|
|
 |
| Press Release Images: Spirit |
 |
 |
04-Jan-2006
|
|
 |
Still Shining After All This Time (Vertical)
The most recent self-portrait of NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit shows the solar panels still gleaming in the Martian sunlight and carrying only a thin veneer of dust two years after the rover landed and began exploring the red planet. Spirit's panoramic camera took this mosaic of images on the 586th sol, or Martian day, of exploration (Aug. 27, 2005), as part of a mammoth undertaking that resulted in the largest panorama ever acquired by Spirit (http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/press/spirit/20051205a.html; http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA03610). This image is a subset of that panorama, showing just the rover. The vertical projection used here produces the best view of the rover deck itself, though it distorts the ground and antennas somewhat.
This image is an approximate true-color rendering that combines images taken through the camera's 600-nanometer, 530-nanometer and 480-nanometer filters.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell
|
|
Browse Image |
Medium Image (155 kB) |
Large (15.4 MB)
|
|
 |
Still Shining After All This Time (Polar)
This bird's-eye view combines a self-portrait of the spacecraft deck and a panoramic mosaic of the Martian surface as viewed by NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit. The rover's solar panels are still gleaming in the sunlight, having acquired only a thin veneer of dust two years after the rover landed and commenced exploring the red planet. Spirit captured this 360-degree panorama on the summit of "Husband Hill" inside Mars' Gusev Crater. During the period from Spirit's Martian days, or sols, 583 to 586 (Aug. 24 to 27, 2005), the rover's panoramic camera acquired the hundreds of individual frames for this largest panorama ever photographed by Spirit.
This image is an approximately true-color rendering using the camera's 750-nanometer, 530-nanometer and 480-nanometer filters for the Martian surface, and the 600-nanometer, 530-nanometer, and 480-nanometer filters for the rover deck. This polar projection is a compromise between a cylindrical projection (http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/press/spirit/20051205a.html; http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA03610), which provides the best view of the terrain, and a vertical projection, which provides the best view of the deck but distorts the terrain far from the rover. The view is presented with geometric seam correction.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell
|
|
Browse Image |
Medium Image (21 kB) |
Large (63.0 MB)
|
|
|
|
 |
Intricately Rippled Sand Deposits
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit welcomed the beginning of 2006 on Earth by taking this striking panorama of intricately rippled sand deposits in Gusev Crater on Mars. This is an approximate true-color rendering of the "El Dorado" ripple field provided by Spirit over the New Year's holiday weekend. The view spans about 160 degrees in azimuth from left to right and consists of images acquired by Spirit's panoramic camera on Spirit's 708th and 710th Martian days, or sols, (Dec. 30, 2005 and Jan. 1, 2006). Spirit used the Pancam's 750-nanometer, 530-nanometer and 430-nanometer filters to capture the colors on Mars. Scientists have eliminated seams between individual frames in the sky portion of the mosaic to better simulate the vista a person standing on Mars would see. Spirit spent several days acquiring images, spectral data, and compositional and mineralogical information about these large sand deposits before continuing downhill toward "Home Plate."
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell
|
|
Browse Image |
Medium Image (164 kB) |
Large (16.0 MB)
|
|
|
JPL Image Use Policy
|
|
