APOD: A Mars Panorama from the Phoenix Lander (2011 Mar 13)

[keirvt]

I find the matching of the terrain on the RHS fairly poor. the sort of mottled terrain in the background is signifcantly different to the section stitched onto its left. Maybe the times that the pictures were taken is significantly different and the lighting changed?

[neufer]

Picnic, huh? NO ants and NO Yogi to steal take the pic-a-nic baskets

But... Yogi is on Mars!

Oh-My! What a boo-boo! I didn't reconize [sic] him in his dehydrated lack-of-pic-a-nic-baskets condition.

<<[RECON (i.e., reconnaissance)] is generally an intelligence-gathering asset of human intelligence,
under the intelligence cycle of intelligence collection management.>>

I too was both warmer and wetter in the past.

Yogi

[owlice]

I too was both warmer and wetter in the past.

Yogi

:: bites fingers! ::

[Chris Peterson]

I too was both warmer and wetter in the past.

Too much information.

[rstevenson]

Considering the Phoenix Lander has been on MARS for 3 years in such a dusty land and atmospheric environment!! How did it stay so clean?? There must be Aliens on that planet.

This craft only operated for a few months. It took the picture more than two years ago. I imagine it is a little more dusty now.

Rob

[Max S]

Well not to ONLY mention that gold rock, what else is there to see hmm....
bottom left, moved rock with trail
bottom right, WHITE RESIDUE in some sort of footprint!?
and if you look just left of the solar panels, a similar footprint
(when i say footprint i mean the machines footprint probably)
and last but no least...
It says canada?!

[rstevenson]

Well not to ONLY mention that gold rock, what else is there to see hmm....
bottom left, moved rock with trail
bottom right, WHITE RESIDUE in some sort of footprint!?
and if you look just left of the solar panels, a similar footprint
(when i say footprint i mean the machines footprint probably)
and last but no least...
It says canada?!

The Phoenix Lander has a scoop designed to shovel up a bit of soil and drop it into a sampler. Those are scoop marks, not footprints. And that white residue seems to be carbon dioxide ice. As for Canada, various countries contribute in various ways to NASA's efforts. I assume that part of the lander was made for and contributed by the Canadian Space Agency.

Rob

[WildGuruLarry]

So, when I apply my Photoshop program to a whole bunch of samples for a panorama, I typically get a cleaner looking picture. How come this one is so tatty?

I'm surprised nobody has answered this question yet. I think it is quite a good one. I believe the answer is that NASA is more concerned about scientific accuracy than making the panorama look as seamless as possible. If you were to use standard "photoshop" techniques on the panorama to make it look nice, you would necessarily have to mess with the data, and "make up" information to make it look good. This would compromise the scientific accuracy of the photos.

[Chris Peterson]

I believe the answer is that NASA is more concerned about scientific accuracy than making the panorama look as seamless as possible. If you were to use standard "photoshop" techniques on the panorama to make it look nice, you would necessarily have to mess with the data, and "make up" information to make it look good. This would compromise the scientific accuracy of the photos.

Although your point about scientific accuracy in general is well taken, I don't think that's at issue here. Scientifically, this mosaic doesn't provide much- that comes from the individual images that make it up. I think there's a simpler answer: it's a heck of a lot of work to make a seamless mosaic, especially when there are likely to be some geometric issues with camera position between the different images. You can't do it with a tool like Photoshop in this case, you need to actually transform each image into a mathematical projection, and then reassemble the entire thing (this is done with some images at JPL, and at other labs as well).

In this case, the intent of the image was largely aesthetic, to simply provide a sense of the view from another planet. The production of this image was probably just a quick side project, not supported with funding to produce something of high technical accuracy. I'd guess that one person simply stitched together the images with Photoshop or a similar tool, meaning that there are all sorts of issues along image seams.

[~Marreco~]

Was only me or everyone would get confused how a landed spacecraft could be so clean in a dusty planet like Mars? Congratulations for the awesome photo.

[BMAONE23]

Was only me or everyone would get confused how a landed spacecraft could be so clean in a dusty planet like Mars? Congratulations for the awesome photo.

Bear in mind, the lander/lab only operated for a few months. The images comprising this panorama were only taken a couple of months after landing so there wasn't sufficient time for the ambient dust to settle much.

[Chris Peterson]

Bear in mind, the lander/lab only operated for a few months. The images comprising this panorama were only taken a couple of months after landing so there wasn't sufficient time for the ambient dust to settle much.

Also, it's not a one-way process. Dust settles, but it also gets blown off. The success of the long-lived rover missions depends very much on that fact, as the solar panels would have long since been covered with dust and made useless but for occasional cleaning by strong winds.

[Anthony Barreiro]

Much of the interest in human missions to Mars seems to arise from the desire to see still pictures and video of humans in spacesuits on the Martian surface. While I too would love to see this on apod, the evening news, etc., it hardly seems worth the incredibly high cost relative to robotic missions, the risk to human life, or the marginal scientific value of sending human scientists, rather than robots, to Mars. Perhaps some of this understandable human craving to see ourselves "out there" could be satisfied by including an additional small rover with a simple camera with each spacecraft that will land on Mars or another solar system body. After landing, the rover deploys a short distance from the primary lander and takes snapshots and video of the lander doing its thing against the exotic extraterrestrial background. That would make a great apod, and would probably even make the evening news.

[jazz41au]

So, when I apply my Photoshop program to a whole bunch of samples for a panorama, I typically get a cleaner looking picture. How come this one is so tatty?


Ed

Edward Sutorik

However much I would like to believe it's on Mars, I have my doubts. The rocks on the far left cast a shadow to the left and the rocks on the far right the shadows are on the right. Other shadows don't tally either. One would think cables were incapsulated much better. Pretty sloppy. Then there is all the sand on a box, but no sand elsewhere. And a square hole has neatly been dug on the far right in the picture. Not convinced it's on Mars.

[Mikey]

The most expensive ad for duct tape..., ever.

The yellowish object is an escaped Easter chick.

[BMAONE23]

The most expensive ad for duct tape..., ever.

The yellowish object is an escaped Easter chick.

No Peeping

[rstevenson]

However much I would like to believe it's on Mars, I have my doubts. The rocks on the far left cast a shadow to the left and the rocks on the far right the shadows are on the right. Other shadows don't tally either. One would think cables were incapsulated much better. Pretty sloppy. Then there is all the sand on a box, but no sand elsewhere. And a square hole has neatly been dug on the far right in the picture. Not convinced it's on Mars.

Rob

[BMAONE23]

So, when I apply my Photoshop program to a whole bunch of samples for a panorama, I typically get a cleaner looking picture. How come this one is so tatty?


Ed

Edward Sutorik

However much I would like to believe it's on Mars, I have my doubts. The rocks on the far left cast a shadow to the left and the rocks on the far right the shadows are on the right. Other shadows don't tally either. One would think cables were incapsulated much better. Pretty sloppy. Then there is all the sand on a box, but no sand elsewhere. And a square hole has neatly been dug on the far right in the picture. Not convinced it's on Mars.

This is a similar arguement as that which was used against the validity of the Lunar photos.
This is a Mosaic Panorama image that was stitched together from hundreds of individual images. The Shadowing on the far left side of the image indicates the sun is on the left casting shadows toward the right of the rocks. The shadowing on the far right of the image also indicates the sun is on the left and casting shadows toward the right of the rocks. Above the sample trench, adjacent to the left solar panel, lies a small patch of gravel/rocks which indicates the sun is also on the left, but directly above this area there is a part of the mosaic that doesn't indicate any shadowing at all. This portion was taken at a different time of day when the sun was more directly overhead. The central portion of the panorama, between the two solar panels, is illuminated from the opposite side and was taken either much earlier or later in the day than either side.
The cable work is pretty typical of most martian probes considering they need to be cost effective and travel 60,000,000 miles plus the rigors of reentry and landing.
The "sand on a box" is the byproduct of the effort to get samples (sand) into the chemistry lab and ovens (box). They had problems with the soil being "Sticky" and needing to shake (vibrate) the trenching scoop which caused the soil to get all over the top ov the oven (box). The Square hole on the right is where the scoop had trenched the surface soil away and then tried to scrape some of the subsurface soil for samples. As neat and square as it appears, it is actually longer than it is wide and is made from 3 separate trenching maneuvers.
This image will give you a feel for the size of the scoop vs the size of the trench http://fawkes4.lpl.arizona.edu/images.p ... 01&clD=161

Click to view full size image

Here is just how dirty things get trying to deliver soil into the lab/oven space

Click to view full size image

And here is one of the trench on the right side that appears square http://fawkes4.lpl.arizona.edu/images.p ... 128&cID=71

Click to view full size image

[geckzilla]

Oklahoma isn't that desolate.

Maybe he was thinking of the dust bowl. I've found that a lot of people who have never visited Oklahoma think of it as a dry place where they shoved a bunch of indians back in the day. Maybe you live in a teepee, Bystander.

[Beyond]

And here is one of the trench on the right side that appears square http://fawkes4.lpl.arizona.edu/images.p ... 128&cID=71

Click to view full size image

Remembering a 'bout' in another APOD thread about oval vs oblong, i would hazzard a guess that this trench is really rectangular and not square.

[WildGuruLarry]

Although your point about scientific accuracy in general is well taken, I don't think that's at issue here. Scientifically, this mosaic doesn't provide much- that comes from the individual images that make it up. I think there's a simpler answer: it's a heck of a lot of work to make a seamless mosaic, especially when there are likely to be some geometric issues with camera position between the different images. You can't do it with a tool like Photoshop in this case, you need to actually transform each image into a mathematical projection, and then reassemble the entire thing (this is done with some images at JPL, and at other labs as well).

Well, I'll have to give you the point about scientific accuracy, but I disagree about the time argument. I've made plenty of seamless panoramas, both manually in Photoshop and using open source tools (autopano-sift is a good one). The hard part is transforming the images and lining them all up with each other, but with seam blending it doesn't have to be perfect, and clearly that work has already been done. Blending the seams to make it look nice is a very trivial part of the task, and something that could easily be done in Photoshop... so if the maker of this image didn't care about preserving pixels, then I'm left to wonder what the real answer is. Interesting. I suppose it could be that whatever tool they are using makes it easy to transform the images, but for some reason doesn't have an auto-blend tool built in, and - as you mentioned - they are not getting paid to blend panoramas.

[djj01]

Hello all,

I doubt if anyone is still interested in this photo at this time, but I'm still not convinced that the trail 'behind' the rock was made by the exhausts:

Why has only one of the many rocks in that area been affected?
Why is the trail crooked and not straight?
Why is the trail so well defined and not showning signs of blast marks, if it was caused by the exhaust?
Is anyone else given this some thought, or is it just me?

Just a thought

Cheers

djj01

[rstevenson]

I agree that trail is odd looking. But recall that this is a full 360° panorama, so that rock and its trail, at the far left, is quite close to the famous trench with ice at the bottom, which is way over on the right in this view. I wonder if the scoop which made the famous trench just dragged the rock a little as it was going by, the rock sticking up a little higher than expected perhaps? Wrapping the image around in your head, you'll see there's a squarish trench on both sides of that rock and trail, so the scoop would have moved over the rock to go from one to the other.

Or, as someone else mentioned, there are clear blast effects from the lander's motors all around that rock. So I suppose if that particular rock were a little lighter and more exposed than its neighbours, it could have been pushed by the blast while the others stayed put.

Or, it's the not-yet-famous Martian land crab. I hereby volunteer to go and catch one.

Rob

[bystander]

Or, it's the not-yet-famous Martian land crab. I hereby volunteer to go and catch one.

Wow, sounds like a costly adventure, but I wish you luck. Bring back enough for everyone.

[BMAONE23]

Wwile you're there, stop by Bluberry Hill for a real thrill