Visual Monitoring Camera: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 13:23, 8 May 2015

Revision as of 17:58, 5 November 2015

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'''Visual Monitoring Camera'''<ref>http://blogs.esa.int/vmc/faq/</ref> (or Video Monitoring Camera<ref>http://www.lpi.usra.edu/vexag/mission_definition.pdf , p.3</ref>), also known as "Mars Webcam", is a small camera (65x60x108 mm) mounted on [[Mars Express]] spacecraft, with the unique purpose of monitoring [[Beagle 2]] deployment, happened on December 19th19, 2003 at 8:31 UTC (9:31 CET).

After performing this task, VMC remained unused, having no scientific purposes.

Sometimes [[ESA]] started public campaigns inviting people to propose subjects to be shot by the camera, the last one planned for 25-2725–27 May 2015.<ref> VMC Imaging campaign 2015 - http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Operations/Have_you_ever_used_a_camera_on_board_an_interplanetary_spacecraft</ref>

== Technical specifications<ref>VMC technical specifications - http://blogs.esa.int/vmc/faq/</ref> ==

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* Pixel depth: 8 bits

* [[Field of View]]: 40 x 31 degrees

* Distance from [[Mars]] surface: 300-10000 300–10000&nbsp;km<ref>Mars Express orbit video - https://www.flickr.com/photos/esa_marswebcam/16707518966/</ref>

* Calculated<ref>tan(31°/2) * 10000km / 240pixel</ref> resolution at 10000 &nbsp;km: 11.5 &nbsp;km/pixel

* Calculated<ref>tan(31°/2) * 300km / 240pixel</ref> resolution at 300 &nbsp;km: 0.347 &nbsp;km/pixel

* Mass: 430 g

* Size: 65 x 60 x 108 &nbsp;mm

[[File:Mars-Haze-VMC.jpeg|thumbnail|Valles Marineris on Mars in haze]]

[[File:Beagle-2-separation.png|thumbnail|Beagle 2 separation]]

VMC is not operated by scientists as other onboard instruments; it's instead operated by the '''Mars Express Flight Control Team''', based at [[ESOC]], Darmstadt, Germany.

MEFCT is currently uploading VMC images to its Flickr account in a fully automated process which makes images available to the public as soon as they are downloaded from the spacecraft,<ref>http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2012/12190600-mars-express-vmc.html</ref> and all pictures taken till now are available for free download, including images of [[Beagle 2]] separation occurred in 2003.<ref>8 images of Beagle 2 separation - https://www.flickr.com/photos/esa_marswebcam/sets/72157632218100711/ </ref>

== External resources ==

* VMC blog: http://blogs.esa.int/vmc/

* VMC [[FAQ]]: http://blogs.esa.int/vmc/faq/

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== Images copyright<ref>Copyright info - https://www.flickr.com/people/esa_marswebcam/</ref> ==

All VMC images, past and present, are released by ESA under a [[CC license]], as follows:

''This work is licencedlicensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 IGO (CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO) licence. The user is allowed to reproduce, distribute, adapt, translate and publicly perform this publication, without explicit permission, provided that the content is accompanied by an acknowledgement that the source is credited as 'ESA - European Space Agency’, a direct link to the licence text is provided (see example below) and that it is clearly indicated if changes were made to the original content. Adaptation/translation/derivatives must be distributed under the same licence terms as this publication. To view a copy of this license, please visit creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/igo

Credit: ESA - European Space Agency, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO''

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{{Mars}}

[[Category:Mars Express]]

[[Category:Mars imagers]]