Let's take a walk on Mars

I'm sure most of you here have seen numerous Curiosity rover images from Mars, showing some interesting landscape, rocks, and, more recently, buttes (small plateau-like hills) near the Mt Sharp. If you're like me, you would have wondered about the size of those things and imagined what it would be like to stand there.

Using the measurements from orbital images, and other various calculations, space imaging enthusiast Seán Doran was able to "drop" a simulated image of an astronaut into those scenes. Results, in my opinion, are out of this world, and are very inspirational:









More about these images here: www.planetary.org...
And more of Seán's images at his Flick page.

a reply to: wildespace

They're really nice images and do exactly what the artist intended - added context.

That bottom one looks like an ancient pyramid! Yes, I said it. A pyramid struck by a falling asteroid!!

This is lovely stuff, and I have awarded you the much coveted star & flag double punch.
I do feel that for some of the members who will see these images it needs to be clarified that, 'NO, THESE ARE NOT REAL IMAGES LEAKED FROM WITHIN NASA OF ASTRONAUTS EXPLORING/OCCUPYING MARS THAT HAS BEEN SUPPRESSED THROUGH CONSPIRACY OF OBAMA!'.

originally posted by: Iamnotadoctor
I do feel that for some of the members who will see these images it needs to be clarified that, 'NO, THESE ARE NOT REAL IMAGES LEAKED FROM WITHIN NASA OF ASTRONAUTS EXPLORING/OCCUPYING MARS THAT HAS BEEN SUPPRESSED THROUGH CONSPIRACY OF OBAMA!'.

There's that, and somebody even suggested that such images shouldn't be created at all, lest we send the moon hoaxers and other conspiracy nuts into a frenzy of "see, we told you so!" I, of course, disagree with that line of thinking, and beleive that such images are of great value to the genuine space enthusiasts.

Personally, I love space images where an astronaut or some familiar object is "dropped" into the scene for scale. Such as this busy highway on the comet P60:

They're pretty cool from what I see.

Ok they're not real but does make you think one day it just might be.

Thanks for sharing OP.

originally posted by: DarkvsLight29
They're pretty cool from what I see.

Ok they're not real but does make you think one day it just might be.

Thanks for sharing OP.

Everything in those images apart from the astronaut is real.

a reply to: Kandinsky

That bottom one looks like an ancient pyramid! Yes, I said it. A pyramid struck by a falling asteroid!!

You're right about being struck by impactors. That outcrop appears shattered, with extreme prejudice.

a reply to: intrptr

Looks like the pyramid in the background was targeted and its peak landed on the top of the second one. Two destroyed with one medal-worthy shot.

There's that guy who thinks Mars was nuked by someone for some reason. He'd love that picture!

a reply to: Kandinsky

There's that guy who thinks Mars was nuked by someone for some reason. He'd love that picture!

Bigger than nukes. Mars has little weathering compared to earth. Many of the features, though piled up wth sand drifts, reflect the shock and awe of massive concussion and blast from impacts long ago (like it was nuked).

a reply to: intrptr

Dr John Brandenburg is who I was thinking of: Nuclear War Killed All Life On Mars And Yup, There Were Totally Aliens On The Red Planet.

He had a decent idea based on certain radiation signatures and then jumped two sharks, lassoed them and used them as skis. He's been surfing ever since with the last interview I heard including every ancient alien myth and meme imaginable. His thesis is a powerful spacefarer passed through our system and decimated the, apparently, megalithic Martian populations.

originally posted by: Kandinsky
a reply to: intrptr

Looks like the pyramid in the background was targeted and its peak landed on the top of the second one. Two destroyed with one medal-worthy shot.

There's that guy who thinks Mars was nuked by someone for some reason. He'd love that picture!

Of course, it could be just wind or water erosion (like buttes on Earth). Which explanation do you think is more likely?

a reply to: Kandinsky

He had a decent idea based on certain radiation signatures...

Any link to that part? I would like to read it. I have this (underedumakated) theory that some impactors actually achieve enough heat and pressure to fission material. That could create certain fallout signatures.

Weak traces of radioactivity, detected in tree samples and the polar ice layers dating from 1908, near the Tunguska Siberia fireball event.

a reply to: wildespace

Can we rule out underpaid Martian labourers taking their own work down? Maybe they were destroyed with the introduction of effective building regs? Nobody likes a death trap.

I wouldn't necessarily discount aeolian processes either.

a reply to: intrptr

Someone snuck it on the Mars wiki a couple of years ago and it's since been removed.

There are some types of isotopes that are only present on Earth in the aftermath of nuclear weapons testing and they've also been recorded on Mars. He therefore put them together and got a euraka moment - Martian genocide. This has subsequently grown in ever expanding detail and scope to the point where his last interview was saturated in pseudoscience and extrapolations.

When I looked into it at the time, those signatures do appear in nature and have been attributed to the effects of major impacts. So yeah, you're idea is pretty much right.

ETA - Here's a gist. Beware it's the Daily Mail.

originally posted by: wildespace

originally posted by: Kandinsky
a reply to: intrptr

Looks like the pyramid in the background was targeted and its peak landed on the top of the second one. Two destroyed with one medal-worthy shot.

There's that guy who thinks Mars was nuked by someone for some reason. He'd love that picture!

Of course, it could be just wind or water erosion (like buttes on Earth). Which explanation do you think is more likely?

Blast damage. Although the winds on Mars can be up to sixty miles an hour, the barometric pressure is so low they 'feel like' a mild breeze.

Look at the exposed and shattered bedrock in the foreground of this pic from Hiroshima...

originally posted by: Kandinsky
a reply to: intrptr

Dr John Brandenburg is who I was thinking of: Nuclear War Killed All Life On Mars And Yup, There Were Totally Aliens On The Red Planet.

He had a decent idea based on certain radiation signatures and then jumped two sharks, lassoed them and used them as skis. He's been surfing ever since with the last interview I heard including every ancient alien myth and meme imaginable. His thesis is a powerful spacefarer passed through our system and decimated the, apparently, megalithic Martian populations.

He appears to also wish to lasso in the 'face on Mars' concept too. Brilliant.
Dr. Brandenburg's book cover

a reply to: Iamnotadoctor

He's like a new Richard Hoagland arriving late to the party.

originally posted by: intrptr
Blast damage. Although the winds on Mars can be up to sixty miles an hour, the barometric pressure is so low they 'feel like' a mild breeze.

And yet that mild breeze, and the fine dust carried by it, work for many millions of years to do their eroding work. Erosion caused by the wind is everywhere on Mars, and it constitutes a major part of studing martian geological processes. www.uahirise.org...

These buttes may have been especially weak to erosion as they're composed of sediment layers in what was then a lake in the middle of Gale crater. Trust me, if anything heavy or powerful hit those buttes, there'd be nothing left standing.

a reply to: wildespace

And yet that mild breeze, and the fine dust carried by it, work for many millions of years to do their eroding work. Erosion caused by the wind is everywhere on Mars...

But not impactors?

originally posted by: intrptr
a reply to: wildespace

And yet that mild breeze, and the fine dust carried by it, work for many millions of years to do their eroding work. Erosion caused by the wind is everywhere on Mars...

But not impactors?

Impactors do too, but, ironically enough, marian winds and other processes tend to cover the traces of impacts. You'll find very few craters in the polar regions, due to the high winds filling those craters up with dust.