You've probably seen the news already...

Kepler Crater as seen by SMART-1

It's easy to see some moving shadows in the animation. I took the gif and split out the individual images. I applied a .7 gamma in Paint Shop just to make the shadows stand out more. *Note, the inserted image below is a 5 frame animated gif. If it is not animated in your browser, please save the file locally and use a graphics program that will show the animation.



The right most box in the upper right has the darkest shadow, presumably SMART-1's shadow. The box next to that box shows a shadow of the shadow...at least, there's another shadow that appears to have the same trajectory as the darker shadow.

The box all alone in the left side contains a shadow that moves 'up', it begins near the crater at the lower left of the box.

The circle contains a large round shadow, probably something internal to the camera.

I don't think it's shadows - I think it's more likely contamination on the camera combined with internal reflection that appears to move as the spaceraft targetted the crater, and they then cropped the image thereafter.

You have to ask - a shadow of what? Smart's orbit is several hundred km - we're not talking Hayabusa here.

Doug

I like the animation never-the-less. Hopefully they'll do another or several more before the swan dive.

Oh - it's very very cool, no doubt, and I'm sure, at some point, we should see some even lower better sequences like it.

Doug

Keplar is something like a 50 km diameter crater. Not near as big as Copernicus, but fresh.

Mr. Foing tell us that the team has well mapped light and shadows; but, for now, it is still analysing the long exposures at the poles.

Not a scoop but here's the Project Scientist given answers...

SMART-1 news at ESA's site:

"Even the instruments on SMART-1 were special. They were miniaturized to be ten times lighter than their traditional counterparts. The camera weighed just 2 kilograms. As a result, two of the instruments (D-CIXS and SIR), which mapped the Moon's elemental composition and minerals, are being upgraded and rebuilt to fly on the 2008 Indian Moon mission Chandrayaan-1."

Kinda nice 3d effect with the crater and its rim though...

SMART-1 update

Germany Preparing For Moon Mission
http://www.moondaily.com/reports/Germany_P...ission_999.html