Comments on: Clumps Growing on Phoenix Lander Legs

By: jerry

jerry — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 21:44:55 +0000

Dont you know this is the red planet,heh heh.Ivebeen waiting long nigh to sample some of your earthling spacecraft whilst it oxidises in my icy paradise,heh heh Im slowly growing on the old bird's legs,eating away the metal.just wait until the winter comes,I will have a veritable feast of your mars polar earth snack and dont try and send any robots or i will turn them into mars bars!

By: Jorge

Jorge — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 00:37:53 +0000

Well, as far as I know, the majority of Hubble images are in enhanced true color.

On the other hand, most of those spectacular and colourful images Hubble brought us, stuff like the Pillars of Creation or the Cat's Eye nebula, are in false colour.

By: Yoo

Yoo — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 16:23:27 +0000

Hmm, for some reason I thought most images from Hubble were processed to show false colors because the natural color images were boring and unenlightening. Guess there are much fewer false color images than I thought.

By: Louis

Louis — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 16:03:38 +0000

personally, I don't think that those "clumps" found growing on the Phoenix Lander's legs are lifeforms. It just seems quite absurd thinking that those things are little life forms, 'coz there were no life forms ever found, right? No extraterrestrials have not been seen yet. But I am not discouraging others who are hoping those have life in it. There is a chance, of course. Good luck to what's to happen next.

By: Captiosus

Captiosus — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 21:53:33 +0000

@Yoo

Almost 80% of the hubble images are true color images, taken with a big ass camera totaling some 1.5+ GIGApixels in its light receptor. this explains how the hubble can take extreme long range images such as the hubble deep field at such incredible clarity. But then again that 1.5 Gp camera cost a good quarter of a billion bucks when it went up w/ the hubble. If you think the images are false color, try looking at the Orion Nebula with a two foot wide reflector telescope and then compare it w/ a Hubble only image of the nebula's heart and you will see the colors. Hell, if you can see it where you live, the Andromeda Galaxy is the furthest away thing in the night sky (almost some 2 million lightyrs away) that the unaided human eye can detect, and you notice it has a slight bluish color. look at an image taken by hubble: it has a slight bluish tint.

Sorry if i was an ass, but just trying to defend the most kick ass telescope in human history XD

By: Yoo

Yoo — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 16:37:30 +0000

Most color images from the Hubble are probably false color images, anyways.

By: Joe

Joe — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 16:27:16 +0000

Ooops.. Spoke too soon. It appears this lander can, and has actually taken stereo color images. My bad.

By: Joe

Joe — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 16:14:24 +0000

The Hubble produces very nice color images… so why shouldn't the lander?
I'm very sceptical about these B/W images. They do not appear to be Hires either.

By: Jorge

Jorge — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 15:31:55 +0000

Don't panic.

But do keep your towel handy.

By: DJ

DJ — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 01:43:19 +0000

Can somebody keep an eye on this and let us know when it's time to PANIC??!!?!!

By: Pressman

Pressman — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 22:49:36 +0000

One word; Andromeda

By: Richard

Richard — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 22:45:34 +0000

I welcome our new alien overlords.

By: Marvin

Marvin — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 22:02:35 +0000

Martians, please stop poo'ing on our lander.
Really, have a little interplanetary respect.

By: Brian

Brian — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 21:29:45 +0000

What a bunch of ridiculous conjecture. Did any of you think of the fact that it is quite possible that the high res photos whether b/w or color are classified to some degree and therefor you are not allowed to see them? Just because they did not show up in one web article does not mean they do not exist. Not to mention the hi res color photos that have been posted everywhere. And to the person who mentioned Kodak Gold, first off that film is crap which is why NO professional photographer anywhere who is worth a damn uses it, secondly, do you want the lander to run over to photomat to get it developed? Maybe if you ask nicely it will pay for double prints and send you a set.

By: RR

RR — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 21:12:11 +0000

In other news, NASA plans first carwash for planet Mars.

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 21:04:29 +0000

Looks like the guys in the studio lack attention to detail when applying planetary makeup to their Mars stage. This proves that the Mars landing is a hoax, just like the one 40 years ago.

By: Aodhhan

Aodhhan — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 12:56:54 +0000

TD…

You're a victim of your own closed mind. Open it up, do your own study. It takes a long time to do this, but you'll eventually get the correct answer for yourself.
Not everything is theory; many things are proven even without direct visual evidence. If you rely only on what you see and know, then you are easily fooled; like an audience at a magic show.

By: Chris Coles

Chris Coles — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 08:53:36 +0000

TD great image. If any of you had ever tried your hand at plastering you would see clear similarities between the plaster surface before trowelling smooth and that image of Mars with the trough. That surface is not solid, as TD says, sand blown over millions of years; it is so much like a wet plaster surface, it makes ones hair stand on end.

By: David S

David S — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 02:10:10 +0000

Black and white (actually gray scale) gives you 4 times the resolution of color photos. Why??
Because color photos require the use of red, yellow, blue and white (in separate pixels)

You are correct about grayscale having higher possible resolution, however you don't have the particulars right.

Color images are generated using red, green, and blue pixels. Grayscale has 256 possible shades of gray available. RGB divides that by three. There is no white pixel. Black is all pixels off. So using three grayscale images would give you higher resolution, for the given element. But this is mostly for printing. Raw images have a much wider range. White is all three pixels on at once.

Technically there's no reason in this day and age that they can't fit one of these probes with a high resolution RGB camera. Most of us have them, and these grayscale photos look of poorer quality than most cell phones!

As far as bandwidth… we were able to send back live video from the moon. And that was almost 40 years ago!

By: TD

TD — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 01:26:01 +0000

Jorge,

thanks. If you get a chance, go to the HiRise page and check this image:

http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/TRA_000827_1875

with all the wind-blown sand over hundreds of millions or billions of years, how could these troughs not fill up? To me it's a mystery.

By: Jorge

Jorge — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 23:10:19 +0000

TD,

http://astrogeology.usgs.gov/Projects/MarsChanges/

Knock yourself out.

By: TD

TD — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 21:26:06 +0000

The colors of Mars – the seasonally changing dark areas – are subtle and interesting. At least that's what astronomers who devoted decades to the planet said in scientific papers. The theory that it's wind-blown sand on a lifeless planet is a theory, but just a theory. To not see anyone produce a time lapse sequence of true-color images of the seasonally changing dark areas over the last 50 years – one of the most fascinating dynamic processes in the solar system – is just impossible to believe. When you exclude the impossible, whatever else remains, however improbable, is where the truth is. (or something like that). But continue, if you like, with your praise of the status quo and ridicule of whoever asks for more.

By: Jorge

Jorge — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 19:37:02 +0000

Chris, thanks, but it won't work: I'm not a IE creature.

Still, there might be a similar plugin for my browser. I don't like cluttering it too much, but that might be worth investigating.

By: Peter Wright

Peter Wright — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 18:06:54 +0000

I don't want to burst anyone's bubble, but those spectacular images that we get from the Hubble telescope are largely color-enhanced composites created from a lot of boring digital data. If you folks are so intent on getting pretty pictures of Mars (or any other extraterrestrial objects), buy a damn calender!
TD, the notion that "these same scientists" are engaging in some sort of conspiracy to assure job security is akin to saying that the people and institutions that are doing cancer research at the expense of "American taxpayers" are withholding cures for the same reason. Phoenix incorporates several instruments that may help to confirm if there is (or was) life on Mars. Unfortunately, a camera that takes pictures "humans can relate to" does next to nothing for this particular intent.
I'm sure the folks at NASA would like to be able to offer a lot more flash and bling to the general public. They are, however, scientists, not advertising executives, and their priorities are collecting and interpreting information, not selling a product.

By: Mags

Mags — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 17:35:03 +0000

There's a fungus amongst us !!