Self-Portrait by Curiosity Rover Arm Camera | Hacker News Reader

Self-Portrait by Curiosity Rover Arm Camera

mars.jpl.nasa.gov

74 pointslelf36 comments

Actual hires photo here : http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpeg/PIA16239.jpg (3.831 MB)

The extra detail is awesome. Being able to see the individual bolts, the decals, and other reference points makes the image far more real than the low-res version. Without those details, it's just a cute publicity shot of tax dollars in action; with detail, it's a large machine grinding across a brutal landscape (complete with dents in the tires and dirt in the joints).

What strikes me is how earth-like this picture is. Could be a dessert anywhere. It's hard to imagine that if I were next to the rover I wouldn't be able to breath!

Makes Mars seem approachable!

https://maps.google.com/maps?q=sahara&hl=en&ll=23.94...

They do look weirdly similar.

How big are the dust fines in the Sahara compared to those on Mars? NASA says the dust on Mars can be "as fine as cigarette smoke" which surprised me. (http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2003/09...)

> Because the martian atmosphere is thin--about 1% as dense as Earth's at sea level--only the smallest dust grains hang in the air. "Airborne dust on Mars is about as fine as cigarette smoke," says Bell. These fine grains reflect 20% to 25% of the sunlight that hits them; that's why the clouds look bright. (For comparison, the reflectivity of typical martian terrain is 10% to 15%.)

I'm not sure about Saharan dust sizes. (http://home.shirazu.ac.ir/~kompani/geomorphology/papers-87-8...)

Mars has no rain. The Sahara has maybe 3 inches (lol inches) per year.

This youth website has some interesting snippets - (http://www.calacademy.org/exhibits/africa/exhibit/sahara/mor...)

>Sand dunes make up only about 15 percent of the Sahara, but the desert is so huge (about three and a half million square miles or 5.63 million sq km) that even a single dune may be enormous. The sand dune known as the Libyan Erg is as big as France.

NASA really needs some more recognition for the amazing work they do. "Soft power" and all that; they should be designated a wonder of the world or a UN heritage thing.

Yeah, to me it looks like you are viewing the aftermath of a dust storm in the American Southwest, or maybe Afghanistan.

It's so earth-like it's hard to believe that if you magically found yourself standing next to the rover in that picture, you would be dead in a couple of minutes.

We are the aliens. That's the irony in all of this. Martians aren't invading earth. Earthlings are invading Mars ;)

Q. Is there life on Mars?

A. There is now!

This picture will be a core part of the conspiracy theories in five years.

sadly that is most likely the truth. I already saw some convo about people claiming some of the images were fake or doctored. Perhaps these people dont quite understand how mosaics work

You can actually see footsteps on the left.

I hope you're joking...

Yea, I wonder if they still have the 55 pictures they stitched this together from.

The crazy part being the third-person perspective. From the perspective (stitching?), it looks like the camera isn't attached to the rover.

I'd really love to see how they pulled this off. I can't think of any way to do it without using a second camera at some point.

See elsewhere in the thread [1] where I discussed this.

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4738558

"SUPPOSED TO BE DRY MARTIAN DUST? HOW COME IT STICKS TO DRY WHEELS THEN?" etc etc.

Why does the dry martian dust stick to the dry wheels? An electrostatic effect?

Replying to myself. I asked Emily Lakdawalla on Twitter. She's a journalist for The Planetary Society website, has great info on all the rover stuff.

Rodney Ramsey: @elakdawalla Maybe you can answer a curious Q for me... Why does Mars dust stick to Curiosity's wheels?

Emily Lakdawalla: @RodneyRamsey Electrostatic! The dust is extremely fine, Mars super dry.

I want to know how they were able to hide the camera that took the picture. I don't see any part of the arm with the camera, any difference in shadow, but I do see a warping effect on one of the wheels.

The camera is on the end of the arm at the bottom left in [1]. By comparing that to this picture you can see where part of the arm is in the self-portrait, above and to the left of the front-most wheel. The third-person perspective in the self-portrait comes about because the robot arm will always move out of the way of any photo that the camera is taking.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:PIA15279_3rovers-stand_D20...

um whats up with the guys face in that pic?

its obvious, the mars rover just asked john carter to his picture.

Why are all of the wires on the Curiosity Rover wrapped in bundles and tied to the exterior? Wouldn't the wires be better protected inside of a casing of some sort? Is it just to save weight?

Putting the wires on the outside does save some weight, but the main reason is to make the connections accessible during assembly and test. If something needs to be fixed you want to be able to get to it with a minimum of disassembly.

This HN discussion [1] and submission [2] which delves into the cable lacing on Curiosity might be of interest to you.

1: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4472312

2: http://igkt.net/sm/index.php?topic=4028

Every time one of these rover photos gets posted I find myself scrolling around the high res version looking at rocks for a while. Amazing that this is coming from Mars - seems worth it to not to let this kind of thing become routine.

Would curiosity be nearly as popular with the public if it didn't have a semi-antrhopomorphic "head" with a "face"? Our far-away pal is as cute as WALL-E.

I wonder about the design intent behind placing its one "eye" on one side of its face, where it seems friendlier, rather than smackdab in the middle where it'd look creepier and more cyclopean.

It's not very well camouflaged, let's hope the martians won't find it anytime soon.

I wonder if there are strong winds and sandstorms over there, can the rover survive those? Also, shouldn't there be a cover or sth to avoid fine dust destroying its circuits?

The atmosphere on Mars is about 100x less dense than Earth's, so winds probably won't pack much of a punch.

The "circuits" you see on the exterior of the rover are mostly just bundles of copper wires. Sensitive electronics and instruments are securely housed on the inside.

All I see is martian footsteps in front of it.

I can't believe all those cables resists the mission. Reminds me of the Ap.ollo XI capsule. in the Aeronautical Museum

Seems the Mars vehicle really lives up to its name.

Amazing but what a ramshackle-looking device!

Reminded me of that 1970s VW Beetle advert: "It's ugly, but it gets you there." (IIRC)

I spent ages going over the hi-res image looking for any damaged cable sheath. Still wondering where that scrap of the sheath insulation tape they noticed on the ground in a photo a while ago came from.

No doubt the external, unprotected cables saved a lot of weight and assembly time. But it would really suck to snag one on a rover arm or something, and then be looking at pictures of the broken wire that killed some vital rover equipment. That Kapton tape is very thin.

Upvoted for not being in a bathroom duck-facing

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