Colour mosaic of Kasei Valles composed of 67 separate HRSC images
Colour mosaic of Kasei Valles composed of 67 separate HRSC images
This image was created using 67 separate image strips acquired using the HRSC stereo camera, operated by DLR on board the ESA Mars Express spacecraft. It covers some 1.5 million square kilometres, which is almost three times the area of France. The image resolution has been reduced in places and is approximately 100 metres per pixel. The large-scale view shows how catastrophic floods carved the southern highlands during the Martian 'Middle Ages', and flowed out into Chryse Planitia in the delta region (right). Zooming into the high-resolution image, numerous small-scale geological details are visible that can be traced back to the influence of flowing water. When the ESA Mars Express spacecraft was launched in 2003, one of the primary goals of the mission was to create a global map of our planetary neighbour in high resolution, in colour and in 3D. The HRSC system was developed at DLR for this purpose. The real strength of HRSC lies in its ability to capture large-scale views of the Martian landscape. Ideally, the individual image strips can be used to create composite image mosaics. However, due to the changing conditions at the times that the images were acquired, such as the difference in the angle of the Sun, in the altitude from which the images were acquired or variations in the atmospheric conditions, slight variations in the brightness and colouring are unavoidable in such mosaics.