Long time no see, here are some interesting news:

Copyright, Science Daily:

"TUCSON, June 6 (UPI) -- U.S. astronomers have released more than 1,200 high resolution images of Mars, making them available on the Internet.

The University of Arizona-based team said anyone connected by Internet can see Mars better than at any time in history through the High Resolution Imaging Experiment, or HiRISE -- the most powerful camera to orbit another planet.

The scientists operating the HiRISE camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance orbiter not only released 1.7 Terabytes of HiRISE data -- the largest single dataset delivered to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's space mission data library -- but also a user-friendly way for the public to easily see HiRISE images.

The HiRISE camera takes images of 3.5-mile-wide swaths as the orbiter flies at about 7,800 mph between 155 and 196 miles above Mars' surface. For at least the next 18 months, HiRISE will collect thousands of color, black-and-white and stereo images of the Martian surface, resolving features as small as 40 inches across while covering about one percent of the planet.

The images are available here

Copyright 2007 by United Press International. All Rights Reserved."

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My photography world

Covering just 1%???

Correction to hyperlink: The images are available here!

Covering just 1%???

Correction to hyperlink: The images are available here!

Thank you very much for the correction, I haven't been here for 5 months, so I can notice the lack of practice.

Tiare.-

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My photography world

You're welcome, and thanks very much for the link - the images and browser are great!

I'm still waiting for Google to come out with a Mars version of GoogleEarth instead of the rather inferior flat thing they've got occupying http://mars.google.com!

Andy

You're welcome, and thanks very much for the link - the images and browser are great!

I'm still waiting for Google to come out with a Mars version of GoogleEarth instead of the rather inferior flat thing they've got occupying http://mars.google.com!

Andy

Inferior? Its rather precise actually.

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"By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible". Hebrews 11.3

Inferior? Its rather precise actually.

Something can be precise and yet inferior! The maps are old, flat and not updated. No way of being able to fly through the Valles Marineris!

Google Earth interface paradigm is excellent, all they have to do is replace the map data with the latest visual and topographic and use all the same code.
It is easy for them to keep it updated as new data comes in.

Inferior? Its rather precise actually.

Something can be precise and yet inferior! The maps are old, flat and not updated. No way of being able to fly through the Valles Marineris!

Google Earth interface paradigm is excellent, all they have to do is replace the map data with the latest visual and topographic and use all the same code.
It is easy for them to keep it updated as new data comes in.

something I've always wanted to know:

do you know if Google Earth provides accurate coordinates? or are they program-specific? in other words: could you use Google Earth coordinates in a real-world setting?

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that would have worked if you hadn't stopped me

do you know if Google Earth provides accurate coordinates? or are they program-specific? in other words: could you use Google Earth coordinates in a real-world setting?

Yes, they are used in a real world setting every day. It is accurate to within a few metres, but it depends on what you define as accurate.

Mathematically it is perfectly accurate, you can locate any point on the globe to a millimetre, but the question is how accurately are the maps and geometry placed on the sphere. There is distortion present in all images, which have to be stretched and corrected to fit. The amount of accuracy ultimately depends on what the humans deem acceptable.
Topographic resolution is much much less than the image detail, but there is no reason why it can't get better. Data gathering, processing and storage of such huge datasets are a big problem for any organisation.