Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Mars rover camera project manager explains 2MP camera choice

dpreview.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 89 posts

Re: Mars rover camera project manager explains 2MP camera choice

#61

Post by brudgers »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #52
brudgers wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mars has a very thin atmosphere, so a microphone would capture very little data if any. Star Wars aside, there isn't much sound in the universe.

Mars is also windy, and microphones can be made to be very sensitive. Plus, there might be some interest in hearing the dust from one of the common dust storms hitting the rover. Not a high priority in terms of data, but potentially interesting nonetheless.

It appears that NASA already sent a microphone to Mars.

And you can listen to it:

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msp98/lidar/microphone/mic_found.ht...

[Edit] Never mind, Mars Polar Lander crashed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Polar_Lander#Communication...

Re: Mars rover camera project manager explains 2MP camera choice

#62

Post by InclinedPlane »

brudgers wrote: post #61
waterlesscloud wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mars is also windy, and microphones can be made to be very sensitive. Plus, there might be some interest in hearing the dust from one of the common dust storms hitting the rover. Not a high priority in terms of data, but potentially interesting nonetheless.

It appears that NASA already sent a microphone to Mars. And you can listen to it: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msp98/lidar/microphone/mic_found.ht... [Edit] Never mind, Mars Polar Lander crashed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Polar_Lander#Communication...

NASA sent microphones to Mars twice, but neither were used due to technical reasons (one because the vehicle crashed).

Re: Mars rover camera project manager explains 2MP camera choice

#63

Post by smackfu »

kbolino wrote: post #56
smackfu wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course, once you stop seeing this is as crazy, you are doomed to mediocre results.

No, it would be crazy if the rover failed due to a bad bolt, and no one could explain why the bolt was bad or even where it came from. Also, no one is stopping you from building, launching, landing, and operating a multi-purpose roving vehicle on the surface of a foreign planet, 50 to 400 million kilometers away, that's designed to last for several years and withstand extremes of temperature, pressure, and radiation.…

I still think there is a middle ground. I guess I will just have to make my own mars rover in my spare time though, that seems viable.

Re: Mars rover camera project manager explains 2MP camera choice

#64

Post by kbolino »

smackfu wrote: post #63
kbolino wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it would be crazy if the rover failed due to a bad bolt, and no one could explain why the bolt was bad or even where it came from. Also, no one is stopping you from building, launching, landing, and operating a multi-purpose roving vehicle on the surface of a foreign planet, 50 to 400 million kilometers away, that's designed to last for several years and withstand extremes of temperature, pressure, and radiation.…

I still think there is a middle ground. I guess I will just have to make my own mars rover in my spare time though, that seems viable.

If your point is that there is a lot of bureaucracy, then I wholeheartedly agree. Unfortunately, in any government project, that is going to be the case.

You cannot on the one hand expect great things, and on the other hand chastise every failure. I'm not saying you specifically would do this, but any failure would result in a storm of controversy about how billions of dollars were wasted to land a pile of scrap metal on Mars while X, Y, and Z pressing political crises are a better use of our time and money.

A private company, on the other hand, can afford to take greater risks. If you're actually able to do it on your own, more power to you, but I would recommend some help.

Re: Mars rover camera project manager explains 2MP camera choice

#66

Post by MattSayar »

johno215 wrote: post #35
kghose wrote: post #32

I really liked the article - it was very coherent and easy to follow. BTW, is there a full-res movie of the descent? I've only seen the 'thumbnails' stitched together of the heat-shield and the parachute.

Not yet. Only 20 or so of the full frames of the descent have been downloaded so far. Will probably be a day or more before they are all down. You can see the frames that are down here: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/?s=0

I'd like to see someone make an animated .gif with those images.

Re: Mars rover camera project manager explains 2MP camera choice

#67

Post by Pfhreak »

senthilnayagam wrote: post #27

just curious, why they are releasing only black and white pictures

The B&W cameras are primarily used for navigation and hazard avoidance. The rover is equipped with color cameras, and they will get stood up in time. For now they are starting with the basic pieces and gradually bringing more online.

Re: Mars rover camera project manager explains 2MP camera choice

#69

Post by pyoung »

sigkill wrote: post #43

I'm a bit disappointed that they didn't take this as a chance to try out cobbling up a "radiation box" and put commercial equipment in that. Surely, that would be a good experiment data point that could be used in future endeavors.

I feel like you could simulate those conditions here on earth pretty accurately. At the very least, it sounds like they have some radiation sensors on the rover, so we will soon have a better idea of what conditions are like.

Re: Mars rover camera project manager explains 2MP camera choice

#70

Post by ghshephard »

asmithmd1 wrote: post #14

The mast camera is actually two cameras with zoom of each camera fixed at two different values: http://msl-scicorner.jpl.nasa.gov/Instruments/Mastcam/ James Cameron lobbied to make zoom lenes for the cameras so they could be set at the same zoom level to create stereo pairs for 3D images. JPL had "problems designing the lens without using wet lubricants which would require battery-sapping heating" Difficult trade-off…

Given that the Plutonium power core is putting off 2000 watts of heat in order to generate 125 watts electricity, I find it surprising that they don't have enough heat to keep wet-lubricants heated sufficiently. But - that's an awfully big Rover, and it does get pretty cold on Mars...

2000 watts at 14 years in kilowatt hour - 245,000 kilowatt hours.

Post reply on HN