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Posted by: DrShank Nov 30 2010, 09:24 PM

hey fellas,
Just posted a new blog showing the topographic maps of Saturn's icy moons that I showed back at DPS in Pasadena last month. Ive been on extensive travel since then and just now getting back to some backlogged projects, including posting these new maps. They are global topography of the 6 larger icy moons (excluding Titan). There are some interesting comparisons and details to be seen here. Hope yall enjoy. A more detailed report will be published this spring.
paul

http://stereomoons.blogspot.com/

Here is a greatly reduced version to wet your appetite. Note that all are scaled to +/- 5 km topographic range.

Posted by: ngunn Nov 30 2010, 10:15 PM

Beautiful! One immediately obvious fact is that the equatorial ridge of Iapetus continues all the way round, with only minor gaps and no deviations from geometric regularity.

Posted by: djellison Nov 30 2010, 10:18 PM

Awesome - can't wait to add these as normal maps to Eyes on the Solar System

Posted by: DrShank Jan 13 2011, 03:21 AM

finally processed the February Mimas data and here is a nice view of the interior of Herschel.

http://stereomoons.blogspot.com/2011/01/mimas-picture-show.html

Posted by: Bjorn Jonsson Jan 15 2011, 01:41 AM

Looks awesome and needless to say a huge improvement over anything created using data obtained prior to February 2010.

As a matter of curiosity, is the DEM based on stereo imagery only or combined stereo and shape from shading?

Posted by: scalbers Jan 15 2011, 03:58 PM

Very nice color & topo maps on Paul's blog. It seems to me though that the ridge is a bit subdued around 0-90E longitude areas. Still it's nice to see some hints of it in these areas where I hadn't noticed it much before.

Posted by: tasp Jan 15 2011, 06:31 PM

How about that, the 'off ramps' are in the right location on the ridge! (the highest spot)

An inclined outer 'brim' of the ring system would seem to be evident, therefore. Inclined ring elements were noted at Neptune and are attributed to the effect of Triton's inclination, would this be a converse type of effect at Iapetus, the primary (Saturn) essentially being 'felt' as inclined (although it is actually Iapetus at ~15 degrees that is inclined) and creating the inclined 'brim'?


I note in the blog an invitation to computer model some rings. I hope if the sims are carried out they can incorporate Dr. Burns ideas about ring warping. I'm itching to watch this animation, having been born about 4 billion years too late to see it in real life . . .

Posted by: JohnVV Jan 16 2011, 03:04 AM

I think the dr is using all stereo ,so far all i have been able to do with sfs is artistic only .

the maps ARE nice . I like them .

Posted by: DrShank Jan 20 2011, 10:05 PM

Mimas map so far only stereo. will add SFS soon but the Herschel areas are with higher sun elevations making SFS very unreliable in those data.

Posted by: Bjorn Jonsson Jan 25 2011, 10:05 PM

And distinguishing between albedo variations and brightness variations caused by topography must present some problems as well.

Are these images rendered using true vertical relief or exaggerated relief?

Posted by: MarcF May 31 2013, 08:29 PM

"Thanks to close-up images of a 500-mile-long (800-kilometer-long) mountain on the moon from NASA's Cassini spacecraft, scientists have found more evidence for the idea that Dione was likely active in the past. It could still be active now."
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-178