High Resolution Stereo Camera

Photos like no man has seen before. 3D images from the red planet – for many years considered to be impossible, this vision has become reality. The credit for these spectacular images belongs to the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC). Almost overnight, the high resolution stereo camera became Germany’s most important contribution to the Mars Express mission of the European Space Agency. The camera was developed at the Institute for Planetary Research of the DLR and is the result of a unique experimental effort. Never before has a special camera been employed on a space mission to systematically map a planet’s surface in three dimensions and in color. The HRSC, which does not even weigh 20 kg, enables three dimensional analysis of images to an accuracy of 10 to 20 meters. Additionally, using the Super Resolution Channel in the camera (a high resolution telephoto-objective), pictures of a selected region can be taken with an accuracy of up to 2.3 meters per pixel. This supports locating rock formations the size of a garage or identifying the individual layers in a sedimentary rock formation.

More information: www.dlr.de