One of our blog readers asked about the wallpapers we post on our website for some of our released images. If you haven’t seen these, they’re linked over on the lower right of pages like this. Many different sizes are available, from 800×600 all the way up to 2560×1600 (for lucky people with ginormous monitors), so you can choose the right size for your screen resolution.

Our masterful web master creates these wallpapers for each of our weekly captioned releases (these are the images we release each week with some commentary written by the science team). He picks out an interesting area from each image and produces custom cutouts in different sizes. We provide these extra files because we think the images are so beautiful, everyone should have them on their desktop. Because they’re all done by hand, though, we unfortunately don’t have the resources to make these special products for every single image. For example, most of the 1,642 images we released in our big December PDS release don’t have wallpapers. However, you can make your own, and here’s how!
(more…)

Here are 40 RGB color images from the 1500 – 1600 orbit range of MRO.

View Images

There are, as always, many magnificent images here. Some of the noteworthy observations are:

PSP_001521_2025 and PSP_001501_2280: On the HiRISE web site you can see diagrams made by Tim Parker show the locations of various parts (lander, backshell, heatshield or parachute) for Viking Lander 1 and Viking Lander 2. It’s possible they aren’t in the color strip (I haven’t found them)!

PSP_001508_1245 and PSP_001510_2195: These two exhibit a “glow” pattern of saturated pixels due to high TDI (Time Delay Integration) settings on the blue-green CCDs. (All of the exposure settings are chosen for each observation based on a photometric model of the scene).

PSP_001538_2035: This is a rim-to-rim section across a crater called Tooting that is about 30 kilometers in diameter. It’s also interesting to note how the altitude of the rims, when combined with the large off-nadir roll angle (23 degrees), leads to an oddly bowed geometric projection. But it is correct; as the terrain rose, fell, and rose again from HiRISE’s angled point of view, the center of the ground track deviated slightly east or west from a true great-circle line.

PSP_001558_1325 and PSP_001593_2635: These dune fields are striking, forming incredible patterns.

PSP_001582_2245: Looking like a super-sized area of dried mud, the polygonal cracks in this image are amazing.

Updated (2008-Apr-10)

Some of you out there may be asking: what happens to a HiRISE image between the time that it is taken and the time that it is released to the public? Well, I’d like to give a summary here.

(more…)