Sol 0521: Left Navigation Camera, Vertical Projection

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity took 17 images in Gale Crater using its mast-mounted Left Navigation Camera (Navcam) to create this mosaic. The seam-corrected mosaic provides a vertical projection of the Martian surface near the rover, covering an area of 20 meters (north/south) by 20 meters (east/west). North is up in the image. This projection provides an overhead view, but introduces distortion for items not on the surface, such as large rocks and the rover itself. Curiosity took the images on January 23, 2014, Sol 521 of the Mars Science Laboratory mission at drive 1296, site number 25. The local mean solar time for the image exposures was 2 PM. Each Navcam image has a 45-degree field of view. CREDIT: NASA/JPL-Caltech