Soil
The
Opportunity rover acquired this mosaic of a rather indistinct patch of soil
on Sol 1640
(Sep. 3, 2008). Originally, the mosaic was designed to provide images of
a patch of bright soil before the IDD
(Instrument Deployment Device, a bit of which can be seen at the lower
left of the image) was deployed to study the soil. However, the
imaging was planned pre-drive and taken post-drive (which is a very
common procedure), and the drive did not complete as expected. As
such, the pancam sequence instead captured this area of soil.
An image of the the type of bright soil this mosaic would have captured
can be seen here. The mosaic's
field of view is about 22 degrees across and 8 degrees high.
This mosaic was created using
Pancam's 753-nm, 535-nm, and 432-nm filters. Two versions are offered
here at full resolution: an approximate true color rendering, and a
false color stretch to bring out subtle color differences in the scene. Also provided is an overhead view showing the approximate location of the rover at the time of imaging.
Jim Bell
Pancam Instrument Lead
February 20, 2009 |
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