Starship Asterisk*

hville wrote:This picture perfectly demonstrates why it would be ridiculous to send a man to Mars.

hville wrote:This picture perfectly demonstrates why it would be ridiculous to send a man to Mars.

hville wrote:The nearest Big Mac and frys is a long way off.

Asterhole wrote:
OK - it appears this is some sort of You Tube video. I'm at work and not allowed to stream videos, music, etc. on the Company computer. So I use my smartphone and play the video. It shows the time elapsing, but nothing's happening? The rover is just sitting there. Did the Mastcam pan 360 and this is the result? Or am I missing something?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ME_T4B1rxCg wrote:
<<This image of the downwind face of "Namib Dune" on Mars covers 360 degrees, including a portion of Mount Sharp on the horizon. Use the arrows in the top left, or click and drag your cursor or mouse, to move the view up/down and right/left.

Important note: Not all browsers support viewing 360 videos/images. YouTube supports uploading and playback of 360 degree videos/images on computers using Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Opera browsers.

If your browser does not support 360, a static view of this same panorama image
is available at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/det ... d=pia20284

hville wrote:The nearest Big Mac and frys is a long way off.

APODFORIST wrote:Description: "color adjusted to mimic Earth lighting"

I really don't understand why NASA is always doing this and not showing the pictures in original colors - like a human would see the scenery on Mars.

Chris Peterson wrote:
Alternatively, assuming that the Martian atmosphere results in a somewhat different color temperature for the sunlight and scattered skylight, the reason to correct that is so that we see the rocks as we would see them on Earth, allowing us to better understand what they are. That makes sense if the primary intent is to inform us about what materials are around the rover, as opposed to accurately simulating the experience of standing in that location.

http://nineplanets.org/news/category/mars-rovers/ wrote:
The scene is presented with a color adjustment that approximates white balancing, to resemble how the rocks would appear under daytime lighting conditions on Earth.

diane in los angeles wrote:You really should put a sentence of explanation about the 360 panoramas. I had to do some investigation to understand why a 2 minute video claiming a 360 panoramic view was static. It's not obvious to everyone who might enjoy it that a little mousing permits full view of the panorama--that the viewer controls the image and that clicking 'play' will not show it. A link to an explanation would go a long way towards increasing viewer happiness.

runge2000 wrote:
I like it and I want more of it, for example as a live stream.

• http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150930.html

Chris Peterson wrote:

APODFORIST wrote:Description: "color adjusted to mimic Earth lighting"

I really don't understand why NASA is always doing this and not showing the pictures in original colors - like a human would see the scenery on Mars.

I take this to mean that the colors were adjusted to approximate what our eyes would see on Mars- which is different from what the unprocessed camera data provides, given the filters used.

Alternatively, assuming that the Martian atmosphere results in a somewhat different color temperature for the sunlight and scattered skylight, the reason to correct that is so that we see the rocks as we would see them on Earth, allowing us to better understand what they are. That makes sense if the primary intent is to inform us about what materials are around the rover, as opposed to accurately simulating the experience of standing in that location.

APODFORIST wrote:Isn't it a foto with enhanced colors (to see more details)? If this is the reason why I can understand it. But I am always interested to see them in true colors too.

Probably like that true color foto:

Click to view full size image

In contrast to a foto with enhanced colors (as today ADPOP):

Click to view full size image

Chris Peterson wrote:

APODFORIST wrote:Isn't it a foto with enhanced colors (to see more details)? If this is the reason why I can understand it. But I am always interested to see them in true colors too.

Probably like that true color foto:

Click to view full size image

In contrast to a foto with enhanced colors (as today ADPOP):

Click to view full size image

I suspect that if we were standing on Mars, we'd actually see something much closer to the second, "enhanced" image. Our eyes and brains do an excellent job of automatic white balance, but that function doesn't work with photos. Whether we're in a room lit by incandescent lights or fluorescent lights, we see things almost the same (after a short adjustment period). But when we look at photographs made under those conditions, they look very different, and we usually can't normalize them. Put on pink-lensed glasses, and in a few minutes you won't be aware of them, and white will again look like white. Can't do the same with a pink filter on a camera.

We evolved to see things under Earth sunlight, and our vision autocorrects colors accordingly.

Neither of these images have been enhanced in a way that really brings out much more color detail. And there's really no such thing as "true color", given that color is a physiological response, not a physical one, and varies widely from person to person, in addition to being influenced by the viewing environment (which is why we have so many startling optical illusions based on color).

geckzilla wrote:
There have been some really, really long discussions on this over at the Unmanned Spaceflight forum. Like, what color is the sky on Mars, really? You'll find several well reasoned examples of why this or that is the real color of Mars. Amusing, but in the end, pointless... at least in my opinion, anyway. Mainly for the brain's white-balancing ability which you mentioned.