Jim Bell Q'n'a, October 19, 2006, Your questions answered! Options

[elakdawalla]

For your fun and enjoyment, a new Jim'n'Doug show!

http://www.planetary.org/explore/topics/ma...vers/audio.html

--Emily

[algorimancer]

Just a quick follow-on to the sun-finding accuracy: while the precision of finding the solar disk within an image can be good to half a pixel as Jim mentioned, the pointing accuracy of the camera masthead is rather worse. I forget the exact figure, but as I recall the relative pointing accuracy of the pancam masthead was something like 0.1 degrees (a minor limitation for automated panorama stitching programs). The overall orientation determination combines the sun-finder results with internal vehicle level data, which has some additional error. Finally the sun-finding algorithm is only performed at major sites, rather than following every drive, and in between the vehicle's self-orientation knowlege may drift up to around 1.5 degrees.