Lander Zeroes in On Martian North Pole

now lets see if the parachute works!

Phoenix has landed! TOUCHDOWN!!!

WooooOOOOooo HooOOOOOOoooo!!!!!!!!!!

TOUCH DOWN!!!!!

landing sequence initiated !

What would have been really kewl would have been if NASA could have positioned one of the Rovers to take some snapshots of the Phoenix entering the atmosphere and landing.

Hopefully no damage occured and the solar panels will deploy. We will know in about 10 minutes.

Was an extremely exciting landing. If the rest of the mission goes as smoothly as this we could get some really interesting info out of this.

[edit on 25-5-2008 by BlueEyes]

[edit on 25-5-2008 by BlueEyes]

Originally posted by WhatTheory
What would have been really kewl would have been if NASA could have positioned one of the Rovers to take some snapshots of the Phoenix entering the atmosphere and landing.

It would have been cool if that was possible, but the rovers landed nowhere near this lander (the rovers landed near the equator, while Phoenix landed near the North Polar region) -- and the rovers have only traveled 4.7 miles (Spirit) and 7.25 miles (Opportunity) so far in there entire lives -- they don't have the ability to go very far at all.

[edit on 5/25/2008 by Soylent Green Is People]

Just said AN HOUR AND A HALF FOR FIRST PIC.

Gives em time to clean it up i s'pose

Originally posted by Soylent Green Is People

Originally posted by WhatTheory
What would have been really kewl would have been if NASA could have positioned one of the Rovers to take some snapshots of the Phoenix entering the atmosphere and landing.

It would have been cool if that was possible, but the rovers landed nowhere near this lander (the rovers lander near the equator, while Phoenix landed near the North Polar region) -- and the rovers have only traveled 4.7 miles (Spirit) and 7.25 miles (Opportunity) so far in there entire lives.

I realize this. Of course I was speaking hypothetically.

reply to post by Anomic of Nihilism


Well, according to NASA, we (the public) will be seeing the photos at the exact same time they see the photos...I suppose it's up to each person to believe NASA or not (I believe them).

Originally posted by Anomic of Nihilism
Just said AN HOUR AND A HALF FOR FIRST PIC.

Gives em time to clean it up i s'pose

You're right. That should give them enough time to airbrush out the Martian waving hello and holding a sign saying "welcome to Mars".

Heh Heh!!

I'm just wondering if they'll be in .....*AHEM* ...COLOUR!!!!!! or not.

If so, just how RED will the sky look, and... does anyone know what the resolution will be??

Where's ZORGON!!! HE should DEFINATELY be in this thread, im sure he'd be able to fill us in on a fair few details

Cheers

AoN

reply to post by Anomic of Nihilism


No Zorgon needed.

The "Robotic Arm Camera" is a colour camera.

I don't know it the "Surface Stereo Imager" is a colour camera.

Edit to add more information:

The "Robotic Arm Camera" is a colour camera that uses red, green and blue LEDs to iluminate the subjects of the photo. In that way they know exactly the light that is iluminating the object and so they can know the true colours of it.

Characteristics of the RAC
Magnification - up to 1
Distance to object - 11mm - infinite
CCD - 256 x 512 pixel
Resolution - 23 microns/px
Mass - 0.415 kg
Dimensions - 116 x 61 x 76 mm
Light source - 26 red, 26 green and 52 blue LEDs

[edit on 25/5/2008 by ArMaP]

reply to post by Anomic of Nihilism


They will probably be in black and white (at first) since they will be the raw images. ALL photographs from Mars first come in Black and white, then are computer colorized later.

In fact ALL digital cameras are "color blind". The color you see in your digital pictures are only an approximation of true color. The camera on the lander (and the rovers, and your home digital camera) rely on colored filters to help discern the intensity of light. Different colors will be of different intensities when viewed through a particular filter. Computers (like the CCD chip or CMOS in your digital camera) translate these intensities of light into different colors and display those "guessed" colors onto the finished image.

All color photos from Mars were originally black and white raw images taken through different filters that show the light in different intensities. These intensities are read by a computer and the color is "guessed at" (although usually a good guess). So a "true color" picture of Mars is alway labeled "approximate true color".

Sometimes the imaging scientists want a different material to stand out, so they do "false color" imaging that may show all light of a certain intensity as blue (when it really isn't blue) to make a certain material show up better against the background. Blue is often used because it contrasts very well against the yellows and reds of Mars.

[edit on 5/25/2008 by Soylent Green Is People]

I think that congratulations are in order for the Phoenix team for all of their hard work and current/future sucesses. It is nice to see the wishes of older failed missions come to light in this lander. I hope that it gives us some good science to ponder in the future. Although it is just a 90 day mission it will be fun to see what comes out of TEGA and MECA tests. Would love to see some organics come out of this...

[edit on 25-5-2008 by Lost_Mind]

The "Surface Stereo Imager" is a camera with 12 different filters, so I think this will be take the same kind of monochromatic images as the cameras from the rovers.

reply to post by ArMaP

Thanks for the camera info ArMap.

Is this similar to the traditional type of camara and filter system used in the rovers (as I said in my post above), but instead of using filters to identify the light intensities, Phoenix is using these color LED lights?

Will these colored LED lights be able to "light up" the entire area being photographed?

EDIT:
UPDATE: Thanks ArMap...you must have been posting while I was composing my post.

[edit on 5/25/2008 by Soylent Green Is People]

The cameras for which I posted that information are two, one on the robotic arm (RAC), the other a stereo camera on a mast (SSI).

RAC

The instrument provides close-up, full-color images of (1) the martian surface in the vicinity of the lander, (2) prospective soil and water ice samples in the trench dug by the RA, (3) verification of collected samples in the scoop prior to analysis by the MECA and TEGA instruments, and (4) the floor and side-walls of the trench to examine fine-scale texturing and layering.

As the RAC was made mostly to photograph the samples the LEDs do not need to iluminate a large area.



This camera is the one similar to those of the rovers.
SSI

Situated atop an extended mast, SSI will provide images at a height two meters above the ground, roughly the height of a tall person. SSI simulates the human eye with its two optical lens system that will give three-dimensional views of the arctic plains. The instrument will also simulate the resolution of human eyesight using a charged-coupled device that produces high density 1024 x 1024 pixel images. But SSI exceeds the capabilities of the human eye by using optical and infrared filters, allowing multispectral imaging at 12 wavelengths of geological interest and atmospheric interest.

Well, it has been over an hour and a half, so I'm just wondering where are the images? Was there a delay or something?