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Sunday 29 January 2017

Outer Space - Sunday Stamps !!

If you are forever mooning about then this is the stamp for you.

USA - 22 February 2016
If space travel is your thing then which of these alternative planets would be your destination?

USA - 31 May 2016

You have seven to choose from excluding the Earth, of course; all with the attraction that no-one else has been there yet.

This stamp sheet, with two blocks of eight, shows views of our planets taken from different space missions explained on the back.

NASA's Messenger spacecraft took the view of Mercury in 2011-2012 and used colours to show chemical and other differences between the surface rocks.

Data from NASA's Magellan spacecraft in 1991 mapped the details of the surface of Venus in simulated colours.

Earth's image was created by an imaging radiometer on the NQAA/NASA Soumi NPP satellite during its orbit of our planet in 2011.

24 images of Mars taken on one day in 1999 were combined by a camera on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor.

The NASA Hubble Space Telescope's Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer shows a 2004 image of Jupiter in pastel colours. Infrared shows up the layers of clouds that make up the planet's atmosphere.

Variations in the colour and brightness of Saturn's rings were shown by Hubble's Wide Field Planetary Camera in one of a sequence of images taken in 1998.

The atmospheric features of Uranus were obtained using an infrared filter on Hubble's Imaging Spectrograph and the Advanced Surveys Camera in 2003.

The oldest image on the stamps is that of Neptune, taken in 1989 by NASA's Voyager 2 and shows the 'Great Dark Spot' that later disappeared from view.

For other spaced out views please visit the links to be found at Sunday-Stamps-II-111.

9 comments:

Heleen said...

Amazing pictures! I am happy to see the complete stamp serie, thank you for sharing, Bob!

Heleen said...

P.s. I am surprised by the picture of Venus. I first thought it to be the sun!.. Today I posted Sri Lankan stamps, including one of the sun and one of Venus so I had to look twice to both series :-) But if I understand correctly, the colours of this Venus photo are simulated / added to show the structure of surface.

FinnBadger said...

I thought this was a great sheet, except perhaps for wishing the image of Jupiter was a different view.

Author R. Mac Wheeler said...

kilroy was here

Mail Adventures said...

We chose the same set. But you wrote alot of interesting information about the stamps, thanks!

violet s said...

I love this series with their bright colours.

Jo said...

What great stamps. That first one looks familiar.

Hilary Melton-Butcher said...

Hi Bob - what a great sheet of stamps - they do give us some wonderful images with some great simple info ... loved seeing these ... me: I can't think - I'll stay here please!! Cheers Hilary

Joy said...

I don't think I'd like to land on any of them but would love to fly past Saturn for a close up view of the rings. Nice sheet.