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posted by Fnord666 on Sunday March 22 2020, @11:44AM   Printer-friendly
from the camera-on-a-stick dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

NASA's Curiosity Mars rover recently set a record for the steepest terrain it's ever climbed, cresting the "Greenheugh Pediment," a broad sheet of rock that sits atop a hill. And before doing that, the rover took a selfie, capturing the scene just below Greenheugh.

[...] Before the climb, Curiosity used the black-and-white Navigation Cameras located on its mast to, for the first time, record a short movie of its "selfie stick," otherwise known as its robotic arm.

Curiosity's mission is to study whether the Martian environment could have supported microbial life billions of years ago. One tool for doing that is the Mars Hand Lens Camera, or MAHLI, located in the turret at the end of the robotic arm. This camera provides a close-up view of sand grains and rock textures, similarly to how a geologist uses a handheld magnifying glass for a closer look in the field on Earth.

By rotating the turret to face the rover, the team can use MAHLI to show Curiosity. Because each MAHLI image covers only a small area, it requires many images and arm positions to fully capture the rover and its surroundings.

"We get asked so often how Curiosity takes a selfie," said Doug Ellison, a Curiosity camera operator at JPL. "We thought the best way to explain it would be to let the rover show everyone from its own point of view just how it's done."


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  • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday March 22 2020, @01:11PM (2 children)

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Sunday March 22 2020, @01:11PM (#974116) Journal

    Curiosity's mission is to study whether the Martian environment could have supported microbial life

    That's just the cover story. The real mission is to stand around looking like an idiot tourist, taking selfies, hoping to lure a Martian rock worm out into the open. Once that happens we will nuke the dusty red planet into - uhhh - red dust, and declare ourselves the winner of War of the Worlds.

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  • (Score: 4, Touché) by c0lo on Sunday March 22 2020, @02:01PM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Sunday March 22 2020, @02:01PM (#974127) Journal

    That's just the cover story. The real mission is

    Wait 'til it gets to the real-real mission: PoV porn on Mars. It only needs to find a partner; any time now.

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 22 2020, @10:26PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 22 2020, @10:26PM (#974246)

    The whole thing is a giant tax-payer fraud to provide a back story for the fake moon landings. The American people aren't falling for it.