Why do cameras used by NASA's probes make so crappy images?

Question

I mean, my 10Mpixel cheap kodac makes better snaps

Answer 1

cause its all FAKE!

now that you know, they'll get you!

Answer 2

Your 10 megapixel camera does not take red, green and blue colors at each of those points.  It only takes red, green or blue.  The other two colors are interpolated from neighbors that happen to be those colors.

This doesn't work for science.  The NASA cameras are generally black and white, and a filter is used to take a red image, then a green image, then a blue image, and the result is combined into a color image.  This also lets them use an Oxygen 3 filter, or a Hydrogen Alpha filter. Sometimes, for speed, they'll take a black and white image and send it.  But the pan cam images from the rovers on Mars are spectacular.  Why not send that kind of image all the time?

That's because it takes roughly forever to send that much data back.  Your 10 megapixel camera can create a 2-ish megabyte compressed jpeg and transmit that to your computer in seconds.  But at 300 BAUD from Mars, it takes days.  And NASA isn't interested in a lossy jpeg.  Yes, they use compression, but lossless compression only gives you about three to one.

Answer 3

Considering that the pictures are transmitted with batteries that don't put out much more power than your cell phone, it's remarkable we get anything at all. Factor in the fact that they have to be transmitted over millions of miles, the pictures we get are amazing.

Answer 4

Umm probably because the images that the camera takes has such a long distance to travel and, because of that, some of the quality goes away . I know what you mean tho with that . But i would have to say its because of that . im just assuming tho

Oh yea . Another thing is maybe because they spent so much money in getting to the planet that they didn't really spend much time on the cameraaa??

i liked the first one tho

Answer 5

Huh?  Which images are you referring to?  The vast majority of them look high quality to me.  

Here, browse some of these:

http://www.redorbit.com/images/gallery/h...

They're the first ones I hit on a google search.

For all you people who are talking about bad images, do you have any idea what you're talking about?  Or are you just parroting what someone else said?  Show me some, please.  I'd be willing to bet that for every bad image you find, there are a thousand great ones.  Or maybe you don't know what you're looking at when you see one that's somewhat blurry, but it's a picture of Pluto and its three moons.  Maybe you don't understand how impossible it is to get a crystal clear picture of some very distant or extremely magnified things.

Answer 6

lol

i dont like kodak

give them your camera~

Answer 7

How many discrete wavelengths can your snapshot camera take?  How much electricity does it use?  What extremes of heat or cold can it endure?  What degree of radiation can it withstand?  How many G's of launch, entry, and landing vibration can it withstand?

I am a space engineer first, but a photographer second.  I own several nice cameras, none of which would survive the rigors of space.  They take very nice pictures, but simply aren't suitable for a space mission.

Surprisingly, image quality is not always the overriding concern.  The camera that's best is the camera that survives the trip, to be sure.  But often scientists want 10 pictures at pretty good quality instead of 1 picture of outstanding quality:  transmission bandwidth is also a limited commodity in space.  Big, highly-detailed pictures take a long time to transmit.  And as soon as the ship begins its operational phase, the clock is ticking toward its eventual demise.

The same goes for computers; people complain about how their laptops have more power than many spaceborne computers, including the space shuttle's.  The space-shuttle computers were chosen for reliability, not speed; the shuttle is human-rated.  They simply aren't programmed to do more than their capacity.  The question I always ask scorners in return is if I can boil their laptop, put it in a paint mixer, then cycle the power every two seconds -- and I get to shoot them in the head if it fails.  When put like that, people begin to see that the computer that's best is the computer that works.  Similarly, the camera that's best is the camera that works.

Answer 8

I DON'T KNOW.

That is a very good question!

Answer 9

I looked at thousands of those photos and most are razor sharp.  The ones of Titan are made via synthetic aperture radar so are poor.  Maybe your reading glasses need a prescription adjustment!

Answer 10

The vast majority of NASA's images are amazing quality.  In the event that you see "crappy" images, they are usually the are highly magnified images from extreme distances.   In addition, photo quality images are not NASA's first priority, it's scientific data acquisition.

Also consider most instruments on space probes are designed 15 to 10 years before they are launched.

Answer 11

Could be because most pictures you see are condensed a huge amount from their original size to make them more manageable.

Answer 12

Along with quality of the photos they also have to take into account how much space the camera will take up and if it can survive the harsh conditions of space. Not to mention a rough landing in the case of the mars probes. There are a lot more important things they are meant to do like testing the soil for microbes and things like that.

Answer 13

Low power, radiation exposure, light weight, FAR away, high reliability requirements, etfc !

The spacecraft run on solar cells - not a lot of power available. The cells are in a harsh environment and degrade. You can't be putting new D cells into it every couple of hours.

Electronics for space applications have to be radiation-resistant. This 'hardening' usually means previous generation technology.

In addition, methods to get extreme reliability push you back from the cutting edge.

The extreme distance means noise is more of a problem, requiring greater redundancy, using more bandwidth.

Bandwidth is expensive since the transmitter is on Mars or wherever.... You might think your cell phone rates are outrageous, but consider the rates for service on Mars - a million times further end to end, much farther from the nearest tower, murderous roaming charges.... And the nearest tower may in itself be a satellite.

Consider also that the fact that your "10Mpixel cheap kodac" is available at a cheap price, or at all, because NASA et al developed the technology [or at least gave enough of a market at an adequate price so that others could develop it].  



Look at images from the '70's probes, then look up what microprocessor they used [bits & clock rate]. Stuff like 8080s !