PIA03231 Sprit sol 454 2005.4.13 Credit: NASA/JPL-Solar System Visualization Team

This view from Husband Hill features Clark Hill (to the left), the Meridiani plains, and the far side of Gusev Crater. A scale model of the rover was added to Sprit's actual false-color image.

This synthetic image was produced using "Virtual Presence in Space" technology. Developed at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., this technology combines visualization and image-processing tools with Hollywood-style special effects. The image was created using a photorealistic model of the rover and a false-color mosaic.

The size of the rover in the image is approximately correct and was based on the size of the rover tracks in the mosaic. The mosaic was assembled from frames taken by the panoramic camera on the rover's 454th Martian day, or sol (April 13, 2005); see PIA07855).

PIA08816 Opportunity sol 957 2006.10.03 Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

When Opportunity finally arrived at the rim of Victoria crater, the newly commissioned Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter was ready to capture this amazing image from orbit some 270 kilometers above. This enhanced color view, taken with the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) instrument, has enough resolution to distinguish objects only 80 centimeters across. The image is so detailed that the shape of the camera bar at the top of Opportunity's mast can be seen in its shadow, cast down and to the right of the rover; in many places, the twin tracks of the rover's wheels are visible as well.

Original caption: This image from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity near the rim of "Victoria Crater." Victoria is an impact crater about 800 meters (half a mile) in diameter at Meridiani Planum near the equator of Mars. Opportunity has been operating on Mars since January, 2004. Five days before this image was taken, Opportunity arrived at the rim of Victoria, after a drive of more than 9 kilometers (over 5 miles). It then drove to the position where it is seen in this image.

Shown in the image are "Duck Bay," the eroded segment of the crater rim where Opportunity first arrived at the crater; "Cabo Frio," a sharp promontory to the south of Duck Bay; and "Cape Verde," another promontory to the north. When viewed at the highest resolution, this image shows the rover itself, wheel tracks in the soil behind it, and the rover's shadow, including the shadow of the camera mast. After this image was taken, Opportunity moved to the very tip of Cape Verde to perform more imaging of the interior of the crater.

This view is a portion of an image taken by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera onboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft on Oct. 3, 2006. The complete image is centered at minus7.8 degrees latitude, 279.5 degrees East longitude. The range to the target site was 297 kilometers (185.6 miles). At this distance the image scale is 29.7 centimeters (12 inches) per pixel (with 1 x 1 binning) so objects about 89 centimeters (35 inches) across are resolved. North is up. The image was taken at a local Mars time of 3:30 PM and the scene is illuminated from the west with a solar incidence angle of 59.7 degrees, thus the sun was about 30.3 degrees above the horizon. At a solar longitude of 113.6 degrees, the season on Mars is northern summer.

This is an enhanced-color view generated from images acquired by the HiRISE camera using its red filter and blue-green filter.

PIA08814 Opportunity sol 952 2006.9.28 Credit: NASA/JPL-Solar System Visualization Team

“Creeping with awe to the verge ...”
-- Dr. David Livingstone, on the discovery of Victoria Falls, 151 years earlier (November, 1855).

Opportunity finally reached Victoria Crater in September 2006, after traveling almost 10 kilometers over 21 months. This approximately true color view, with an artist's concept of the rover superimposed to give a sense of scale, looks north from "Duck Bay" towards the dramatic cliff of layered rock called "Cape Verde." The rim of the crater is composed of alternating promontories, rocky points towering approximately 70 meters above the crater floor, and recessed alcoves. The bottom of the crater is covered by sand that has been shaped into ripples by the Martian wind. The vista extends for more than 400 meters to the far side of the crater.

ASU-IPF-2454 Opportunity sol 134 2004.6.09 Credit: NASA/JPL-Cornell, Rover Model: D. Maas , Synthetic Image: Z. Gorjian, K. Kuramura, M. Stetson, E. De Jong

This photo-realistic, but false color, image shows what a Mars Exploration Rover would look like on Mars. The background image shows the dark soil, ancient rock and small spherules ("blueberries") inside Endurance Crater.

The hematite (iron oxide, or rust) blueberries aren’t really blue – they’re actually grey – nor are they the size of blueberries – they're only around 3 millimeters in diameter.

The 2 meter high Opportunity rover is superimposed at the correct scale. Dan Maas created the excruciatingly-detailed digital model of the Mars rovers based on blueprints from NASA/JPL, including virtually everything on the real rovers down to every last nut, bolt, and wire.

PIA07922 Opportunity sol 446 2005.4.26 Credit: NASA/JPL

While motoring across the Meridiani plain on its 446th sol, Opportunity ground to a halt as it dug itself into what came to be called 'Purgatory Dune'. The elongated dune, or ripple, is about one-third of a meter tall and 2.5 meters wide. The colors in this vertical projection show the relative elevations - red areas are about 70 centimeters higher than the green. "All six wheels were just about completely buried," said MER Principal Investigator Steve Squyres. Freeing the rover took more than five weeks of planning, testing, and carefully monitored driving. The drivers finally decided the best exit strategy was, as Squyres described it, to "put it in reverse and gun it."

This mosaic of navigation-camera frames from NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity, presented in a vertical projection, shows the rover's position after it dug itself to wheel-hub depth in a small dune during its 446th martian day, or sol (April 26, 2005). The colors are coding for information about relative elevations in the surrounding area. Red areas are the highest in the image, green areas the lowest.

Opportunity had completed nearly 40 meters of a planned 90-meter drive that sol when its wheels began slipping. The rover was driving backwards at the time. The rover team frequently alternates between backwards and forwards driving to keep wheel lubrication well distributed. The wheels kept rotating enough times to have covered the rest of the distance if they hadn't been slipping, but the rover eventually barely inched forward. After a turn at the end of the planned drive, Opportunity sensed that it had not turned properly and stopped moving. The rover team spent more than a week designing and conducting tests under simulated Mars conditions on Earth before choosing the best way for Opportunity to drive out of the dune.

PIA03273 Opportunity sol 652-663 2005.11.23 Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell

As it crossed the Meridiani plains, Opportunity paused for this self-portrait at the rim of the wide but shallow "Erebus" crater. The false-color image emphasizes differences in composition among the finely-layered outcrop rocks, wind ripples, and small cobbles and grains. The same view is shown at left in approximate true color but as a polar projection. The outcrop is crisscrossed by small troughs only inches deep, which the team's geologists determined could not have been formed by wind erosion or volcanism. The only possibility, they concluded, was that they were created by flowing water in the far distance past, 2 billion or more years ago, when Mars might - just might - have been warm and wet.

This view combines frames taken by the panoramic camera on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity on the rover's 652nd through 663rd Martian days, or sols (Nov. 23 to Dec. 5, 2005), at the edge of "Erebus Crater." The mosaic is presented as a vertical projection. This type of projection provides a true-to-scale overhead view of the rover deck and nearby surrounding terrain. The view here shows outcrop rocks, sand dunes, and other features out to a distance of about 25 meters (82 feet) from the rover. Opportunity examined targets on the outcrop called "Rimrock" in front of the rover, testing the mobility and operation of Opportunity's robotic arm. The view shows examples of the dunes and ripples that Opportunity has been crossing as the rover drives on the Meridiani plains.

This view is a false-color composite of images taken through the camera's 750-nanometer, 530-nanometer and 430-nanometer filters. This kind of false-color scheme emphasizes differences in composition among the different kinds of materials that the rover is exploring.

PIA03095 Spirit sol 581 2005.8.21 Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell

This approximate true color picture is a small part of the 360 degree "Everest Panorama" from the summit of Husband Hill. Sprit’s meandering, crisscrossing wheel tracks trace its route across this broad plateau of rock outcrops and windblown drifts. Near the center of the picture, a dust devil swoops across the plains of Gusev Crater, about 100 meters below.

If a human with perfect vision donned a spacesuit and stepped onto the martian surface, the view would be as clear as this sweeping panorama taken by NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit. That's because the rover's panoramic camera has the equivalent of 20-20 vision. Earthlings can take a virtual tour of the scenery by zooming in on their computer screens many times to get a closer look at, say, a rock outcrop or a sand drift, without losing any detail. This level of clarity is unequaled in the history of Mars exploration.

It took Spirit three days, sols 620 to 622 (Oct. 1 to Oct. 3, 2005), to acquire all the images combined into this mosaic, called the "Everest Panorama," looking outward in every direction from the true summit of "Husband Hill." During that period, the sky changed in color and brightness due to atmospheric dust variations, as shown in contrasting sections of this mosaic. Haze occasionally obscured the view of the hills on the distant rim of Gusev Crater 80 kilometers (50 miles) away. As dust devils swooped across the horizon in the upper right portion of the panorama, the robotic explorer changed the filters on the camera from red to green to blue, making the dust devils appear red, green, and blue. In reality, the dust devils are similar in color to the reddish-brown soils of Mars. No attempt was made to "smooth" the sky in this mosaic, as has been done in other panoramic-camera mosaics to simulate the view one would get by taking in the landscape all at once. The result is a sweeping vista that allows viewers to observe weather changes on Mars.

The summit of Husband Hill is a broad plateau of rock outcrops and windblown drifts about 100 meters (300 feet) higher than the surrounding plains of Gusev Crater. In the distance, near the center of the mosaic, is the "South Basin," the destination for the downhill travel Spirit began after exploring the summit region.

This panorama spans 360 degrees and consists of images obtained during 81 individual pointings of the panoramic camera. Four filters were used at each pointing. Images through three of the filters, for wavelengths of 750 nanometers, 530 nanometers and 430 nanometers, were combined for this approximately true-color rendering.

Sol708A-P2267-L257 Spirit Sol 708-710 2005.12.30 Credit: NASA/JPL/Cornell - Image mosaicking: Pancam team (Jim Bell) - Calibration and color rendering: CCC and the Pancam team (Jim Bell) - Enhanced colors and sky rendering: Eric Hartwell

This is an exaggerated false color rendering of the "El Dorado" dunes, a field of dark, rippled sand that is visible from space as a dark spot on the side of Husband Hill. Analysis showed the wind-blown sand is unusually "well-sorted, well-rounded and olivine rich." The waves don't change much over time, but their color and brightness do change as dust is blown off or accumulated. The inset image above shows the approximate true color.

This view of the "El Dorado" dune field was captured by Spirit over the New Year's holiday weekend. The view spans about 160 degrees in azimuth and consists of 66 Pancam images acquired on Spirit sols 708 and 710 (Dec. 30, 2005 and Jan. 1, 2006) through the 753nm, 535nm, and 432nm filters. Image-to-image seams have been eliminated from 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 mineralogic information on this large basaltic sand sheet before beginning to move further downhill towards "Home Plate."

Spirit-ARDN-Sol-592-598 Spirit Sol 592-598 2005.9.2 Credit: Raw images: NASA/JPL; Panorama by Midnight Mars Browser; Image and color enhancement by Eric Hartwell

This exaggerated, false color view from the crest of Husband Hill overlooks the Columbia Hills and the surrounding plains of Gusev Crater, about 100 meters below. The inner basin area contains a broad range of interesting geological targets, including the dark, circular feature dubbed "Home Plate". The rocks and geologic characteristics of Home Plate, probably an eroded-over volcano, are like no others found by either rover so far.

PIA03241 Opportunity sol 298-294 2004.11.13 Credit: NASA/JPL-Solar System Visualization Team

Burns Cliff is an exposure of bedrock and ejecta on the southern rim of Endurance Crater. The meteorite impact broke up the bedrock, creating the ejecta blocks at the top of the wall. The blocks were then weathered by sand, wind and water, suggesting that the Meridiani area was covered by a shallow sea or lake that went through wet and dry episodes. This is an approximate true color image, with a virtual Opportunity rover superimposed to scale, based on the size of the rover tracks.

This synthetic image of NASA's Opportunity Mars Exploration Rover inside Endurance Crater was produced using "Virtual Presence in Space" technology. Developed at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., this technology combines visualization and image processing tools with Hollywood-style special effects. The image was created using a photorealistic model of the rover and an approximately full-color mosaic. The size of the rover in the image is approximately correct and was based on the size of the rover tracks in the mosaic.

Because this synthesis provides viewers with a sense of their own "virtual presence" (as if they were there themselves), such views can be useful to mission teams by enhancing perspective and a sense of scale.

Opportunity captured the underlying view of "Burns Cliff" after driving right to the base of this southeastern portion of the inner wall of "Endurance Crater." The view combines frames taken by Opportunity's panoramic camera between the rover's 287th and 294th martian days (Nov. 13 to 20, 2004).

This is a composite of 46 different images, each acquired in seven different Pancam filters. It is an approximately true-color rendering generated from the panoramic camera's 750-nanometer, 530-nanometer and 430-nanometer filters. The mosaic spans more than 180 degrees side to side. Because of this wide-angle view, the cliff walls appear to bulge out toward the camera. In reality the walls form a gently curving, continuous surface. See PIA07110.

Sol211B-P2424-L257 Opportunity sol 211 2004.8.27 Credit: Credit: NASA/JPL/Cornell - Mosaicking: Pancam team (J.R. Skok, Jim Bell) - Calibration & color rendering: CCC and Pancam team (Jim Bell)

This exaggerated false-color view shows the dune field at the bottom of Endurance crater. The dust (a lighter color) accumulates near the dune crests, while hematite-rich spherules (which appear blue in this scene), tend to rest in troughs with more gradual slopes. Sinuous tendrils of sand less than 1 meter high extend from the main dune field toward the rover.

PIA08423 Spirit sol 813 2006.4.17 Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell -- Colorization by Eric Hartwell

A spectacular field of sand ripples separates Spirit from the slopes of Husband Hill. The rover arrived at this position on "Low Ridge" some 200 sols after it started its descent from the peak. Looking back to the north, Spirit acquired this panorama while the Sun was low in the sky late in the afternoon. Approximate true color for the landscape was added from the McMurdo Panorama, PIA08527, and for the sky from the sunset view, PIA07997.

Looking back to the north on sol 813 (April 17, 2006), Spirit acquired this blue-filter (436-nanometer) view with the right panoramic camera (Pancam) while the Sun was low in the sky late in the afternoon. Because of the low-angle lighting (sunlight is coming from the left), images like this provide superb views of subtle textures in the topography both near and far. Husband Hill, where the rover was perched late last summer, rises prominently just left of center in this view. A 150-meter wide (500 foot) field of curving sand ripples named "El Dorado" lies at the base of Husband Hill.

By collecting photos like this at different times of day, when lighting comes from different directions, scientists can distinguish surface properties such as color and reflectivity from topography and roughness. By separating these components they can map more details of the geologic terrain, providing new clues about the geologic history of Gusev Crater.

PIA07997 Spirit sol 489 2005.5.19 Credit: NASA/JPL/Texas A&M/Cornell

Spirit captured this stunning view as the Sun sank below the rim of Gusev crater some 80 km away. Spirit was commanded to stay awake briefly after sending that sol's data to the Mars Odyssey orbiter just before sunset. Because Mars is farther from the Sun than the Earth is, the Sun appears only about two-thirds the size that it appears in a sunset seen from the Earth. The colors are as close as possible to what a human would see.

On May 19th, 2005, NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit captured this stunning view as the Sun sank below the rim of Gusev crater on Mars. This Panoramic Camera (Pancam) mosaic was taken around 6:07 in the evening of the rover's 489th martian day, or sol. Spirit was commanded to stay awake briefly after sending that sol's data to the Mars Odyssey orbiter just before sunset. This small panorama of the western sky was obtained using Pancam's 750-nanometer, 530-nanometer and 430-nanometer color filters. This filter combination allows false color images to be generated that are similar to what a human would see, but with the colors slightly exaggerated. In this image, the bluish glow in the sky above the Sun would be visible to us if we were there, but an artifact of the Pancam's infrared imaging capabilities is that with this filter combination the redness of the sky farther from the sunset is exaggerated compared to the daytime colors of the martian sky. Because Mars is farther from the Sun than the Earth is, the Sun appears only about two-thirds the size that it appears in a sunset seen from the Earth. The terrain in the foreground is the rock outcrop "Jibsheet", a feature that Spirit has been investigating for several weeks (rover tracks are dimly visible leading up to "Jibsheet"). The floor of Gusev crater is visible in the distance, and the Sun is setting behind the wall of Gusev some 80 km (50 miles) in the distance.

This mosaic is yet another example from MER of a beautiful, sublime martian scene that also captures some important scientific information. Specifically, sunset and twilight images are occasionally acquired by the science team to determine how high into the atmosphere the martian dust extends, and to look for dust or ice clouds. Other images have shown that the twilight glow remains visible, but increasingly fainter, for up to two hours before sunrise or after sunset. The long martian twilight (compared to Earth's) is caused by sunlight scattered around to the night side of the planet by abundant high altitude dust. Similar long twilights or extra-colorful sunrises and sunsets sometimes occur on Earth when tiny dust grains that are erupted from powerful volcanoes scatter light high in the atmosphere.