[HN Gopher] Virtual Mars Traverse: Every inch of Curiosity rover...
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Virtual Mars Traverse: Every inch of Curiosity rover's path since
2012 landing
Author : bookofjoe
Score : 38 points
Date : 2026-04-05 11:28 UTC (3 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.rovers.land)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.rovers.land)
| raldi wrote:
| I find it so hard to figure out how close Curiosity is to the
| peak/ridge of Mt Sharp and whether/when it seems likely to cross
| over to the other side.
| zokier wrote:
| Here is a map: https://science.nasa.gov/mission/msl-
| curiosity/location-map/
|
| It's nowhere near the peak and is very unlikely to reach it.
| raldi wrote:
| I'm aware of the map but I'm unclear on where the peak/ridge
| is.
| zokier wrote:
| The main peak is under the letter "C" in the "Gale Crater"
| text on that map.
| engineer_22 wrote:
| this is really cool but it's missing a lot of context... like...
| they're taking pictures of the ground beneath their feet. it
| would be a very autistic way to tell the story of a hobbit's
| journey without the context of what they're looking at and why.
|
| this slideshow is missing a narrative. people normally travel and
| orient themselves by landmarks. their journeys are related
| amongst themselves by language surrounding common landmarks.
|
| maybe the narrative for the rover isn't available
| pimlottc wrote:
| I assume the different angles are different cameras mounted at
| different parts of the rover and used for different images? It
| would be nice to be able to select a particular camera and just
| follow the view from that, say.
| zokier wrote:
| I don't think it's cool to hotlink every single raw image from
| NASAs server here.
| embedding-shape wrote:
| Generally yeah, but NASA seems to explicitly allow hot linking?
|
| > NASA images may be used as graphic "hot links" to NASA
| websites, provided they are used within the guidelines above.
| https://www.nasa.gov/nasa-brand-center/
|
| As long as you don't "explicitly or implicitly convey NASA's
| endorsement of commercial goods or services" and "NASA should
| be acknowledged as the source of the material" they seem fine
| with it.
|
| Seems this project does miss that last part though, I don't see
| any mention of where the images are from.
| sgt wrote:
| Cool but... I am pretty sure that it took photos that aren't
| close ups. All of those photos are all close up of rocks and I am
| sure it took some more wide angle shots too?
|
| Or some showing the horizon at the very least.
|
| I can't find any of those here as I work my way down the path.
| pimlottc wrote:
| Please create an option to automatically move forward through
| time so you can see an animated version of the journey. And
| please get rid of the fade-in/fade-out transition when you switch
| images, it makes it harder to see the difference between shots.
|
| It would also be nice to be able to move forward/backwards
| through photos keyboard (e.g. arrow keys).
|
| There's also some sort of toggles on the map pane to different
| views (zoom levels?) but they're not labeled nor do they have any
| sort of tooltips so it's not very clear what they do.
| kelsolaar wrote:
| I came to say exactly this, keyboard navigation please and
| automatic playback!
| bookofjoe wrote:
| Not one comment praising the existence of this site. Remarkable.
| givinguflac wrote:
| I really don't understand the lack of mobile access. Even
| requesting desktop site changes nothing.
|
| You really can't make what's effectively a slideshow/streetview
| work on mobile?
|
| I don't care if it's not as good on mobile, just that I can
| access it.
|
| Seems like a cool idea, but not about to hop over to my desktop
| to check it out though.
| nosrepa wrote:
| Not to mention the constant flashing on the mobile page.
| themanmaran wrote:
| Maybe a naive question, why doesn't this doesn't look like google
| street view?
|
| Not OP's app in particular, but the underlying data from NASA.
| Nowadays the 360o cameras are $400 and work really well.
| Obviously we're working off of 2012 tech here.
|
| But it seems like it would be enormously useful to have a full 3d
| image every 20 feet like google street view. Is this really just
| a power / bandwidth limitation?
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(page generated 2026-04-08 23:01 UTC)