanks, featuring imagery from the book.
He was recognised by the Arthur C. Clarke Foundation and the British Interplanetary Society in 2024 - receiving the ‘Arthur’ (Sir Arthur Clarke award) for outstanding contribution to space exploration, in the category of media, broadcast and written, at the Royal Aeronautical Society, London.
In addition to The Moonwalkers show, and a large-scale outdoor exhibition spread throughout London’s King’s Cross, his solo photographic exhibitions have been viewed in person by half a million people.
2025 will see the highly anticipated release of the prequel to Apollo Remastered - Gemini & Mercury Remastered, offering a never-before-seen window into the dawn of human space exploration, and featuring some of the finest photographs of our home planet ever captured on film, in unprecedented detail and clarity.
As of 2024, he is 50 years old and lives in Culcheth, Cheshire with his young family.
