back to article NASA reveals secrets of Curiosity’s selfies

NASA has published a long and detailed explanation of just how its Curiosity rover managed to take a self-portrait. The agency has posted a video, which we've popped at the bottom of the story, and lengthy text explanations of the way it assembled the shot below. NASA says “Curiosity held the rover's Mars Hand Lens Imager ( …

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  1. Rampant Spaniel

    Obviously Chuck Norris took it.

    1. Sir Runcible Spoon

      Sir

      Speaking of the bearded wonder I was watching Expendables 2 the other night, I hadn't looked at the cast list so was very surprised to see him walking down the street after saving Sly and his buddies.

      It really did elicit a loud "No, Fucking, WAY!" :D Awesome.

      Is it me or does his beard look like a spray tan applied through a stencil?

      1. Rampant Spaniel

        Re: Sir

        A legend indeed :-) He's on TV non stop here stateside advertising the total gym, much rarer to see him in a movie. It's sad to see him reduced to that. I hadn't noticed the beard but now you mention it, it does have that gi joe spray on look. Got to give him credit for staying in such good shape!

        1. KjetilS

          Re: Sir

          After he made his opinions perfectly clear, it is probably for the best if we just let him fade into obscurity.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Whatever

    We know curiosity was faked because the aliens are already here and it's an easy way to funnel bribery money to our hidden overlords. Apollo faked? Old news

  3. fLaMePrOoF
    Headmaster

    Photo caption... "NASA should no better"?! 0_o

    1. Chris007
      Headmaster

      @fLaMePrOoF

      no or know

      ???

  4. Eddy Ito

    Not good enough

    The NASA denialistas will just say that "recreating" the photo is easy enough as all NASA had to do is just drive it back from the desert to the lab and take a few more snaps with the rose colored filter removed. Unfortunately they will require first hand proof of actually seeing Curiosity wave at them from Mars through a high powered telescope while they are physically standing on the Moon and I'm not sure that will be good enough.

    1. NomNomNom

      Re: Not good enough

      For pity's sake. Given Neil Armstrong managed to see JFK through a sniper scope from the moon well enough to shoot him dead, I think we should be able to easily see Curiosity from Earth using a simple pair of binocular. Yet we can't. Explain that!!

      1. Rob Carriere
        Boffin

        Re: Not good enough

        We _will_ be able to see Curiosity from Earth with binoculars. Have patience and remember Armstrong could only do it because the scope was aimed 6 years back in time.

      2. Colin Brett
        Joke

        Re: Not good enough

        "For pity's sake. Given Neil Armstrong managed to see JFK through a sniper scope from the moon well enough to shoot him dead, I think we should be able to easily see Curiosity from Earth using a simple pair of binocular. Yet we can't. Explain that!!"

        That must have been one heck of a shot! Not only over the 240,000 miles from Moon to Earth but also six years back in time. Truly, Armstrong was a hero!

        Colin

        1. Turtle

          @Colin Brett Re: Not good enough

          "That must have been one heck of a shot! Not only over the 240,000 miles from Moon to Earth but also six years back in time. Truly, Armstrong was a hero!"

          A super hero, in fact.

  5. Paul Hovnanian Silver badge
    Alien

    Simple

    The camera is detachable and has a self timer. Curiosity simply set the timer, detached the camera, set it on top of a Martian post box, rolled back into frame and waited for the shutter to go click.

    1. Michael H.F. Wilkinson Silver badge

      Re: Simple

      Or it brought its own mirror. Flipping the result in any image processing programs easy

      1. Justicesays
        Black Helicopters

        Re: Simple

        You Fools!

        Clearly these are images of the rover reflected in the shiny hull of the flying saucer it is currently investigating.

        That explains the distorted image, AND the announcement NASA were going to make and then pretended was just about clay or whatever.

      2. Sir Runcible Spoon

        Re: Simple

        How long is Rovers arm? These shots look like they were taken from quite a distance.

        Is the arm in question in the composite shot? If so, explain how it could take the shots of its own appendages.

        1. Steve Crook

          Re: Simple

          Wide angle lens, something @ 14-20mm would get a lot in so the arm doesn't have to be that long, and there's some really good panorama building software that'll remove most of the lens aberrations and exposure differences if you can take sufficient pictures with enough overlap.

        2. Can't think of anything witty...
          Alien

          Re: Simple

          i think that it is about 2 metres long, so plenty long enough to take some good shots at arms length.

          There is a video of the movements here:

          http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?media_id=156880341

          it looks like quite a few of the shots were originally taken upside down and then composited together. but i think that you can see from the animation how the arm could articulate to keep itself out of the shots.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Why are they pandering to morons?

    Let them cling to their conspiracy theories. After all, for many it's all they have in the world.

    1. ian 22
      Happy

      Re: Why are they pandering to morons?

      Yes, they were born with nothing and still have most of it.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Alien

    Sod the Curiosity pic...

    ...I want an explanation of the floating lady with no legs.

    1. P_0

      Re: Sod the Curiosity pic...

      The what?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Sod the Curiosity pic...

        The what?

        The lady on the left side of the recreation pic. Her legs are missing from the knees down.

        And take a look at the top half of the orange step ladder. Someone must have been having a sly fag when that part was being exposed.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Trollface

      > an explanation of the floating lady with no legs

      She was going to blow the whistle on the whole sound-stage "Mars Trip" so they used Curiosity's laser to zap her, from the bottom up like a good old-time witch burning (it's actually the only part of the lander that works, since rayguns are all that the DoD puppetmasters ever bothered testing). They decided to release this photo as a ghastly warning to all others who oppose the Illuminati.

      Now if you want a load of ghostly aberrations try doing a photo montage of a room with a couple of small bored children waiting for Daddy to quit pfaffing around - end result was like Ghostbusters played by midgets, fragments of kids fading in and out all over the show. Stitching software needed a few nudges but luckily it's mostly relying on edge detection & I took generous overlaps.

  8. hplasm
    Happy

    As usual-

    The angle makes the rover look far more svelte that it actually is...

  9. JayBizzle
    Trollface

    I fancy a trip to Mars, where on Earth is it?

    1. cortland

      http://www.roadsideamerica.com/tip/8237

      Talk to the saucer driver. He's on break.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Isnt it on iOS maps??

  10. Valeyard
    Thumb Up

    titular text

    Surely the nature of our near planetary neighbour is just a tad more interesting than learning how a nuclear-powered, laser-equipped space tank takes selfies?

    beautiful! Love the writing on this site sometimes

  11. NomNomNom

    i think i see Obama's Birth Certificate taped to the back of the robot and it's giving off all the wrong shadows suggesting it's fake.

  12. This post has been deleted by its author

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: If they could only...

      Yeah not a proper sexy pout though, it'd have to be one of those stupid duck-faced pouts girls today seem to do all the time.

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    surely it just asked a fellow tourist to take a snap for it?

  14. Danny 14
    Stop

    a waste of NASAs time

    There is a flat earth society FFS. I thought it was a piss take but there are people who believe the earth is flat.

    Wasting time trying to justify these images is lost on some people.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge

      Re: a waste of NASAs time

      If the earth wasn't flat, how could curiosity VISIT THE OTHER SIDE? EXPLAIN THAT!!

      1. Sir Runcible Spoon

        Re: a waste of NASAs time

        Out of curiosity (pun intended) what do Flat Earthers have to say on the subject of satellite television and the curvature of the Earth as seen from any high flying commercial aircraft?

        1. Blitterbug
          Unhappy

          Re: Out of curiosity ...

          Sir Runcible, you really don't want to know. Really you don't. They have a site. With a lengthy list of forum posts. Can't be arsed to check it out again so you'll have to giggle it. But be warned; you will lose your mind and the will to live if you actually go and check it out. They have many, many answers to anything you could care to throw at them, and skeptical posters are treated with amused tolerance. I'm still trying to spoon my brains back in from my last visit.

    2. Tom Melly
      Black Helicopters

      Re: a waste of NASAs time

      I suspect NASA know that there are a hard-core who will never be convinced even if you rubbed their faces in Martian dust whilst giving them a spacesuit wedgie.

      The point is that potential converts (who might otherwise be convinced by a 'no way this could have been taken on Mars' argument) have an alternative - and correct - explanation.

      I guess they've learned from all the nonsense that sprung up around the moon landings with regard to shadows and fluttering flags, and so on.*

      * what I love about conspiracy theories is how they require the conspirators to be both superhuman geniuses and complete cretins - they build a convincing moon set, but then decide that a gentle breeze and some extra lighting would improve the ambience?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Go

        > a spacesuit wedgie

        Pure poetry, thank you kindly! Now once I am crowned Mongo, Emperor of All Barsoom this will certainly be my favoured method of execution

  15. Crisp
    Coat

    It looks photoshopped.

    You can tell from some of the pixels.

  16. 27escape
    Alien

    Shouldn't that be

    Martian Scorsese?

  17. brain_flakes
    Facepalm

    "That the agency has recreated the shot with the earth-bound test version of Curiosity could be a sign it is keen to prove the shots are easily achievable"

    Or people could just download the bloody raw images that Nasa VERY KINDLY provide us all

    http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/?s=84&camera=MAHLI

    http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/?s=85&camera=MAHLI

  18. Mike Brown

    trolling

    So NASA have started to troll the consiracy nuts. Brilliant.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
      Devil

      Re: trolling

      Looking forward to a shot of a few plastic figurines of Dzeta Reticulians that Curiosity set up from the contents of a secret backpack.

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    hmmmmmm!

    Looks a bit like timanfaya national park to me lol

  20. Wombling_Free
    Trollface

    It's the Moon that's fake!

    Everyone knows the Mars landings are being faked on the Moon, which is ITSELF a fake, the biggest fake and running joke in the history of art and ... history!

    THERE IS SIMPLY NO PROOF OF THE MOON! Every depiction of it is a fake. FICTION - DEPICTION! SEE? They both contain the letters 'ICTION' which is a Rosicrucian CODE! SHEEPLE! WAKE UP! Your Government is conning you! EVEN THE SKY LIES - because the sky is owned by COCA-COLA-IBM! What you see in the sky is just the reflection off geese! ORBITAL MIND-CONTROL LASERS, MAN!

    The best way to fight the conspiracy theorists is chaff: put stuff like this on web pages, and the nuts start to believe it.

    1. El Richard Thomas

      Re: I always assumed that...

      That's not chaff, it's David Icke's next blog entry.

  21. Zambooruk
    Unhappy

    Conspiracy Confirmed

    O2 WiFi is taking orders from Big Brother. Access to conspiracy link is blocked!

  22. Joe Harrison

    What really happened

    "That's one small...er, leap... for the world.. AAHH DAM DAM FKKIT!"

    "No problem Neil we can do another take, remember light and bouncy luvvie as you come down the ladder"

  23. Andus McCoatover
    Windows

    In this day and age, seems perfectly reasonable to me.

    Nasa spent a fortune on Curiosity, then uses its camera to take piccies of itself in the nude, which appear on Facebook, courtesy of NASA.

    The "Yoof of today" spend a fortune on a phone with a camera. Then what? They photo themselves and post the piccies on Facebook, often in their "Birthday suits".

    Surprised we didn't see "Wish you were here" caption. Oh, sorry, wrong spacerock.

  24. Nick Ryan Silver badge

    The lab based self portrait is good for working out the scale of the thing. Putting it into proper context with objects we see and use day-to-day lends a good sense of scale.

    Obviously we always need some sex interest in these pictures... it is Friday after all.

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    OK folks. Time to come back to reality and see what we are fighting for.

    http://www.godaddyguides.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/khazzy.jpg

    Data centers.

  26. Cubical Drone

    Why is it that tin foil hats can protect one from everything except belief in insane conspiracy theories?

    1. Andus McCoatover
      Windows

      Note to self:

      Buy more tin foil tomorrow.

      1. Crisp

        Re: Note to self:

        Buy more shares in tin foil manufacturers.

  27. Dan Deufel

    Curiosity didn't take the pictures of itself. It did what any tourist would do... It handed the camera to a local and asked them to take the pictures. ("Does this laser make my butt look big?")

    The quality of the snaps just goes to show that Marvin is has handy with a camera as he was with an Illudium Pu-36 Space Modulator.

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    That reminds me....

    Now that NASA, the UN and the Tri-Lateral Commission have paid me, I need to delete those pictures I took of Curiousity sitting out in the middle of Death Valley.......

    Thanks, Reg!

  29. Mike Flugennock
    Thumb Up

    Waste of time? Hardly

    Even inasmuch as they're also spectacular eye candy, the high-res mosaic "selfies" provide important information to engineers about the state and health of the rover, as well as information about the nature of the terrain the rover is traversing.

    On at least two occasions, both MER rovers had become stuck in deep dirt, and the engineers and rover drivers used extensively detailed "selfies" to determine the extent of the predicament, develop extraction solutions, and determine how well these solutions were working. Also, polar-projected panoramic "selfies" of Spirit and Opportunity were used to determine the extent of dust coverage on the solar panels before and after dust storms.

    But, yeah... the by-product is really, really cool fotos. That can't be bad.

  30. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
    Headmaster

    DAT URL!

    ...."nasa_explains_curioisty_self_portraits"

  31. Chris Clawson

    Hold off on the tinfoil for now

    I think we're safe from the nuclear-powered laser tanks until they learn how to make "duck face" poses.

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