The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment camera, otherwise known as HiRISE, aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft has taken hundreds of images of the Martian surface during its mission. For the most part, these images are used to give us scientific insights into our planetary neighbor's terrain and topography. Now they have been used to create a mind-blowing art project.
Finnish filmmaker and photographer Jan Fröjdman has stitched together thousands of these HiRISE images to show Mars like you’ve never seen it before, apart from perhaps in a Hollywood blockbuster. Using over 33,000 reference points such as mountains and craters, which he inputted manually, he "stitched" together the images so they appeared like frames in a video to give this cinematic panning effect. On top of that, he had to colorize the images as they appear originally in grayscale.
After three months of hard work, his masterpiece was complete.
Fröjdman notes that “this film is not scientific,” so the sense of depth or coloring might not be scientifically accurate. Instead, he calls it a “fictive flight above real Mars.”
Enjoy it best in 2K HD.
[H/T: WIRED]
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