i.e. earlier than if the spacecraft was orientated to take an image during the egress from behind Mars and then had to reorientate for HGA pointing to Earth.

And there's such as thing as the burn being too long - more is not better - it would mean too much fuel useage and thus lost potential for maintaining the lower science orbit.

Doug

Quoting from Grotzinger et.al. in EPSL

"To obtain true stratigraphic thicknesses, one must be able to correct for deformation of strata associated with folding, faulting, and brecciation due to impact. At Eagle, Anatolia, and Fram the bedrock is fractured and consists of rotated blocks. In general, systematic deformation patterns are absent, which precludes ordering of the stratigraphy at those locations. Exceptions to this are the El Capitan and Big Bend areas of Eagle crater, where strata can be traced laterally for several meters as mostly intact units"

Doug

I think I'd rather have the "OMFG thank god for that" moment of the earliest possible HGA signal back on earth suggesting a good burn than the kodak moment to be honest.

MGS did take an Earth and Jupiter image some time ago - perhaps in an extended mission, HiRISE could 'do' earth as well, but in the meantime, I want it looking down

Doug

Just a thought - the fact that we already have drive direction imaging showing a route up onto the top of Payson suggests that they're not going to hang around here and investigate the front of the outcrop

Doug

http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/HiRISE/image...rise_params.gif
1.14 degrees for HiRISE - which is just a tiny bit more than this much

http://space.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/wspace?t...orbs=1&showsc=1

Doug

I have one at home There is also a building up the road at the University of Leicester that looks like Optimus Prime if you look at it the right way


You can see his head on the right here - http://www.le.ac.uk/admissions/open/081005...es/building.jpg

Doug

I've been to Man and not known it has that museum - is it any good?

Doug

I've searched for WFPC2 observations using similar filter (410, 502, 673 if memory serves me right - blueish, greenish, near IR ish)

I've requested some 208 images from the server - almost 70 individual rgb sets of observations.

That'll be nice.

(should never have got started on this )

Doug

Pity they missed a bit with the mosaic that appears to be stuck on a reference background

Doug

Alex deserves it. Totally OT for this thread, but what the hell - when I first set up the old forum, I put Alex in as a co-admin as a matter of backup incase I got run over, or worse (knowing he had experience with his Yahoo group) - then when I sorted out a few proper admins a few months ago, I forgot to carry Alex over

Doug

Oh yes - it's in every image from the high res channel - enough stretching shows them in the data for every image thru every filter, it's something to do with the camera, I just don't know what/why. Nothing I can do to 'combat' it though - just morbid curiosty as to what it is

Doug

(PS - ahh - it appears the HRC is giving me the finger...
http://www.stsci.edu/hst/acs/faqs/finger.html )

All done - see top post. I'm going to have a hack at WFPC2 ones as well at some point.

Doug

I'd think things that distant ( 4 or 5 times more distance that we've covered so far ) would simply be too far to worth considering, it'd be a waste of time setting off to explore them knowing that the chances of reaching them are so very very small when there might be something less interesting, but a lot more achievable.

To paraphrase Steve, they will die eventually, I'm sure of that.

Doug

Not only did it make it into Emily's blog - it made it onto Planetary Radio

I'd keep the ellipse line large - that demonstrates the level of accuracy to which we know it (and probably just as accurate as when it was defined) To make it thinner would suggest a level of accuracy we just don't have.

Doug

Spot On for the ellipse as I understand it - the only ellipse worth using really is the pre-launch ellipse, which my photoshopping shows to be in the same spot as yours there.

Doug

The joy of data

edited:

Right - done all the ACS one's I can find.....

Jan '03 : 297 Million km
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/doug_im...fv01gcq_drz.jpg

March '03 : 218 Million km
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/doug_im...fv03ahq_drz.jpg

May '03 : 128 Million km
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/doug_im...fv05l8q_drz.jpg

June '03 : 86 Million km
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/doug_im...fv07unq_drz.jpg

Aug '03: 60 Million km
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/doug_im...n410lmq_drz.jpg

Sept '03 : 57 Million km
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/doug_im...p722jfq_drz.jpg

Sept '03 : 58 Million km
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/doug_im...p723tdq_drz.jpg

Feb '04 : 228 Million km
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/doug_im...n470otq_drz.jpg

The little 'tick' mark is still there, even though I'm using geometric and flat/noise/dark field correction - I think this is why the outside of Hubble press images of mars appear pixelated, they're re-projected to take out the 'tick' on the CCD. Still looking into exactly what it is.

Doug

Spotted a few problems, I think.

When starting MMB - it often complains that there's another version already running - even if I've just rebooted.

Some Opportunity pans - back in the 600's - some Navcam frames have bad pointing - they're way up in the sky instead of forming a horizon.

Other than that - all good stuff

Doug

I think actually - some of these are biggies - as big as the ones we saw before on the North rim and skirted way north around.

I don't think they'll come up to camera height - we'll always be able to see over them, but we might have difficulty in planning longer drives

Doug

I'll have a look around for it - but I have a lot of them around - I'll have a hunt.

( JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH, VOL. 111, E02S14, doi:10.1029/2005JE002494, 2006 )
Doug

Is it just me - or is there some great documentation listed....but not accesable Sort of a wave-candy-infront-of-baby type thing

Doug

You've been reading some interesting Pancam papers havent you - They do JUST that - it's very interesting stuff

Doug

The discussions about ID or SETI may be civil and focused, but I remain very uneasy with their existance here, and the sort of traffic they might attract. Civil or not, they're highly OT for what this place is intended. On that basis - you could have a debate about cricket here, because hey - it's civil. Yeah - but totally outside the remit of what this place is about.

95% of the moderation that has to be done here, has to be done in the manned and off topic forums, and that says a lot.

I don't want to close them down - but I may well do at some point in the future, at the moment they are 'ok' - but little more.

I know more than ANYONE here what the 'fine line' is - I've drawn it for two years with more than a little success. But if the more off topic sections begin to take more of my time, I wont moderate them, I'll just cull them - it's a matter of balance. If other sections suffer because the off topic forums are taking too much time, then there's no decision to be made - they're gone.

Doug

The way some websites have reported it is all screwey - even the normally reliable ones.

Doug

Depends what you call the ellipse. The Pre-launch ellipse, the most launch ellipse, or the entry ellipse.

http://marsoweb.nas.nasa.gov/landingsites/...l/HematiteWest/
specifically - http://marsoweb.nas.nasa.gov/landingsites/...ps/Hematite.jpg


I'm not sure which one is on the MSSS imagery, but given that Opportunity was comparatively late in it's launch window, it's likely to be more the red ellipse with closed lines than anything else.

Using this one...

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/pre...LAD_3A-A0R1.jpg
Which is a pre-entry ellipse, the ellipse is much smaller and thus yes, Oppy crossed over that one some time ago - but personally - the ellipse I'd use is the one they had down before launch.

Doug