Epsilon!!

http://nasa.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportu...23P1205R0M1.JPG

Epsilon or Emma Dean??? I'm glad we got there and nice long drive

I have my doubts, but if you are right that was a 100m (or so) drive.
I'm looking forward to the navcams.

Do we have other craters nearby?

Obviously not.

I double-checked that fhaz image with last available pancams from epsilon (sol 917?) and the pattern is the same.
I stand corrected.

How long of a drive was that Tesheiner and where is the updated map???

How does this drive compare to the drives we did after Endurnace???

The images have been on the ground for less than an hour....give us a chance

The record drive was 220m just south of Vostok crater - typical drives back then ( with quite a bit more power than we have now ) were 100m or so.

However - I make this drive 98 metres.

Doug

Rassure me, it's Epsilon crater on the right, yes?

http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...23P1205R0M1.JPG

I can't imagine it being anything else - near as makes no difference we've covered 100m which would put us a few metres from Epsil...whatever it's called

I'd expect some Nav's and perhaps some of the drive dir Pancams in about 7 minutes time ( 2235UT ...ish... ctrl-refresh, ctrl refresh.....maybe at 2335 then... images normally come up at specific minutes past the hour - so if a few are done at X:35...the next lot will be x+1:35 ish.)

OK - a few mintues late - but here come the navcams...

Epsilon...
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...23P0685L0M1.JPG

Victoria...
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...23P0685L0M1.JPG

Doug

I know Doug posted this image but is the front edge of Victoria visible now and the Far Rim visible inside Victoria from this image???

http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...23P0685L0M1.JPG

Epsilon or Emma Jean Crater should be named for Steve Irwin

Amazing driving accuracy there Also, from what we can see of this small crater so far, there don't appear to be any features jumping out that would warrant too long of a stay, at aleast to my scientifically untrained eye.

Its rather subtle, but I believe this feature and the horizon to the left of it is on the far rim
Click to view attachment

To use a famous quote: "Holy smokes!"

http://nasa.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportu...23P2377L2M1.JPG

Drive direction mosaic
Click to view attachment

And just to state the obvious: the Pancam anaglyphs make it pretty clear we are seeing inside the crater.

Navcam equirectangular so far, centered on south (until it gets filled in more anyway):



Still waiting for the Pancam data.

I have a feeling that Victoria is going to provide a most exceptional view.

Wow, in the Pancams we can clearly see Epsilon, Zeta, and that degraded crater right next to Epsilon.

Alan's drive direction mosaic in a rough polar version - angles and orientation only approximate. The mound on the left of his pan, top in mine, appears to be the beacon. A white slab on its north face was probably what was visible from a distance.

Phil

Click to view attachment

You sure Phil?

I haven't looked at the angles yet but I would say that the beacon is the bright line toward the left edge of mhoward's navcam mosaic (at the edge of the first and second frames). And was visible beacuse it sits on top of a small hill.

James

Not certain, but I think I'm right.

Here is mhoward's half-pan in polar form...

Phil

Click to view attachment

(looking at the angles and a MOC image now... I'm still pretty certain I'm right)

And here's a real Uber-blooper version of a polar from mhowards's pan... - hey, I made a new word!

Phil

Click to view attachment

This should really be rotated quite a bit clockwise....

Sol 929 Pancam mosaic:

Some rough calculations

The beacon as marked on Tesheiner's map should be almost exactly due east (~90 degrees) of Epslilon where we now are.

Navcam frame 1N210665627EFF75##P0685L0M1 is pointed at 108 degrees (according to the tracking site)

Your mound is toward the right of that image => 108 + ~10 = ~120 degrees

My bright line on a hill is on the left of the same image => 108 - ~15 = ~90 degrees

The left most pancam is also pointed at 120 degrees confirming this.

EDIT: Just to add, I would guess that that mound is the end point of Tesheiner's hypothetical route.

OK!

Ok, at the risk of laughter, ridicule, and banishment, here I go:

Pancam 'glyph

Pancam 'glyph of just the horizon - and with the left/right registering optimised for looking at Victoria.

Click to view attachment

3x Phil-o-vision anaglyph.

Click to view attachment

James

One each 40 meter square planar projection from the new location. Lo-res, just to get a feel for what's going on locally. Created with AlgorimancerPG 3.4.3 (just updated).

Click to view attachment

Now, where's Zeta?

Having perused the new raw images (in 3D), as well as the above mosaics and polars from all you fellow Martians, I'm getting the impression that we are not actually yet seeing the VC far side. My main argument: the Navcam mosaics seem to reveal a continuous and even horizon line, broken only by the Beacon mound and the odd dark feature in about ESE (~125 deg).
So, could that new feature be part of the faraway very big crater in the southeast?

If i'm not completely mistaken, the real Victoria is still awaiting beyond those foreground mounds. And it must be then a really formidable sight, in the full meaning*.

*formidable To be dreaded or viewed with respect; likely to be hard to overcome, resist, or deal with. (The New SOED )

Well I'm sure not going to banish you, even if I had that power. I'm pretty sure that's on the far rim.

Could be wrong, of course. Don't think so, though.

At the risk of laughter, ridicule, banishment, though, I'll add this: It looks like there is a horizontal band pretty clearly visible on the far wall. If that's right, it must be pretty significant to be visible from all the way back here, I would think.

Nothing to see here, folks. Move along... thank you, just keep moving...

Brian

I take it from your reply that you haven't yet seen the anaglyphs with all their glory. This is definitely Viccy, and it's huge!

mhoward: I know... I was just joking.

Combined Navcam/Pancam equirectangular (reduced size) (centered on North):



14000x7000 pixel version - not full Pancam resolution, but the best I can do at the moment

And here's the stitched and cropped version of mhoward's image above:

Viccy full pan

I think what marswiggle is saying is that what we can see over the near rim is actully the planes southeast of Victoria and that the far rim is still hidden. The anaglyph is not really much help deciding - it's all well too far away to range.

To me, the picture make most sense if that *is* the interior of Victoria - but after reading Marswiggle's post I can see that it's not the only explanation.

Anyone know if there are any MOC images covering the region southeast of Victoria?

This is how I was identifying features... in this scheme, 'B' on the MOC image is the beacon.

Phil

Click to view attachment

Here is the direction of that feature on the other side of Vicky.

Click to view attachment

The more I look at it, the more I start to think that maybe it's *not* a rim feature.

Pando you inspired me to do my own centered version. Still not cropped up top, but oh well. The view is 200 degrees wide and 90 degrees vertical, centered on 145 degrees azimuth.

This is how I see it

Click to view attachment

Polar of mhoward's north centred pan overlayed on the MOC image

Here I had some fun with Photoshop, but Victoria stands out pretty nicely

Darn it. Aren't we all having fun getting our new bearings after this drive. I've run out of time tonight, but that's surely the boat ramp straight ahead, between the two flat-topped rises on the near rim. (in the two leftmost pancams)

Here's an artistic simulation (i.e. not scientific) what the arrival to Victoria may look like. We are currently at the top frame. Pretty soon we'll see the sandy slope, and then finally the dunes at the bottom. I'm guessing that we'll probably spot the dunes a few sols before we actually reach the rim.

Damn, I was away 24hrs and I missed all this!
The new features are very intriguing and very enignmatic too. At first glimpse, I was persuaded that bright portion we see is the VC interior, but now I'm not sure.
Click to view attachment
This composition of MGS image with pseudo-polar projection (using last Michael stitch and orientation infos) show that there is a pretty match of the closest features (though different from Phil identifications) and this suggests we are seeing crater interior below it.
However, the bright terrain continues toward East, well beyond VC border (e.g. point H)! Moreover, we do not clearly see the dark streaks we expect from satellite image and the distant feature and we need to understand what is "E" far relief... the strange thing is that we could have a better overall match if we rotate the Polar image 30 deg left: Michael, is possible to have such a large error in your projection?

Anyway, this is my 3x stretch from Pancam stitch:
Click to view attachment

It looks to me like Pando is right and the middle feature is indeed a far rim feature. In the anaglyph, the most prominent right-most ridge of the near rim also shows what appears to be benches. There seem to be several indications of horizontal banding, both in the raised rim features and in what seems to be visible of the crater wall. And I think I see what looks like a small, subdued but bright crater on the far wall to the right of the raised far rim feature, only a little ways down from the lip.

Does anyone see anything in the MOC image that would correspond to a smallish, light-toned crater in what would be the far wall from here?

-the other Doug

Yup me too. The longer I look and think about this the more I'm starting to think that Marswiggle is right.

The way that the distant horizon continues and looks the same well past the edge of Victoria and the lack of features that we should be seeing on the far rim make me beleve that we are seeing the flat terrain south-east of Victoria. It's been mentioned before that the south rim of Victoria could be quite depressed wrt the north, so it is not nesasarily surprising that we can see the plains beyond Victoria.



Yup that's what I see too.



I'm not Michael but I use the same data from the tracking database regularly and I can say with confidence that the azimuth is correct in that image. I don't know the error but it'll be much less than 1 degree.

Just ONE more of these 100's drives and we'll see much much more
Come on Oppy, we're waiting since March 13th when you left Erebus : 176 (Earth) days, can you imagine? Any cm move in VC direction stress us making tens of stiches, hypothesis, comments,... Please just ONE more of these 100's drives. We can't wait anymore. See U tomorrow there to preapare together for final VC approch

I think I understand what's going on now!!

We *can* see the far rim - but it's much more subtle - it's here

Click to view attachment

The bright section between the two black vertical markers is the bright section of the far rim where the rimshot crater is! The azimuth is right and if you look at the anaglyph that bright section does appear to be further away than the near rim!

So the rest of what we see over the rim *is* the plain (annulus) beyond Victoria - and that distant feature probably is part of the huge crater km's away!

James

I think you're right - because we're just not seing the sort of outcropping or features on the far rim that we should from here if the crater were 'flat' from side to side. I think it might be at quite a slope and thus we're seing some near rim, a tiny bit of far rim, and then the annulus beyond and etched terrain beyond that.

Doug

Hey! It looks like I lost a party this last night (Europe time)!

The party only really started after I went to bed

Doug