Anthony Appleyard posted at 3:52PM Fri, 13 May 2016 - #4269065

But why is the astronaut's shadow on the ground so dark, but the front side of the astronaut, which is equally hidden from the sunlight, is nearly as bright as in a CGI image rendered in "no shadows" mode?

There are two things going on here. The first is exposure-related. The suits are white. The moon's surface is dark gray. If you look at that large rock on the left that the stand-thingy is on, you'll see the same effect. The rock is slightly lighter than the rest of the surface and on its shadowed side you can just make out some of the detail of the rock, but the shadow on the dirt is nearly pitch black, like Charles Duke's shadow (the flight was Apollo 16, by the by). The white suit is simply reflecting more light.

The second issue is that the photo has been manipulated and its exposure adjusted. John Young was panning across the scene while Duke stopped to watch him film, and the frames of that film were cleaned up and composited into a panoramic image, of which your image is part of. This is what the original imagery looked like, with the frame showing Duke:

You'll note the lens flaring, blowouts, and other image artifacts that were corrected (such as the removal of the image number at the bottom and the focus crosses from the camera.)

Oh, and that this is in colour (note that you can see the gold in the visor reflection).