These images are part of much larger photos taken from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment uses a camera capable of capturing the surface of Mars at a very high resolution. University of Arizona’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory by Ball Aerospace & Technologies oversees the project and allows public access to the Mars pictures with one stipulation – credit. So, credit for these images goes to NASA/JPL/University of Arizona.
The challenge was to extract a portion of their photos and post process to create a unique landscape. The choice of using black and white was to accentuate the wonderful lighting already contained in the images. B&W also “neutralized” location, i.e. the images look like they may have been taken of earth. There is something incredible about the lighting on Mars. It may be how the sun reveals itself on objects further in space.
One may question the validity of creating an image from someone else’s work. I have come to justify it by how different my interpretation is from the original. An analogy may be photographing a building created by an architect, or photographing graffiti. Every time we capture a subject we are attempting to take a portion of a scene from a larger context and simplify its composition, be it nature, street scenes or extraterrestrial landscapes taken from an orbiting satellite.
(Click on image to enlarge and show thumbnails or scroll down.)
