Revealing the True Colors of NASA

[Craig Lamson]

The sad facts of the color being ordered altered , are in both articles I posted here ... I don't make this stuff up to bust out nasa's lies and trickery ... Other people , who are qualified to do this , bust them out .

If you really can't understand that nasa ordered the images of Mars changed to show the planet is red , when it isn't , then you would be the one who is acting ignorant , not me .

Attacking everything I post is just a silly game you play on this forum ... and saying that I am ignorant about everything I post is another game you play .

Read the articles ... It's very clear that nasa ordered the color changed in the Mars photos ... and if you don't believe these articles , then I will be very happy to post dozens of others which state the same tragic facts .

Like I said before Lamson ... you lost this one .

You posted an article that CLAIMS to show NASA changed the TV screens. Other than Hoaglands wacko site and those who parrot it, were is the PROOF this actually happend? Oh thats right..THERE IS NONE!

As to the actual color of Mars you have yet to post ANYTHING other than the rantings of pseudoscientists. You have no clue if the digital imaging processes they describe are accurate (heck you cant even figure out how to measure two grey squares in photoshop) yet you parrot them as if you know they are correct. Great work. Did NASA process images of Mars at different color settings? Sure they did, it was the NATURE of the process they were using. And when the NASA images are processed for "natural" color, we see that Mars is indeed red. And the really cool thing is that YOU cuold do it yourself , if you had the knowlege and the understanding.

You get attacked because you post JUNK. It's really not my problem if your knowlege base does not allow you to see just that. It could, as many here have tried to teach you WHY your positions are mistaken. However in a typical closed minded fashion you attack those who could teach you. Very sad indeed.

You can post as many parrots as you please but none of them will change the simple fact that they are wrong...as you can PROVE for yourself using the link I provided.

If it makes you feel better to think you arguments stand up in this case, then by all means go for it. Too bad its not the truth....

Edited February 26, 2007 by Craig Lamson

[Duane Daman]

Lamson ... You wouldn't know the truth about nasa if it jumped up and slapped you on your closed minded , opinionated face .

The color of MARS was ALTERED two hours after the first color images came in showing the TRUE color of Mars , which looks like the Arizona desert .... Hey , do you think it's possible ?? .... Naw , they wouldn't be so stupid to fake another mission , would they ?

And here is all the proof that you or I or anyone else should need that nasa changed the color of Mars .

Craig's and nasa's American flag ... Red , white and blue ? .... Nope ... try maroon , off white and purple .

[Craig Lamson]

Lamson ... You wouldn't know the truth about nasa if it jumped up and slapped you on your closed minded , opinionated face .

The color of MARS was ALTERED two hours after the first color images came in showing the TRUE color of Mars , which looks like the Arizona desert .... Hey , do you think it's possible ?? .... Naw , they wouldn't be so stupid to fake another mission , would they ?

And here is all the proof that you or I or anyone else should need that nasa changed the color of Mars .

Craig's and nasa's American flag ... Red , white and blue ? .... Nope ... try maroon , off white and purple .

You showing that posterized piece of crap again Duane? You are hopeless. I'll ask again HOW DO YOU KNOW THE FIRST IMAGES were process to show the natural color of Mars? The answer...you don't.

One more simple question...What would loads of red dust in the Mars sky do to the "color balance of an image?

Your "proof" stinks.

Edited February 27, 2007 by Craig Lamson

[Duane Daman]

Like my grannie always used to say Craig ... "The proof is in the pudding" ... Or in nasa's sad case , the proof is in their phony , altered photographs ...

Does Martian dust get kicked up higher than moon dust does ? .... You mean to say that little bit of atmosphere on Mars can kick that 'RED' dust all the way up into that BLUE sky ??

Don't be such a sore loser Craig ... The whole world knows that nasa altered the colors of the Mars photos... and one day , hopefully soon , they will also know that they faked the Apollo photography too ...

Edited February 27, 2007 by Duane Daman

[Craig Lamson]

Like my grannie always used to say Craig ... "The proof is in the pudding" ... Or in nasa's sad case , the proof is in their phony , altered photographs ...

Does Martian dust get kicked up higher than moon dust does ? .... You mean to say that little bit of atmosphere on Mars can kick that 'RED' dust all the way up into that BLUE sky ??

Don't be such a sore loser Craig ... The whole world knows that nasa altered the colors of the Mars photos... and one day , hopefully soon , they will also know that they faked the Apollo photography too ...

Translated from Duanespeak:

I don't have a clue...again.

[Duane Daman]

Translated from Craigspeak :

I'm going to have the last word about this even though I have been proven to be wrong .... again .

You know for an older fellow Craig , you sure do act immature about all of this ... Is it because you always have to have the last word , or because you are trying to convince everyone that you are always right , even when you're not ?.. Or is it maybe because you just can't stand seeing my name as having posted last on any of these threads ?

You really do seem to have a problem with anyone who exposes nasa's many deceptions .... Maybe you should consider getting some counseling for this.

[Craig Lamson]

Translated from Craigspeak :

I'm going to have the last word about this even though I have been proven to be wrong .... again .

You know for an older fellow Craig , you sure do act immature about all of this ... Is it because you always have to have the last word , or because you are trying to convince everyone that you are always right , even when you're not ?.. Or is it maybe because you just can't stand seeing my name as having posted last on any of these threads ?

You really do seem to have a problem with anyone who exposes nasa's many deceptions .... Maybe you should consider getting some counseling for this.

Proven wrong by whom? you? ROFLMAO! By your very poorly done auto color balance cockup photo of Mars? Not likely! The only 'deception" you have exposed (not that it was really hidden) is the ignorance of the NASA CT's and the GULLIBILITY of those who follow them. If it was not so sad it would be funny.

As a youngster Duane it would do you a world of good to OPEN your mind and actually LEARN something instead of parroting the crap chose you read. A little education in the areas you attempt to argue would go a LONG way.

Give it up Duane, you are beaten to a pulp! I'll give you good advice once again, when you are in a hole...STOP DIGGING!

Now if YOU want the last word...by all means have at it. This discussion (if you want to call it that) is over.

Edited February 27, 2007 by Craig Lamson

[Matthew Lewis]

Mars is not red ....

Think about what you said here then think about how Mars looks through any telescope. Looks red, doesn't it?

[Evan Burton]

Getting a bit heated in here, gentlemen. Don't let it slide over to insults.

[Evan Burton]

I've been trying to get my head around this subject, and - as a layman - I think there are aspects of both Duane and Craig's arguments being correct.

It would appear quite correct that NASA changed the images from what was originally seen. The dispute would be appear to be over why the original images were changed.

My brief reading of this subject would indicate that it is actually quite complex. Colour (I'll use Australian spelling) calibration charts used were for what we would see under a pretty much Earth-normal daylight. The original images were 'uncalibrated'. When the correction was applied, some areas appeared correct but other colour values appeared wildly off. Because images were due to be released, a 'compromise' correction was used - much favouring the traditional 'red Mars'.

The problem seems to be that we are not exactly sure what is the "correct" colour. Factors such as atmospheric colouring due to dust, etc, cannot always be properly accounted for. Similarly, all areas of Mars are not necessarily the same colour (or rather shade).

Think about this - you take a photo of a house here on Earth during midday under a clear sky, then take another of the same house when the sun is low with a deep red effect (perhaps through clouds). Which is correct? Well, they both are.

Duane has said that the Martian sky is blue; at times, this would appear to be correct:

Using the proper color filters one can determine colors of Martian features, usually red; however, we have found that certain atmospheric clouds display blue-to-blue white color at times [beish et al, 1988]. Even without filters there are a few clouds that appear bluish, such as the "Capen Blue Syrtis Cloud."

http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/~rhill/alpo/mar...es/FILTERS1.HTM

This is not always the case, though.

My best advice is to read through some of the links below, and try to get your head around the problems involved in producing a 'true' image of Mars:

http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/~rhill/alpo/mar...es/FILTERS1.HTM

http://marswatch.astro.cornell.edu/pancam_...projects_1.html

[Craig Lamson]

I've been trying to get my head around this subject, and - as a layman - I think there are aspects of both Duane and Craig's arguments being correct.

It would appear quite correct that NASA changed the images from what was originally seen. The dispute would be appear to be over why the original images were changed.

My brief reading of this subject would indicate that it is actually quite complex. Colour (I'll use Australian spelling) calibration charts used were for what we would see under a pretty much Earth-normal daylight. The original images were 'uncalibrated'. When the correction was applied, some areas appeared correct but other colour values appeared wildly off. Because images were due to be released, a 'compromise' correction was used - much favouring the traditional 'red Mars'.

The problem seems to be that we are not exactly sure what is the "correct" colour. Factors such as atmospheric colouring due to dust, etc, cannot always be properly accounted for. Similarly, all areas of Mars are not necessarily the same colour (or rather shade).

Think about this - you take a photo of a house here on Earth during midday under a clear sky, then take another of the same house when the sun is low with a deep red effect (perhaps through clouds). Which is correct? Well, they both are.

Duane has said that the Martian sky is blue; at times, this would appear to be correct:

Using the proper color filters one can determine colors of Martian features, usually red; however, we have found that certain atmospheric clouds display blue-to-blue white color at times [beish et al, 1988]. Even without filters there are a few clouds that appear bluish, such as the "Capen Blue Syrtis Cloud."

http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/~rhill/alpo/mar...es/FILTERS1.HTM

This is not always the case, though.

My best advice is to read through some of the links below, and try to get your head around the problems involved in producing a 'true' image of Mars:

http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/~rhill/alpo/mar...es/FILTERS1.HTM

http://marswatch.astro.cornell.edu/pancam_...projects_1.html

Its more a case of the cutoff of the filters used and the sensitivity of the ccd. Very few,if any of the mars images were take with visable light. And since CCD's are sensitive to light beyond the visable spectrum (this is true of even a cheap point and shoot digital) and ONLY capture black and white data filters MUST be used to render a color image. Its the use of these filters and the filters cut off point that shapes the the color of the images as they are transfered to earth. In addition some digital data processing is done at the spacecraft before transmission thatt also effects the data.l

Scientists really dont care about making images in the visable spectrum of light. They get better resutlts...for their intended uses...by making thier photographs using light outside of the visable spectrum.

What returned to earth are three b/w images of the same scene photographed through three filters (red,green and blue) these three images are then combined to produce color images.

The problem starts when you simply combine these images directly, without alloowing for the desity shifts to the basic b/w images caused by the color filters designed for non visable light. When you do this YOU GET FALSE COLOR...and that will give you a MARS with a false blue sky. The same thing happens when you take a color normalized mars image (a RED one) and try and balance the color using a priogram like photoshop.

And of course thats EXACTLY what the NASA CT's have done. By ignoring (or not understanding) the correct process and taking a short cut thay produce FALSE color images and CLAIM they are correct!

I'm sorry Evan, nothing about Duanes argument is correct. His claim is that NASA is changing the color of Mars to HIDE the fact that it has a blue sky all the time! His argument has NOTHING to do with changes in the conditons on Mars, and stands totally on the the claim that NASA is somehow trying to dupe the world.

Of course Duanes argument fails when one understands the process of creating images on Mars.

[Duane Daman]

Here's another article which proves that nasa intentionally altered the color of the Mars photos ... This is NOT a conspiracy site , and I even included the hateful insults directed to conspiracy therorists to prove this point and show that at least I have nothing to hide .

This blows your nonsense right out of the water Craig .... Everyone , including Evan , knows that the nasa deliberately screwed with the Martian photos to make them look more 'alien' in appearence and conform to the "Red Planet " myth ....

God fobid we would be allowed to see the truth about the color of Mars ... Or the truth of anything , for that matter .... But you know what they say N A S A stands for ... NEVER A STRAIGHT ANSWER !

........................................................

What Color is Mars?

Tungsten points to a discussion that has been going on in several threads here on Martian Soil, lead by Barry Kearns about the true color of the Martian surface and skies, as humans would experience it through their own eyes. Barry contends that comparing various calibration shots and some of the earliest Spirit images released by NASA suggest that we would see Mars not in shades of red and orange as it's been romantisized by the phrase The Red Planet, but it would contain a lot more earthly colors, including specs of blue and green. The charges aren't new, similar discussions were raised about Viking images in the past.

Barry is certainly very passionate about the topic and has gone to great lengths to discuss it. Personally though, I'm not clear what NASA's agenda could be for altering the color of images released to the public. Does a redder Mars help them meet the public's expectations of what the planet should look like better? Would the mission seem less credible in their eyes if it looked more like pictures taken here on Earth and thus gain them less support for future missions?

Perhaps there are technical reasons at the root of this that required a compromise in how the images are presented. I'd love to hear from our readers here what they think might be behind this. I'm also attempting to elicit a response from someone on the Athena team on the subject (Jim Bell, who is in charge of the cameras on the Mars rovers comes to mind).

Posted by jschuur in Mars Exploration Rover | Home

Previous: Maestro Data package #2 Released

Next: Spirit Shows Its Empty Nest

Related

NASA Unveils Color Snapshot of Mars (Jan 6, 2004)

Mars Color Imager and Context Camera (Oct 19, 2006)

NASA Rover Finds Earth in Martian Sky; Deploys High Gain Antenna; Color Pictures Expected Monday (Jan 5, 2004)

Fram In Color (May 27, 2004)

Comments

I've thought about this before and come to the conclusion that NASA is reproducing the colors as faithfully as they know how. Now that isn't to say NASA is above milking something to generate some excitement (think "Possible Evidence of Life Found in Martian Meteorite" headline), but that doesn't really apply here. I mean, if the colors were more earthy then I think that would generate MORE excitement about a manned mission. I also don't think the NASA scientists would participate in such a blatant lie, sounds too conspiracy theory to me. If we accept that then we have to start listening to the crackpots that say we never went to the moon. They have a color calibration chart onboard, I'm sure they are using it.

Posted by: skantman at January 21, 2004 08:47 AM

It seemed obvious to me that they would be using the color calibration tool as well... it just makes sense.

But if you look at the image of the tool as included in the January 8th mosaic (bottom center), I don't see how they *COULD BE* calibrating the images properly.

The tool in that picture looks almost nothing like the actual tool. Blue should not be shown as hot pink in a properly calibrated image.

If they are unable to properly calibrate the images, they have no business claiming that the images actually *are* calibrated to anything close to true color.

The pictures of the tool for the MarsDail project, the Lego figure "Biff Starlight", the US Flag... all show at reasonably close to true colors. The mosaic photos clearly are NOT.

The two different versions of PIA05015 should be enough to show that there's some serious explaining to do regarding color... the press release photos are ridiculously over-red.

People keep insisting on wanting to speculate on motivations. I've heard a variety of them, and frankly don't care which of them might be the underlying cause *IF* this is deliberate. (Note the "if").

None of these are *my* offerings for motivations, but I'll offer some that I've heard others mention. Please don't ask me to defend any of them, these are NOT my speculations on motivations. I don't particularly believe that any of these have to be the "real" reason... motivations are irrelevant to me:

1) Funding concerns. The current exploration team that is getting funded now is populated heavily by geologists and robotics experts. So long as Mars continues to be portrayed as "dead", their cash cow is safe... they keep getting funded. Seeing strong evidence of life shifts funding towards biologists and manned missions instead. No one wants to lose funding.

2) Dodging conspiracy theorists. If the terrain and sky look remarkably Earth-like, that provides fodder for conspiracy nuts to say that the probes aren't actually on Mars. Adjusting colors to make it look alien keeps the noise from the kooks down to a dull roar.

3) Dodging long-term accountability / maintaining credibility. If the Mars exploration teams have been showing Mars as "too red" all along, revealing the truth now opens up a can of worms regarding how long the deception has been going on. Very pointed questions start getting asked, and jobs might be on the line.

4) Preconception. If current team members are driving what the pictures "should look like" based off of previous data (which may have been suspect), then they might simply be making adjustments that are "obvious" to them, without being scientifically justifiable.

5) Pressure to meet deadlines / poor planning. Expediency may be driving the actual data gathered, as opposed to gathering the data necessary to present the images as originally represented ("you'll see Mars in its true colors"). If they didn't plan to take L4 images and they are required, they might just be slapping together whatever they have and just hoping that folks don't notice.

6) Pandering to ignorance. If the public has been "taught" already what the surface is supposed to look like, they might be unsatisfied with pictures that are nowhere close to that expectation ("These don't look like Mars... OK, where are the REAL pictures?"). Ironically, this could lead to exactly the same sort of conspiratorial chatter that they might have been seeking to avoid.

I'm sure there are plenty of others, and I won't include the more ridiculously whacked-out ones that I'd heard offered.

My point is that their actual motivation would be largely MOOT so long as they know that they are putting out mis-representative picture.

If they know that, I don't care what caused them to do it... I just want it stopped.

Posted by: Barry Kearns at January 21, 2004 10:01 AM

The sadness (or hilarity, depending on your perspective at the moment) continues with the Jan 21st press release image:

"Data from the panoramic camera's green, blue and infrared filters were combined to create this approximate true color image."

Approximate true color? Definitely... just look at the image yourself. Quite convincing.

We all know that hot pink is "approximately" blue. It's all over that picture. Everyone should just learn to accept that the NASA logo has an "approximately" dark brown background (lower right corner of platform). That much is definitely clear. We should alert the NASA webmasters and have them fix their copies.

And of course, for you trivia buffs who want to zoom in on the picture at the upper right of the platform, you can verify what we were all no-doubt taught in school: That the United States flag is made up of (approximately) brown and light tan stripes, with light tan stars set in a field of dark brown.

There's no cause for concern here, it's all easy to reconcile. All it takes is the realization that "false" is approximately the same as "true".

What's next? A booming voice telling us to "PAY NO ATTENTION TO THOSE LENSES BEHIND THE CURTAIN!"?

Posted by: Barry Kearns at January 21, 2004 04:43 PM

Found several more webpages discussing this issue today:

http://www.goroadachi.com/etemenanki/mars-hiddencolors.htm

http://www.keithlaney.com/spirit_color_ima...calibration.htm

http://www.atsnn.com/story/30048.html (very technical!)

Enjoy. I know I did!

Posted by: Tungsten at January 21, 2004 07:28 PM

More links:

http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/30805#613967

http://www.xfacts.com/spirit2004/

Posted by: Peter Uwira at January 22, 2004 03:11 AM

I am afraid that in many respects that the Martian landscape and sky are too pink,too orange. I would allow that sometimes we might see a more blue sky when the dust in the atmosphere diminishes. Astronomical artist Don Davis (who worked for USGS in times past) has prepared some studies of color on Mars (he has his own web site). My very limited experience with the Davis work, plus other impressions, suggest that Mars might have bluer skies and perhaps browner soil than we are being shown in the Spirit and other Martian surface photos, except when dust storms are occurring, and their aftereffects are present.

I write as someone who studied the colors of Mars myself over the years. I made 30 hand-painted globes of Mars for NASA, JPL, and some universities and planetaria 1961-1967 based on the observations of Dr. Gerard de Vaucouleurs (deceased, with his name given to a large crater fragment near the crater Gusev in which Spirit has landed; the de Vaucouleurs feature is shown on both versions of the Sky and telescope Mars globes currently available). I was also cartographer for de Vaucouleurs' Mars Map Project 1968-1974 at the University of Texas at Austin in the Department of Astronomy, in which we made maps of Mars which utilized groundbased telescopic data consisting of de Vaucouleurs' observations, Lowell Observatory photgraphic data, and Pic du Midi, France photographic data (and later, photographs from Mariner 9 Mars spacecraft photography) to create a variety of Mars maps.

I think the problem of color on Mars is an interesting one which should be pursued by those able to work scientifically on it.

Posted by: James Roth at January 22, 2004 07:57 PM

Re James Roth

Here's the link to Don Davis' website:

http://www.donaldedavis.com/PARTS/MARSCLRS.html

Great site!

Posted by: Peter Uwira at January 24, 2004 03:08 AM

Well, the first color mosaic is in from Opportunity (congratulations on the near-perfect landing, NASA! Only 2-3 g on the first bounce... that's awesome!)

And, of course, the pictures put out are a self-described "bizarre" landscape. The took the shots with the wholly inappropriate (when trying to show humna-like colors) L2, L5 and L6 lenses.

When they were making larger panoramas, which included stereo pictures, it was at least understandable why the would include lens L2... there was a complementary R2 lens.

In this sequence, no R2 frames were taken. It would have taken exactly as long to take the pictures using L4, L5 and L6 as it did with the shots they chose, and we would have received the benefit of something close to what a human sees.

So long as NASA persists in using the L2-L5-L6 scheme, we will continue to see "color" pictures that can NEVER be adjusted to something like what humans would see... the L2 lens contaminates the human-vision red domain by producing very strong 'red channel' signals from predominantly blue fields, and likewise swamps out green pigments.

An L2-L5-L6 picture cannot be separated back out and remixed, because there's no way to distinguish if an L2 pixel is bright because it is blue or red. This leads to the (IMO) fatal flaw in trying to use L2 as the red channel for color images approximating what a human would see.

NASA has yet to produce a single picture which include the L4, L5 and L6 filters in a picture which simulatneously shows the color calibration tool and the landscape.

There have been quite a few opportunities to do so (no pun intended). The color pictures that they took of the calibration tool (with L4, L5 and L6) could have done precisely that... the mosaic of Jan 8th shows that a single EFF frame easily holds the tool in the lower-left and a LOT of landscape in the top half of the image.

Instead of capitalizing on that chance, they chose to shoot the pictures of the calibration tool as "ESF" (sub-frame) pictures, meaning the Rover pre-crops the image down to a particular size before transmitting it.

Having the color tool in the same shot as the terrain (using USEFUL color filters) is the obvious means by which we can determine what the landscape would look like... to a human.

Since human eye color receptors do NOT receive large signals in the 750 nm range, we are left with "color" pictures as the might be seen by something utterly non-human.

If non-humans were funding the mission, that would be fine. But since it is HUMANS that are paying for this mission, I think it's only fair that the mission team make a simple change/addtion in their filter choices, and show us the L4, L5, L6 terrain data with the calibration tool in the same single EFF frame.

Doing so would completely end any speculation about what color the terrain looks like to humans.

I see no good reason at all that they CAN'T do this... they are simply choosing NOT TO DO IT.

Posted by: Barry Kearns at January 25, 2004 09:59 AM

http://www.martiansoil.com/archives/001683.php

[Duane Daman]

Bump for Craig .... I rest my case ... You're wrong and I'm right .... Get over it .

[Craig Lamson]

Bump for Craig .... I rest my case ... You're wrong and I'm right .... Get over it .

You did not READ (or at least understand) what you posted did you Duane? It was a pretty silly mistake since your post ACTUALLY PROVES MY POINT and proves YOU wrong! ROFLMAO!

Thanks for resting your case posting information that proves you wrong. This is simply TOO funny!

Edited February 27, 2007 by Craig Lamson

[Evan Burton]

That post does tend to favour Craig's arguments. No-one is arguing that NASA did not alter the images. The contentious point is WHY, and there is a lot of technical material that explains why they did it.

Another contentious issue is if they have correctly colour-adjusted the images; Duane's post from another board suggests that there is far from agreement about this. Even so, none of the quoted posts support a conspiracy. One poster raised it as a possibility; Barry Kearns doesn't seem to suggest it; he just argues that the calibration is wrong and doesn't see a valid reason for it being that way.