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Posted by: nprev Sep 24 2014, 02:33 AM

Successful insertion!!!!! Congratulations to ISRO!!!!

Posted by: Astro0 Sep 24 2014, 04:09 AM

That's two for two this week!! And now seven spacecraft operating at Mars!!

CanberraDSN (along with Goldstone) acquired the signal confirming that ISRO's Mars Orbiter Mission successfully made orbit

Accomplishment Unlocked!

Posted by: nprev Sep 25 2014, 06:01 AM

Apparently only available as a Facebook link right now, but https://www.facebook.com/ISRO/photos/a.1448404935382864.1073741828.1448364408720250/1556527811237242/?type=1&theater is the first image (and it's nice.)

Posted by: djellison Sep 25 2014, 06:06 AM

By my guessing it's approx 1100 x 850km, the southern end of Syrtis Major - about 72E, 2S in the center.

Posted by: nprev Sep 25 2014, 06:11 AM

And you call that "guessing"... Great context!

Seems to have a bit of motion blur is all, but that may be a subjective impression on my part.

Posted by: Astro0 Sep 25 2014, 06:17 AM

Just posting the first image here.

From ISRO's twitter: 1st image of Mars, from a height of 7300 km; with 376m spatial resolution.

Posted by: kenny Sep 25 2014, 09:15 AM

A great first photo ... and in colour! The spacecraft and instruments are still in commissioning phase, so hopefully image resolution will improve later.

Initial orbit is 421.7 km by 76,994 km, at an inclination to Mars’ equatorial plane of 150 degrees. Orbital period is 72 hours 52 minutes. The periapsis was
predicted to be 515km after the last course correction, so it came in a little low.

The BBC and CNN have been reporting along the following lines:

“ (CNN) -- India's Mars Orbiter Mission successfully entered Mars' orbit Wednesday morning, becoming the first nation to arrive on its first attempt and the
first Asian country to reach the Red Planet. “

In fact, Mars Express made ESA the first nation/ region to succeed at its first attempt. Both Japan (Nozomi) and China (Yinghuo 1) have attempted
Mars probes which failed. So this is a major first for India, in Asia’s “mini space race”.

Posted by: nprev Sep 25 2014, 10:39 AM

MOD MODE: Reminder to all members that rule 1.2 will be enforced, and posts that violate that rule will be deleted without warning.

Mod hat off. Let's please celebrate achievements here on their own merits instead of making essentially futile comparisons of the "first", "better", etc. variety, which never seem to accomplish anything but raising tensions.

MOM is a remarkable achievement thus far, and it seems as if we'll have a considerable amount of not only new imagery but also new science data to talk about in short order. Good stuff.

Posted by: elakdawalla Sep 25 2014, 02:53 PM

A second photo. This one is actually at the camera's full resolution of 2048 pixels square! Can anybody identify the location?

Posted by: Julius Sep 25 2014, 02:58 PM

It's the southern hemisphere for sure but I wouldn't dare say exactly where

Posted by: machi Sep 25 2014, 03:49 PM

It shows boundary between Terra Sabaea and Arabia Terra (it's mostly Terra Sabaea). The biggest visible crater is Tikhonravov.
EDIT: I uploaded improved graphics, older version was deleted.

Posted by: Phil Stooke Sep 25 2014, 03:57 PM

Good for you! You're right. I was looking but hadn't found it yet. And it's in the northern hemisphere (sorry Julius!)

Appropriately, the small feature Indus Vallis is in this area, as the map shows.

Phil

Posted by: Phil Stooke Sep 25 2014, 04:11 PM

Playing with the ISRO image (Thanks, ISRO!) to bring out the surface features a bit better:

Phil

Posted by: 4throck Sep 25 2014, 06:30 PM

Phil, that last image looks like something from Mariner 4!

Nice to see the images being released fast.
Also good color balance / correction for first images.

I think the camera is a bit out of focus, but that's expected for such an early mission phase.

Posted by: MarsInMyLifetime Sep 25 2014, 07:13 PM

I worked with the hi-def image a bit. The saturation is probably higher than true color. The color histogram clearly shows the peaks of primary red, green, and blue contributions; playing with these channels brought out different limb features, although there I could not be certain I was seeing true layers or the contribution of the very heavy compression blocks. My impression is that this image is probably a better representation of the mission's atmospheric research goals than of the general photographic capability of the camera--playing with levels pretty much kills the limb structure. Data with more gray scale and less compression will tell a better story of the geologic capabilities of the camera.

Posted by: Krit Sep 29 2014, 01:06 PM

Another photo (from the ISRO Facebook Page)

"Regional dust storm activities over northern hemisphere of Mars - captured by Mars Color Camera on-board ISRO's Mars Orbiter Mission.
The image was taken from an altitude of 74500 km from the surface of Mars."

Posted by: vikingmars Sep 30 2014, 08:03 AM

My interpretation, processed, de-noised and de-saturated...
Looks like the Red Planet people dreamed on in the 50's !
And CONGRATULATIONS again to India ! Enjoy...

Posted by: Julius Sep 30 2014, 12:06 PM

I'm no expert in image processing but I would think this version of red colour seems more real cos I don't believe the dust clouds to the upper left would be that white as depicted in Ted 's version.

Posted by: vikingmars Sep 30 2014, 12:34 PM

Thanks Julius. But what is the "Ted's version", you are referring to, please ?

Posted by: Krit Sep 30 2014, 12:53 PM

I suppose he is referring to https://twitter.com/tedstryk/status/516680322373922816

Posted by: djellison Sep 30 2014, 01:28 PM

Check out imagery from Hubble, or the Rosetta OSIRIS flyby imagery - white clouds are the norm. MEX has seen white fog, MGS MOC/WA saw white clouds. The MRO MARCI weather updates regularly show a sluice of white clouds around Mars.

Even amateur ground based astronomers have seen white clouds on Mars. I've seen them thru a tiny telescope with my own eyes.

Posted by: Julius Sep 30 2014, 03:45 PM

What about dust clouds resulting from a dust storm? Are they white in colour?

Posted by: djellison Sep 30 2014, 03:58 PM

Obviously not - which is why the dust storms visible in every version of this I've seen retain their ochre / butterscotch color.

Posted by: elakdawalla Sep 30 2014, 04:06 PM

It's been interesting to see all the different takes on this photo. People seem to agree that the original was too red and saturated, but the corrections have been varied. Here's a roundup of links to processed versions I've seen -- have I missed any?
https://twitter.com/dgog61/status/516953719636639744
https://twitter.com/tedstryk/status/516680322373922816
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=7898&view=findpost&p=213487
https://twitter.com/SpaceGeck/status/516744907281948672
https://twitter.com/cirquelar/status/516795116212604928 - https://twitter.com/cirquelar/status/516782930614427648
https://www.flickr.com/photos/lunexit/15207846158/

Posted by: Bjorn Jonsson Oct 1 2014, 12:51 AM

Beautiful images so far and congratulations to the Indians. Clearly this mission is going to be the best source ever of global color views of Mars, maybe a bit like a 'super VMC'. Hopefully a 'PDS-like' version of the images will be released in the future to make more accurate processing of these images possible for us here.

The various versions of this image are interesting. Here is a quick-and-dirty version I did by reducing the color saturation a bit. I then corrected the color using Mars' global spectrum as a guide, together with what Mars has looked like to me through a telescope. Planetary color is highly subjective so I really don't know which one of the various versions posted here is the most realistic one. But I agree that the original image is probably too saturated and reddish and probably the blue channel should be brighter, at least in the dark areas (it's remarkably close to 0 in the darkest regions). Here is my version:

The terminator is a bit ugly at lower left. This is a processing artifact; I may do a better version later.

Posted by: Bjorn Jonsson Oct 1 2014, 01:13 AM

I also found versions by Don Davis and Mattias Malmer on Facebook.

Posted by: mcaplinger Oct 1 2014, 02:43 AM

From http://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2014/pdf/2449.pdf "MARS COLOR CAMERA ONBOARD MARS ORBITER MISSION: SCIENTIFIC OBJECTIVES &
EARTH IMAGING RESULTS", A.S. Arya et al:

Posted by: vikingmars Oct 1 2014, 07:38 AM

Thanks Emily for this interesting compilation.
The somewhat "yellowish" (not pure white) color I found after my processings for the dust clouds on the northern hemisphere is consistent with MARCI team's Mars weather reports : "Regional storm activity picked up in the northern hemisphere, with large storms occurring from Utopia to Arcadia and arcuate-shaped storms following the Acidalia storm track into Chryse"... And in the southern hemisphere, ice crystal clouds appear white indeed. Also, Mars is not a "bright" planet. Thus, I believe my interpretation is a close representation to what the human eyes would see

Posted by: Julius Oct 2 2014, 09:20 PM

Only now I realize who vikingmars is! I have 'visions of mars' in my mars books collection..brilliant work!

Posted by: wildespace Oct 6 2014, 07:22 AM

A quick Photoshop levels adjustment, using "Enhance Per Channel Contrast" with "Snap Neutral Midtones" box checked:

I think this has resulted in colours very close to the colours of the surface as we have seen from raw Mastcam and MAHLI images.

I remember reading in a few places that the pronouncedly red appearance of Mars when photographed from outside of its atmoshere is due to all the dust suspended in its atmosphere.

Posted by: vikingmars Oct 6 2014, 07:48 AM

Thanks Wildespace : quite good interpretation if I may say !
BUT, please remember that :
1) Mastcam images are in raw format and must be calibrated for their colors ;
2) Dust clouds from space looks indeed yellowish, not white.
3) The color of the planet from space, as you say, is not as yellowish brown as it is seen from the ground...

Posted by: fredk Oct 6 2014, 02:51 PM

Mastcam cameras have a well-known "greenish cast" making the surface look yellowish.

If atmospheric dust reddened the planet, then the limbs should be redder than the centre of the disc, since you look through more dusty air near the limbs. Also the planet should look redder during global duststorms, but I haven't heard of a hue shift during duststorms.

Posted by: 4throck Oct 6 2014, 04:22 PM

The surface color seen from space suffers the effect of the atmosphere 2 times. Light must come down and then back up.
So any hue will be magnified on full disk images, more so if there's dust or anything that absorbs / reflects light.

The Red Mars from orbit is an accurate rendition of what you would see, the same way as astronauts see the Earth as a blue planet.
If really doesn't compare to what it looks like on the ground .

The limbs are also complicated because you have phase angle there. One thing is reflected light, another absorbed light, just to keep things simple. But you really have to take into account scatting, diffraction, etc, etc. Really not that simple.
And on Mars you have limb hazes and clouds, so a bluish color is to be expected there.

All this meaning that the MOM image is just fine.

Posted by: fredk Oct 6 2014, 04:54 PM

Another factor is the seasonal variation in atmospheric dust - some seasons are far dustier than others, even in the absence of duststorms.

Posted by: Bjorn Jonsson Oct 7 2014, 12:04 AM

Also comparing Mars's global color with the Curiosity images might not be accurate. In addition to light coming down through the atmosphere and getting reflected back out of it (as pointed out above) and seasonal variations in dust, Mars' global color isn't totally uniform (although color variations aren't big) and the Curiosity images show just one location on the surface.

Regarding Mars' color as seen through a telescope: There is a lot of orange color but I have found it to be orange with a slight pinkish tint as well but this is extremely subjective. Of the various versions of the MOM image I have seen, Don Davis' version is probably closest to what I have seen through a telescope in terms of color (but again, this is subjective).

Posted by: djellison Oct 7 2014, 12:26 AM

Very very very subjective.

Posted by: 4th rock from the sun Oct 7 2014, 11:01 AM

Completely subjective. And it changes with the telescope and magnification.

It's interesting that Mars seen with the naked eye (point souce) looks quite like Antares (that's why the star is called like that).
That comparison seems to be valid for most people and since a long time.

Posted by: fredk Oct 7 2014, 02:44 PM

A measurement of spectral irradiance, ie the spectrum of incident light, is completely objective. Of course that's not what people are referring to when talking about telescope views. But it's worth remembering that, in principle, the "colour" of Mars could be measured and reproduced. In practice this would be extremely hard (no display devices exist to reproduce all, or a large part of, a visible spectrum, etc, etc...). The matter of subjectivity of perception is separate from this.

But, getting back to the thread topic, it is easier to objectively discuss differences of colour. Long-term monitoring by MOM may tell us about seasonal variations on a global scale...

Posted by: Phil Stooke Oct 7 2014, 08:32 PM

A new MOM image of Mars has been released - see Emily's blog for the link. Here I compare it with the Rosetta flyby image. Lots of small changes to be seen, and much that is the same including the distribution of clouds.

I wanted to add a Hubble view and a Mariner 7 view (incredible changes since Mariner 7) but I don't have time.

Towards upper right, a group of dark markings change very substantially. Look below them, there is a bright-toned curving patch on the surface in the Tartarus Montes area. That is where Mariner 4's first image of Mars was taken in 1965.

Phil

Posted by: vikingmars Oct 8 2014, 03:30 PM

My interpretation of the new global Mars image taken by MoM and released by ISRO... Enjoy !

Posted by: ugordan Oct 8 2014, 07:09 PM

My attempt at "un-enhancing" the image:

Posted by: Hungry4info Oct 14 2014, 02:46 PM

Phobos (animation)
https://mtc.cdn.vine.co/r/videos/B7459728571133760064197705728_26bd180e684.5.1.8295492310491926854.mp4

Posted by: Mr Valiant Oct 15 2014, 10:03 AM

Through my telescope (8" Newtonian) the Mars I have observed is similar to ugordan's
image. Only difference is the Polar Cap always appears very bright, white and sharp edged.

Professional observations of Mars in daylight (sorry I don't have any links) reveal the
planet to be a tan colour, markings brown to dark grey.

Currently my scope is in pieces, gotta get it all together. Miss it.

p.s. Never saw any canals

Posted by: vikingmars Oct 18 2014, 04:59 PM

The last image from the Indian Mars Orbiter Mission (MoM) showing the huge Tharsis volcanoes with Olympus Mons on the left, close to the terminator... (with colors corrected) Enjoy

Posted by: MahFL Oct 18 2014, 08:04 PM

Do you mean the latest or the last one ?
Did the mission end ?

ADMIN NOTE: MahFl, I think that a quick look to either the mission website, Twitter feed, Facebook page, ISRO's website or any number of space news sites could have answered that question for you. MOM's mission continues as normal. At the very least check/Google before asking a quesion like that please.

Posted by: Bjorn Jonsson Oct 19 2014, 01:43 AM

It's the latest one (English is not his native language).
These MOM global images are really beautiful.

Posted by: vikingmars Oct 19 2014, 05:46 PM

Thanks a lot Bjorn ! (and sorry for my English)

Posted by: Phil Stooke Feb 6 2015, 07:11 PM

The MOM images of Phobos and Deimos have been highlighted on Emily's blog after appearing in a MOM abstract at LPSC.

Here I have combined two of the images (and masked out the planet itself) to see what might be visible on the surface of Phobos with careful processing. More than a quick look might suggest.

Phil

Posted by: elakdawalla Feb 6 2015, 09:00 PM

Dr. Arya provided me with one more file that I didn't use, the attached animated GIF. I thought there were too many dithering-related artifacts for me to make much of it, but I'll bet you can do more with it:

Posted by: Phil Stooke Feb 9 2015, 03:21 PM

I tried to get something out of that, but I couldn't make anything work. Maybe too much was lost in the color indexing for the GIF.

Phil

Posted by: rasun Mar 12 2015, 01:36 AM

New photos released:


http://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/a-day-before-holi-isro-releases-images-captured-by-mangalyaan/article1-1323435.aspx

Posted by: Steve G Jun 4 2015, 12:46 AM

ISRO just released its first scientific findings. Only could find it on Spaceflight101. Lots of new images

http://www.spaceflight101.com/mars-orbiter-mission-updates.html

Posted by: belleraphon1 Sep 23 2015, 10:51 AM

Isro to reveal Mar's methane secret on Thursday 09-24-2015
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/science/Isro-to-reveal-Mars-methane-secret-on-Thursday/articleshow/49069475.cms

????????????????

Posted by: Paolo Sep 24 2015, 05:43 AM

Color camera Mars atlas released: http://www.isro.gov.in/pslv-c25-mars-orbiter-mission/celebrating-one-year-of-mars-orbiter-mission-orbit-release-of-mars
the 35 Mb atlas is http://www.isro.gov.in/sites/default/files/article-files/pslv-c25-mars-orbiter-mission/celebrating-one-year-of-mars-orbiter-mission-orbit-release-of-mars/Mars-atlas-MOM.pdf

Posted by: Ron Hobbs Sep 25 2015, 04:41 PM

What happened to this revelation? Was this a false alarm?

Posted by: belleraphon1 Sep 25 2015, 05:35 PM

Would seem so. My information just came from the article I linked to.

Posted by: Paolo Sep 25 2015, 06:44 PM

as I understand it, ISRO was only going to release the data. Despite what the title of the article says, no result was going to be announced.
now, have they released the data? are they available somewhere?

Posted by: dvandorn Sep 26 2015, 12:30 AM

I read a second-hand report that went something like 'we have detected methane but our results have not been confirmed. Analysis of the data continues.' Something like that.

So, it sounds maybe like someone wanted to make a big announcement before peer review has been completed, and was embargoed from doing so until either issues in the data/analysis are resolved, or until peer review is completed.

-the other Doug

Posted by: Explorer1 Nov 12 2015, 04:44 AM

Nice report from SpaceFlight 101 (includes the Deimos far side shots!)

http://spaceflight101.com/mom/indias-mars-orbiter-mission-delivers-first-science-results-looks-at-future-challenges/

Posted by: Seryddwr Jan 9 2016, 02:56 PM

Just bumping this thread to see if anyone's heard anything from MOM lately - the ISRO page has nothing new, and barring an (admittedly very nice) pic of the north pole on New Year's Eve (https://twitter.com/MarsOrbiter), the Twitter feed has been quiet since last July. Any more news on that supposed methane detection or even imaging campaigns of Deimos, anybody?

Posted by: blueaeshna Jun 15 2018, 07:01 PM

I just had a search to see if there were anything new regarding MOM's observations of the dust storm currently raging and found this ISRO twitter feed which includes an image:
https://twitter.com/marsorbiter/status/516555073829081088?lang=en

Posted by: blueaeshna Jun 15 2018, 07:03 PM

Oops just notice thats way out of date

Posted by: Ohsin Sep 27 2022, 01:53 PM

Apologies for bumping this old thread but today ISRO held a one day workshop on Mars Orbiter Mission on occasion of it completing eight years in Martian orbit, giving an overview of whole mission.
http://\"https://www.facebook.com/ISRO/videos/5474505689310772/\"
Yet to go through it all but I\'ll add anything important if found.

Edit:
Per Nandini Harinath (@2hr6min), in April 2022 they faced increasingly long eclipse period and barely survived 6.5 to 7 hrs long ones. In near future there are no long eclipse phases but they barely have any propellant left onboard as 20 kg out of 33 kg of it were spent in Jan 2017 modifying the spacecraft\'s orbit to survive oncoming eclipses back then and ~2.5 kg per year propellant is required for maintenance.

Edit2: Panel discussion with plausible future roadmap.
http://\"https://www.facebook.com/ISRO/videos/504033751113966/\"

Posted by: nprev Sep 30 2022, 06:28 AM

Topic title edited- admin

Posted by: Decepticon Oct 4 2022, 01:31 AM

https://www.space.com/india-mars-orbiter-mission-loses-contact

Posted by: nprev Oct 5 2022, 04:23 PM

Here's the https://www.isro.gov.in/MOM_NationalMeet_2022SEP.html of EOM.

Congratulations to ISRO and the nation of India on this brilliantly successful mission! We'll miss you, MOM.