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Using Cassini Raw Images, An Update
djellison
post Jan 27 2007, 11:47 AM
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Over the past 3 years, we've been fortunate enough to have an ever expanding library of nearly 200,000 images from the Mars Exploration Rovers thrown onto the web as uncalibrated JPG's for enthusiasts like ourselves to get our teeth in to. The success of this is written on the walls of UMSF and elsewhere, and most remarkably, the scientists and engineers involved were pleased to see people getting their hands on 'their' data. Jim Bell even commented on Planetary Radio in November '05 :
"The team really appreciates the public support, and we put the images out there every day on marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and people download them and make their own mosaics and panoramas and do their own analysis and we think that's great - it's great to have the public along for the ride"


Cassini followed suit and after some trouble getting images that were not overly stretched the workflow was sorted out and amazing images have been making it onto the JPL website ever since. From time to time we've seen some great results - mosaics, colour composites, animation - great work and a fantastic credit to the Cassini team, their policy of putting images online and the example set by MER.

However - over the last 18 months or so there have been some rumours and unpleasant undertones regarding Cassini imagery. Some enthusiasts who have created amazing images found that their creations were not universally appreciated. There seemed to be an unspoken 'look but don't touch' policy in place regarding the raw JPG's and thus they stopped working with Cassini imagery or took down bits of their websites and so on.

Over the past year or so, the UMSF mod and admin team have been discussing this, and recently we contacted JPL for clarification. Could we find some way to give people the confidence to get creative with the Cassini images as they have with MER images? I want to thank the Cassini outreach team for responding to us so positively and for everyone involved in helping us establish in writing what we all hoped was true, but were perhaps a little unsure of. I'm happy to report that the Cassini images are out there for us to use and enjoy in exactly the same way we do with MER imagery.

To confirm that - recently there has been an addition to the text on the Raw Images page saturn.jpl.nasa.gov

"Welcome to the Cassini raw image section, where the Cassini mission and Cassini outreach are happy to provide these raw images for the public to use and enjoy. ... "

As with MER - if you do something with the Cassini images - you should cite where the data comes from. For MER it has always been NASA/JPL/Cornell and for Cassini it should be NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute. For those of you that may have had concerns or doubts about getting thoroughly stuck in to the Cassini imagery, then you can put those fears aside and get stuck in - to cite a senior Cassini team member:

"Our intent in creating the raw image page was to accomplish exactly what Jim Bell said for the MER Project. The public is paying the bill for this, so we should be doing everything we can to help them enjoy the ride"

So - crack open your photo editing software and start exploring Saturn!

Thanks to Alice and the team at JPL for helping us with this, and personal thanks to the rest of the mod and admin team who, as ever, knew the rights words to say at the right time.

Doug
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helvick
post Feb 22 2007, 07:38 PM
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The speculation here about the Enceladan plumes was one example where folks here speculated on a Cassini discovery prior to the official announcements but so too was the speculation on the reappearance of the ring spokes. If I recall correctly they were discussed here a number of days before it was officially acknowledged that they had re-appeared.

I understand Dr Porco's irritation with that but I can't see that problem going away - the whole reason we are enthusiasts is that we are interested in this stuff and some folk here go to fairly extraordinary lengths to feed that interest. There are very few people here who would look at a Cassini image, potentially see Spokes (or Plumes, a Titanian river or evidence of change on Enceladus ...) and then decide to shut up about it.

So is it OK to speculate in that way here but must we then refuse permission to forward the results to APOD or to forbid Emily or anyone else to blog about such speculation on TPS? As UMSF's reach increases (now that Doug is acting as a TPS rep in Dharmstadt for example, or the recent appearance on the BBC) are we about to reach a stage where UMSF becomes classifiable as "Media" and as a result becomes held to a higher standard.

The sentiment expressed by Stevesliva captures the most important point for me:
QUOTE
The attentioned garnered by (for instance) a National Geographic cover and a two-page spread in Time must be pretty gratifying to the Cassini team. It needs to be understood that this level of press attention is not at risk by UMSF, APOD, and the TPS blog. The enthusiasts that frequent these sites understand where these photos are coming from.
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centsworth_II
post Feb 22 2007, 09:41 PM
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QUOTE (helvick @ Feb 22 2007, 02:38 PM) *
The speculation here about the Enceladan plumes was one example where folks here speculated on a Cassini discovery prior to the official announcements but so too was the speculation on the reappearance of the ring spokes.

I can understand a scientist's frustration. The interested public is free to speculate wildy on this and that possibility based on the images. And if one of the speculations pans out, it looks like the scientists were "scooped". On the other hand, the scientists must be much more deliberate, methodical, and thus slower. They can't jump to conclusions too soon.

The age of the internet is truly something new that will take getting used to.
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Posts in this topic
- djellison   Using Cassini Raw Images   Jan 27 2007, 11:47 AM
- - scalbers   Interesting to hear today that CICLOPS may soon be...   Feb 11 2007, 11:14 PM
- - dilo   To confirm what Doug report, I just received last ...   Feb 12 2007, 07:10 AM
- - djellison   Actually the Sector 6 news is a new, very suprisin...   Feb 12 2007, 08:36 AM
|- - ugordan   Yeah, talk about a plot twist... I'm curious, ...   Feb 12 2007, 08:59 AM
- - CosmicRocker   This is really quite good news. I wasn't awar...   Feb 12 2007, 09:50 PM
- - mysagan   To all of you from Carolyn Porco... -------------...   Feb 22 2007, 01:46 AM
|- - ElkGroveDan   QUOTE (mysagan @ Feb 21 2007, 05:46 PM) C...   Feb 22 2007, 08:44 PM
- - dusty   Hi folks. This is Dusty from #space on irc.freenod...   Feb 22 2007, 02:03 PM
- - ngunn   I appreciate Carolyn taking so much time to explai...   Feb 22 2007, 02:46 PM
- - climber   I must say that having Carolyn Porco's opinion...   Feb 22 2007, 02:47 PM
- - ugordan   Actually she says APOD and TPS are "grey medi...   Feb 22 2007, 02:56 PM
|- - AlexBlackwell   QUOTE (ugordan @ Feb 22 2007, 04:56 AM) A...   Feb 22 2007, 06:11 PM
- - elakdawalla   I'll confirm that Dr. Porco has repeatedly ask...   Feb 22 2007, 03:45 PM
|- - tedstryk   QUOTE (elakdawalla @ Feb 22 2007, 03:45 P...   Feb 22 2007, 05:07 PM
|- - stevesliva   QUOTE (elakdawalla @ Feb 22 2007, 10:45 A...   Feb 22 2007, 05:31 PM
- - Littlebit   QUOTE (Dr. Porco)Maybe it's not possible for s...   Feb 22 2007, 04:15 PM
- - dvandorn   There is really only one example of a Cassini disc...   Feb 22 2007, 05:21 PM
|- - tedstryk   QUOTE (dvandorn @ Feb 22 2007, 05:21 PM) ...   Feb 22 2007, 06:29 PM
|- - AlexBlackwell   QUOTE (tedstryk @ Feb 22 2007, 08:29 AM) ...   Feb 22 2007, 06:52 PM
- - tasp   Also interesting is the varied reactions to the Ia...   Feb 22 2007, 06:41 PM
- - Nix   "I ask you: Would *you* be disappointed? ...   Feb 22 2007, 07:00 PM
- - helvick   The speculation here about the Enceladan plumes wa...   Feb 22 2007, 07:38 PM
|- - centsworth_II   QUOTE (helvick @ Feb 22 2007, 02:38 PM) T...   Feb 22 2007, 09:41 PM
- - djellison   I think it's right and fair that Carolyn air h...   Feb 22 2007, 09:13 PM
- - CarolynPorco   Everyone, Interesting comments, along the lines -...   Feb 22 2007, 11:11 PM
- - helvick   QUOTE No one credits the discovery of America to t...   Feb 23 2007, 01:45 AM
- - djellison   I'd like to thank Carolyn for her input, and a...   Feb 23 2007, 08:20 AM


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