Comment by sandworm101
2 days ago
And the cost of the camera program was paid back a hundred times as that footage was used to diagnose, correct and improve countless systems. Accident investigations would have taken ten times as long without that footage.
I absolutely love that beautiful film footage, particularly well-exhibited in one of my favorite documentaries, the spectacular "When We Left Earth" (a lovely and lengthy series). That said...
Modern rockets have the ability to stream a great deal more data, including live camera streams, than the Mercury/Gemini/Apollo or Space Shuttle could. This increased real-time data bandwidth is probably much more valuable than high-dynamic-range cameras were.
Telemetry only records what you deem interesting prior to flight. When something goes really wrong it probably came from something you were not expecting, like foam insulation. Cameras recorded everything visible, even the stuff you don't think important.