> What takes the place of a light source and slit in this situation?

The Sun.

(and the 150.000.000 km between it and us)

From the NASA page you link:

> The light is passed through a slit which is placed such that the reflected light from the mirror forms parallel rays that pass through the test section.

A light source placed at 150.000.000 km distance will obtain the same effect without any slit or mirror: the rays coming from it will appear to be substantially parallel to one another.

The fact that the Sun does not appear point-like in the sky has a small effect on this, as each point of the surface of the Sun will generate a family of parallel rays, and each family will not be parallel to the others, possibly blurring the image.

A careful construction of the receiving optical system (on the right of the slide you took from the NASA page) can obviate to this. Details on how to achieve such a result are more in the realm of photography, optics and physics in general rather than aviation.

> I'm looking for how these planes were oriented for this flight

Straight from [NASA themselves][1]:

> NASA flew a B-200, outfitted with an updated imaging system, at around 30,000 feet while the pair of T-38s were required to not only remain in formation, but to fly at supersonic speeds at the precise moment they were directly beneath the B-200

[and][2]

[![enter image description here][3]][3]


  [1]: https://www.nasa.gov/centers/armstrong/features/supersonic-shockwave-interaction.html
  [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZPK3B8rQV4
  [3]: https://i.sstatic.net/ySI8K.png