Bruce Murray Space Image Library

Spirit Mission Success Panorama, sol 3

Spirit Mission Success Panorama, sol 3
Spirit Mission Success Panorama, sol 3 This 360-degree panorama was acquired at Spirit's landing site on Mars in Gusev Crater, subsequently named Columbia Memorial Station. The rover was still sitting on the lander, and had not yet "stood up" in preparation to drive off the lander. The individual images of this mosaicked panorama were acquired by the Pancam cameras over the course of three sols starting on Sol 3 (5 Jan 2004). NASA / JPL-Caltech / Cornell

Because the images were taken at different times of day and across different days while the dust abundance and sun illumination were changing, there were brightness differences and color seams visible in the assembled mosaic. In the mosaic presented here an attempt has been made to minimize these seams by balancing the colors. An "average" sky color was also used to remove the seams in the sky. These kinds of image processing steps yield a more aesthetically consistent rendering of the scene, as it would have been viewed if Spirit's cameras could have obtained the whole panorama all at once, or as a human standing there might have viewed it. Pancam's 753nm, 535nm, and 482nm filters were used in making this mosaic.