posted on Sep, 18 2007 @ 11:32 PM
What most of you likely don't know is that when they make these images, they are done in strips, then stitched together (as mentioned in the video
posted on the previous page).
The process isn't perfect. Often passes don't line up quite right. Rather than put out pics with big black pieces missing from them, they
interpolate the sections of missing data from the edges of the data they have. Anyone who's done this knows that it always results in a fairly crappy
job... but since these images are not critical, it really doesn't matter that much.
I "discovered" this years back when I was working on a game project involving Mars. We wanted to be as accurate as possible to the Martian surface,
so I was re-constructing hight-map data from NASA side-scan images. I noticed a crap load of this kind of artifact and got curious. I played around a
bit and was able to erase then reconstruct them by using the process I mentioned above.
Later, it was confirmed when I was corresponding with NASA directly. Hehe, they wanted to know how the hell I'd made such accurate maps after we'd
sent them some samples. They were a little put-out when I confessed that the artifact areas were filled in by totally fake information. After I'd
done the same thing they had to fill in the gaps (but at a higher resolution), I hand painted in terrain that matched up.
BTW, I used my technique for building height maps on the area known as Cydonia (the "face"). I was sorely disappointed at the results. Nothing came
back looking at all face-like and I managed to prove (to myself, at least) that "the face" and the pyramids were all just tricks of the lighting.
I caution anyone interested in "structures" on other planets to be aware of the human tendency to impose Pattern Recognition upon just about
anything we look at. Read up on it:
Wiki entry
We see faces in clouds and Jesus on potato chips.
Why would you expect anything different when looking at pictures of the Moon?