In just under 3 minutes, this timelapse video uses 3,418 different images taken by Spirit’s front-right Hazcam to give an overview of her mission — from waking up and driving off the lander back in January, 2004 to studying countless rocks, climbing up (and down) Husband Hill, studying more rocks, trekking across Gusev Crater, stirring up some interesting light-colored soil, to ultimately getting stuck not being able to get out. This time-lapse covers 7.25 km (4.8 miles) of driving over the course of 5 years, 3 months, 27 days, all played back at 24 frames per second.
Via @SpaceFuture
Fascinating.
I have one question, which you may or may not be able to answer. At and around 0:35, the camera appears to be looking into the sun as the picture is over-exposed, yet we can see the shadow of the rover so there must be a light source behind. Can you posit an explanation? I’m too tired to think of one at the minute…
Looking at the footage around 0:35, the picture appears over-exposed because, possibly it is overexposed, or alternatively, dust in the atmosphere has significantly brightened the horizon(backscattering?). In either case, the sun is the light source that produces the shadow of the rover visible in the images and over-illuminates the horizon at this time in the video. Just a guess…..
The camera appears to be geared for the shadow of the rover, so the sunlit parts are overexposed, especially since the soil right outside the shadow appears to be reflecting the sunlight back at the camera.
Would be nice to have a version of this with a sol counter and occasional captions.
I rather wish they had left Spirit atop Husband hull to look at the scene below…
Imagine.. driving around on Mars!