Caption

This is a view of the Mars Surveyor '98 Mars Descent Imager. This camera has a mass of 420 gm, draws 2 W when operating and 0.1 W in standby mode. It has a field of view of 73.4 degrees. The optics include 9 elements, including 2 cemented doublets. The wide angle lens has a focal length of 7.135 mm and a focal ratio of f/2.0. Behind the lens are two, 2-sided electronics boards. The board immediately behind the lens is the Focal Plane Assembly (FPA), which includes the megapixel charge-coupled device (CCD) imaging sensor and support electronics. The second board is the Data Acquisition System (DAS), which includes a high-speed (60 MHz) digital signal processor (DSP) and other advanced electronics parts.

This camera will acquire a set of nested images, spaning nearly three orders of magnitude in scale, from about 6 km altitude to the surface of Mars. The first image will cover an area roughly 8 km on a side at 8 m/pixel; the last image, taken about 2 seconds before landing, will cover an area 9 m on a side at better than 1 cm/pixel.

Shown for scale is the reverse side of the "advanced technology" Susan B. Anthony dollar--the power (?) of a dollar in the size of a quarter ;^).

The image should be adjusted for brightness according to your monitor. The boards are a medium bright green.

The image is a computer rendering of the camera made by Malin Space Science Systems software engineer Jeff Warren.