The Smithsonian Institution is out to make the most of the Pluto flyby hype, launching its first Kickstarter campaign ever centered around the one man who still stands as NASA’s brightest beacon: Neil Armstrong. The Smithsonian wants to preserve and put back on display Armstrong’s moonwalk space suit. They’re asking $500,000 to do it.

The Reboot the Suit Kickstarter campaign launched on July 19. As always, the Smithsonian Institution has 30 days to reach its funding target, or it receives nothing. As to why the Smithsonian, a federally-funded entity, needs your money at all, here’s the official line:

“Federal appropriations provide the foundation of the Smithsonian’s operating budget and support core functions, such as building operations and maintenance, research, and safeguarding the collections. Projects like Reboot the Suit aren’t covered by our federal appropriations, which means we can only undertake them if we can fund them some other way. In other words, we won’t be able to do this project without the participation of Kickstarter backers.”

Also:

“No matter the outcome of this project, Neil Armstrong’s spacesuit will be cared for and safeguarded for as long as the Smithsonian Institution exists (and we’ve been around for 169 years so far). But we want to do more than keep the spacesuit safe — we want to display it for all to see. The only risk we have is not meeting our deadline to have it conserved, digitized, and on display in time for the 50th anniversary of the Moon landing.”

Of course, that doesn’t really explain why Kickstarter is being used for the first time right now, but it’s understood at this point that a crowd-funding campaign can serve as marketing almost as equally as it serves funding purposes. After all, I’m writing about it at this very moment. But on to the details.

A rendering of the upcoming Destination Moon exhibition.

A couple of things will happen if the $500,000 gets funded:

1. The Smithsonian will embark on a conservation process with the Apollo 11 suit itself, documenting, stabilizing and protecting it as a historical artifact.
2. The suit will be “digitized,” entailing a full 3D scan to be used as a mold for personal recreation using 3D printers.
3. The suit will be displayed at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum as a part of the upcoming Destination Moon exhibition. The Smithsonian wants the suit on display in time for the Apollo 11 mission’s 50th anniversary in July 2019.

As for backer rewards, in stark contrast to the ideal Kickstarter campaign from a company lacking in resources, what the Smithsonian is offering is almost surreal. Highlights include an exclusive mission patch at $55, a behind-the-scenes tour of the Air and Space Museum at $1,000 and a Smithsonian flag that flew on the Space Shuttle Discovery in to actual freaking space at $2,500; with plenty more rewards spread around. The $10,000 reward is a whopper, but I suppose if you’re in a position to throw around $10,000 then whoppers are all you’re eating.

The Smithsonian Wants Your Help Preserving Neil Armstrong’s Moonwalk Suit

Earlier this week we lamented the loss of a movie that never existed, a new Alien movie from Neill Blomkamp, by gallivanting through the web in search of random memorabilia. It was a joy. The final item of that list was a faux travel poster for one planet of particular importance in the Alien universe, LV-426. Though fictional, traveling to such a planet isn’t so far from the imaginations of many, especially the imaginations of people who work at NASA, that place that’s eventually going private under the leadership of a man named Charles Bishop Weyland.

In any case, NASA’s put out it’s own wonderfully inventive travel posters of exoplanets that actually do exist, yet are still unreachable by the average tourist.

Named for the NASA telescope that discovered it, Kepler-186f will always be the first planet discovered in the “habitable zone,” that distance from its own sun that suggests the potential for liquid water on the surface. These posters are part of an ongoing series out of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the California Institute of Technology. The website, dubbed Planet Quest, is devoted to the search for habitable planets. It’s fitting, then, that this theoretically reddish planet (due to the wavelengths of its sun known to be redder than our own) should have its own poster.

According to the Planet Quest website as of publication date, NASA’s confirmed the existence 1,89 exoplanets (those outside our solar system), with another 3,199 candidates (those that need further evidence for official listing). Most of this is due to the Kepler telescope, which launched into orbit around the Earth in 2009. It was designed for the specific purpose of discovering other Earth-like planets.

The other two posters are just as fun, if not as nostalgic. The only thing left, really, is actually naming these things. We’ve definitely got some more Roman Gods left in the bank.

Some might feel satisfied with a Star Wars reference for Kepler-16b. Others might remember the planet from the only Vin Diesel movie that ever mattered, Pitch Black. And no, let’s not remember the sequels.

Here at Ben’s we like to set you up with some sweet deals, and these posters are no exception. In fact, they’re the best deals ever: free. NASA’s versions of theses images are offered at staggeringly large sizes, ripe for the downloading and printing at your own convenience and customization. Maybe you should find a Kinko’s, if those still exist (they’re just FedEx’s now).

3 NASA Exoplanet Travel Posters That Should Be On Your Wall