Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's Mars Color Imager (MARCI): A New Workflow for Processing Its Image Data

TL;DR

This paper presents a new workflow for processing Mars Color Imager (MARCI) data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, enabling more effective analysis of over 15 years of Mars imagery despite processing challenges.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive workflow tailored for MARCI data, addressing processing issues and optimizing the use of free software to enhance data analysis capabilities.

Findings

Processed images and mosaics demonstrate the workflow's effectiveness.

The workflow significantly speeds up data processing.

It enables detailed global and regional analysis of Mars surface and atmosphere.

Abstract

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's (MRO's) Mars Color Imager (MARCI) has returned approximately daily, approximately global image data of Mars since late 2006, in up to seven different colors, from ultraviolet through near-infrared. To-date, that is over 5300 Mars days of data, nearly eight full Mars Years, or more than 15 Earth years. The data are taken at up to nearly 500 meters per pixel, and the nearly circular orbit of MRO and its consistent early afternoon imaging provide an unprecedented baseline of data with which to study Mars' atmosphere and surface processes. Unfortunately, processing MARCI data is difficult, fraught with exploding file sizes, issues that require workarounds in free software, and other problems that make this a severely under-utilized dataset. This paper discusses a workflow to process MARCI data to their fullest, including suggestions on how to work around issues unique to MARCI and how the data work with the current version of the free software ISIS (Integrated Software for Imagers and Spectrometers). Discussion of some trades that can be made to dramatically speed data processing are also described. Examples of processed MARCI images, mosaics, and color composites are shown, demonstrating the abilities of this workflow on global, regional, and local areas at the full, 96 pixels per degree scale afforded by MARCI.