Heimdall Camera System
Heimdall Camera System
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High resolution multi-imager system for the lunar Gruithuisen Domes. The four cameras of the Heimdall camera system, from left to right the Descent Imager (HeiDI), Workspace Imager, Panoramic Imager and Regolith Imager.
Image credit: MSSS
Eyes on the Moon
Eyes on the Moon
Heimdall is a high flight-heritage instrument consisting of four wide-angle, 5-megapixel color CMOS cameras and a DVR. Heimdall acquires images of the lunar surface at meter- to millimeter-scale during descent, and at centimeter- to submillimeter-scale on the surface. For those who want more technical details, click here for more information about the goals, design, testing, and performance of the cameras.
Icon credit: Christopher Thacker.
The Heimdall Descent Imager will take pictures of the surface as nested frames with finer and finer resolution, all the way down to the surface. From these nested images, multi-scale digital elevation models (DEMs) can be computed, letting us understand the landing site in 3D. The Descent Imager can also take images at near-video speed, of interactions of the exhaust plume with the lunar regolith.
The Workspace Imager will acquire images of the area in front of the lander accessible to the Sample Acquisition, Morphology Filtering and Probing of Lunar Regolith (SAMPLR) robotic arm.
Two Heimdall imagers are mounted on the end of SAMPLR: a Regolith Imager that will capture images at ~35 µm/pixel (that is, it can resolve the smallest sand grain), and a Panoramic Imager for landscape imaging and contextual geologic mapping (500 µm/pixel at 1 m from the lander, resolving the width of a paperclip; 50 cm/pixel at 1 km from the lander, or resolving about the width of two basketballs).
Laboratory panorama or album cover? A mosaic of images taken by the Panoramic Imager from the testbed at Malin Space Science Systems.
Image credit: MSSS
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